FCC Investigating Apple's Rejection of Google Voice iPhone Application

[Anuba]

if the government is going to step in and say that Apple or any company should HAVE TO provide something, then as a Mac user, i look forward to all those companies, that over the years have provided software ONLY to PCs with NO mac version, being forced to make Mac versions of ALL their intellectual property.

Your logic is making less sense by the minute.

It's not about Apple having to provide anything, it's about Apple preventing someone else from providing it and users from accessing it.

A company's choice of developing software for PC only is something entirely different. En-ti-re-ly.

 

[nkawtg72]

Not following your train of thought at all. You're saying that because there's a hypothetical, alternate universe where Apple never created the iPhone, everyone should just breathe a sigh of relief and the FCC should just back off because in the alternate universe, the iPhone doesn't exist so they're not allowed to scrutinize Apple's and ATT's actions in this universe?

You could put "what if" in front of anything, it's rather pointless really. The iPhone does exist and the FCC is entitled to do whatever the hell is within their power.

i knew this would get asked by someone.

what Apple is doing is not preventing anyone from entering the market and doing the same thing. period.

Apple in the market or (WHAT IF) Apple not in the market, the opportunity for others to freely enter or exit the market still exists. because Apple is in the market however doesnt mean they should be forced to bend over and make it easier for competitors. what they can't do is doing anything to prevent competitors. not allowing apps is not preventing competition (as it relates to Apple, ATT is another matter as my previous post states)

 

[Oletros]

not allowing apps is not preventing competition (as it relates to Apple, ATT is another matter as my previous post states)

Are you joking?

In my country it's said "Te mean encima y dices que está lloviendo" (Someone pisses over you and you say it's raining) when such a defense it's used.

 

[nkawtg72]

Your logic is making less sense by the minute.

It's not about Apple having to provide anything, it's about Apple preventing someone else from providing it and users from accessing it.

A company's choice of developing software for PC only is something entirely different. En-ti-re-ly.

i guess i'll need to spell it out elementary for you. APPLE is a private company. the fact that they choose to create products that can do great things, doesnt mean they should be forced to make their products to do things they didnt intend or want them to do. the iphone is a platform Apple develop to push its own goods and services, and further the sale of its own intellectual property, whether that be MobileMe subscriptions or Mac computers. other companies can choose to do the same thing if they want, forcing Apple to have one of their pieces of intellectual property to be a springboard for other companies wanting to compete with them is ludicrous.

how does that not make sense to you? if Apple went out and told suppliers of chips, precious metals, etc that they could not sell to companies that were in the business of making competing products, or trying to get into the market, then that would be an example of Apple preventing competition and they would get in trouble. MS had this very thing happen to it, because it was telling every PC manufacturer it dealt with they could provide competing OSes on their machines and had to ship with Windows.

im not going to get into an Economics lesson and try to educate everyone here on the definitions of monopolistic business practices, open markets, etc. go to the FCC or a library and read it for yourself.

the problem these days is that just because a company does something to improve their competitive edge, everyone accuses them on trying to be a monopoly.

 

[Anuba]

i knew this would get asked by someone.

what Apple is doing is not preventing anyone from entering the market and doing the same thing. period.

But the market in question is the iPhone App Store. This isn't about "oh well if you don't like it you can release your own phone" (companies have been doing that looooong before the iPhone existed and will continue long after).

If the iPhone was a closed system with no opening for third party software, fine. But it's not. It's open to third party software. Yet Apple are dictating which software we're allowed to use, by way of arbitrary censorship and anti-competitive measures. This makes no more sense than blocking third party applications from your Mac so that you can only use Apple's own software or a limited selection of third party software that can only be downloaded directly from Apple. And AT&T are in the background pulling the strings, affecting decisions on the part of Apple that affect ALL carriers in all countries, including those who have nothing to do with ATT and don't agree with them at all.

 

[nkawtg72]

Are you joking?

In my country it's said "Te mean encima y dices que está lloviendo" (Someone pisses over you and you say it's raining) when such a defense it's used.

no i am not joking. there is a distinct difference between PREVENTING COMPETITION and COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGE.

 

[Oletros]

no i am not joking. there is a distinct difference between PREVENTING COMPETITION and COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGE.

Yes,and banning applications which duplicate functionalities (like Opera, GV, podcaster, etc) is PREVENTING COMPETITION.

 

[nkawtg72]

A company's choice of developing software for PC only is something entirely different. En-ti-re-ly.

forgot to comment on this:

it isn't different. a company choosing to NOT make a piece of software for Mac and only making it available for PC, is ALSO preventing consumers from accessing it. they are telling me i have to buy a PC. i want a Mac.

you just said yourself that what Apple is supposedly doing is preventing consumer access to certain things. so you tell me how that is different.

by the way, incase you don't realize it. i don't think companies should have to make software for Mac if they don't want to.

 

[Oletros]

forgot to comment on this:

it isn't different. a company choosing to NOT make a piece of software for Mac and only making it available for PC, is ALSO preventing consumers from accessing it. they are telling me i have to buy a PC. i want a Mac.

you just said yourself that what Apple is supposedly doing is preventing consumer access to certain things. so you tell me how that is different.

by the way, incase you don't realize it. i don't think companies should have to make software for Mac if they don't want to.

The difference is that the software IT'S DONE and Apple doesn't allow it.

 

[Anuba]

im not going to get into an Economics lesson and try to educate everyone here on the definitions of monopolistic business practices, open markets, etc. go to the FCC or a library and read it for yourself.

You're really not in a position to educate anyone here, your grasp of the situation (not to mention your ability to distinguish the hypothetical from the real) appears sketchy to say the least. Go to the FCC? The FCC are already investigating this – had it been the clear-cut non-issue you make it out to be, they would have dismissed it immediately.

it isn't different. a company choosing to NOT make a piece of software for Mac and only making it available for PC, is ALSO preventing consumers from accessing it. they are telling me i have to buy a PC. i want a Mac.

A company can choose to skip a Mac version for many reasons. They may not have the inhouse skills or resources to support two platforms, there may not be viable a market for a Mac version or there may be a competing Mac-only product with such overwhelming popularity that the company deems it futile to compete. Either way, the Mac version never comes into existence. Needless to say, the company has full freedom to not create.

The situation here is quite the opposite – the product already exists and there is a viable market for it. The party preventing it from being sold to end users had zero involvement in its creation.

 

[danimal99]

Doesn't the presence of dozens of "free SMS!" apps and Skype kind of blow any argument Apple & AT&T have out of the water? They can't say GoogleVoice got banned because it offered SMS, since there's already an app for that. They can't say well we don't want cheap international rates, since there's already an app for that too.

And even if you make your calls through GoogleVoice, AT&T gets the minutes. So what exactly are they bitching about?

 

[nkawtg72]

But the market in question is the iPhone App Store. This isn't about "oh well if you don't like it you can release your own phone" (companies have been doing that looooong before the iPhone existed and will continue long after).

If the iPhone was a closed system with no opening for third party software, fine. But it's not. It's open to third party software. Yet Apple are dictating which software we're allowed to use, by way of arbitrary censorship and anti-competitive measures. This makes no more sense than blocking third party applications from your Mac so that you can only use Apple's own software or a limited selection of third party software that can only be downloaded directly from Apple. And AT&T are in the background pulling the strings, affecting decisions on the part of Apple that affect ALL carriers in all countries, including those who have nothing to do with ATT and don't agree with them at all.

first the App Store is not a market. the App Store is a privately owned, operated, and paid for service provided by a company to ATTEMPT to gain competitive advantage to further its sales of other intellectual property. in this case iPhones and iPods. furthering that, the company hopes that by providing a seamless, and satisfying experience that users will also choose to switch to Mac computers and away from PCs, because they believe Apple is better at providing a better user experience across the board.

the other problem here is that you are not differentiating between what Apple does with its iPhones and what AT&T may be doing, in the background as you put it.

as i have said before, if ATT has been influencing the prevention of software on the iPhone platform that competes with their (ATT) goods and services using anything other than their own propriety, privately owned and operated data networks, then i agree with you. this would be an example of a company (ATT) telling another (APPLE) that if you support our services, then you cannot support the services of our competitors. again, ATT should be allowed to say that about their own data networks, but not WiFi bluetooth, etc

Yes,and banning applications which duplicate functionalities (like Opera, GV, podcaster, etc) is PREVENTING COMPETITION.

try again. the makers of Opera, GV, podcaster, etc are free to find other avenues to gain a competitive advantage over Apples business model and the competitive advantage that they (apple) have. it may not be ideal or the best option for them, but they are free to do it. hence Apple is not preventing competition.

 

[outphase]

Doesn't the presence of dozens of "free SMS!" apps and Skype kind of blow any argument Apple & AT&T have out of the water? They can't say GoogleVoice got banned because it offered SMS, since there's already an app for that. They can't say well we don't want cheap international rates, since there's already an app for that too.

And even if you make your calls through GoogleVoice, AT&T gets the minutes. So what exactly are they bitching about?

I think part of the thing is the fact that non-GV users seem to have similar misconceptions as to what GV actually is. The decision makers at AT&T/Apple probably thought GV was VoIP over 3G.

 

[madmax_2069]

.....there was a business contract written and signed by both Apple and AT&T. Both companies included terms, conditions, definitions, and limitations to protect their services, assets, and financial gains.

Why would AT&T allow the use of another company's voice network? Would Apple allow the use of a competitor's App Store app on their phone? They won't...makes sense to me.

Because data is data, it uses the internet for VOIP (which is still provided by AT&T) and not another cell provider for communications.

You pay for the data plan (from AT&T) so you can do things like this, they are basically saying what you can or can not use with your data plan.

This isn't the same as if it was Sprint trying to get iPhone users to switch to them.

 

[j-traxx]

i can't believe the number of ignorant people on this forum, as well as others. every time a headline like this comes out, lately it has turned into a discussion of free markets, monopolies, anti-trust, unfair business practices, blah blah blah blah blah.

oh and don't forget the every popular, disjointed analogies to try and prove ones opinion being more right than someone else's (i'm guilty of that one too).

i'll attempt on this occasion to refrain from an analogy and instead ask two "what if" questions.

WHAT IF Apple had never designed and built an iPhone? or here's another: WHAT IF Apple had never developed the iPhone OS to support the purchasing and installation of applications?

would ANY government or entity have had the "right" or power to step in and tell Apple they had to make a phone, or had to allow apps on the phone?

would Apple have been accused of all these same improprieties because they weren't providing a platform or marketplace for competitors to distribute their own intellectual property? i think not.

i will concede that a Google Voice app should be allowed to be installed on an iPhone an run as long as it's using WiFi and not AT&Ts data networks. so i am curious as to how this investigation will turn out with regards to that.

not that Apple would ever do this, but one last WHAT IF. WHAT IF Apple were to get tired of all the bs, and complaints, and investigations, and decide to get out of the market and stop producing iPhones, and shut down the App store, and quite providing software updates for existing devices? where would all be then?

we'd be in the same place we've been the whole time (before and after they made the iPhone). we'd be in a market were any entity is FREE to make their own device that does wonderful things to make the lives of consumers better in their never ending quest to buy more stuff.

personally i dont think Apple cares if there is a Google Voice app. i think itll be shown that it was a result of ATT input, pressure, etc. apple will eventually have to allow the app.

in a case like that, i go back to what i said before about WiFi only access for such apps, but the iPhone is NOT ATT's intellectual property and therefore should not be able to dictate who gets to use it and not use it. their data network however is their property, and they should be allowed to dictate what can and cannot be done on it.

take that one step further, the iPhone is Apple's intellectual property and they should be allowed to decide when and where it gets distributed. ie exclusivity contracts. maybe they are the greatest things in the world for everyone, and maybe Apple doesn't like the idea of them a whole lot either. but if they didn't think they were necessary for the purpose of meeting certain corporate goals, then they wouldnt be entering into them.

it's a shame i said i wouldnt use analogies in my post today, because i had a great one about toilets and me being able to force you to have a Kohler toilet installed next to every American Standard toilet in each of the bathrooms in your home when i visit, because i have the right to choose where i want to do my business

cheers to a person who uses their mind. Some people in this thread have had their good sense veiled by an absurd sense of entitlement. Its sad that as soon as there is some displeasure you can point a lawyer or government office at any offending company and fire away costing them millions or more. after such a fiasco why would a company not be afraid to be innovative. stifled by the whining babies constant threats, these companies get stagnant and don't innovate out of fear. for the rest of their existence they merely copy other products that other similar companies haven't been "brought to justice" over. Microsoft could've been as good as Apple if everyone didn't send every government agency after them for something or another. Now look at them.

 

[nkawtg72]

You're really not in a position to educate anyone here, your grasp of the situation (not to mention your ability to distinguish the hypothetical from the real) appears sketchy to say the least. Go to the FCC? The FCC are already investigating this – had it been the clear-cut non-issue you make it out to be, they would have dismissed it immediately.


A company can choose to skip a Mac version for many reasons. They may not have the inhouse skills or resources to support two platforms, there may not be viable a market for a Mac version or there may be a competing Mac-only product with such overwhelming popularity that the company deems it futile to compete. Either way, the Mac version never comes into existence. Needless to say, the company has full freedom to not create.

The situation here is quite the opposite – the product already exists and there is a viable market for it. The party preventing it from being sold to end users had zero involvement in its creation.

ah, so you're one of those kind of people. just because they choose to investigate a situation, that makes the target guilty?!?! so tell me something ANUBA, yes or no...have you stopped beating your wife yet? since yes means you have stopped, that means you have been. saying no, means you still are. therefore you must be guilty of beating your wife.

secondly, you're right, this isn't clear cut, which is why the FCC is investigating. but again, despite your guilty before proven innocent approach, that doesn't mean Apple or ATT have necessarily done anything wrong. that remains to be seen.


EDIT:
by the way, i do applaud the FCC for investigating. maybe theyll find something to all of this. im curious to see what happens. my posts have been nothing more than my opinion of the situation based on my perception of the facts vs anyone elses opinion. i cant speak to the facts of this case, but only to basic principle, which is what i've been trying to do

 

[nkawtg72]

Doesn't the presence of dozens of "free SMS!" apps and Skype kind of blow any argument Apple & AT&T have out of the water? They can't say GoogleVoice got banned because it offered SMS, since there's already an app for that. They can't say well we don't want cheap international rates, since there's already an app for that too.

And even if you make your calls through GoogleVoice, AT&T gets the minutes. So what exactly are they bitching about?

good question. the only thing i can think of is that ATT figures, they already have you for the required unlimited data plan, that you can't choose not to get. and if you want to text with the default SMS app, you have to pay for an ATT SMS package. otherwise you pay for a per text rate, so they still get their money.

as it turns out, ATTs largest source of revenue is with its voice plans. i think this tends to motivate them to defend their voice advantage more than things that utilize the unlimited data plan that everyone is already forced to buy into anyway, even if you are able to use the app on WiFi.

 

[techmonkey]

How much kool-aid can you drink before you kill yourself?

 

[Anuba]

Microsoft could've been as good as Apple if everyone didn't send every government agency after them for something or another. Now look at them.

Yes, look at them – they're finally starting to make products that don't suck, after getting away with peddling utter garbage for decades.

Microsoft is the epitome of what happens when a company acquires a de-facto monopoly (they were up to 97% there for a while). Stagnation, complacency, quality control meltdown, poor service and ludicrous prices. Kinda like AT&T, or the Big Three for that matter. Not that any of them ever had a monopoly, but they sure act (or in the automaker's case, acted) like they were untouchable.

It was only when various regulatory bodies around the world put a blowtorch to Microsoft's butt that they got the first wake-up call. Later, Apple stepped up and added a second blowtorch by nibbling away on their marketshare and taunting them through ads. Lo and behold, now Microsoft are opening retail stores, designing new Zunes that don't suck, struggling to find ways to tackle Google's search engine domination, advertising like crazy, launching an OK "sorry about Vista" version of Windows, slowly turning the blowtorch back on Apple, who have so far responded by lowering their prices. Meanwhile the EC have pressured Microsoft into A) separating IE and WMP from Windows, and B) introducing a ballot screen where the user can choose which default browser to install: IE, Safari, Firefox, Opera or Chrome (possibly more to come). Good, maybe now MS will get around to creating a version of IE so good no user will want to live without it – the current version still kinda sucks.

Apple needs their wake-up calls too. Shake it up, FCC. The EC is waiting in the wings.

 

[Anuba]

ah, so you're one of those kind of people. just because they choose to investigate a situation, that makes the target guilty?!?! so tell me something ANUBA, yes or no...have you stopped beating your wife yet? since yes means you have stopped, that means you have been. saying no, means you still are. therefore you must be guilty of beating your wife.

secondly, you're right, this isn't clear cut, which is why the FCC is investigating. but again, despite your guilty before proven innocent approach, that doesn't mean Apple or ATT have necessarily done anything wrong. that remains to be seen.

What the...? I don't HAVE a guilty before proven innocent approach, I said it wasn't a clear cut case, which is indeed why the FCC is investigating. Nice job saying the exact same thing I just said, yet somehow managing to attach an assumption of guilt to my statement AND throwing in the added bonus of a wife-beating remark.

My statement: "The FCC are already investigating this – had it been the clear-cut non-issue you make it out to be, they would have dismissed it immediately."

(See, one of those wife-beating people who take a guilty before proven innocent approach. Or not.)

Your statement: "you're right, this isn't clear cut, which is why the FCC is investigating."

(See, another one of those wife-beating people who take a guilty before proven innocent approach. Or not.)

Fascinating. Now go beat your wife.

 

[elgrecomac]

Glad to see ...

I think google Voice is great, but I totally see why this is a soar subject. The future will be all about who has the most info, and google tops everyone

...that someone besides me feels that Google is the Evil Empire, not Microsoft. Google is great and scary at the same time.

 

[elgrecomac]

I find it funny that....

Not following your train of thought at all. You're saying that because there's a hypothetical, alternate universe where Apple never created the iPhone, everyone should just breathe a sigh of relief and the FCC should just back off because in the alternate universe, the iPhone doesn't exist so they're not allowed to scrutinize Apple's and ATT's actions in this universe?

You could put "what if" in front of anything, it's rather pointless really. The iPhone does exist and the FCC is entitled to do whatever the hell is within their power.

...people cried and cried when the monopolistic activities had a Microsoft label: it was bad, bad, bad. But if has an Apple label on it...it is good, good, good.

Now its time for the government, as they did with Microsoft, to decide if things are 'fair' or not. Remember...

What is good for the goose is good for the gander.

 

[cere]

if the government is going to step in and say that Apple or any company should HAVE TO provide something, then as a Mac user, i look forward to all those companies, that over the years have provided software ONLY to PCs with NO mac version, being forced to make Mac versions of ALL their intellectual property.

??????
Who said anything about forcing anyone to provide anything. The discussion centers around Apple preventing companies that are willing to provide the apps from doing so. That Apple has made themselves the sole gatekeeper of all iPhone apps, they have put themselves into a position that might appear like the FCC forcing them to provide apps. It isn't. It would be the FCC preventing them from obstructing other companies abilty to provide these apps.

 

[Anuba]

...that someone besides me feels that Google is the Evil Empire, not Microsoft. Google is great and scary at the same time.

Yeah, once Google have their netbook OS out, along with utter and complete dominance in the search engine department on both Mac and PC, plus Android, plus Chrome, plus Maps, Mail, photo gallery... they'll have grown into quite the scary giant in relatively little time. Yet they don't seem to have a core idea. They just do stuff. I can't shake the feeling that they're about to implode suddenly one day.

 

[nkawtg72]

What the...? I don't HAVE a guilty before proven innocent approach, I said it wasn't a clear cut case, which is indeed why the FCC is investigating. Nice job saying the exact same thing I just said, yet somehow managing to attach an assumption of guilt to my statement AND throwing in the added bonus of a wife-beating remark.

My statement: "The FCC are already investigating this – had it been the clear-cut non-issue you make it out to be, they would have dismissed it immediately."

(See, one of those wife-beating people who take a guilty before proven innocent approach. Or not.)

Your statement: "you're right, this isn't clear cut, which is why the FCC is investigating."

(See, another one of those wife-beating people who take a guilty before proven innocent approach. Or not.)

Fascinating. Now go beat your wife.

feel free to take that one singular post of yours to suggest that you now don't think apple or att are guilty of anything. good form.

my response to that post mind you was based on all the other statements youve been making about apple and att being effectively guilty as sin (in your opinion) and then following it up with indirectly saying, your position is right because if it weren't the FCC wouldn't have chosen to investigate.

if you can't separate my wife-beating example of a loaded question from me actually accusing you of beating your wife, then you have other problems too. my point was, since you need it spelled out, that just because the FCC investigates something doesn't mean that a "crime" has actually taken place. and before you say otherwise, yes you have suggested that a crime has taken place in all your other posts. again, don't start backpedaling now.