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by vidarh 5118 days ago
Did you read the article? The part that expressly points out they've tried a number of other options, including PRC's, and it didn't work well for her? They part about how using this app has significantly increased her communications abilities where other solutions failed?

PRC might have a rightful claim and a right to protect it, but that's not what the issue is about here.

The issue is that the way they are going about it is having a substantial negative effect on innocent third parties, and that Apple is complicit in that by unilaterally deciding to remove the app without waiting for an injunction or for the case to be decided.

Never mind the broken patent system. It's possible to be in the right and still act like total assholes.

1 comments

PRC might have a rightful claim and a right to protect it, but that's not what the issue is about here.

Actually, that is exactly the issue here, like it or not. Yes, the article explains how the app has been of great benefit to them. That is a good thing. The issue, however, is PRC's right to protect what they feel is theirs--even though I personally detest it and they (and Apple) are the assholes here.

It's possible to be in the right and still act like total assholes.

Of course it is. And that is clearly what is happening here on the human scale. I don't think anyone disputes the asshole behavior of PRC or Apple's reaching too far by removing the app.

I both read the article and a bunch of others on the author's blog. The thing pointed out in my comment, and your parent's, is that the author steps too far in the direction of taking the personal aspect to the point of hyperbole, where it is clear that the app has added a greater amount of convenience to two-way communication, not allowed communication that did not otherwise exist or cannot exist through another medium, with more effort. The author is reacting to a threat to that convenience, and the changes it will bring in communication they've enjoyed with their daughter, which is an awesome thing in and of itself.

Neither I nor your parent comment were saying the author is wrong in being upset by this. I'd be completely upset if I enjoyed enhanced communication with one of my children and suddenly felt like that was threatened. But I wouldn't help my case by making hyperbolic statements about how losing this app means I can't communicate with my child at all anymore. That's what was pointed out here.

It's amazing that conversation on HN is in such a state lately that a well-reasoned comment pointing out a different dimension of the issue is downvoted, while a two-liner calling someone "a dick and an imbecile" isn't downvoted to oblivion.