> "There aren't many really big tech markets left"

I've heard this repeatedly over the years. There are ALWAYS new markets. You just have to look in the right places, or wait for new pareto frontiers to open up.

Imagine going back to the early 1980s and seeing people argue that the personal computer market was too crowded, and there was no way anyone was ever going to make any money in it. The whole thing had played out. Big companies owned the software market. Big companies owned the games. Big companies owned the peripherals. What could possibly be left?

Wait, what's a laptop? What's a workgroup server? What's email? None of those things had really happened, they were all markets just over the horizon about to explode onto the scene.

My 12th grade computing science instructor (who was admittedly horrible) said that she didn't see much of a future programming computers, because pretty much all of the computer programs that were required had been created, and all that was left was to improve the speed, size of documents allowed, and maybe add a few extra features.

This was in Spring, 1987.

And, funnily enough, the word processing tool most often used in my office (Dropbox Paper) is slower, less suited to long documents and has fewer features than the first word processor I used. Still, you can't expect your teacher of 30 years ago to foresee "the future is emojis".

People just want different software every few years, because fashion is fickle there's a natural feeling that old stuff is out of date. Slack doesn't provide any real improvement over an IRC server that keeps its logs around, but it's web-based and it has custom emojis, so...

I mean, did the first word processor you use allow collaborative working on documents available anywhere with an internet connection, constantly backed up to Dropbox servers?

Sure, the internet makes our lives a lot better, but Wordpad sticking regular .rtf files in a vanilla Dropbox folder would provide 80% of the benefit. Realtime same-file editing is convenient, but it's pretty minor really.

It was actually very useful at my last company. We used it in many different kinds of meetings. I think it will pave the way to some interesting collaborative software in the future.

Dropbox has a word processor? My god, Google's offering is bad enough and I hate when coworkers inflict it on me. I hope nobody discovers the Dropbox one.

My father had a completely different experience. His ancient physics teacher said, "computers my boy...they are the future". This would have been some time in the 1970's.

Of-course dad didn't listen and went on to have a unremarkable career as a Structural Engineer.

A real shame as I'm sure he would have made an excellent programmer. I like to tease him over what-ifs - especially as he shares a birthday with Bill Gates.

The computer market was more crowed in the early 1980's that it is now, goto a library and look at an old computer magazine from that period. Dozens of brands with dozens of operating systems.

There are massive, momentous opportunities to create billions of dollars of value in tech in the next decades and beyond. Just imagine every thing you could conceive of that should be physically possible, but no one does currently. The space is almost unbelievably big.

Granted, most of the things you would come up with are currently infeasible due to technological or scientific prerequisites not being available yet, but many of them are also in the realm of "possible, but no one has figured it out yet".

So true. There are always opportunities to create wealth because people never ever happy with what they have and someone else with free time can solve that problem. A company of Apple's size is well poised to make some real great strides in exceptional areas such as self driving cars.

"There aren't many really big tech markets left."

You know of course that this statement has been uttered for a couple thousand years.

Eccl 1-9 "The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be; and that which is done is that which shall be done: and there is no new thing under the sun.”

Eccl 1-9 "There aren't many really big tech markets left." - New Revised HN Translation, 2030

AppleTV a loser?

The only device significantly ahead of it in sales is the Roku (Amazon and Google's sticks are ~the same number of sales as Apple TV).

But the market is pretty evenly split in sales and Apple still maintains one of the larger overall install bases for any of them (not the outsized winner it used to be there though of course).

"Not being a de-facto monopoly" is hardly a loss.

Articles like http://www.recode.net/platform/amp/2016/6/10/11904942/google... seem to point to Apple TV being easily outsold by Amazon and Google.

During 2015-16 I was given 3 or 4 opportunities to get a free Chromecast, and I got one. It sits barely used now, in one of the rarely visited HDMI inputs on my TV. I wonder how many of those "sold" devices were actually given away and forgotten.

Chromecast cannot possibly be considered usable by most because it follows a weirdo, google-style, controlled-by-the-browser (but only Chrome) model. It is the most absurd way to watch TV ever invented. I use it sometimes, sure, because it's the only Linux-friendly HDMI dongle (Chrome runs on Linux), but can't imagine anyone actually liking it.

Apple TV, in comparison, is tightly integrated into every MacOS and iOS device, i.e. not only into the OS but often into the applications that run on them. And I don't remember anyone offering a free ATV to me... :)

>Chromecast cannot possibly be considered usable by most because it follows a weirdo, google-style, controlled-by-the-browser (but only Chrome) model. It is the most absurd way to watch TV ever invented. I use it sometimes, sure, because it's the only Linux-friendly HDMI dongle (Chrome runs on Linux), but can't imagine anyone actually liking it.

This only makes sense if you completely disregard the fact that almost all the major VOD providers (excepting Amazon Prime Video) provide Chromecast support in their Android and iOS apps. It's extremely convenient for me; open the app, cast to the TV, and select the video.

I find Chromecast to be pretty much the perfect model for displaying content on TVs. Put the intelligence in the device, not the TV.

I wish that more tablet and phone apps supported it. But then I always have the browser fallback when they don't.

Apple TV is OK and I have one. But I prefer to display stuff the way I'm already accustomed to doing so and then cast it to my TV when I want to.

The Apple TV works great for that. I pretty much only Airplay videos with Beamer.

I have the exact opposite feeling. Love Chromecast and don't care about Apple TV.

Even if I open a torrent file on my laptop, it automatically starts streaming to the Chromecast.

I'm honestly suprised that someone dares to say that the Chromecast isn't successful/usable

Ps. I have 3 Chromecasts and 1 Chromecast audio

>Even if I open a torrent file on my laptop, it automatically starts streaming to the Chromecast.

Wait, what? How did you set this up?

It's not that hard. Create a console application in Visual Studio ( it's a Windows Application).

The arguments are the default ones, that are triggerd when you "Open With" - Choose a program. You receive a filename

Then run a new console, which runs castnow ( https://github.com/xat/castnow ). And voila

PS. Can choose the wrong chromecast when there are 2 devices in the network :p

I genuinely like the Chromecast. It works with Netflix, Popcorn Time, BBC iPlayer, Twitch, YouTube, and I use an app called Airflow which lets me cast any video file. That's 100% of the TV my family watches. Plus it shows nice pictures in between all that.

I'm totally aware that it's basically just a fancy HDMI cable but we can easily cast from three operating systems, plus all our phones and tablets. I don't want a device any smarter than this, with menus and libraries of stuff it wants me to buy. The Chromecast model works great for us.

>And I don't remember anyone offering a free ATV to me... :)

I love my AppleTV and got it free from pre-paying my DIRECTV Now app for 3 months. It was a no brainer for me.

I use an Apple TV, but 90% of the time it's just being an AirPlay receiver - the same functionality that Chromecast provides.

Inebriated on that Apple kool-aid I see. I think 90% of the stuff me and my friends play on the Chromecast is initiated by the Netflix or YouTube app, where all I have to do is tap a button. You know what else is great? If we're chilling with multiple people, I don't exclude 80% of them from controlling or playing anything by having an Apple TV. Fancy that, the Chromecast is actually a simpeler, more useable product than what Apple created.

Hold on, how do you let 80% of people to control Chromecast? If anything's it's not controllable by anyone by default because nobody happens to lug around a laptop with a pre-installed chrome extension. I haven't used Android for a while, but on my last Nexus phone Chromecast wasn't useful for anything other than Youtube.

Android + Chromecast integration is really great. You can get automatic playback controls if you're on the same wifi or in near proximity.

Everything I use for media support Chromecast on both iOS and Android (Spotify, Pocket Casts, Netflix, Youtube, etc) Chrome supports to videos in websites. I'd say most times I go to see if an android app has Chromecast support, it does. I'm not sure how much that's true of iOS apps. I'd guess it's less.

Google home integration is really nice too. I can tell Google home to play something on the Chromecast.

I've worked in places with Macs + Apple TVs in conference rooms, and Airplay was definitely more annoying than Chromecasting.

For things like Netflix or HBO, I just cast from the iPhone app.

Localcast on Android allows you cast any video stream (on a browser), or any local file or any chrome tab. So you can stream a presentation from Google Drive.

>I haven't used Android for a while

Maybe you should have considered that before engaging in a conversation about devices tightly integrated with Android.

Fwiw, all the major apps which have Chromecast support on Android also have it on iOS as well.

It doesn't say anything about sales of Amazon devices. And I would take the initial volumes of Chromecasts with a big grain of salt. The iPhone is outsold by Android phones... it's not exactly an unsuccessful product.

While accurate is seems disingenuous to lump $35 devices in with $150-$200 devices and then pretend total units shipped is the only thing that matters (as if Mercedes was a failure for selling fewer cars than Yugo in 1987). Apple could easily make a media stick if they wanted to, but they don't. They used to sell Apple TV's at $100, marked it down to $70 while they phased the cheaper models out and now only sell them at $150 and $200.

Roku had $400 million in revenue in 2016[1] which includes content share while Apple TV produced a billion dollars of revenue back in in 2013 [2]. And Apple's margins are way higher than Roku's. Apple TV, while a self described 'hobby' by Apple (presumably when compared to iOS/Mac), was and still is a very successful product in a category it basically invented.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roku,_Inc.

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_TV#3rd_generation

to be fair, the apple tv remote is fantastic and it's better than any other remote i have used for the common features. (i do wish it had a tv power button though since it can actuate the volume but i guess they wanted to go with the standard that shuts down the tv when you shut off the apple tv if your tv supports it)

Really? The TiVo peanut is still the best I've used. The ability to scrub with the Apple remote is really nice and Siri can be useful but the shape is a disaster and I really miss physical buttons for moving around the interface.

I have both, and vastly prefer my AppleTV. Using voice or my iPhone keyboard to search is a game changing experience.

I've got just the apple support document for you! https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT205225 If your TV supports HDMI features you will only ever need one remote.

I have a cheap and old tv that doesn't have that hdmi feature is the problem. to be fair, the tv is kinda off brand and doesn't have any mapping in those "universal" remotes so I have to keep the original remote around if I want to turn it off and on with it. kinda a pain.

Sadly there's no way to disable having it power the TV off without also disabling the ability to control the TVs volume.

If you haven't yet, check your TV settings. My Samsung has a buried option "Auto Turn Off" under HDMI. Disabling this prevents the AppleTV from turning off the TV.

Yes there is you should have HDMI CEC settings somewhere depends on the TV you can set what exactly is passed and is it bi-directional or not. At the least CEC power is available on virtually every appliance I've seen.

Funny, at times my Apple TV seems to do just that…though in my case it's probably just a bug.

For some TVs the power off signal is sent using infrared, surprisingly.

It works for me; they are separate settings.

maybe so but this is the age of Netflix so remotes don't matter

I think it's always good to include iTunes Ping in any list of bad apple products.

Sure, though that was a fairly low-grade failure. An inexpensive, unremarkable failure for both Apple and consumers.

iTunes itself is a bad Apple product. Ping was just one bad part.

It's worth pointing out that the iTunes Music Store was revolutionary for its time. It was the first online music store that was legal, easy to use, and sold popular songs.

The store, yes, the app, no.

The app was pretty good back then, too. It really only started crumbling under its own weight once the iPhone 3G came out.

>> big tech companies new really big markets to move the needle

The problem is that most big markets are small at start.

Aren't there models to enter many smaller markets , like a VC , but instead of just supplying capital, the big company will also supply some key tech/knowledge/resources advantages, maybe some that are specialty developed for startups , all for equity?

> Apple TV

Profitable and doing billions of dollars of revenue a quarter.

Losers?

Source?

Profitable = Apple wouldn't keep it around if it wasn't.

Revenue = Asymco estimate. Apple lumps it into the "Other" category in its reporting. Horace estimated that it was doing $3bn of revenue a year in 2015. Maybe it's still just a $3bn a year business and not a $4bn a year business, but the point remains that calling it a "loser" is nuts.

Hey now, I LOVE my Apple TV's. They may not have the adoption or attach rate as other multimedia devices but they definitely fill a need for a certain group of people. Since I am all in on Apple they work perfect for me. I just wish they would market it a little better.

> There aren't many really big tech markets left

Global GDB is estimated to be at around 80 trillion $.

> getting it right

Self-driving. Apple Maps.

Your reasoning is excellent. The only problem is that Apple doesn't have sufficient drive, talent, or reputation, in the auto industry to actually make and sell a good car.

No employee wants to leave Tesla to work at Apple. No consumer wants to buy a car made by Apple. Hopefully Tim and the gang won't blow through too much money before they accept that.

They're pretty good at making phones and computers. They might want to focus on keeping that reputation in the meantime.

Your reasoning is excellent. The only problem is that Apple doesn't have sufficient drive, talent, or reputation, in the cell phone industry to actually make and sell a good cell phone. No employee wants to leave Motorola to work at Apple. No consumer wants to buy a phone made by Apple. Hopefully Steve and the gang won't blow through too much money before they accept that. They're pretty good at making computers. They might want to focus on keeping that reputation in the meantime.

I mean from a computer to a mp3 player to a phone is the same ballpark. Electronics. Moving to mechanical systems is a whole different thing.

I'm not saying it won't work out, but I don't think their plan is manufacturing cars. Maybe it's just licensing the self driving tech along with the infotainment system.

Yet somehow Elon Musk went from internet payments to building rockets and cars. Musk had zero background in rockets or cars. Remember Apple is a company that has more cash in the bank than the entire value of Tesla. It's foolish to think that Apple can't execute. Remember Apple has a long history of the last mover advantage: they take promising but cumbersomely executed tech and expand on it.

That's an interesting point and dwells in philosophical space.

Is Apple an entity with knowledge that it accumulates, develops, and applies or are people who work on and hold key positions in projects the ones that bring forth knowledge, develop it and apply it?

Is company's know-how separate from people working on it, and are people the ones who (can) bring it into the company or are people coming to the company and applying company's knowledge? What happens if either lacks - can a company bring in (group of) knowledge and can a company bring in (a group) of talent without (much) knowledge?

Cases can be made for both, I guess. So, there's no straight answer.

Yet hardware, especially dumb mechanical parts like cases, is what distinguishes Apple devices the most. They also design awful inconvenient UIs, just like auto companies.

But surely Apple can cooperate with one of the car makers? There is no indication that they are or are not working on it with someone else.

You seem to be forgetting the Moto ROKR, when Apple extracted a lot of cell phone expertize from Motorola with "iTunes collaboration" as a cover.

My impression is that building a car involves a fairly different set of skills (ie: pretty much everything except the dashboard) than Apple has.

The thought of bringing in 95% new-hires to work on a project in which your company has no experience... I mean, why?

If the primary motivation is money, without sufficient passion, good luck competing with Tesla - where they live and breath electric cars.

What were Tesla people doing before they made cars? We could have made this argument comparing Tesla to GM a few years ago.

My point about experience is that it's not Apple building this car, it's basically a new group at Apple handicapped by poor motives.

In the context of my comment, Tesla's answer to "why" was a bit more inspiring than "we need to enter a new market because our existing markets are saturated"

You're not holding it right, so you don't have signal vs. you're not sitting in it right, we're sorry everyone died.

Phones are toys. Cars kill people and are highly regulated.

I think Apple may be able to make this distinction as well. You portray them as an incompetent organization based on one defect. And, of course, car manufacturers routinely put out products with life threatening defects (i.e. Takata), so it's not like they're immune from fault either.

I'm not worried about their technical capabilities. I'm worried about a company culture that blames the customer when the product is misused or doesn't meet industry standards in some way. Things they have gotten away with in the phone and computer market will kill people in the automotive market.

I had the iPhone in question (the original 4) and it wasn't that bad. It's not like other consumer products have no glitches and always work perfectly however you use them.

Not meeting industry standards, with respect to cars, is illegal.

Mis-using vehicles while operating on the road is illegal.

Cars are far more tightly regulated both for end-users and for manufacturers.

What I'm getting at is that Apple likes to restrict their devices to work very well in the narrow designed use case, and make the non-designed use case very cumbersome.

However, people use cars across broad use cases. Some just commute, but some drive in snow, some need to ford small streams in emergencies, some need to install roof racks, and some want car-seats for infants.

I don't see Apple designing for broad use cases, because it isn't in their culture. And that will be a problem, because cars are not toys that you can choose not to use without large consequences.

    > Your reasoning is excellent.

Fwiw, I meant that sincerely. I just doubt Apple can pull it off.

Bingo.

List of people who have been or are working on Project Titan:

Jamie Carlson (ex-Tesla autopilot)

Megan McClain (ex-Volkswagen)

Vinay Palakkode (Carnegie Mellon automated driving)

Xianqiao Tong (computer vision at Nvidia)

Paul Furgale (Autonomous systems lab at SFIT)

Sanjay Massey (automated vehicles, Ford)

Stefan Weber (Bosch video based driver assistance)

Lech Szumilas (Delphi computer vision researcher)

Doug Betts (global quality lead at Fiat)

Johann Jungwirth (head of R&D at Mercedes)

Mujeeb Ijaz (Ford electrical battery cell specialist)

Nancy Sun (VP electrical engineering at electric motorcycle company Mission Motors)

Mark Sherwood (VP powertrain systems engineering at Mission Motors)

Eyal Cohen (VP software Mission Motors)

Jonathan Cohen (director of Nvidia's deep learning group)

Chris Porritt (Tesla VP of vehicle engineering and chief engineer at Aston Martin)

Alex Hitzinger (Technical Director of Porsche LMP1)

Cool.

Considering they need to answer to, try to communicate with, and rely on, a bunch of Computer execs, and moreover execs primarily interested in the project for financial reasons... that's a list of 17 employees who are at high risk of burning out.

Like Steve Zadesky before them: http://businessinsider.com/apple-steve-zadesky-quits-2016-1

Re: the Tesla names (biased article, but fun): http://marketwatch.com/story/elon-musk-heres-why-we-call-app...

> Considering they need to answer to, try to communicate with, and rely on, a bunch of Computer execs, and moreover execs primarily interested in the project for financial reasons... that's a list of 17 employees who are at high risk of burning out.

The profile of Jonathan Ive in the New Yorker last year made it pretty clear that he was interested in the car because he hates his car. But tbh: car manufacturers are primarily interested in "financial reasons" for making cars. That's called being in business.

It's interesting that your original premise has now been refuted:

> The only problem is that Apple doesn't have sufficient drive, talent, or reputation, in the auto industry to actually make and sell a good car. No employee wants to leave Tesla to work at Apple.

Apple demonstrably has talent from around the auto industry, with reputations which suggest they might be capable of building a good car, and people have left Tesla to join them.

So you're now changing your argument to "well maybe they can hire people, have the reputation, have the drive, and persuade consumers that they want to buy a car from Apple, but those employees have to talk to dumb computer execs!"

I must have forgotten all about Elon Musk's background in automotive manufacturing which makes him uniquely equipped to build an electric self-driving car compared to someone like Tim Cook.

Honestly the arguments you're making are so absurd that they border on the infantile.

Part of me wants to rebut your points, but the tone is a bit of a bummer. Life's too short.

If you make facile generalisations in lieu of a nuanced argument you should expect people to react fairly badly. I didn't even get as far as the insanity of "no consumer wants to buy an Apple car".

> No consumer wants to buy a car made by Apple.

Why not? Have you seen it?

I've seen the "Acer Ferrari One" laptop, and an Apple Car is the same kind of "wrong." I think Apple might have been able to sell a car if it had come to market five or six years ago. But these days, the world is so over-saturated with Apple (not that I mind, personally) that I don't think there'd be enough enthusiasm.

I'd be worried about the youngs though. 10$ they don't see cars the same way previous generations did. They grew up with smartphones and internet. They may be very curious about feeling the Apple feel with a vehicle.

Very true! A16Z recently had an episode where they said millennials prefer nicely integrated infotainment over horsepower or looks.

Define "nicely integrated" here, because I'm perfectly satisfied with my 3.5mm to cassette adapter.

And probably don't want to bother with dealers and such.

I might. I love what Tesla is doing but I sure hope there will be competitors (not to take anything away from Lucid, Rimac, Nissan etc). Right now, Tesla is in a league of its own and until the setbacks reported in recent months Google and Apple seemed more suited for competing with Tesla than the traditional car manufacturers and the tiny new EV companies.

> No Consumer wants to buy a car made by Apple.

[citation needed]

No consumer wanted to buy a phone from Apple either. Until they made one.

Dealing with Apple Store level service for a car that needs regular maintenance isn't going to fly. Imagine waiting 2+ hours for an oil change entry three months.

I have a hard time imagining how Apple Store level service wouldn't be a big improvement over what I currently receive.

Also there's nothing routine I do at the Apple Store that requires me to wait any significant amount of time. Anytime I have a question, or want to buy something, or pick up an online order the service could hardly be any more prompt.

The only thing I have to wait for is the Genius Bar, and if I schedule in advance I don't usually wait very long. And I only have to do that when something actually breaks.

When my car breaks I generally have to schedule something in advance as well.

Dude, the car is self-driving, why are you waiting for it to get its oil changed?

Agreed, also why would it need oil changes since it would most likely be electric? Scheduled maintenance is a very occasional thing in electric vehicles.

Electric is a much smaller market. And nothing about self-driving requires an electric vehicle.

I'd consider buying self-driving features on a regular car. Electric would be a total deal-breaker for me with today's technology.

Edit: upon further reflection I think it's likely that Apple is just developing the self driving tech and is unlikely to be actually planning to build cars, electric or otherwise.

That last paragraph. The Android model would be very attractive for cars, even for Apple. On smartphones, that model suffers from the hardware being all too indistinguishable. Glass rectangles with or without rounded corners, maybe a button here and there. Car manufacturers by contrast have a century of experience with making mechanical differences count, on top of the same UI everywhere.

For Apple and Google, the case is clear: if they want to defend their incredibly valuable gatekeeper position for local search (the market formerly known as the yellow pages) they need to provide the UI for the car or else they lose much of that gatekeeping. The question is, will any car manufacturers be willing to play, or are they all trying to succeed where Nokia failed?

I don't know much about engines nor cars but I am guessing that even with electric motors one needs gears? If so then there would be a need for gearbox oil.

There isn't a transmission/gearbox, but Teslas undoubtedly have differentials in some form which is where you would definitely find oil. I change the axle oil about once a millennium in my Jeep, so Tesla owners probably don't even think about it. To your point, though, there is probably a single reduction gear to lower the rotation speed of the motor and it might need oil. (Reverse does not require reconfiguring anything in an electric system, given that one just flips polarity. Electric motors have different torque characteristics which obviate the need for traditional gearing.)

I'm guessing service on Teslas is the usual: brake pads every century given that regenerative braking does most of the work, greasing bearings every now and then, coolant, tires, wipers. Internal combustion is extremely complicated in comparison.

No you don't need a gearbox.

This user clearly is a troll and has basically no experience with actual service at the Apple Store, which consistently has the highest marks for service among all retail stores.

Is Apple Store service not the gold standard?

It is for electronic devices. Why someone would think they would do exactly the same model for a car division is very strange.

Their service may be good for hardware, but from personal experience it has been far from great if you're an app developer. We're in the top 100 grossing apps and can't even get a callback from them, let alone a point of contact if there are issues.

Surely their vehicle would be electric. Likely some occasional maintenance but you wouldn't be getting your oil changed.

Not to mention that it would drive itself to the maintenance....

Disclaimer: If it wasn't clear from the username, this is a throwaway. I don't want to endanger my business by associating my rant with my >7 year old HN account :-(

There is a 0% chance that I would ever purchase a car from Apple with their self driving functionality in it.

We recently had issues with a whole bunch of rejections of our app for reasons that are not clearly defined in their guidelines (allegedly they were "new terms" [not documented]... they pointed me to official documents that didn't match what they were telling me). The functionality that they were rejecting our app for initially wasn't new, followed by several rejections for functionality that had been in the app for nearly 2 1/2 years and had approved numerous times over that span.

I've been waiting almost a month for a phone call that they promised me "within 3 business days" to discuss the App Review issues, and have yet to receive it.

While I think that Apple creates some great hardware, and their end user support is likely better than their B2B support (which is IMHO atrocious, unless you're buying more hardware from them), there is no chance I would put my life in the hands of their product or expect them to provide me with safe travel.

You . . . argue that you wouldn't trust an apple car on the basis that they make good hardware, but you have a software dispute with apple?

I'm sure you are very frustrated, but this comment really doesn't make sense to me.

I would tend to think of an apple car as hardware, which you admit is good. And it's probably being driven by apple software, which is sometimes iffy and buggy and downright crappy. I can't imagine a world where your argument makes sense because 3rd party/app story complaints really have nothing to do with this.

It feels like a total non sequitur to me. I'm not going to flag you, but I am going to downvote.

While looking back at it, my comment was a rather vague as to the target... Apple's customer support is spotty if you factor in their B2B (?assuming being an app developer puts you in that position?). I don't want to trust my mode of transportation to them as a result of my experiences.

In this situation, a self driving car is a combination of hardware and software. As you said:

> it's probably being driven by apple software, which is sometimes iffy and buggy and downright crappy

Whether it rolls well is one thing, but I question the consistency of the software from them, as well as their consistency on policies (app rejections)

Apple's software would be a huge improvement over what traditional automakers produce. See Toyota's pile of spaghetti topped with 10,000 global variables, Jeep's "remotely disable brakes through the entertainment unit", etc. Meanwhile iOS, while not perfect, still has the best security architecture of any mobile platform.

It sounds like you have a beef with Apple, but frankly, I want my automaker to be overly cautious with 3rd party apps. Can you imagine the Android model applied to self driving cars?

It looks like the comment you were replying to was trying to equate dealing with oil changes/maintenance to poor customer support in an ongoing relationship.

I don't know that I can fault them for feeling frustrated with Apple's support. The number of times that things have been made obsolete by Apple after just a couple of years doesn't lend a lot of confidence to the thought of a vehicle purchase that you may wish to own for 10+ years.