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by jack_arleth 2549 days ago
This has got to be one of the best quotes that illustrates what I believe to be wrong about everything related to Apple and it's products: the blatant and worrisome repackaging of ideas and words.

I'm not facetious at all when I say: Thank you for this quote. I'll save it and use it all the discussions I'll have on the subject from now on. It has really added a key-puzzle-piece to my understanding of the Apple-mindset.

The "notch" (Who came up with the term anyway? I don't believe Apple actually identifies it with a name.) is most definitely meant to be a notch: when applications are full-screen the notch will actually "eat" a part from your screen. This was shown since day 1 of the introduction where a phone was on display with the Wonder Woman movie full-screened and HDR activated. This is Apple's intended and expected behavior. It's Apple's choice to put the "notch" front and center, not to hide it with software and even set up guidelines to ignore it in application development.

Personally, I have an issue with notches and I will never own a device that has one. I find it a lazy, ugly and uninteresting way to increase the screen to body ratio of phones. But I'm somewhat glad with the current experimental designs that are being released by other manufacturers. It's refreshing to see different takes on the issue wether by popping up camera's, flipping over camera's or now even hiding camera's under the screen. Now that is innovation, that is design, that is actually looking for a solution for a very difficult problem. Instead Apple chose to put the "notch" front and center and to ignore it even going so far as to almost market it as a feature. Because look at all the high-tech stuff you get because of it. Sorry, I'm not buying it.

And this shows the incidious marketing that Apple partakes in. It redefines words and ideas on an active basis:

- A motherboard isn't a motherboard, it's a logic-board. It does exactly the same thing, it is exactly the same thing and even is produced in exactly the same way as motherboards. But somehow the brand on the shell makes it different.

- A Mac is different from a Personal Computer and as Louis Rossman has indicated a Mac can "regress" into becoming a PC. How is this possible, it does the exact same thing, is build in the same manner, uses the same technology and serves the exact same purpose.

- An "App" is basically a term that collects all the things that are software-y. A deamon? That's an app that runs in the background. A service? That's an app. A compiler? That's an app. A game? That's an app. A script? That's an app. A shell? That's an app. Etc...

- A repository with a gui suddely is an app-store. No, it's a software repo with included DRM for free.

- Durcing the introduction of the then new "earpod" design of the corded headphones that statement was made that they were engineered to guide audiowaves into your ears. Gee wiz Batman, what are all the other headphones doing then?

- The CE Iphones were "unapologetically plastic". So they are just plain and simple plastic. Just like all the other manufacturers out there.

- The famous "I'm a mac and I'm a PC" commercial is so obvious that it almost hurts. No, they both are PC's; they just look a little different.

This repackaging of words and ideas is a very worrisome trend. It muddies the water when it comes to definitions of words and it eventually will lead to the muddying of the truth. Not only that, but if we accept this sort of repackaging with our PC and phone hardware; why should we not accept it in other aspects of our lives? Why should there not be alternative-facts, when there are alternative PC's? It's a mechanism in our psyche that is prone to abuse and therefore we should not partake in it, even if it maximises profits.

It's all actually pretty simple, look at the definition of the word and if all of it applies; it sticks. How you feel about that does not matter.

1 comments

I wish I could triple-vote your post. The redefinition of words, the abuse of language, is Orwellian.

> but if we accept this sort of repackaging with our PC and phone hardware; why should we not accept it in other aspects of our lives?

But most of us already do - in politics this redefinition of words is common. "Oil companies" become "energy companies", etc etc.

> It's a mechanism in our psyche that is prone to abuse

The hardest thing to change in an person is their identity. If someone's identity is tied to a particular belief (the earth is flat, my deity can throw bolts of lightning, etc) then anything that contradicts that belief is either ignored or else spun to fit the existing belief system of that person.