Not the Apple I loved
I remember when they believed in free software and included a schematic with their computers. Now they are in favor of secrets and secretive governments for few rubles. As American as napalm now. Feel the Love.
At least two VPNs are no longer available for Russian iPhone users, seemingly after the Kremlin's internet regulatory agency Roskomnadzor demanded Apple take them down. Red Shield VPN, which is focused on providing its services to Russian users, claims it received a note from Apple that says its VPN was removed from the …
Long history there. When I worked in Silicon Valley in the late '80's & early 90's, Apple made a big deal about turning green and not polluting California with the manufacturing their products. It was all just cover for closing their California manufacturing & offshoring it to Asia where labor was cheaper & at the time, there were no significant pollution controls.
.. yet Apple is at the forefront of recycling (sadly not on repairability) and was the first to actually report on conditions of where their goods were manufactured - without being forced to, by the way - but because they were at the time the only ones they were criticised again, without that anyone asked other manufacturers for their data.
It's not all black and white.
Companies have to obey the laws of countries in which they do business. So, obviously, Apple has to pull things from its App Store in China when its government demands it.
But why on Earth is Apple doing business in Russia when Russia is dropping bombs on people in a democratic country allied with the United States? That's like doing business in Germany in the 1939-1945 period.
I’m curious why you got a down vote. It’s not like the Russian regime is benign or just oppressing its own people. They are actively bombing a sovereign nation that had entered into agreements with for them to surrender their nuclear arsenal. Good luck ever convincing any country to ever give up nukes from here on in.
That's like doing business in Germany in the 1939-1945 period.
Why are you surprised? Since inventing it, humans by default seem to go for "opportunities" making them vast quantities of money.
Actually, I read the book "IBM and the Holocaust" from cover to cover. It seemed to me that the book was well-researched, and the facts which it presented were accurate. But maybe there is something wrong with me, because as I read the book, it seemed to me that despite the way the authors reacted to those facts, they were telling the story of...
a company that had been doing business in Germany before Hitler came to power, and when Hitler came to power, they did just about everything that a private corporation could reasonably do to cease all operations in Germany, without placing their employees there in danger. Rather than IBM's behavior in Germany being egregious, what they recounted was behavior that was exemplary.
All right, it is true that it is shocking that IBM covered up the fact that the Nazis (illegally) used (pirated) IBM punched card equipment in running their concentration camps, so as to avoid a potential image problem. But except for that, I was struggling to figure out what it was about IBM's behavior they considered objectionable and why.
Doing Business
""All right, it is true that it is shocking that IBM covered up the fact that the Nazis (illegally) used (pirated) IBM punched card equipment in running their concentration camps, so as to avoid a potential image problem. But except for that, I was struggling to figure out what it was about IBM's behavior they considered objectionable and why.""
The Nazis didn't use counterfeit punch cards on their IBM original tabulators during WWII. They purchased them(cards) through a Swiss company that IBM started, operated, and wholly owned to meet the letter of the laws.
Others tried to counterfeit the cards but never got it right, so the Germans along with IBM cooked up this scheme to defeat the object of the law. The secret to the cards was the paper it was made from, it was highly stabile and the individual card weight was very uniform. From what I understand from a family member of mine, it took about 1.5 cards to get a good one. That's why I spent my early childhood using defective punch cards as drawing paper, he would bring them home when they were defective. And they never bleached the fibers to whiten them, that's why they had a yellow tint.
The cards were precision printed on high quality, die cut stock. IBM would pull 10% of QA stock and either test punch it or send it to the manufacturing floor where the tabulators were made to assure interoperability between cards and the entire list of machines that used them. In other words IBM had their customers locked in on the supply side.Even the Nazis couldn't break this shit up and paid a dear price for it(in gold).
Apple should have done the right thing and shutdown everything, turned off al their phones.
If ALL corporations did the same, this war would have been over a long time ago. At the very least they would have done their thing to help.
The American government should fine Apple for co-operating with the enemy, people got shot in WW1 and WW2 for doing a lot less.
Is Apple actually cooperating with an enemy? If we take on western paranoia with Chinese manufacturers, it should be seen as just the opposite.
I guess Apple could have code in iOS that allows them to remotely disable phones in any particular region, but I doubt it would go down well with the folk here, knowing they have that capability. Besides, who will be hurt or disadvantaged most by disabling iPhones: the general population, who have no real influence on a war, or than the government.
Not complying with local laws is likely to hurt the users more than Apple, as it gives suppressive authorities more legitimacy to persecute them.
I'm not happy that VPNs have been removed but I doubt those who really need to use them don't have an alternative...
Of course Apple is co-operating with the enemy. Iphones are being used by millions of Russians as part of their business. Many of these same businesses are building weapons that are used against Ukraine.
While most Russians obviously dont believe the bullshit from Putin, ther eare many who still do. THe sooner the entire Russian economy collapses because stuff doesnt work the better it will be for them, Ukraine and everybody else in the world.
AC: Not complying with local laws is likely to hurt the users more than Apple, as it gives suppressive authorities more legitimacy to persecute them
cow: exactly. When everything turns off and they sent back the stoneage the sooner Putin and his friends will be hung.
Interesting question.
Merriam-Webster says:
The past tense of hang in almost all situations is hung. You hung a picture on the wall yesterday, or you hung out at the mall last week. Only use hanged when referring to someone being sentenced to death via hanging.
Based on this, I believe that a person nailed to a wall (as you would with a painting) is indeed hung.
But wait, there's more...
It's not that simple, however: most usage guides reserve hanged for people subjected to death, which means if an inanimate object is suspended from a gallows, the correct term is hung.
I need to stop hanging out in the Reg comments section
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> cow: exactly. When everything turns off and they sent back the stoneage the sooner Putin and his friends will be hung.
No. When you inflict as much immediate damage to people as you want to do, they react against the immediate aggressor, they do not engage in chains of justification back up to their leadership. Talking heads and self-elected "local leaders" who get themselves in front of the TV cameras will indulge in some political thinking, but likely not what you want to hear.
Instead, the normal people you have just sent back to the stone age will be screaming at Apple for preventing them from finding out if their relatives are still alive, if the water supplies are still on their ways: real, immediate anger at what is in front of them.
AC: Instead, the normal people you have just sent back to the stone age will be screaming at Apple for preventing them from finding out if their relatives are still alive, if the water supplies are still on their ways: real, immediate anger at what is in front of them.
cow: So the real priority is not preventing and shutting down a war killing thousnads but to protect Apple ?
> AC: Instead, the normal people you have just sent back to the stone age will be screaming at Apple for preventing them from finding out if their relatives are still alive, if the water supplies are still on their ways: real, immediate anger at what is in front of them.
> cow: So the real priority is not preventing and shutting down a war killing thousnads but to protect Apple ?
Sigh.
You want A to happen. You suggest doing B. I tell you B will cause C, not A. You claim that means I only want to prevent C.
Spot the strawman yet?
《I guess Apple could have code in iOS that allows them to remotely disable phones in any particular region, but I doubt it would go down well with the folk here, knowing they have that capability.》
Another direction could be in a future iOS update install a VPN client for every russian iphone. :)
A bit like running the bowler hatted interference at the end of the 1999 remake of Thomas Crown Affair (but I still prefer the '68 version. :)
https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/national/daily/nov98/nazicars30.htm
> General Motors was far more important to the Nazi war machine than Switzerland," said Bradford Snell, who has spent two decades researching a history of the world's largest automaker. "Switzerland was just a repository of looted funds. GM was an integral part of the German war effort. The Nazis could have invaded Poland and Russia without Switzerland. They could not have done so without GM."
It was GM then today there are other American companies helping Russia.
I guess Apple could have code in iOS that allows them to remotely disable phones in any particular region, but I doubt it would go down well with the folk here, knowing they have that capability. Besides, who will be hurt or disadvantaged most by disabling iPhones: the general population, who have no real influence on a war, or than the government.
It probably does have the capability, ie using geolocation to know where a phone is means Apple could disable phones in a specific region.
I'm not happy that VPNs have been removed but I doubt those who really need to use them don't have an alternative...
But the average user probably doesn't know how to use those alternatives. They're conditioned to just downloading an app via the store. The politics are interesting though. We've sanctioned Russia, so Apple and AlphaGoo have to obey those sanctions. There's been tit-for-tat sanctions and bans on media in the West and in Russia. So normal way to avoid that is using a VPN so Russians can view Western media. Russia's now banned those, so Russians can't view the West's views on the conflict. Does this mean Apple had been evading sanctions by supplying services to Russians, or should we be encouraging Russians to use VPNs to bypass censorship?
Jellied: I guess Apple could have code in iOS that allows them to remotely disable phones in any particular region, but I doubt it would go down well with the folk here,
cow: SO what if it doesnt ?
Im sure IBM shareholders were also disappointed they lost sails to Hitler when he was using their machines to count gas chambers... but we have to talk about priorities.
cow: SO what if it doesnt ?
That wasn't my quote. I said Apple probably could block iPhones and iPads. It's not supposed to be selling into Russia due to sanctions, but new iPhones are in the shops.
Im sure IBM shareholders were also disappointed they lost sails to Hitler when he was using their machines to count gas chambers... but we have to talk about priorities.
Sure, but modern phones are essentially intelligence gathering devices. Apple (and AlphaGoo) know where phones are and everything the user is doing with them. This obviously has value. Same with VPNs as they can allow users to bypass state censorship attempts, hence Russia blocking those.
jellied: That wasn't my quote. I said Apple probably could block iPhones and iPads. It's not supposed to be selling into Russia due to sanctions, but new iPhones are in the shops.
cow: yes i know you said COULD block and they could do this and that.
Its strange how you think its more important that people keep using their iphones above the misery of millions dying.
jellied: Sure, but modern phones are essentially intelligence gathering devices. Apple (and AlphaGoo) know where phones are and everything the user is doing with them. This obviously has value. Same with VPNs as they can allow users to bypass state censorship attempts, hence Russia blocking those.
cow: stop talking bullshit, theres more value in slowing down the russian economy further by killing as many of their smart machines phones and computers.
They're not "their" phones. They sold those phones. Stop encouraging the idea that people never own anything.
They could legitimately turn off the App Store and all their other cloud services, though. Which would of course greatly reduce the utility of the phones. Which is why only a total moron would ever buy an Apple phone.
US army executed about 140 of its own during WWII. One - Eddie Slovik - was for desertion; the others were for murder and/or rape.
The desertion case seems to have been "pour encourager les autres" though it was the only case of execution for desertion since the ACW. There were about 50 convictions with a capital punishment for desertion but all the others were commuted.
We are not at this time at war with Russia. In fact, to my knowledge, we maintain full diplomatic relations with them (and China), as opposed to North Korea, Iran, or Cuba.
I agree that Putin & Pals are enemies of the West generally. But governments are only supposed to punish persons (including corporate persons) when laws or regulations have been found by a competent authority to have been violated.
It is not at all clear that this article describes a such a violation.
Not that I want to do business with Apple personally, mind you.
Yes, would be nice though it they allowed other apps or app stores to be sideloaded (no, not only like their restricted malicious compliance in the EU). Then it wouldn't be their fault when Russians installed VPNs. But that would set a precedence for their other markets.
Companies have to obey the laws of countries in which they do business.
Unless you're Apple in the EU, then making up shit and loudly proclaiming you're compliant with that is fine.
So, obviously, Apple has to pull things from its App Store in China when its government demands it.
They do but if they also allowed the user to sideload any app they wanted then wouldn't be a problem in the first place. Note: Apple redefined what "sideloading" means for the EU. You can't just install an IPA file which is what everyone else understands by sideloading.
> That's like doing business in Germany in the 1939-1945 period.
Business collaboration with Nazi Germany (Wikipedia, so check their citations, of course): In December 1941, when the United States entered the war against Germany, 250 American firms owned more than $450 million of German assets.
And, of course, Fanta was created by Coca-Cola (Germany) because the parent company was under a trade embargo and could not ship its cola syrup.
its the obsession with a standalone app for everything that means Apple has to remove theses VPN apps in the first place.
Just go to a VPN providers website, sign up for an account and you will be given the setting that you put into your phone and voila you will have access to a VPN without any app being required.
Apple products (like many other Western brands) are getting into Russia as black market imports from the surrounding ****-stans. So I understand how preventing iPhones, MacBooks etc from being sold to Russians could be a difficult task.
However, given that sanctions are in place, Apple shouldn't allow their app store to be accessed from Russia/updates to be downloaded from Russia/iCloud accounts to be created from inside Russia.
If Russians want to install apps, let them jailbreak their iPhones and sideload apps.