That's what we need-- another middle man taking a even more off the top of every transaction.
If they just built their own search engine and used it as default, and it provided high quality un-manipulated results, I think even more would flock to Apple. Yes they'd take a (big) hit up front by losing out on all of that free Google money (estimated to be ~$12B in 2019), but then they could actually say with a straight face they were truly privacy advocates and won't sell their users data to Google via the Google Search Engine.
Saying how privacy conscious a company is, while literally making billions of dollars by indirectly selling a lot of their customers data, really rings hollow with me. Build a search engine. It's not as hard as building Apple Maps, and will do more good in many ways. Hell, even non-Apple people might use Apple search and fall in love with the results, bringing them into the Apple fold.
Based on the series of frustrating searches I did in iTunes last night, Apple either isn't working on this at all, or isn't using iTunes as a testbed.
Apple to some extent launders responsibility for extremely useful services that require or use personal data by outsourcing it to others.
Why not actually turn iMessage into a privacy preserving social network?
For the same reason, as with search, I think the difficulty is underestimated.
Apple is not a small startup anymore, it can not even replicate DDG
But why? It greatly puzzles me how many "consumers" now think in terms of "brands" and dream up and discuss strategies on behalf of them. Companies should concentrate on fleecing customers, and customers should concentrate on not getting fleeced.
Most of us spend our day fleecing and then go home to be on the receiving end. If thats the terminology you want to use for the production/consumption cycle.
There's nothing that says one has to be wearing their consumer hat when using hacker news. In fact given the context of both the forum and article, it makes far more sense to me that people would be commenting as fellow fleecers not the fleeced.
Hacker news in general has more content relevant to fleecing rather than being fleeced. This article being a prime example.
As a consumer its of zero interest to me. What do I care of iPhones growth or lack of it? Reading about Apples market position and growth options only appeals to me as a producer.
Yet another poster berated me for considering it anything but rare... what gives?
At any rate, fleecing, exploitation and deception of all kinds are externalizations of costs that will always bite the groups and individuals who do it in some form, and the ecosystems that choke on it.
> here's nothing that says one has to be wearing their consumer hat when using hacker news.
Is there something that says you aren't allowed to wear it? I mean, the comment I was responded too sure is be written from that perspective. And as you say, everybody is also a customer. So why not always be in mind of that, why not refrain from fleecing people simply because you don't want to be fleeced? These hats aren't actual hats, they don't actually make you different persons.
A matter of perspective on how you see the modern economy I guess. Fleecing generally means some kind of fraud or poor trade. When you used it to describe Apple just hypothetically moving in to a new market (without any fraud being mentioned) and then backed it up with a statement about how that's just the natural way of things, I took it as a criticism of the market as a whole. That the provision of new products and services is an overall fleece as it doesn't really improve the human condition. Just a general comment on consumerism.
So because I see just economic activity as a whole as one big fleecing, I consider fleecing to just be what we all do for our 9-5. I call people up and tell them about software they don't have. You make software it is you do and then people find it some other way or whatever else it is you do. Apple is charging more for phones than they did last year making them less attainable or whatever it is they do. It's all part of the same game. Making people feel bad about their current situation by either showing or creating a better one.
Other guy almost certainly doesn't agree with that. I don't know where you stand. I mean, as far as things go Apple moving in to billing/banking doesn't seem particularly evil. It's a "problem" a great many people face that could do with some "it just works" design. At least in the US by the sounds of it. So if you're against that it makes me think you align somewhat with me. However if you think it's possible to exist in society and not fleece then probably not!
>will always bite the groups and individuals who do it in some form, and the ecosystems that choke on it
Absolutely! My opinion of society as it is now or its future are not high! We're creating new needs and standards for others to live up to in order to meet the new needs and standards created by others. A circular flow of hustle where the steps we take power the very machine we're on! That's a huge negative externality.
>Is there something that says you aren't allowed to wear it?
No, I just took your question as a challenge to that way of action as much as a genuine question, just because of the context of it. The comments section of an article discussing business strategy, on a forum filled with business owners and aspiring business owners, ran by an investment firm. It's fleecer central.
>So why not be in mind of that why not refrain from fleecing people simply because you don't want to be fleeced?
Because there are core things I want, that if not biological which I suspect they are, are so deeply ingrained from whatever other source that they might as well be biological anyway. I can't attain those thing by not playing the game. I can't be a forest hermit and also be a well respected big deal with plenty of access to pretty women. I need to produce great economic gains and capture tons for myself, because that's what everyone else is doing. That's the standard to meet. Awareness that you're playing a prisoner's dilemma game doesn't do anything to change the outcome if you can't organise with and trust the other players to agree to outcomes. It can be hard to pull off with only two people,. It's certainly not going to happen with 7.53 billion.
Me abstaining wont change the world to any noticeable degree while condemning myself to a less content life than I already am.
[..]
> So because I see just economic activity as a whole as one big fleecing, I consider fleecing to just be what we all do for our 9-5
Wait, clearly moving into a new market is economic activity, all economic activity is fleecing in your outlook, yet there is a problem with me being "critical" because there is no fraud being mentioned? Yet you say it's all fraud, so according to you it's clearly implied.
I mostly took it as implied greed, the inability to "leave money on the table". That's not what most people do, that's not what all economic activity is, if that were true, we wouldn't even have built the civilizations capitalism now gobbles up.
> I can't attain those thing by not playing the game.
Start with not referring to abstractions like "the game". People say "hate the game, not the players", but that's like saying "hate the group, not the individuals that form the group". It's your game, not "the" game.
I know for a fact, from my life and the people I read, that you're wrong. If what you said was universal there wouldn't be so many exceptions. It's just that the people who somehow started to chase external validation only hang out with people who do the same.
As for being a "big deal with access to pretty women" -- be attractive, or let pretty women be, period. The second they fuck anyone for any reason other than finding them genuinely hot, they cease to be pretty, and only the ghouls collecting them as trophy don't see that. There is no "problem" here that isn't better solved with a cold shower and people growing up.
> Awareness that you're playing a prisoner's dilemma game doesn't do anything to change the outcome if you can't organise with and trust the other players to agree to outcomes.
Maybe you personally can't. Maybe you should learn from those who are doing it, instead of making excuses and pretend "everybody can't do what I think I can't do".
> Me abstaining wont change the world
Look at the wall of text you just wrote to keep it as it is. Even not writing it would have been doing more.
> Of course it's extremely easy to say, the heck with it. I'm just going to adapt myself to the structures of power and authority and do the best I can within them. Sure, you can do that. But that's not acting like a decent person. You can walk down the street and be hungry. You see a kid eating an ice cream cone and you notice there's no cop around and you can take the ice cream cone from him because you're bigger and walk away. You can do that. Probably there are people who do. We call them "pathological". On the other hand, if they do it within existing social structures we call them "normal". But it's just as pathological. It's just the pathology of the general society.
-- Noam Chomsky
You can't have your rationalizations and also be a still in the company of people, intelligent or not, who never ever gave in, never gave up, never became accomplices. Can't serve two masters, made a bad choice, and if you can say "tough shit" in the context of exploitation and deception, I'll say "tough shit" in the context of that.
but in most cases, these musings are forms of armchair quarterbacking, not some brainwashed adoration of a brand.
This mentality is a problem. Companies have many valid motivations, and certainly profit is one, but long-term success is rarely predicated on gouging customers.
How is that a "mentality"? How is it a problem?
> but long-term success is rarely predicated on gouging customers
It being predicated by gouging is not a claim of mine, success being accompanied by gouging it is enough. Would you say fleecing customers is "rare"?
Razor blades, Inkjet cartridges, sunglasses, broadband internet/telecom, most luxury goods, payday loans, the entire diamond industry
Are you saying that the current system of having a checking/saving account, and setting up autopay/direct payments for your various bills (mortgage, utilities, gym, etc.) is cumbersome?
And proposing that instead, Apple should add up all your bills and provide you with a $amount to pay each month, and you just pay that amount into your Apple checking account?
The example you gave above, overpaying for a music subscription because it didn't auto cancel, wouldn't be solved by this system, Apple would just add it into the bill and if anything, reduce your visibility into what you're paying for and why. I'm not sure how they would know to "protect" you from a music streaming service you signed up for.
The method that works best for me is to use an app like Personal Capital/Mint to centralize financial info and get notifications on what I'm paying for, and when. It also summarizes what buckets you are spending into, so if any look odd you can dig down and investigate further.
This is my nightmare of where the subscription-culture is headed.
Isn't that far easier to set up scheduled payments with your bank or allow the company to use direct withdrawal?
While I strongly agree with your top-level comment, and I think Apple's brand is very valuable, a lot of that is from a trustworthy, privacy standpoint. Small nitpick, but I think on the "data gold mines" point, any area where collecting data is paramount is an area that Apple should not enter to maintain that brand value (i.e. their Maps not collecting data as much as Google's is a real pitfall).
The areas you listed above are largely possible without collecting that much data, which may be the exact reason Apple should pursue them. :)
I bought a new cable modem to take advantage of the higher tier data rate, so I'm not actually ahead of things yet, cost-wise, but another couple of months will do it.
I think we need that monthly payment friction to pressure companies to keep up their value proposition to customers. If I have to continually re-choose to be a customer, the company has to do more to keep me satisfied.
I also disabled autopay for similar reasons. This helped me notice that Comcast had started charging me for a TV tuner that I didn’t have (I don’t have their television service, only internet). It took three months and multiple calls to get that resolved and credited. I might not have remembered to follow-up if I didn’t have to look at the bill each time.
That’s what we have in America. Internet run by a couple of mafia like companies who have the government wrapped under their fingers.
Yes I would very much love if Apple threw a couple of billions and shook the internet pipes.
This costs me about an hour a month, which I spend noticing the bills I pay rather than paying them by hand.
Mint, 401k Management, Bill Pay, TAXES, Yahoo Finance, Student Loans, the old Manilla (collecting ALL aggregate statements in one place forever.)
They should buy Schwab, Envestnet, Personal Capital, YNAB, and Motif and slap a Robinhood/Monzo coat of paint on a new frontend. They could go from Apple Pay to Best Banking Experience in the World, in no time. As far as "Services" go apple competes in Music, Health, Maps, Messaging. They dont compete in Backups, Photos, or Banking. I would love for Apple/Google/Facebook to move aggressively against Intuit/TurboTax, if for no other reason to create a more competitive environment.
Imagine Apple getting into LENDING. They have cash up the wazoo. They should be able to determine who is most likely to pay back a loan, and come up with pretty accurate interest rates. And at that point, why is apple just a personal bank, and not a corporate bank as well, fully taking on QuickBooks. And if they dont want to get into business logic programming, become a Financial version of AWS and offer finanance, accounting, and banking APIs as a service, for App Developers to build on top of, like a AWS/Firebase/Pulse meets Chase/WF/Intuit.
I find it VERY odd that none of the big players (Microsoft, Amazon, Google, Samsung, Sony, Facebook, Apple) have done anything more than a Wallet and Money Transfer. Why is Mint/Personal Capital/YNAB not on everyones radar. Why are TurboTax and 401K management not being looked into by ANY of the major tech companys? So many people have a bunch of accounts that need individual management. Make my life easier Apple/Microsoft/Google/Facebook.
Ive outlined this idea before. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12868316
I ALSO think SOMEONE should come up with a "financial ID." Instead of signing into banking sites with "Facebook" or "Google" each one has its own unique login, password, security questions, validation. One Financial ID, isolated from Social IDs could drastically cut down on phishing, hacking etc. Smaller institutions would not be running their own Identity/Trust silos in isolation. Resources to build trust over who is who could be shared. Intuit has something like that for their services, but it really needs to be a Chase/WF/BoA effort like Zelle. "Sign in with your Pony ID"
We do have those in (some parts of) Europe. BankID in Sweden comes to mind.
apple's move here is to use applepay as a platform to allow other companies to do those things. they're executing that strategy quite competently. they won't (i.e., can't) ever become a bank (consumer, lending, commercial, or any other kind).
(and your overuse of capitalization is making me twitch uncontrollably =)
Apple is not just an electronics company, and their latest earnings report makes that exact point. Its about subscriptions and service, not devices. They want to hook you on Apple Music.
Fintech isnt just banking. Intuit, Personal Capital, and Envestnet are services that layer on top of banking.
What I described is not an all or nothing approach, its a bunch of ideas. Apple could very much add money management services without offering lending.
Making someone like Schwab their "first party" bank would mostly be a commitment to customer service and "it just works" more like Apple Stores, than anything else.
One of the draw back of the current solution for IoT is connecting different eco systems, such as GE light bulb to Amazon Echo. If apple have a solution that is elegant and 'just works', i'd be interested in that
There were early complaints that Apple was making too many demands on manufacturers with regards to security, but given the utter shitshow that is IoT these days, it sure seems like it was a good idea.
Apple could have killed it in this space. The development costs would have been relatively low, and there was a wide-open goal with the possibility of much-improved security and privacy, high quality industrial design, AI, and yet more links to Apple devices, as well as providing a home network foundation for future products such as health monitoring devices.
Instead Apple handed the market over to 3rd parties and... not much of interest happened with HomeKit.
I would wager that you need to pay more attention to your finances. As the old addage says, "look after the pennies, and the pounds will look after themselves"!
I always heard adages and advice about "watching pennies." In practice, though, I've found that I'm far better off looking after the pounds and not worrying about the pennies: that is to say, set up savings targets that get treated like necessary expenses, and to not worry too much whether lunch is $7 or $12.
Is there a way you could split each area to a separate account/card so that you can spot odd spendings? eg. recreation on one, business on another, food on another, fuel on another, general household/mortgage/insurance on another, and then another for miscellaneous ?
Sounds like an opportunity for an app of sorts....
I'm enjoying the hell out of it currently with these guys.
Mr BuyBack Cook could have bought Sony 3 times over already.
Google Photos does full res backup - easy to get working with android - not sure about other devices or non-phones.
We have 2 apple computers, and apple tv, 4 android tablets and three windows computers, 1 iphone, 2 android phones.
I dont think any of my friends are apple-only, even those who love apple.
Is an apple-only household really that common?
You point out two distinct aspects, how locked in is a locked in household, and how many households are actually Apple only. I bet it’s rare to be all-Apple households, but Apple should be finding ever more reasons for a household’s next purchase to be an Apple related one. Since my locked-in household still only buys so many devices per person per 2-3 years, Growing services is another way to do it.
As far as degree of lock in, I’d say not much, I think it could all collapse with a few major missteps. There’s an enormous amount of pressure on the board of directors and C suite to maintain the expected quality.
I do concede your point that greater centralization isn’t really in the consumer’s best interest. I stand by my point that it could be on apple’s radar for ways to continue growth, in its best interest. My parent comment is not a consumer wishlist but that of a (rookie) investor.
I was recently taken aback by the amount of money I was paying for high-quality subscriptions “oh my god, I’ve paid $20/month for the last 12 months to subscribe to high quality streaming to Phish concerts via their app?!?” I signed up for it thinking I would only do it for a month. I forgot. I spent $240 on Phish audio, more than I spent on my Apple Watch. Apple’s real social network could be just getting started. Imagine if those “luxury” expenses were intermixed with a dozen other large, more legitimate bills? Apple could be processing $1000s a month per household, taking a hefty fee from some of them. And then launch a loyalty program :).
If I had to guess, I’d say this comment resembles Buffet’s view of Apple’s opportunity.