(no subject)

[theweaselking]

Apple: Garbage people making garbage products, with no accountability to anyone they harm through incompetence. Again.

(Bonus: Check out "GeorgeCh"'s comment, proving that not all useless assholes are employed by Apple.)

Comments

[bunnybutt.livejournal.com]

Hmmm. While this is a heinous practice, I think it's a little strong to call the employees "garbage people". Just saying.

Also, many of their products do kick actual ass in terms of usability. But that's just a personal opinion, obviously ymmv.

[franklanguage.livejournal.com]

I've been an Apple user since the early 90s, so this story fills me with dread.

I'm going to look into running Linux on my Mac.

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

I can totally tell you're new here.

(I have never encountered an Apple product that "kicks ass" in terms of usability. At the very best, they're average, almost all worse-than-normal because they deliberately damage usability as soon as you step away from whatever workflow whatever one specific Apple engineer picked as "best" sometime in 1983 and changing a previous decision is absolutely banned.)

[bunnybutt.livejournal.com]

I've actually been here for several years, I just don't comment often. I'm fine with philosophical differences/disagreements in opinion regarding platforms. I come from a Xerox alto/star/6085 background, so it's no surprise I prefer apple to dos. I'm thus overly familiar with the methodologies used to convert Xerox Parc's R&D into commercially viable, inferior products in the PC sphere throughout the 80's and early 90's via the "15% rule", but that's a friendly if spirited argument over a frosty beverage. (Including anecdotes about how often I have to pull out my iphone 4s because someone's top of the line android device chokes at a critical juncture, lol).

However, I do object to casually referring to humans as "garbage people", pretty much across the board.

That said deleting people's content is flat out not ok. Unfortunately, Amazon set the precedent and the convenience of licensing content has overtaken the benefits of ownership among the populace, including the risk of these shenanigans. Lesson: stop signing up for software as a service without reading the fine print.

[matgb]

Apple usability is specifically designed to be easy for people that aren't good with computers. For anyone that uses them professionally outside of a niche design side they're terrible. My father loves his iMac, my mother her iPhone. They're both way past retirement age.

Anyone moving to Apple from any other system, especially if they knew that system well, will find the choices and emphasis given absolutely mindboggling.

Android may have problems, but at least it lets me make my own decisions.

[franklanguage.livejournal.com]

When I was in school in the 1980s, I learned graphics programming on an MS-DOS-based system. This was my first computer—no, wait; my first computer was the DEC PDP-11 in the computer lab, and it crashed all the time. Graphics with the PDP-11 were done with the plotter, of course, and because it was a time-sharing system, you had to sign up to run your program—but I will allow it was a step up from submitting punch cards once a week in programming class.

So the IBM computers we wrote programs on were a welcome change, but I never really warmed up to it because the usability quotient was so low. My first Macintosh was an upgraded 512—which sort of made it a Mac Plus—and it was slow, but I loved it. I first went online with it in 1990.

When I first moved up to a smartphone, my phone company didn't offer iPhones, so I was forced to get an Android. I fucking hated that phone—it was clunky to use, and caused me to lose a lot of photos. I admit, if you're only using the Android to make phone calls, it's not bad, and I tried to avoid taking photos with it, preferring my digital camera.

I tolerated my Android for two years, but I love my iPhone—which is much higher on the usability scale for me in every way. So what's your point?

[pappy-legba.livejournal.com]

Android vs iphone is a good illustration of what Apple does well: enforcing a decent baseline. I buy androids, but very carefully selected Androids. As long as I can pick, you will never catch me with an iphone. On the other hand, if I had to risk getting saddled with a random android vs. a random iphone**, I'd go iphone in a second. There are dozens of absolutely terrible androids. For iphones, well I might not like it much but the worst iphone is still usable. The best android phone is, as far as I'm concerned, much better than the best iphone. The worst android phone is extremely, objectively worse than the worst iphone.

**This isn't a purely philosophical problem. People working in companies that supply work phones may have a choice between "iphone and android" and have no more control over it than that.

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

I really can't argue with any of that. I *might* flip that coin and hope that the provider customisation hasn't ruined the Android I get, but I'd want to be sure I could change my mind later.

[nojay.livejournal.com]

Usability is dependent on what the individual is used to using. I've been driving DOS and Windows machines for decades and when I try to interact with a Mac it won't do what I want because the keystrokes and mouse-clicks I use instinctively don't do the right thing.

As for mobile phones, I'm using the same model of phone I started with back in 2001. It's not smart, it can't play Angry Birds but muscle memory means I can disable the alarm function while undercaffeinated, half-asleep and in the dark/with my eyes closed.

[tisiphone.livejournal.com]

I've been driving DOS and Windows machines for decades and when I try to interact with a Mac it won't do what I want because the keystrokes and mouse-clicks I use instinctively don't do the right thing.

And I've been using a Mac by preference since 2006, along with other *nix boxen, and have the same problem with Windows - I struggle to even remember how to use the mouse. At the basic interaction level for an experienced user, usability is about kinetic memory and instinct, and it's not clear that any particular usability system is any better than the rest. (Which is to say, they're mostly all mediocre.)

[skington.livejournal.com]

Our esteemed host has somewhat decided that, despite pretty much everyone in the history of computing ever having agreed that Apple kit has always been easier to use than anything else, they're all wrong, and people who think they like using Apple kit have in fact been brainwashed by evil marketing.

It's really weird. Normally he'd poke fun at the sort of people who say things like "despite all of the legal opinions ever, the 16th amendment wasn't actually ratified, so I don't have to pay income tax". But when it comes to something as thoroughly, uninterestingly obviously correct like "Apple stuff is easy to use", he just clams up.

It's not even "Apple software has suffered recently, and it's not as outstanding as it once was (their hardware is still really good, though)", which I'll grant you, especially when iTunes is involved. He actively rejects that any Apple software, ever, has been any good, despite it being the one thing that kept Apple Computer afloat during the 1990s.

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

Ahem. I do *not* "clam up". I do the exact opposite: Call it out for the filthy lie that it is.

"Apple stuff is easy to use" is only true if you're trying to ONLY do exactly a very small set of things, in a specific way, and you're willing to tolerate gargantuan fuckups like, say, "deletes local copies of your music".

As soon as you want to do something outside the default workflow, which is constantly for me because Apple's idea of "what people want to do with computers" doesn't match what I want to do with a computer pretty much ever, Apple actively, deliberately throws up roadblocks. It's not even just that they don't make it easier, it's that they *put work in* to *make it harder*.

And: "Apple software has suffered recently, and it's not as outstanding as it once was" is only true if you use "outstanding" in the sense of "dear god, that was record-settingly stupid". Remember Quicktime when they decide it needed a walkman-like interface complete with a volume control that emulated a wheel, so you had to click and drag it repeatedly to turn the volume up or down? Remember "Extensions"? Remember when they decided to bundle EVERYTHING with iTunes and silently installed a buggy version of Safari with a known exploited-in-the-wild security hole? Remember when they shipped iPods with malware factory pre-installed? Remember OSX 10.5 where your Macbook would now DOS every other machine nearby if you weren't using an Apple wireless access point?

And: "(their hardware is still really good, though)" Yeah no. Their SCREENS are consistently good. Their cases are fairly pretty. Everything that's actually inside the computer is middle of the road, often underpowered, and way, way, way overpriced.

And there's a special place in hell reserved for the designers responsible for their mice and touchpads.

He actively rejects that any Apple software, ever, has been any good,

Again, not true. Apple software has always been good at one single thing: Letting someone who knows nothing about a computer and never wants to learn anything about a computer feel like they know how to use a computer, because they never *see* any different options they might want to use instead.

despite it being the one thing that kept Apple Computer afloat during the 1990s.

You misspelled "Microsoft bailout". HTH.

[skiriki.livejournal.com]

Much like our esteemed host here, I find Apple's stuff like I've been non-consentually bound, gagged and blindfolded. Well he didn't say that, but that's how I feel about it.

I like to tinker with the parameters of stuff I own. I own Linux servers. I got myself only Pro or better versions of Windows. I root my 'droid phones and tablets as soon as warranty wears out. Apple's logic in some stuff (infamous "drag floppy to trash", for starters) is so mindboggling, and their UI designs don't fill me with happiness, because fuck you Apple fungineers, go being whalers on the moon.

Doing tech support for iPhone/Mac crowd (when I was still doing that for a mobile provider) was a nightmare, because users had expectation of "it will magically just work no matter what hole I'm trying to put in this 3G dongle" and had less skills in dealing with problems than a sack of potatoes or Windows-drones calling in with their own brainfarts. I will admit that this does exclude those smartie Apple users, who did not have to call in and who could handle their own shit, but let's face it, it also applies to Windows users who knew their shit.

Any time we heard "Mac/iPhone" when we started the call, we could prepare for a long bout of explaining and handholding while not seeing what the fuck they are doing, possibly boning the orifice where they tried to insert the dongle. Frickin' hell, even ninety-year old grannies with Windows Vista Home Edition, three months of ownership and 3G device grokked it faster than some longtime Apple users.

*grumble*

There's no such thing as "one interface which will work for everybody". For example, I got Windows 7 Ultimate right now, and I've disabled Aero and done a lot of customization to keep me from being distracted by blinkenlights and gadgets and widgets and grommits and gimps and such. I can't use Poser, the interface is a nightmare; Daz Studio is my 3d app of choice. I can't use ZBrush, because it has fucked up deluxe edition of UI nightmare, but I can deal with 3D Coat. Blender sure is powerful, but I think I will still deal with the bug-laden crash-prone Hexagon when it comes to very quick and dirty modeling-something-real-quick.

And then there are my friends who are exact opposite. Then there's a friend who needs screen magnification, custom color and contrast in menus, and other support tools, because he's going blind, little by little and he finds these cutesy UIs (such as that aforementioned Quicktime) a horrid pain in the ass.

One of my friends is a composer, and when I shared this link in our 3d art group's chat, she pretty much blew up. The very idea that Apple would dare to do this kind of thing was unspeakable horror to her, seeing how she went to great lengths to be careful about sources of her samples, or how she'd use only copyright-free sheet music, or copyright-free performances, and YouTube STILL FUCKS UP HER CHANNEL, and refuses to acknowledge Creative Commons/otherwise copyright free music, instead it automatically sides with copyright trolls.

So the idea that Apple would do this... well, it is just proof how fucked up everything is, since Apple apparently sides with those copyright trolls. While RIAA/MRAA gets to shoulder a lot of blame on this, no doubt, the entire "delete without notification, upload to cloud, convert without consent" execution lands solely on Apple's shoulders. There's no "could you possibly explain the origin of these files" or "hey what do you want me to do" button or prompt.

Another friend of mine who lives in Australia is on one of those "we ratio your internet and fuck you if you exceed it, oh by the way welcome to 20 kb/s speeds, you did realize the contract said 'up to' when we spoke of the speed of the internet" deals... because his corner of Poisonalia doesn't have any better ISPs available and there's an additional complication I can't delve into here. He hasn't been able to watch YouTube for a year+ now. To him, the idea of "my stuff in a cloud!" is terrifying.

I think I should call it "rant over" by now, otherwise I'm going to throw a lot worse words around than mere "garbage".

[pappy-legba.livejournal.com]

Yeah Apple sucks but this problem grows less out of Apple than the nature of the Cloud and DRM. It's a symptom of the problem when Kindle users find their libraries stripped of stuff they bought because some publishers' agreement changed overnight. To single out the Apple angle is to overlook the bigger dangers.

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

This SPECIFIC problem was caused by Apple deciding on a default behaviour (delete local files, match generously with cloud files, convert to lossy format), that decision being fucking stupid, and that decision being enforced without adequately notifying users.

[argonel.livejournal.com]

Since Google music has similar functionality, I wonder if it is possible to get it to duplicate this misbehavior. As far as I can tell, the closest possibility would be to download a "matched" song and save it on top of the original copy. Even in that case I don't think the user interface will let you do it to more than one song at a time.

[pappy-legba.livejournal.com]

Amazon's music match is equally bad. I've still got missing files and duplicates in my library from turning it on just once, several years back.

In any case, The behaviors involved are terrible decisions, but they are also decisions that were almost certainly tied in with licensing issues. The combination of broad matching and automatic deletion is something that the MPAA/RIAA LOVE. It's caused numerous problems with automated copyright claims/ad monetization on Youtube.

Now, Those same organizations have been making noise about Dropbox and its ilk for years, calling them piracy networks and the like. Imagine if they got some copyright-happy judge to force some content scanning process on those.

You can hate on Apple all you like, but please stop thinking It Can't Happen Here.

[dionysus1999.livejournal.com]

Any company that thinks it has the right to go into my computer and delete files without my explicit permission is crap. That all of the major companies do this to some extent does not excuse losing music or e-books. What scares me is that this crap is in EVERYTHING. Can GM come and take my car if I modify their software?

Farmers have tractors that "tattle" on the farmers, monitoring the soil conditions. Farmers who complain or try to circumvent this spying have their tractors repossessed. There's something wrong when the physical object you've paid huge amounts for is no longer owned, but leased. The farmers need a class action lawsuit against this bullshit.

[pappy-legba.livejournal.com]

This is a fight we're losing. (http://www.wired.com/2015/04/dmca-ownership-john-deere/) It's another case of Intellectual Property trumping private property. In that article, it's tractors. Here, it's Apple Music licensing schemes running roughshod over a user's files.

[peristaltor.livejournal.com]

Apple did it, yes, but (according to another source) why they did it might be beyond their control. If there's an organization that deserves your ire, I'd suggest RIAA and copyright holders in general.

Now, to be fair, Apple has done some infuriating things: losing the random play feature in itunes was one. They couldn't get user preference data out of me when I let the machine pick stuff randomly, I guess. And how can they monetize my preferences through advertising if they don't have sufficiently granular data on those preferences? That is bullshit, the idea that every known preference can lead to a multi-million buck advertising platform that isn't just fucking advertising and won't be dismissed as fucking advertising by the user.