Quote:
Originally Posted by whydidnt
Once again, we see double standards on this sort of thing. "It's Apple, so they are protecting us from evil". If it was Microsoft, I suspect we would be hearing things differently.
|
I don't want to get into a petty tit-for-tat here, but just to clarify myself. I in no way said that Apple has nothing but the consumer in mind with every move they make. They clearly also look out for what they perceive are their best interests. And despite your assertion to the contrary, I do no believe that I would immediately jump to the conclusion that Microsoft had "evil" intentions, were they attempting something similar. I was merely pointing out that comments like: "But since it's Apple, we mostly have people saying it's to "protect" us from
malware, which is total crap," and"Microsoft: The Less Evil and More Disorganized company compared to Apple..."
do indeed jump to a conclusion on the matter without having all of the facts in.
As far as the "feedom to do the wrong thing" argument goes, nearly every writer of code that interfaces with a network or the internet (including Mozilla, Microsoft and Apple) limits our choices in a multitude of ways in an effort to protect us. Some of these things we can opt out of, others we cannot. It's just a byproduct of our connected world, and let's face it, software coders are in a lose/lose situation. If they close holes hard and fast, they'll be criticized for being "benevolent dictators" (see earlier post). On the other hand, If they let users (most of whom, let's face it, don't know a phishing scheme from a macro virus) opt out of their "protection" they'll be harshly criticized for leaving holes open. In theory, I agree with your "opt out" idea, but I see why Apple and all the others often choose to let the ignorant remain ignorant, but safe.
Could Apple use it to block useful, safe software that doesn't line-up with their vision? I don't know. Do they intend to? I don't know, and neither do you. If they do, they'll be roundly criticized and probably backtrack. Just like they did in allowing for the iPhone App Store.
Gear Diary has handled this thing pretty even-handedly:
Apple iPhone + Unsupported Rumours = Big News Day|Gear Diary