I'm not bothered by system-exclusive elitism any more than Lego bricks not working with any other building blocks. It's easy to see why it bothers people; hell, it bothers me when Sony tries to push their own closed system stuff, mainly because it feels like there is already a widespread (or soon-to-be) solution which Sony gleefully ignores at the expense of their consumers.
Historically, Apple's closed system are a vanguard, where other systems soon follow. Where systems already exist, Apple tends to go out of their way to work with existing, mainstream items with which compatibility is desired (see: printer drivers, Windows networking).
However, with the iTunes Music Store becoming increasingly inaccurately named, as applications, movies, books, etc. being sold through it, I grow proportionately concerned about their secretive nature and its affect on their relationship with third-party developers.
It is not just possible, but increasingly common for independent app developers to butt up against Apple's own software plans, because one of Apple's central tenets is "no replication of Apple provided functionality." This means if a developer sees a gap in functionality in iPod OS 3.0 and makes a cute little app which deals with it, if Apple chooses to address that gap on their own (YAY!) they will deny listing the app which provides the same functionality (BOO!). Apple's plans for their devices tend to be entirely, intentionally opaque to anyone outside the company. Not only that, it's entirely feasible that Apple uses the metrics of sales from their store to determine the desirability of natively addressing the functionality offered by any given app.
But, despite all this, I see Apple's defensive posture as a weapon which has repeatedly benefited then as they stay ahead of Microsoft's technical accomplishments in the OS and handheld markets, still leaving MS to play continual catchup, and looking like a "me-too" effort.
I also feel much of my initial "blast off" burn on my anti-Apple sentiment was fueled by the four months of overtime I'd worked. My wife speculated that I was displacing my intense frustration with working so much overtime, feeling trapped and obligated to work overtime despite contractual agreement that such obligations do not exist, feeling that I'd not seen my kids more than a few minutes each day for all of Winter... Anyway, Apple is shitty for only offering one, official, 200USD path for customer resolution of a 2USD hardware failure. Yeah, that's crappy, but the Touch is otherwise... untouchable in terms of functionality.
I'm not back in love with Apple, but I'm willing to let it back in the house even if I'm not ready to share a bed. Please don't read too much into this analogy, esp. with the reference to Steve Jobs' bony ass in the initial subject. It's purely platonic.
no subject
Historically, Apple's closed system are a vanguard, where other systems soon follow. Where systems already exist, Apple tends to go out of their way to work with existing, mainstream items with which compatibility is desired (see: printer drivers, Windows networking).
However, with the iTunes Music Store becoming increasingly inaccurately named, as applications, movies, books, etc. being sold through it, I grow proportionately concerned about their secretive nature and its affect on their relationship with third-party developers.
It is not just possible, but increasingly common for independent app developers to butt up against Apple's own software plans, because one of Apple's central tenets is "no replication of Apple provided functionality." This means if a developer sees a gap in functionality in iPod OS 3.0 and makes a cute little app which deals with it, if Apple chooses to address that gap on their own (YAY!) they will deny listing the app which provides the same functionality (BOO!). Apple's plans for their devices tend to be entirely, intentionally opaque to anyone outside the company. Not only that, it's entirely feasible that Apple uses the metrics of sales from their store to determine the desirability of natively addressing the functionality offered by any given app.
But, despite all this, I see Apple's defensive posture as a weapon which has repeatedly benefited then as they stay ahead of Microsoft's technical accomplishments in the OS and handheld markets, still leaving MS to play continual catchup, and looking like a "me-too" effort.
I also feel much of my initial "blast off" burn on my anti-Apple sentiment was fueled by the four months of overtime I'd worked. My wife speculated that I was displacing my intense frustration with working so much overtime, feeling trapped and obligated to work overtime despite contractual agreement that such obligations do not exist, feeling that I'd not seen my kids more than a few minutes each day for all of Winter... Anyway, Apple is shitty for only offering one, official, 200USD path for customer resolution of a 2USD hardware failure. Yeah, that's crappy, but the Touch is otherwise... untouchable in terms of functionality.
I'm not back in love with Apple, but I'm willing to let it back in the house even if I'm not ready to share a bed. Please don't read too much into this analogy, esp. with the reference to Steve Jobs' bony ass in the initial subject. It's purely platonic.