Sure, you can buy whatever you want, you aren't living in a dictatorial country. Sadly enough, most people can't say this. Therefore it is important for you to fight decisions like this. If something doesn't exist, it cannot be abused by some regime.

I am going to say something very cynical now, if the reader doesn't like that, he should tune out now. But I guess Apple can't wait to have that special China deal. ^_^

Except Apple isn't a dictatorial country, and there are other computer vendors to choose from.

Apple isn't Mafia, doing personal visits while giving advices to buy Apple computers otherwise accidents do happen.

Buying an Apple computer is a conscious decision.

I love how many around here make their decisions, and then feel entitled to complain and point the finger to big corporations, as if these corporations are the only ones to blame and they poor souls were mislead.

Multinationals are not countries, but they are operating in multiple countries and there actions can have influence on the people in those countries. If Apple makes it possible to stop certain software to be installed then China can abuse the mechanism.

And I am entitled to complain about big corporations. That is the beauty if you life in a free country and even if it wasn't free to complain about them, I still would do it.

I rather see them all burn today than tomorrow.

Buying a house and suddenly getting your water cut off because the county"doesent feel like it" is also similarily a "conscious" decision, and similarily bites you only a time after you bought something.

You might say that's illegal, and I'd recommend thinking about why that has become the way it is. Things are deemed important to everyday life, and suddenly they aren't free game.

Which fails again as an example, because legally is not the same thing.

It's can vs. can't, which is perfectly comparable, in both cases you cant know what you get until afterwards, which is not acceptable. When the freedom to use the your own devices is in question, it needs to be addressed.

Shifting the blame onto the victims by saying they should have known the county can do that, is just sheltering yourself from the uncomfortable truth.

I don't want to feel like I'm being taken advatage of either, believe me. It's just better to fight back than let it roll over you.

When they force their proprietary standards on everyone else... https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23250831

Apple was the first major HEIC adopter, but it’s not really something proprietary they came up with: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_Efficiency_Image_File_For...