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Apple Facing Antitrust Inquiry Over Flash-to-iPhone Compiler Ban?
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Come on now, did Adobe sign a blood pact with Apple or something? Adobe is not allow to shift its business focus even though Apple gradually withered away in the mid 90s? What kind of sane CEO can lead a company to do that? If Apple thinks that this is a stab in the back, then it's got an ego problem.
Flash has never been great on Mac platform, since the days of Macromedia. While we would like Adobe faster at fixing security issues, but to say that it never improved is denial.
Flash 8 was crap, it was under Macromedia back then. Flash 9 was the first version released by Adobe - it was a HUGE improvement over 8 along with AS3 support. see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adobe_Flash#History_2
Flash 10.1 is now touted as performance equivalent of the Windows version. A beta version of GPU video decoding Flash came out a week after Apple publicly announced GPU video acceleration. So it seems like Adobe has been actively improving Flash.
I agree you with some of CS UI being flash based, its complete crap - though it seems limited to Flash IDE only, but hey you are welcomed to use other open source IDEs to compile Flash. I personally like using Eclipse with the Flex framework since I have everything under one roof (js + js libraries, html, php, AS).
Intel support only came in CS3? Perhaps Apple should tell major software vendors much ahead of time about the switch instead of being so secretive about it? A monumental switch in chip architecture is no easy task.
Quicktime X is laughable under snow leopard, I won't go in detail, but read here: http://arstechnica.com/apple/reviews/2009/08/mac-os-x-10-6.ars/6
But of course, middleware is not prohibited and Jobs didn't say that. Care to demonstrate otherwise?
Yes, and nothing here prohibits a game engine per se. And as already reported, Unity (and others) believe they can and will comply, and are actively working with Apple to do so.
Total idiocy. Objective-C can be compiled for Android, and any number of iPhone apps have been ported to Android (at least some of them using OpenStep). You have not the first clue what you're talking about.
But it's disingenuous, if not an outright lie, to claim that "middleware" always produces a lower quality result (and note that I also mentioned earlier that this prevents developers from creating front-end/IDEs specific to the iPhone which might also improve products). The implications here are far, far broader than stop Adobe.
Flash sucks. Let's be real. If Adobe Flash is going to "destroy the differentiation of the [iPhone] platform", then Apple is doomed.
I think what you said is quite obvious for everyone. It's just Apple fanboys do not see anything wrong with that (long live Apple).
I think FlexBuilder is pretty cool actually. C# has a cleaner look than Obj-C and can be done in Xcode. IntelliJ Idea is superior to Xcode.
Real competition is good for everyone. Apple's decision is based on wanting absolute unopposed control over the platform. I think that is a bad decision but I also think they are entitled to make that decision. In a few years we'll see if the more open mentality around Android will be superior.
and, if this were the case: please explain what is illegal about it.
if this were the case, is it not just good business tactics? if you were apple, would you not also be thinking of ways to keep your niche product exclusive and therefore valuable, as opposed to "all apps are available on all phones"?
i'd contend that iphone buyers are also happy to boast that their exclusive toy has apps that won't run on other devices/systems. that is the nature of exclusivity. if that were the case
"Middleware" is a term that a few people have thrown out in this thread, but I'm not really interested in using it--it's vague and doesn't really get at the specific issues in the license agreement. All sorts of "middleware" are perfectly fine. And I disagree with what you said about IDEs. An alternate IDE might easily produce applications that fall within the new terms. All it has to do is link "directly" to the API. Nobody knows for sure yet, but a plain reading of this says that (for example) an IDE with set of libraries that encapsulates higher-level abstractions using the documented API is fine, but a set of libraries which provide a translations for (say) actionscript calls and vbscript calls to Cocoa API methods is not.
Flash sucks, yet millions of people "develop" with it because it's easy. I think you're too quick to dismiss how an inferior-for-the-user-but-easier-for-the-developer tool can take over an ecosystem. VB being a great example.
You know what, you are right.
I was coming from the perceptive that having convicted of being a monopoly is a tarnish to the Microsoft brand. But it is true that it is their sub standard products did the most damage.
Still, maintaining good developer relations is very crucial to the vitality of the platform - it worries me that Apple is oblivious to it.
Sorry, but the troll post is yours. Many app developers write in environments that target multiple platforms. It's been that way for a long time, and Apple have allowed that practice on their mobile platform since day one. Seems like you would be surprised at how many apps and games are written this way (generally - not specific to OSX mobile).
Apple have now arbitrarily decided that they only want apps to be written in specific languages. Their arguments seem valid on the surface (more control over future API development), but tied in with their battle of wits with Adobe, plus the possibility that these developers could easily target Android/A.N.Other platform with the same code if allowed to use these cross-compiling environments, the new restrictions do make it seem like Apple are deliberately limiting development for their own purposes, and for no benefit of current cross-platform developers, or end users.
I'm interested in whether any other platforms have such restrictions on the provenance of the source code. I suspect Apple have set a precedent here for an Internet aware operating system.
This isn't about impeding the ability of a developer to target multiple platforms, per se. It's about making sure that they're not doing so with "translation or compatibility layers", that is, by writing the code once and using some tool to shoehorn it into sort-of-kind-of running "everywhere". As someone already pointed out, it is still A-ok to target multiple platforms the "right" way--by having a core engine and then writing platform-specific frontends that tailor the app to the unique advantages of each device. The only caveat is that that engine has to be in C, C++, or Objective-C, but in practice it's very rare to write such a thing in any other language.
If a person or company isn't interested in truly targeting different platforms but only wants to "target" them with a shotgun, then they are still free to stumble around in the 80% of the market that isn't using an Apple device. Have at it.
Actually, it's quite vague if any sorts of middleware are fine, unless you wrote them yourself and they are in one of the specified languages.
Application code must be "originally written in" one of their specified languages. An IDE spitting out code is not originally writing anything, and it certainly could not just link to the documented APIs. Code that links to the APIs must be originally written in the specified languages as well.
Actually Flash sucks because it provides little to nothing to support following the UI guidelines on any specific platform. At least you could write Windows apps that follow Windows guidelines with Visual Basic.
No. There is nothing that addresses, at all, writing them yourself. On the languages question, I imagine you're right but that's not clear.
What I thought you were getting at was that the license bars creating an IDE for developing iPhone applications as an alternative to Xcode. A plain reading (which may or may not be how it actually gets interpreted in the end) says that this is in no way prohibited, as long as it allows only code written in C/C++/Obj-C/Javascript-via-Webkit, and the libraries that do its magic are written in one of the approved C variants.
If that's not what you meant, then apologies and what did you mean?
You could, but that wasn't usually (or even often) what happened. The point is that just because a tool creates crap for the users doesn't mean that developers won't use it. Like any profession, most developers are lazy and get by on the bare minimum.
Alright, so I didn't know the exact definition of cross compiling, but here it is from wikipedia:"A cross compiler is a compiler capable of creating executable code for a platform other than the one on which the compiler is run." So i don't think my usage was wrong, but you can correct me.
I said: "Steve Jobs publicly stated that thrid party cross compiler will yield poor quality software and that's why they are banning it"
Those aren't his exact words, but I did not misrepresent what he said.
They were clear bout the Carbon being a transition. But how long, we didn't know. But according to arstechnica (http://arstechnica.com/apple/news/2007/06/64-bit-support-in-leopard-no-carbon-love.ars), steve Jobs had said there would be carbon 64 support.
But again, the real rag is why is everyone saying that Adobe had it coming when Apple failed to bring their high profile apps into Cocoa before Adobe?
If Adobe is banking on Carbon (which I don't think they were, they just thought the transition would be longer), then Apple's own software teams are idiots of first order too.
How are apples actions any different from the console makers who only allow games to be developed using their dev kits (which have to be purchased), and then have to be approved (at a cost too mind you).
This is why I can't see a case that needs to be answered here, otherwise Sony MS and Nintendo will be in the shizzles.
Not to say I agree with the stance of apple on this subject, but Steve Jobs does have some good points. Mayde the best option would be to allow third party tools, but all code still has to be compiled in Xcode.
This is why I can't see a case that needs to be answered here, otherwise Sony MS and Nintendo will be in the shizzles.
Not to say I agree with the stance of apple on this subject, but Steve Jobs does have some good points. Mayde the best option would be to allow third party tools, but all code still has to be compiled in Xcode.
That's your definition of "A-ok" and the "right" way. There are certainly other valid approaches, potentially better approaches and opportunities for further innovation in those directions in the future (if this restriction from Apple was not in place).
This is clearly nothing more than an anti-competitive move to drive companies and developers to invest more heavily in the Apple APIs and tool chain.
http://tech.fortune.cnn.com/2010/05/03/u-s-vs-apple-who-would-win/
U.S. vs. Apple: Who would win?
Posted by Philip Elmer-DeWitt
May 3, 2010 2:10 PM
Shades of the United States vs. Microsoft, an antitrust case that the government lost.
A report in Monday's New York Post that two government agencies the Federal Trade Commission and the Department of Justice are each considering launching an antitrust investigation against Apple (AAPL) puts me in mind of the case the DOJ and 20 states brought against Microsoft (MSFT) nearly a dozen years ago.
To many observers including the judge who heard the case U.S. vs. Microsoft seemed open and shut. In Nov. 1999, Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson found that Microsoft's dominance of the PC operating systems market constituted a monopoly and that the company had illegally used that power to try to crush Apple, Java, Netscape, Lotus Notes, Real Networks, Linux, and others. His remedy, offered the next spring, was to break Microsoft into two units, one that made operating systems and another that made applications.
Microsoft immediately appealed, and while it couldn't overturn the findings of fact, it successfully fought the remedy. Based on embargoed interviews Judge Jackson had given the press during the trial, the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals found he had displayed anti-Microsoft bias and conducted himself unethically. It handed the case to another judge with instructions to craft a more modest remedy.
The case was settled in Nov. 2001. Microsoft remains intact and its software still runs nearly 9 out of 10 of the world's PCs, although to many in the industry, the company doesn't seem to have the kind of swagger it exhibited before and during the trial.
Given that history, what chances does the government have against Apple?
The issue here, according to the Post's report, is a clause Section 3.3.1 added to the latest iteration of the iPhone software developers agreement that prohibits programmers from writing apps for the iPhone, iPad or iPod touch using "an intermediary translation or compatibility layer."
As the Post sees it, the new policy "kills competition by forcing programmers to choose between developing apps that can run only on Apple gizmos or come up with apps that are platform neutral, and can be used on a variety of operating systems, such as those from rivals Google, Microsoft and Research In Motion."
To win a Sherman Antitrust case against Apple, the government would have to prove both that Apple's market share constitutes a monopoly itself not illegal and that it has abused that monopoly power in ways that damage its competition.
While it is true that Apple controls what apps can run on its mobile devices and even what tools developers can use to write those apps, it's going to be harder to show that it has a monopoly of the smartphone market or that its competitors have been harmed the way Microsoft's were.
The case against Microsoft was launched after Bill Gates bundled a free Web browser (Explorer) into Windows which had a market share at the time in the mid 90's cutting off Netscape's air supply (to use the language of Microsoft's internal memos) and driving it out of business.
Apple's doesn't enjoy that kind of market share. Its slice of the U.S. smartphone market is smaller than Research in Motion's (RIMM) and Google's (GOOG) Android share is rapidly catching up. And while there are companies that can legitimately claim they have been harmed by the success of the iPhone Palm (PALM) comes first to mind Palm can hardly blame Section 3.3.1 of the SDK for its troubles.
Adobe (ADBE) might and probably has filed a complaint against Apple based on the damage Apple has done to its efforts to promote Flash as a cross-platform development tool. And if the DOJ takes the case, it could use the line of attack it used against Microsoft, arguing that the "network effects" of the iPhone OS and the App Store tend to lock customers into Apple's ecosystem, and that to create a level playing field, the two businesses should be forcibly separated.
It didn't work 12 year ago, and it's hard to see how it's going to work today.
U.S. vs. Apple: Who would win?
Posted by Philip Elmer-DeWitt
May 3, 2010 2:10 PM
Shades of the United States vs. Microsoft, an antitrust case that the government lost.
A report in Monday's New York Post that two government agencies the Federal Trade Commission and the Department of Justice are each considering launching an antitrust investigation against Apple (AAPL) puts me in mind of the case the DOJ and 20 states brought against Microsoft (MSFT) nearly a dozen years ago.
To many observers including the judge who heard the case U.S. vs. Microsoft seemed open and shut. In Nov. 1999, Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson found that Microsoft's dominance of the PC operating systems market constituted a monopoly and that the company had illegally used that power to try to crush Apple, Java, Netscape, Lotus Notes, Real Networks, Linux, and others. His remedy, offered the next spring, was to break Microsoft into two units, one that made operating systems and another that made applications.
Microsoft immediately appealed, and while it couldn't overturn the findings of fact, it successfully fought the remedy. Based on embargoed interviews Judge Jackson had given the press during the trial, the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals found he had displayed anti-Microsoft bias and conducted himself unethically. It handed the case to another judge with instructions to craft a more modest remedy.
The case was settled in Nov. 2001. Microsoft remains intact and its software still runs nearly 9 out of 10 of the world's PCs, although to many in the industry, the company doesn't seem to have the kind of swagger it exhibited before and during the trial.
Given that history, what chances does the government have against Apple?
The issue here, according to the Post's report, is a clause Section 3.3.1 added to the latest iteration of the iPhone software developers agreement that prohibits programmers from writing apps for the iPhone, iPad or iPod touch using "an intermediary translation or compatibility layer."
As the Post sees it, the new policy "kills competition by forcing programmers to choose between developing apps that can run only on Apple gizmos or come up with apps that are platform neutral, and can be used on a variety of operating systems, such as those from rivals Google, Microsoft and Research In Motion."
To win a Sherman Antitrust case against Apple, the government would have to prove both that Apple's market share constitutes a monopoly itself not illegal and that it has abused that monopoly power in ways that damage its competition.
While it is true that Apple controls what apps can run on its mobile devices and even what tools developers can use to write those apps, it's going to be harder to show that it has a monopoly of the smartphone market or that its competitors have been harmed the way Microsoft's were.
The case against Microsoft was launched after Bill Gates bundled a free Web browser (Explorer) into Windows which had a market share at the time in the mid 90's cutting off Netscape's air supply (to use the language of Microsoft's internal memos) and driving it out of business.
Apple's doesn't enjoy that kind of market share. Its slice of the U.S. smartphone market is smaller than Research in Motion's (RIMM) and Google's (GOOG) Android share is rapidly catching up. And while there are companies that can legitimately claim they have been harmed by the success of the iPhone Palm (PALM) comes first to mind Palm can hardly blame Section 3.3.1 of the SDK for its troubles.
Adobe (ADBE) might and probably has filed a complaint against Apple based on the damage Apple has done to its efforts to promote Flash as a cross-platform development tool. And if the DOJ takes the case, it could use the line of attack it used against Microsoft, arguing that the "network effects" of the iPhone OS and the App Store tend to lock customers into Apple's ecosystem, and that to create a level playing field, the two businesses should be forcibly separated.
It didn't work 12 year ago, and it's hard to see how it's going to work today.
Sorta...
Initially, it went like this:
* Microsoft sells volume OEM licenses to manufacturer A.
* Manufacturer A sells desktop systems with and without Windows
* Microsoft demands royalties for *ever system sold*, whether Windows had been installed or not
* Seeing as how manufacturer A is paying a royalty for each desktop, they might as well go ahead and install Windows so as to make the most of the royalty they are paying out.
Novell was the major company who complained about this, and this is initially what the EU went after MS for.
Now, in the late 1990s, Sun complained that MS was integrating internet media/streaming technologies into Windows, thus causing an advantage for MS-based software that used media/streaming technologies. Ultimately, the EU decided that the piece of software that took major advantage of this was Windows Media Player, and thus they ordered Microsoft to begin shipping Windows without Media Player installed.
A year or two ago, the EU then announced that they were investigating Microsoft in regards to what type of "anti-competitive practices" the bundling of IE with Windows had. Basically, the EU ultimately said "Begin offering users the choice of selecting which browser they want upon first install, or we're going to fine you yet again", to which MS huffed and puffed, and ultimately relented and began offering the browser selection window.
MS essentially did get in trouble for bundling IE in and having it as the default browser. It's simply that they rectified the "anti-competitive" behavior in time to avoid yet another fine/judgement.
(For the record, the royalty payments was blatantly anti-competitive, but I take some issue with the inclusion of WMP and IE as being anti-competitive. There are many, many free alternatives for both available, each category having a few options that are better. If a user can't put forth the time/effort to improve their computing experience, I don't think MS should be punished).
There is an option
Apple could just say FU, and close down the iPhone totally or stop making them. Then what are developer's to do? Oh yeah, they would build for Android or M$....just like they can now.
I don't believe the gov't has any case here as there are options to create your app somewhere else....
If I build chairs, and I want Wal-Mart to buy and sell them, but they say no. Can I file anti-trust?
Apple could just say FU, and close down the iPhone totally or stop making them. Then what are developer's to do? Oh yeah, they would build for Android or M$....just like they can now.
I don't believe the gov't has any case here as there are options to create your app somewhere else....
If I build chairs, and I want Wal-Mart to buy and sell them, but they say no. Can I file anti-trust?
Apple and FTC/DOJ
Let's define the market as one for iPhones, iPads and iPod Touch.
Apple is a monopoly.
How silly is that?
They are #5 in the world for handsets.
Can't be defined as a monopoly.
Let's define the market as one for iPhones, iPads and iPod Touch.
Apple is a monopoly.
How silly is that?
They are #5 in the world for handsets.
Can't be defined as a monopoly.
Well, if console makers were clear about the exact limitations and requirements when they release their platform, i don't think there will be much discontent.
But if Microsoft, 3 years into their Xbox360 platform, suddenly decides, no more Unreal engines. I bet developers will go into an uproar and most likely lawsuits since some companies have already sunk huge chunks of money into developing their soon-to-be-released games.
I think it could be argued that Apple has a monopoly on quality smart phones and that monopoly is causing harm to their competitors.