[OT] Mac App Store

[Richmond]

On 10/21/2010 10:27 AM, Peter Alcibiades wrote:
>
> Chipp Walters wrote:
>>
>> ....Jeez, how long before you have to JAILBREAK your Mac in order to put
>> your
>> own programs on it? I believe it's just around the corner..haven't been
>> wrong yet.....
>>
> We all have to decide, its both a personal thing and a society thing.  The
> personal thing
> is do we want to do what we want with the devices we have bought, or do we
> want
> the people who sold them to us to tell us what we can do.
>
> The social thing is, the PC/Smartphone/tabet is moving to becoming the main
> vehicle
> by which people get access to content - books, press, etc.  The borders
> between
> what is an app and what is content are blurring, and increasingly control of
> the
> app is a way of controlling the content that app gets for the user.  We have
> to decide
> whether we want this access to be controlled by corporations, or if we want
> it to be open.
>
> So the problem society has with Apple is not whether it will close down OSX,
> I think
> Chipp is right, it will just as soon as it thinks it can.

I think they will end up shooting themselves in the bottom if they do this;
sooner or later end-users will work out that a PC for half the price, 
running some sort
of easily installable desktop Linux (Mint?) at no price at all looks 
better than an
OS tied to hardware tied to dictatorial control about what you can and 
cannot do with
the thing!

I am inclined to belive that Jobs, while, possibly, suffering from some 
sort of
megalomania, cannot believe that he has a sufficient brainwashed following
to allow him to dictate terms to people who pay him.

When it comes down to things, one has to keep the customer happy, unless,
of course the "cult of Macintosh" is far more cult-like than we all 
realised.

However, if you think I'm going to start peddling flowers in airports 
for Steve
Jobs you have another thing coming: done that once, and once bitten, 
twice shy!

>    Its what the
> effect on society will be if that
> model is generally adopted.  By, for instance, the main on-line bookseller,
> in an era
> when e-books are the only way to get lots of titles.

Well; as an ex-moonie once remarked to me; out in the "real world" there 
are plays to
go to, films to watch, books to read, flowers to smell that don't 
require the imprimatur
of "Hoo Flung Dung". And, who, without being brainwashed is going to opt 
for a
restricted view of things?:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ticket_To_Heaven

Out in the Open Source Software world the likes of Steve Jobs and Bill 
Gates can go
and "boil their heads".

So; if I want to read an e-book I am, obviously (unless I am 
hypnotised), going to make sure
I have some sort of machine to read the thing, and by 'thing', I mean 
ANY e-book I want
to read, not only those Jobsy or Gatesy have decided is suitable for my 
tiny mind.

[ Just the other day I found an illegal copy of 'Dr Zhivago' (in 
Russian) that had been smuggled
out of the Soviet Union in 1978 by my late Father-in-law; he risked 
prison and beatings for that! ]

Down the line . . .

    . . . This does mean that the RunRev / LiveCode people will have to 
stop looking at their Linux
variant as "the odd one out" and start treating it equally to the Mac 
and Win variants; and, mayhap,
in due course, put it in pole-position.