Today it turns out Apple not only proposed but implemented and shipped the actual feature last year. "It could be an interesting opportunity to reboot a few long-lost dreams". "I kind of get both sides here". "I guess I personally come down to leaving this turned on in Safari for now, and seeing what happens". Granted, the overall sentiment is still negative but the difference in tone is stark. The reality distortion field is alive and well, folks.
It's not a fan boy thing (and I would hate to be the guy whose github was filled with anger yesterday - it's not his problem, and he should be left alone).
It's just a marker on the journey - we know the rough destination.
(Also Insuspect the second time you hear bad news the community has had time to adjust - FU is usually a first time emotional reaction. Wow I really am into "see the good in both sides". )
Apple has no time for any of that. They consider, they plan, they act. You never learn the identities of anyone involved, they don't generally ask for feedback, they often don't even give the justifications for their plans, and squishy tech sentimentalities are considered irrelevant compared to consumer UX. Getting mad at what Apple does on some web forum is no more useful than getting mad at a brick wall.
There are reasons why the "faceless corporation" is a cliché, after all. It's a deliberate policy designed to protect employees.
We should also consider that Apple’s solution is a way to distinguish between human vs. Non human users on an Apple device. It doesn’t allow a service to randomly lockout browsers and/or OS (which Google’s proposal does), just that if you’re already on your Apple device, you don’t have to do a “verify I’m a human” captcha.
Hence the rather different reaction when Google proposes something similar (and worse) on top of its 70% market share.
I can't tell if you are joking, what sort of fragmented hell do you want?
When Microsoft bundled IE with Windows that was terrible. But Apple bundling Safari and locking out competing browsers? That's just what's best for the customer.
(*) there was a Safari for Windows in the early days of the iPhone. It had a Mac UI which was horrible to look at inside Windows. Maybe it was the time Jobs thought web sites were the way to go for the iPhone. Then he realized that an app store would make a lot of money. Nobody gets everything right all the times.
summer spectacles have been applied: e.g. barbieheimer and women's soccer world cup
I wonder what else
Microsoft was a monopolist (the government went after them for misuse of their monopoly power).
> Apple bundling Safari and locking out competing browsers? That's just what's best for the customer.
I'm not sure how common that sentiment is, but no sane person would argue that Apple has a monopoly on basically anything.
And on top of that, Google's reputation of brutal power grabs on the web may make a difference in tone.
Importantly though, we shouldn't frame this as Apple vs Google. I can ensure you that both companies absolutely hate the open web and open computing in general.
With Apple, it's the opposite. Freedom to install third party app? That would be dangerous! Freedom to use iMessage in the browser? That just doesn't make sense! Freedom to use third-party browsers on iOS? I guess most people just don't care about that one.
It's just striking that for every other company, lock-in is bad. But for Apple, lock-in is actively evangelized by the user base.
2) Apple users being willing to sell themselves down the drain is nothing new.
However, this is shit irrespective of who does it. Period.
Obligatory repost of "The Right to Read": https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.en.html
It's also in the way Apple allows its use; however that's not as strong. Apple has positioned this as a way to prevent CAPTCHAs from reaching the customer. Apple is interjecting with the provider and saying Hey, trust us. We can prove its a human because they're saying they're on iPhone. They're not positioning this as a way to deny service. Only to speed up access.
If Google says it is to prove to advertisers that a human is seeing their ads, trust them at their word, with all the implication it entails.
Who should we get behind? Stallman?
You?
All the startup CEOs whose business was based on low interest?
Where you planning on going? Mars? There’s only Earth.
Apple makes hardware people like and happens to interoperate with the web.
Google wants us believe it is the web.
I can do weird computer science with a MacBook and no Google. Can’t without a MacBook.
They are vastly different companies and the discourse is vastly different. Shock. Awe.
translation: loud minority of people who has a clue what Google really does
Overall they trust Apple to take care of things - that’s why they bought Apple stuff in the first place - and feel that anything that takes control from Apple and could prevent Apple from doing its job, would be bad for them.
There’s no stopping fraudulent behaviour, only defensive barriers to dissuade the non-nation-state actors.
Apple's incentives more closely align with mine, than any other megacorp.
And Apple is the only company in the world big enough to take on those other megacorps.
So, Apple certainly isn't perfect. But they're a hell of a lot better than any other megacorp. And I choose them to help defend me against those other megacorps.
Most importantly, I don't want Apple being crippled in their ability to fight the other megacorps.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Safari_version_history
I found this press release from 2007 https://www.apple.com/uk/newsroom/2007/06/11Apple-Introduces...
“We think Windows users are going to be really impressed when they see how fast and intuitive web browsing can be with Safari”, said Steve Jobs, Apple's CEO. “Hundreds of millions of Windows users already use iTunes, and we look forward to turning them on to Safari's superior browsing experience too”.
History demonstrates that actually they didn't and Apple gave up quickly.
Interestingly they also have some benchmark
> [Safari] now it's the fastest browser on Windows, loading and drawing web pages up to twice as fast as Microsoft Internet Explorer 7 and up to 1.6 times faster than Mozilla Firefox 2 (*)
but by reading the more we learn that they benchmarked Safari on a Mac and the other two browsers on a Windows machine.
A few choice comments:
"I recommend finding everyone responsible for this and exercising your right to free speech on them. It works for politicians, and it should work on this other flavour of bastard too."
"I believe both of these users are acting in very-bad-faith, and not correctly observing any ethical codes of conduct in Engineering."
"As far as I am concerned the reputation of this Ben Wiser guy is so far down the toilet that there’s practically nothing he can do or say to recover it. Like the old joke goes “you screw a goat once…”"
"The people involved in this concept/idea/proposal should be shamed into retirement. They should never work in the tech sector again. They should be afraid to use their names before first knowing their audience (an agricultural audience would likely be OK)."
"sometimes I don't think constructive replies are appropriate or possible. "
"Magnitude of the malfeasance is so great they deserve to be held to account for it"
And lots more.
I'm pretty sure beyond the personalization of the issue, 90% of the difference here can be explained by ad blockers. There's no deep technical or philosophical principle at work in most of those comments but what's clearly shining through is that tech people block ads a lot, feel they have a right to do so and will get furious at any attempt to stop them. Apple doesn't care about click fraud, ad blocking or spam on the web because those are other people's problems so they limit their remote attestation to the CAPTCHA reduction use case. This use case has the advantage that it improves the browsing experience for Apple users only. HN posters dislike CAPTCHAs as much as the next guy, so nobody cares. But Google want there to be lots of web content that's free to access so also concerns itself with the publisher side of the web, not just the consumer side. They list more use cases and ask for feedback, there are more consumers than creators, so surprise surprise, they get a lot of hate.
Remember Net Neutrality? Pepperidge Farm remembers.
Consumer voice is powerful. It shouldn't be underestimated.
None of the comments you quote stand out as more than harsh criticism either. There's no bullying going on. The people pushing this proposal should be held to account for their actions, and it's moronic to argue otherwise.
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