04.07.10
Apple Apologists
Summary: Misconceptions in the press and blind faith in Hollywood-friendly DRM prisons from Apple
WE have already written many posts about the iPad [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9], putting aside the fact that Apple is arrogantly suing Linux [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8].
What we find rather curious is that Apple enthusiasts sometimes fail to understand what GNU/Linux is all about and what “open source” means (some think that Apple is “open source”).
Well, Gizmodo, which was possibly bribed by Microsoft for some rave reviews of Vista 7, is currently mocking Doctorow for his criticism of the iPad. Some writers at Gizmodo have zero understanding of GNU/Linux, as shown in the following part of the new rant that’s also cited elsewhere.
Who brought Linux to the mainstream? Google. Giant, corporate, rule-bending, corruptible Google.
Huh?
The funny thing is that Canonical’s new COO, Mac [sic] Asay, is also among the iPad apologists who antagonise Doctorow. He writes:
Cory Doctorow believes the iPad signals an end to innovation. It doesn’t. Apple’s iPad actually points to a beginning of innovation in personal computing.
Asay does not believe in ‘his’ own products and the associated philosophies, which also resonate with the clients. Why again does he work for Canonical? It becomes embarrassing when a self-proclaimed “open source” champion is salivating over proprietary software, just like Miguel de Icaza.
Here is another piece of utter nonsense from Apple apologists who speak about GNU/Linux:
Consider Linux, which still doesn’t have a user-friendly GUI.
Really?
While we’re at it showing or debunking FUD, here is another piece of inaccurate description from the press.
Nokia has finally ditched Symbian in favour of Maemo, which, like Android, also borrows its design heavily from Linux.
There are at least 3 mistakes in that very short sentence.
In another short piece with an Enderle-like headline (“Microsoft, Apple, Google – The Battle for Domination”) the following statement is made:
Contrary to Apple’s iPhone, Google has been the pioneer for open source technology.
Here we go again. Google is not even an open source company (let alone “the pioneer for open source technology”).
Finally, Gizmag has this to say:
Although open source software is playing an increasingly important part in our digital lives, most of still use commercial applications where the code running them is locked down tight and rarely caters for too much uncontrolled tinkering.
They probably mean “proprietary”, not “commercial”. Microsoft deliberately fails to make a distinction between the two. █
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dyfet said,
April 7, 2010 at 6:18 pm
I certainly never experienced any problem with commercial acceptability of pure free software licensing. In fact I always believed the two are essential partners and not distant relatives that have to be kept apart such as through dual licensing schemes which remove freedoms for some downstream. But some forget that I was a founder and CTO for Open Source Telecom Corp, where we did rather successfully sell commercial software licensed using the GNU GPL.
your_friend said,
April 7, 2010 at 8:00 pm
Google may not be a free software company but they are a pioneering free software user and something for free software advocates to point to with pride. There are dangers in trusting others with your private information but there should be no doubting Google’s technical competence or honesty. Microsoft. Yahoo and other big ISPs all but promise to censor users and sell user data to the highest bidding spammer. As a provider of services, Google has made first rate use of free software. Through Google code and other initiatives, they also sponsor a great deal of free software community.
Through all of Microsoft’s FUD against Google, we should never lose site of the fact that software freedom gives Google and others to do exactly what they are doing. The technical excellence and success of Google are a direct result of the excellent tool set software freedom produces and something most people are not aware of. All of the racket about the dangers of software as a service is spun to give ignorant people the impression that Google is something similar to Microsoft. The two are not remotely comparable.
Dr. Roy Schestowitz Reply:
April 7th, 2010 at 8:23 pm
Their business models are very different.
Needs Sunlight said,
April 8, 2010 at 4:14 am
If an iPad is configured with an M$ Exchange account, an joker that can crack administrator level access can initiate a remote wipe command using the Exchange Management Console or the Exchange ActiveSync Mobile Administration Web tool. The remote wipe can be initiated using directly using Outlook Web Access, and we all know how secure MSIE is…
http://images.apple.com/ipad/business/pdf/iPad_Security_Overview.pdf
This basically blocks using the iPad at any school…
Dr. Roy Schestowitz Reply:
April 8th, 2010 at 4:15 am
Google has similar deals involving software patents.
Needs Sunlight Reply:
April 8th, 2010 at 7:18 am
What, that anyone that can fiddle access to M$ Exchange can go in and nuke the Google services?
The above agreement ties the ability to DDOS an iPad to the fragility of Windows + Exchange. That’s not a winning combination.
Dr. Roy Schestowitz Reply:
April 8th, 2010 at 9:45 am
With or without a “combination”, HypePad seems like a dud to me, but the copyright cartel likes it (DRM, paywalls), so it promotes it a lot.