[ksec]

Ever since Apple moved to Services Strategy in 2014 it has been like this. Services were not there so they could provide a better experience for its "customers". I use the word "customer" here which is what Apple / Steve Jobs used to call their loyal fans, and not user. But to further growth their Revenue pie because they foresee iPhone one day will stagnant.

You now have Apple Fitness+, Apple TV, News, Music, Arcade. None of these are of any quality of what Apple used to be. It is really sad.

Oh and the most iconic thing? Apple was the one who tried to kill internet ads between 2017 - 2020.

[D13Fd]

Fitness+ is actually super high quality, really well integrated with Apple’s products, and fun to use. I love it. I would happily pay the monthly Apple fee just for fitness+. I hope they don’t change it.

If there is anything that represents a “services strategy” like the Apple of the Jobs era, it’s fitness+.

[Analemma_]

Fitness+ is okay-ish but it’s not getting any attention and I don’t think it deserves its $10/month price. Non-Apple fitness subscriptions at the same price are far better.

Just for starters, what if you have two people in the house who want to do a Fitness+ workout together? Too bad: even if they both pay for it, one gets the nice tracking and HUD and the other gets squat. This is an obvious and trivial feature, and it’s nowhere to be found. I could maybe see it getting cut for the launch checklist if people were behind schedule, but Fitness+ plus is more than five years old now, there is no excuse.

It’s total abandonware from a company trying to do the absolute minimum to get your recurring subscription.

[kemayo]

I dunno, I think that multiple people doing a workout together in the same at-home room is a bit of an edge case for this app. I have a not-tiny house, and I don't have a space where I could do that without having to move heavy furniture around first. People who live in apartments are really out of luck.

They do support syncing up the workouts of people who're each using their own device: https://support.apple.com/en-us/101979

[darkhorse222]

I think you would use SharePlay for that maybe

[philwelch]

So you have to buy twice as many Apple products, brilliant marketing strategy

[D13Fd]

> It’s total abandonware from a company trying to do the absolute minimum to get your recurring subscription.

What? Abandonware? They are constantly posting new workouts that are thought out and well produced. The Fitness+ app is very well maintained. It works great. It has cool features. Honestly I don't know what you are talking about, here.

I've worked out together with one to three other people several times. No one cared that their heart rate wasn't shown on the screen. It's really not an important feature and a very niche use case.

[StilesCrisis]

They tried to kill _competitors'_ ads. Everyone else gets "Ask Not to Track" while Apple gets "Personalized Ads." It's so glaring once you see it.

[direwolf20]

The ad industry can't destroy itself soon enough.

[goalieca]

The ad industry basically is the tech industry at this point.

[mavhc]

But how will I get free stuff and also not see ads with my adblocker if ads die?

[direwolf20]

I don't know. How will open source software exist without ads?

[pfdietz]

I'm dreading the day Amazon puts ads in e-books.

[aaarrm]

I often imagine a world where ads are illegal.

[intothemild]

I hate ad companies and ads as much as the next person. But this was one of the moments where I felt like people didn't see what I saw with services era apple. I pointed out that all apple is doing is locking down their phones even further. That they're not eliminating all ads on your phone... Nope they're eliminating their competition.

It's just nuts peoples hatred of ads clouds their vision of this.

[sinnsro]

Again, another great move sponsored by bean counter boy Tim.

[tonyedgecombe]

TV is pretty good even for my English sensibilities. Severance is some of the best television I’ve seen in a long time.

[rootusrootus]

And Slow Horses, which is perhaps my favorite show in years. I'm not a big TV watcher, and this show got me to subscribe (at least for a while) to Apple TV.

[alsetmusic]

Try Pluribus. We just finished S01. Also pretty good.

Calling AppleTV low quality doesn't fit. The rest, yeah. Pretty useless.

[manuelabeledo]

Commercials in TV+ are as bad as ads in News+, e.g. it seems I cannot open the app without getting blasted at with a Peacock commercial.

[MBCook]

What? I’ve never seen a single commercial on an Apple TV+ show.

[eek2121]

Something like 70% of the comments I've seen on this thread show that either:

1) The user has never owned an Apple Device in their life. 2) They are trolling super hard.

There are complaints to be had that I definitely agree with, however, I see a TON of fiction for every single legitimate complaint.

No, not an Apple employee, shareholder, etc. (I am broke and dependent on my wife because I am disabled lol)

[manuelabeledo]

I've been an Apple One subscriber for over three years now. For the past few months, as soon as you open the TV+ app, a Peacock ad starts playing really loud.

[tonyedgecombe]

I’m wondering what platform you are using TV+ on.

[izacus]

Are you not able to think of a simple concept of "maybe the ads are regional" and you need to immediately jump to dumb conspiracy theories?

[alsetmusic]

They've had a commercial (trailer) before every show / movie we've watched in the past week. We can skip them, but they are there.

[heavyset_go]

You haven't seen Apple product placement in their shows?

Servant was a walking ad for iPhones and Facetime lol

[manuelabeledo]

It's right when you open the TV+ app.

[lokar]

Weird, there are none when you use the appletv device

[manuelabeledo]

I use an Apple TV.

Maybe it’s just me. I’ve been an Apple One subscriber for a long time now. The Peacock commercial I’m talking about plays right when I open the app, almost full screen and quite loud. It seems to be some sort of add-on offer for Apple One subscribers.

[fragmede]

the promos for other shows are commercials

[smt88]

TV productions are a product, not a service. Apple TV is the service.

[shermantanktop]

Apple has a tv service and Apple also has exclusive content, which they brand with “Apple TV”…so it’s kind of both.

Same for the other big streaming services. Some of them (Netflix, Prime Video) are more involved in content production, up to and including having production facilities and an in house staff. But a lot of the “exclusive” branded content is made by semi-independent production companies.

[rootusrootus]

> Apple has a tv service and Apple also has exclusive content, which they brand with “Apple TV”…

And of course the device itself. I wish they would have distinct names.

[dlcarrier]

Which makes it even more tragic that the few good streaming shows produced recently are all on a network no one watches.

I am glad that they bought the rights to Brandon Sanderson's books, because I know Netflix wouldn't do them justice and Amazon prime would be far worse than that, but it also means that it will have a tenth of the available audience that a Netflix contract would have brought.

[tonyedgecombe]

If they were serving the mass market then they would be making trash like Netflix.

[dlcarrier]

I'm not sure how causality works on that one. Netflix made great stuff, back when streaming was still a small market, then they got big and started making trash.

It's not like they weren't trying to attract everyone when they were releasing content worth watching. Maybe it's because they didn't have any feedback yet on what works, so they couldn't even try to make safe bets, instead creating a little of everything, with most of it being bland, but a surprising portion being top-tier.

[chrisweekly]

Hmm, your comment resonates in principle [caring about quality production of worthwhile narratives], but your specific examples show how much YMMV when it comes to subjective preferences. I was so grateful that Amazon Prime somehow did justice to The Expanse [I highly recommend the novels, and feel the show was one of the best-ever translations of sci-fi to the screen] and could never get into the Wheel of Time book series [tho I guess that was Jordan, not Sanderson, shrug].

[majormajor]

Amazon didn't start The Expanse as a TV show, though. They bought it after Sci-Fi ran it then cancelled it. They didn't screw it up after that, but that's a very different sequence from creating it themselves.

Compare to their much-ballyhooed exercise in lighting money on fire that was their LOTR series.

[acessoproibido]

I will never forgive them buying the rights to Utopia (UK) - probably the greatest show ever made - and remaking it into absolute shit. Just thinking about it makes my blood boil. Fuck Amazon (even if The Expanse was pretty good)

[addicted]

"customer" is a much better term IMO. It indicates this is ultimately a transactional relationship where both sides have certain responsibilities. The customer the responsibility to provide the money, and the provider receiving the money has a responsibility to provide the customer with something, products or services, of value that makes their lives better.

"user" is a worse term. It suggests that the "user" is simply utilizing the provider's products/services, and therefore they can't really complain about whatever the provider chooses to do in return, because the "user" can simply stop using.

It's also not a coincidence, IMO, that drug addicts are also called "users" since "user" implies a one way dependent relationship and that's what all the tech companies have been trying to create.

[swores]

> "It's also not a coincidence, IMO, that drug addicts are also called "users" since "user" implies a one way dependent relationship and that's what all the tech companies have been trying to create."

You're drawing a connection that's not there. It's indeed not a coincidence, but just because both situations fit the definition of the word "user" (and "to use").

People use drugs, whether they're addicted or whether they're taking a one-off dose given to them by a doctor. They are a customer in that situation if they're buying the drug from somebody (illegal dealer, pharmacy), but they're a user whether they paid or not.

Likewise, someone is a customer if Apple's if they paid for, or are expected to pay in the future, a device or service. But they're a user regardless of whether they're using a phone they bought, or a service that's being provided for free.

People can use services provided by charities, they can use skis on a mountain... there's absolutely no negative connotation to its general definition, it just happens that some things people use are bad and some are good.

[genewitch]

"And don't say 'do it' because i don't 'do it', i ingest it, on orders from my neurophysiologist."

[mbreese]

I agree that “customer” is a better term. I’m not sure I agree with the rest of the rationale.

In my mind, “user” stated to take over when we started having web based services that were used by people, but they were the ones paying. For example, Google and Facebook. Both got paid through ads, so they advertisers were the customers. The “users” were just the eyeballs the advertisers wanted to reach. So, you had to make your service compelling enough for someone to use for long enough that they’d see enough ads to make it profitable to provide the service.

It’s more akin to talking about “viewers” or “viewership” when talking about more traditional media.

For Apple, they are generally looking to get paid by the ultimate consumer of the product. So to them, we are the customers.

[rootusrootus]

> In my mind, “user” stated to take over when we started having web based services that were used by people

Maybe I'm just old, but we've called ... users ... 'user' since Unix or before. Perhaps it is just because Unix was integral to my early computing experience that I see it that way.

[tpmoney]

User is definitely a term that long predates the modern SaaS world. And it’s an appropriate term in many cases because even today the customers of a computer hardware or software company are often not the same people using that hardware or software. I am the user of my work computer, but even as a software developer I am certainly not the “customer” of that purchase. My company has requirements as a customer that might be counter to my desires as a user. And likewise I have needs as a user that my company as a customer does not care about (except in so far as having those needs met allows me to do my job)

[ginko]

"user" feels quite descriptive and neutral to me. It's a person that uses the device they own or are given access to. That's it.

I'm the (super-)user of my Linux PC. I have total ownership and control over it.

Arguably "customer" makes the business relation to the provider of a service/device clearer.

The term I hate with a burning passion is "consumer".

[Melonai]

Definitely agree on your last point, "consumer" is by far the most passive of the terms, and wholly represents the current idea that companies can simply shovel out anything, because "consumers" will simply consume either way. Of course this isn't magic, a single person won't change just because you call them a user or a consumer, but it reflects your view of them, and will inform your actions towards them.

"customer" represents a two-sided relationship, and I do feel that "user" is kind of one-sided, but gives agency, a user will use a product for their own purposes, presumably to help them achieve some kind of goal. A "consumer" is completely passive, their main goal is to do what the company tells them to do. A customer can walk out of the relationship, a user might complain about problems they have with your product, but the consumer will simply continue consuming whatever you want them to consume.

The worst part though, they seem to be mostly correct in their assessment.

[kyriakos]

As someone who owns zero apple hardware, I feel like Apple TV (the service) is probably the most consistent producer of high quality TV shows.

[NookDavoos]

I agree. It seems they don't produce as many titles as other streaming platforms, but what comes out is rather good.

[jangxx]

I actually like Fitness+, it got me working out for the first time in my life.

[browningstreet]

Against Youtube Music and Spotify, Apple Music rates quite well, at least IMO.

[kasperset]

Apple Music is ok but it is not as good on MacOS as it is on iOS. It will skip some songs sometimes and the ui is not very consistent for the player bar.

[browningstreet]

Oh yes, indeed. On iOS I quite prefer it, but I also use it daily on Linux. But the linux web version is still much better than the terrible Windows client. That thing is plain terrible.

I think the Apple Music service is still good. There are little features that I rely on a lot, like the asterisk next to the prominent/popular songs on a given album.

[esskay]

Arcade is comically poor value. I can't tell if Apple doesn't care, or they're just so deluded due to their insular nature and crap attitude towards gaming that they genuinely think its a good service to offer mediocre mobile games for a premium.

[diegof79]

I agree that Arcade is poor.

However, I’ve been subscribed to it since its inception because it is the best way to have games that my kid can play without shady ads or engagement practices.

I know that is not going to last, as my kid is now a pre-teen and likes other types of games (like Hollow Knight) that are not available on Apple Arcade.

But the current state of the gaming industry is terrible, especially on mobile. Indy companies producing games like Dead Cells, Hollow Knight, and Stray are good, and there is the extremely rare case of Larian. But other than that, the market is full of dark-UX patterns to promote app purchases. Mobile apps are a minefield of gacha games that should be forbidden for kids.

[chocochunks]

Just forget that mobile gaming exists? I think one of the cheapo Linux retro handhelds offer a better portable gaming experience than 99% of mobile games, ads or no.

[boredChimp]

Any specific models you’ve used and can recommend?

[chocochunks]

I rather like the Anbernic RG35XXSP for the form factor. It is missing analog sticks, which does cut down on playable games a little but it's cute and tiny and is decently powerful for the price and has good community support. The rest of the RGYYXX line(where YY is the screen size) uses the same hardware but have different form factors so you can pick what you like best.

[akdev1l]

I like Apple Arcade because it has non-shittified versions of classic games

Like Angry Birds, the official version is fucked up to the gills with ads

[esskay]

Sure, but in another time you'd have paid ~$2.99 for the ad-free version one-time, and carried on using it. They intentionally deleted that version of the game, screwing over everyone who did so, then quietly launched the same game again, removing the ad-free one time purchase option.

[akdev1l]

I mean yeah, fuck Rovio or whatever

[crummy]

Agreed. "Free mobile game" almost certainly means "malicious gambling app" at this point.

[eek2121]

Taste is subjective. I get it. There are Triple A games on Arcade. Things like Civilization 7, for example. I don't know what the current standalone price is because we use Apple One Family, however, it used to cost $5/mo.

Apple one is a steal IMO. Apple TV, Fitness+, 2TB, Arcade, and other smaller perks like News+ make it an easy sell. Compared to something like Netflix? Netflix is $25/mo for their top tier streaming alone. Apple TV consistently has higher quality content. So does Apple Arcade and Apple Fitness...then you get 2TB of storage to back your crap up to.

Ask Google or Samsung what they are doing for the cost of an Apple One subscription.

Not a fanboy or anything. I'm basically critical of all tech companies, however, Apple is doing something that is working well for them.

[latexr]

> I don't know what the current standalone price is because we use Apple One Family, however, it used to cost $5/mo.

They raised it a while back to $7/month.

[mghackerlady]

Have you thought of getting your kid a nintendo console of some kind? A jailbroken 3DS seems like it'd be great for avoiding that kind of slop since the 3DSs app store died a few years ago

[SSLy]

note to others: any 3DS can be very easily jailbroken, doesn't require any soldering or sth. https://3ds.hacks.guide/

[pbronez]

I thought the same until my kids started playing iPad games. Apple Arcade is way better than the baseline of aggressive ads and micro transactions.

[hed]

Exactly. It's a way to get games that aren't going to immediately ask for other games to be bought or make you watch ridiculous ads to keep playing.

[bigyabai]

The App Store really ought to just be a better platform in the first place. Apple is the one that let it accumulate slop, and now they're profiting off it's reputation for gambleslop apps.

[dwaite]

If you can figure out a good way for Apple to eliminate the revenue model used for the most profitable games on the platform without getting slapped by regulators, I'm sure they would love to hear it.

[bigyabai]

They don't have to eliminate it, that wasn't my complaint. They need a competitive ecosystem with real-world stakeholders (a-la Epic) and third-party community support like emulators.

iOS is so far behind in this regard that even uttering it in the same sentence as "gaming" almost exclusively implicates gachapon titles or microtransaction slop. Other platforms don't suffer as much.

[lotsofpulp]

Arcade is amazing for my kids, it’s the one thing that pushes the value of Apple One bundle high enough for me to pay it. I assume all games not in Arcade have gambling mechanics.

[mbreese]

The lack of microtransaction/loot box/forced ads/etc driven gameplay is why I keep it. If I can get versions of newer games without all of that cruft, I’m happy. I’m also happy that the game developer gets paid for it.

[dangus]

> You now have Apple Fitness+, Apple TV, News, Music, Arcade. None of these are of any quality of what Apple used to be. It is really sad.

News+ is the only one of these that has poor quality.

Apple Music is extremely good, and pays artists better than many other platforms like Spotify. Unlike Spotify it isn’t enshittifying the product with AI music, video, and podcast distractions. The software is good quality, native code, not a web wrapper. Plus, there’s a classical music focused version that’s entirely separate.

Fitness+ is a premier product in the space. Have you tried it? The workouts sync with your watch and it has top tier video production quality along with a ton of thought put into accessibility.

Arcade probably does need to have more games added and more attention paid to it, but it’s basically the only place to get mobile games that aren’t stuffed full of gambling mechanics, pay to win, and advertisements.

Apple TV+ is literally the new HBO. They produce some of the most critically acclaimed shows on the planet, and broke the record for number of Emmy nominations by a single studio last year. The software is actually good, which is only really true for TV+ and Netflix. The production values, bitrate, and technology integration (Dolby Atmos/Vision etc) is second to none. MLS coverage by Apple is also top tier, again, with other sports networks regularly broadcasting mediocre quality (bad colors, muddy details, poor on-screen graphics). They’re also getting F1 for US viewers which is almost certainly going to be an improvement over the status quo.

[ravetcofx]

> aren’t stuffed full of gambling mechanics and advertisements. Where can you get that from the Play Store?

The Play Store Pass? Which not only has games but utilities https://play.google.com/store/pass/getstarted

[saithir]

> Available offers > Get offers for top games with Play Pass > 50% zniżki na zakup w aplikacji > Do 37 zł zniżki co tydzień > Candy Crush Soda Saga

Yeah, I would say a big ad for a game that is literally THE textbook example of gambling mechanics and dark patterns, followed by 10 other ads for games of the similar genre, is exactly what the previous poster does NOT want from a service like that.

Oh and also from that page there's no telling at all what actual _games_ are included. The only slider on this page that lists anything is for different gambling slop "offers".

That's not even in the same category as Apple Arcade.

[chaostheory]

Fitness, Music, Apple TV, Arcade, and even News are all fine at their price point.

Apple News is the most affordable way to access paywalled mainstream news

TV has decent shows

Games has decent games without IAP

Music is decent without ads

Fitness has gotten me in shape at a fraction of the cost of Les Mills or Beach Body

[SkipperCat]

Agreed. I used to subscribe to the WSJ and WashPo and I cancelled both because I get both in Apple News. Plus I get the Atlantic, New Yorker, Wired and so many other magazines.

The user interface sucks. Sometimes I go to the actual websites to find articles and then search for them on Apple News. But for $13 USD a month, its a huge bargain and worth the crappy interface.

Another thing that kinda helped me was that Apple News doesn't give you access to the comments sections in these publications. Reading comments in the WSJ was just a huge rage-bait time suck and my life is probably better off not seeing that stuff.

[abustamam]

"The only people who call customers 'users' are drug dealers and software companies."

[dingaling]

'User' has been a term in computing for decades before the current Cloud Services fad ( hence uid ).

One uses a hammer, one uses a microwave, one uses a computer, one uses a word processor. Nothing negative towards the user, they're being productive with the product.

If anything it's derogatory in the other direction, towards the manufacturer, reducing the fruits of their labour to that of a simple tool.

[mghackerlady]

Apple Arcade is pretty good, I imagine it's good for parents that want to make sure their kids are playing actually decent games instead of whatever slop you find on the app store or roblox

[xwkd]

Over the past decade, there's been a lot of regulation forcing Apple to open up their "Apple only" integrated platforms.

It used to be the case that if Apple wanted to build a walled garden / cathedral, then in order to compete in the hardware marketplace they had to provide software that didn't suck. You knew that if you bought an Apple product, there was reasonable assurance that everything was tightly integrated. If it wasn't, you'd go buy a market alternative (Android, PC). In my mind, this means that they spent a lot of time and dev resources (i.e. money) on their Frameworks. I think it showed. Time was spent on design. They focused on opening up capabilities "the right way."

Now that's pointless. If the iPhone is just an Android phone with a different coat of paint, then dev resources are going to be shifted to a place where Apple can distinguish themselves in the market, where they have platforms that they can control: Services.

[dns_snek]

Can you support this unfalsifiable reasoning beyond blaming a convenient political scapegoat? Which paragraph of which article of which regulation requires them to deliver low-resolution PDFs in Apple News, for example? What about all the other issues?

Your argument essentially boils down to: If Apple doesn't get to do whatever they want without compromise, their execs get too discouraged and depressed to innovate. The obvious conclusion is that the only way we can enjoy the unrivaled genius of Apple is to give them a blank check to do whatever they want.

Every act of consumer protection and every form of pro-competitive regulation is twisted and exaggerated, no matter how insignificant it is to their bottom line or product functionality. The world is ending any time they don't get their way and when the world doesn't end, this decision becomes the scapegoat for all of their future faults, missteps, and bad performance. They can never do anything wrong and nothing is ever their fault, it's so so incredibly tiring to listen to this.

[kaashif]

Which regulation made Apple News have low res PDFs? Which regulation made the search boxes in Liquid Glass transparent and show text from the window behind?

The company as a whole has changed across the board.

[wk_end]

The beginning of Apple’s backslide far predates any (thus far fairly limp-wristed) attempts by regulators to pry open their iOS walled garden.

At least in North America - their biggest market I think? - the iPhone is still utterly locked down. Far more locked down than, say, their Macs were when OS X was at its best. Meanwhile macOS continues to get more locked down and yet still worse. Your theory just doesn’t match reality.

[iwontberude]

Every mobile device sold in North America is unlocked for carriers. That wasn’t the case back in the day. Also locking down macOS has been for security. It’s way ahead of other operating systems for sound and app security.

[Dylan16807]

Carrier locks have nothing to do with security or walled gardens. Two things using the word 'lock' is mostly coincidence.

And getting rid of carrier apps was a positive but it was moving from one walled garden to another.

And that happened a very long time ago. It provides zero defense against accusations of apple changing for the worse.

[iwontberude]

Yeah I think I was high and totally thinking backwards about this.