General-purpose computing is workable. General-purpose computing on any hardware you own is not. Government regulations prohibit tampering with most emissive hardware, for instance.
Cars, electric scooters, boats, anything where there's other conflicting safety regulations I fully agree that a manufacturer doesn't need to provide the general public with full software access. I still think even in those cases there needs to be some regulation that ensures manufacturers allow independent, qualified, repair shops to effectively repair broken tech.
Since when have iPhones been marketed as such? Apple goes out of its way to promote its walled garden.
> Cars, electric scooters, boats, anything where there's other conflicting safety regulations I fully agree that a manufacturer doesn't need to provide the general public with full software access
Delineating this is hard. iPhones contain modem chips, for instance.
Again, I'm not arguing against the principle in general nor even specifically when it comes to Apple. Just the framing of being "able to install whatever software we want on hardware we own."
Prove to me that Apple has never marketed the App Store or the fact that you can run non-Apple software on an iPhone. If you can do that I'll drop this argument immediately.
> Just the framing of being "able to install whatever software we want on hardware we own."
But I'm specifically not saying that, I'm saying hardware sold to me with the promise that I'll be able to expand its functionality via software. Regardless how you want to try to spin it that's what general-purpose computing means.
I'm saying that if you want to sell a product which relies on software written by other people (that are not the vendor) to be successful, then you have to go the whole way, you can't then say "ah but see actually I'm the only one that can decide WHAT can run on your device, and you have to pay ME forever for the pleasure of running anything on it!". You can put up road blocks if you want, but you've sold me a device intended to be expandable via software, a general-purpose computing device, not a purpose-specific device.
Being able to install third-party software does not make the iPhone a general-purpose computer. Apple never marketed its devices as general-purpose computers. The original iPhone didn't even allow third-party apps. (Had they, there would be a false marketing angle to play. But they didn't so there isn't.)
> if you want to sell a product which relies on software written by other people (that are not the vendor) to be successful, then you have to go the whole way
This is the debate. Restating a position isn't argument.
That argument is relevant for the original iPhone, not for any iPhones sold after the advent of the App Store.
> Apple never marketed its devices as general-purpose computers.
Yet they are. It isn't up to the manufacturer to choose which class of regulations they want to play under, that definition is for an external part to decide, otherwise Apple could just classify all of their devices as fidget spinners and do whatever the hell they want.
(At least me, personally, I’d prefer to hit a wall with my car at 60-70kmph than to have a malware on my phone. And I said that after being in more than one serious car accident)
App sandboxing protects you from apps trying to access your information without your say-so, I'm not advocating for Apple to allow these third party apps to bypass the sandbox.
Android definitely fails in this aspect, if you look at stats on viruses etc.
Yeah sure, things that attempt to break out of the sandbox will not be caught before ending up running on a users phone, but this also gives Apple somewhere to learn about novel sandbox escaping techniques from, so they can eventually patch them.
Congratulations, you've turned a discussion about Apple's anticompetitive actions into a multi-industry free-for-all demanding and drafting exemptions. Hence why I said this is lobbyist-of-the-year material.
Here, we see a flippant comment consume tons and tons of replies, because we tend to think of laws like code. Absolutist, and if the absolutes are wrong, we'll patch.
Which then leaves you open to recursive arguments about patches and unpersuasive railing about regulation being ineffective, lobbyists, etc etc.[^1]
I think this situation might be a bit of a wake up call. Apple decided to implement a maliciously compliant solution, and it's immediately obvious to all concerned they didn't fulfill the spirit of their obligations, and there will be consequences. Not necessarily negative ones. But this isnt going to get delivered with no changes while the EU stays quiet.
[^1] "If you have the facts on your side, pound the facts; if you have the law on your side, pound the law; if you have neither the facts nor the law, pound the table."
To be fair, this resembles a lot of lawmaking, too.
> Apple decided to implement a maliciously compliant solution, and it's immediately obvious to all concerned they didn't fulfill the spirit of their obligations, and there will be consequences
Agree.
Windows, macOS, iOS, iPadOS, Android. I’m up for including game consoles on this list.
Let everybody else be all closed and only require them to open up when they become more important/widespread.
Though if you ask me, software should be covered by right-to-repair. I should have everything I need to technically be able to support my own device when the manufacturer throws in the towel. Unlockable bootloader, source code for device bring-up, drivers, but not necessarily an OS, just the device specific stuff.
I don't pretend to know all the answers, my stance is that the reason our society is where it is today is at least in part because computers have been computers, and not this "my way or the highway" approach Apple has for the iPhone.
Why isn't the iPhone a smartphone, a purpose-specific device?
> there needs to be regulation there as well, but not the same regulation as for general-purpose computing devices like the iPhone or Android
This shifts the game from defining what Apple can and cannot do to what a general-purpose computing device is. And that's the point. That's why this framing is great if you're Apple. A specific discussion regarding tangible outcomes morphs into an arcane debate over jargon and philosophy.
Because it can be extended via software to support whole new categories of apps.
Sure, a games console technically is a computer and the above statement is true for it as well, but it wasn't marketed as such.
In my opinion there are 3 ways forward in such situations.
1. The manufacturer designs the car so that the infotainment unit is replaceable when they stop updating the original. Replacements not certified as "road safe" would be illegal to install.
2. The manufacturer literally never stops updating the software... (yeah, obviously this isn't a real alternative, but it's technically acceptable if a manufacturer wants to attempt to make that promise)
3. The manufacturer, after ceasing updates, provides the necessary documentation for an alternative software to be built, but it wouldn't be obviously legal to install just anything, the software would need to be certified "road safe" and how you would assert that you're not running unsafe software is not obvious to me.
(I don't swap it because there are a few minor annoyances with that)
I wish we lived in a world where we could say, "sure but the driver knows not to put that on while driving, so we're all good!", but we very much unfortunately don't...
Hell, I could pull a small grill into the 12V power supply and cook dinner while driving down the road.
The idea that software can police our lives is actually part of the issue we are talking about. Apple doesn't want us to be able to install arbitrary software on our phones "for our safety".
On the one hand, the hardware of a PlayStation is pretty close to a general purpose PC and some iterations have been claimed as such by Sony for tax reasons. On the other hand, a great many PlayStation customers would be up in arms if regulators forced the platform open in any way that weakened the security that their competitive multiplayer experiences are built to rely on.
It would be perfectly sensible to force large platform vendors to let you install arbitrary software. No problem at all. Doesn’t mean that also has to apply to, I don’t know, refrigerators with WiFi. Or cars.