The Apple iPad has been released in the UK and the usual marketing hype has had certain types shivering with excitement as they pay for the latest stylish gadget from a multi-million marketing machine that has recently turned its fortunes around with its incredibly successful ventures into the MP3 player and mobile phone markets with the iPod and iPhone, respectively.
But beneath these gorgeous ‘must-have’ electronic gadgets there lurks something very sinister; and it’s about time Steve Jobs and his latest gadgets were given more column inches for the way they are reversing the freedoms open source, mobile phones and now personal computers have enjoyed in the past by the draconian and restrictive measures Apple has placed on third-party software written for Apple products.
It started with the iPhone and is now present with the iPad. All software for both products is sold exclusively through Apple’s iTunes Store – possibly the worst piece of software in the history of programming. It is clunky, regularly doesn’t work properly, attempts to control all the music files on my laptop and has me praying it will work and won’t ‘lock’ my mobile phone with every software upgrade. But exclusivity means that once you’ve bought an iPhone or iPad (and they are great products) you have to use this shit software.
Furthermore, as a developer you have to submit your software for Apple’s approval; and if successful pay Apple a whopping 30% of all sales profit!
The freedom brought to anyone who has a computer and an internet connection to choose what software programs they use on their own computers has been eroded and replaced by an exclusivity that aligns Apple with totalitarian dictators. Joseph Goebbels would have been proud of the way Steve Jobs has been able to manipulate western civilisation with a great marketing plan and a cunning strategy for world domination.
Along with Facebook’s creator Mark Zuckerberg, I want to see Apple exposed for their underhanded tactics. The simple answer is to not use either. But the iPhone is the best mobile phone I have ever had. I just want to be able to choose to add the software of my choice and not to use iTunes.
The 1930’s had Hitler and Stalin. Today we have Zuckerberg and Jobs!
1 comment so far
1 Joy // May 30, 2010 at 10:04 am
You tell it like it is Mr Lane…..
I love my iphone too, but I choose not to buy into itunes, I would rather come home and listen to some brilliant music on Soundcloud. It would also help if I knew how to download music, being the old git that I am
)
To date, I have avoided putting music directly into my ear via tiny earphones, as this tends to remove you from society and communicating with people and can also contribute to much longer term damage to younger people…namely Tinnitus and/or hearing loss.
You can call me old fashioned if you like…
Actually, I do have a tendency to crank up the sounds in my car…so you can call me a hippocrate too!!
)