[enos_feedler]

Define computing. I am free to write and distribute computation via Javascript in Safari. Should computing be lower level? How low? From the bootchain? Who decides at what layer “free computing” should be wedged into a product? Why can’t Apple make that decision for themselves?

[alexvoda]

Because they are making that decision for users. The devices are owned by users since the day of purchase.

Why can’t users make that decision for themselves? Granted, many people choose to buy Apple devices because they do not desire general computing devices and instead desire appliances.

But giving up that control erodes ownership itself. A device not fully controlled by you is not fully owned by you. You may own a license to use it for a limited time. But people do not buy hardware devices with the expectation of actually only buying a license to use them.

[enos_feedler]

How many product decisions are made on your behalf between the inception of product specification and distribution to you? Just because you purchase the final thing doesn't entitle you to have control over product decisions. I don't think it makes sense to entangle ownership and programmability as a product feature.

Your reference to "general computing device" here is a concept that a particular market identifies with (you being in that market). Attached to it is some kind of concept of free/open. Apple will tell you their devices are general computing devices. I am currently playing around with lidar sensors in an iPhone 12 pro by writing code and pushing it onto my device. The functionality I can build is pretty arbitrary and I would call it general computing. I would agree with Apple.

[alexvoda]

You do of course have to resign that code every week or so or it stops working. You are also limited to the APIs Apple provides. And if you want to publish that code, you have to get it approved by Apple. Otherwise you are stuck distributing source code that other people have to pay X$ for a dev account and resign every 7 days.

All of this is not applicable to other platforms (maybe to consoles but I already commented about them on this thread).

[chacha2]

A duopoly of news organizations that can pick what facts count as news would be a disaster for democracy, is a duopoly of tech companies getting to pick what protocols and software can exist any better? The decentralized Web never could have been created in this atmosphere.

[alexvoda]

It should entitle me to make any modification I want to the device I purchased. If I am not allowed to modify it I do not fully own it. I am only granted a license to use hardware I purchased (for a limited time even, see Sonnos).

[DarkWiiPlayer]

Well... you can completely reprogram the device, if you have the tools and knowledge for it.

Apple has no obligation to make this process easy or even possible, and if the users still buy their products, they clearly don't care enough about these restrictions.

[alexvoda]

Not caring is precisely the problem. A problem that leads to erosion of ownership. And this leads to a form of communism. Apple, Google, etc. are in some ways similar to the state in communist regimes. They own everything but they promise to give you fair access until they don't.

[enos_feedler]

I don't think it is about "not caring". Apple cares intensely about the products they build taking into the needs of their addressable market. There are 1000s of product decisions made between inception and distribution into your hands. I don't believe that the one decision around open and free programmability of native OS-level applications has any association with ownership to them.

[alexvoda]

I am referring to the customers not caring about whether they truly own the devices they buy.

[chacha2]

How is a capitalist monopoly communism? These operating systems are the companies private property, they can do what they want with them.

The only way to prevent them is by abolishing their property and putting them in the public domain.

[alexvoda]

The software is the property of the companies of course. But the devices, once purchased are the property of the customer. However, the customer lacks full ownership of the device because the customer lacks full control over the device as long as the customer can not replace the software with other software regardless of the existence of that other software.

I own a PC I buy preinstalled with Windows because I can replace Windows with something else. As long as I can find spare parts I can make it work. Windows is just a part.

I do not fully own a device with a locked bootloader that can not be unlocked because once the vendor no longer provides updates I can not replace the broken part (software). The vendor maintains a degree of ownership over a device I purchased (applicable to phones, cars, tractors, etc.).

A capitalist monopoly is not communism. It is not what I said. I said the relationship between users and corporations (Apple, Google, Facebook, Netflix, MS, Tesla, John Deere, etc.) has a degree of resemblance to the relationship between citizens and the state in comunist regimes.