Apple has never had any pretense of caring about people or society, including its own customers. Google has. Google has also made a fortune through the open, equal access nature of the internet (search), open protocols, etc. Apple would prefer if iDevice owners had to buy their iNternet through Apple, and their many loyal customers would buy it, and the stockholders would be happier for it.
I think people are clinging to the idea that Google is greatly morally (or at least strategically) different than Apple. They're anthropomorphizing. Corporations have no personalities, they have brands. Decisions are made by designated people within them, and the mix of decisionmakers at both companies are fairly identical in temperament.
> Apple has never had any pretense of caring about people or society, including its own customers.
Very true, and it hasn't held them back in the slightest. I bet a lot of people have a closeted respect for that- Apple doesn't try to hide its corporate greed.
Everybody knows Apple is a shark, but Google really hustled us.
Not defending google. Actually just slightly ranting on a tangent... Google today is not google 5 years ago. There are different employees, different managers, etc. To say that google (an entity with a single agency, as if it was a single person) "hustled" us by going through these changes is just not an accurate statement .
> Why would middle management changes affect their culture and principles significantly?
Because middle management acts as a filter on upper management's view of operations, and a filter between upper management and the people actually doing the work when it comes to directions going the other way. The effect Bruce Webster calls "thermocline of truth" [1] is one significant manifestation of this.
Very untrue. Apple's target demographic is the arty/greenie/little-bit-leftie. Remember the furore over the factory conditions in China? A large part of that was targeting Apple rather than other vendors because Apple were seen as being egalitarian (for some bizarre reason) and hence above that.
Apple certainly does have a pretense of caring about people, society, and it's own customers... but only if they're using all Apple gear. Apple's whole 'curated garden' approach is about this. I mean, how can you say they have no pretense of caring about their own customers when they're the only hardware vendor with plenty of branded retail outlets that dispense plenty of free tech support?
Because they determine the level of access that their customers have to their own devices based on strategic business reasons rather than for reasons that benefit their customers. They construct their devices specifically to thwart user-serviceability. Their phones don't have battery doors. They don't allow for any usage of their devices independently from their ecosystem. These decisions are aimed directly at restricting their customers, no one else. This is not done for the customer's own good, but Apple's own good.
>they're the only hardware vendor with plenty of branded retail outlets that dispense plenty of free tech support?
There's supposed to be nowhere else to get an iDevice serviced, so without them, who?
I'm not defending their practices, and generally find them awful and elitist - they make a nice product, but at what cost? Nevertheless, the general message from Apple is "give yourself wholly over to us, and we will take care of you" - something that doesn't agree with 'they don't even care about their customers'.
Sure, but you know about that going in. It's part of the deal. You pay a premium and get a premium product with pretty well defined limits on it's features. It's a fair deal.
The problem with Google is so many of the product they put out are utterly unfit for purpose, showing a blatant disregard for and contempt of their customer's right to a reasonable product in return for their money. First near-unusable first gen Google TV, Nexus phones with fuzzy cameras, The first gen Nexus 7 tablet with not TRIM on the flash storage for a whole year leading to rapidly degrading device performance, Chromebooks sold with 2 years of free mobile service that suddenly stops after a year, encouraging the growth of a whole ecosystem around Google Reader that suddenly goes away.
I don't think Google intentionally set out to do any of those things, but equally they didn't put any significant effort into stopping them happening either. They really just don't care. Move fast, break things, iterate. That's fine for them, but it's leaving a long wide trail of broken promises and damaged users and customers in it's bull-rush into the future and it's taking that approach for entirely selfish reasons.
Google may be giving you free things, I'm a happy Gmail and Google Docs user myself, but they're not doing it because they're your friend.
I would not agree that people know about those things going in. Some techies do. Very few non-techies do. Some techies are suprised when you tell them the extent of the limitations. Some are just so used to the ecosystem that they don't even think that there might be a use case outside of it.
The problem with Google is so many of the product...
The lucky thing about Apple is that people seem so willing to forget their cavalcade of turkeys. But anyone else who makes a misstep - google, microsoft, whomever - bang! never let it be forgotten.
The first gen Nexus 7 tablet with not TRIM on the flash storage for a whole year leading to rapidly degrading device performance
And here's a case in point. Google 'has a problem' because of the design, but we happily ignore the "you're holding it wrong" event from Apple, a problem due to an astonishingly fundamental design flaw. And wow, you're listing a bunch of first-gen hardware issues, something every large-scale manufacturer has issues with.
Apple does almost all of the things you're pinging Google for in this comment, and it befuddles me that you give them a free pass for doing so. I really don't understand why Apple gets the kid-glove treatment when it comes to criticism.
I find that significant use of an Apple iPhone or iPad fore most people I meet is web browsing, email, SMS and phone usage. All which is outside the Apple ecosystem.
I can not figure out how we are going to achieve a healthy open ecosystem of apps with significant applications without a major malware problem. I'd be interested to see how that would work.
Apple actually seems to care about not selling lemons where possible (unlike other large brands I can mention). That at least gives them slightly more credibility in my eyes. They seem focussed on that over all the other supposed corporate responsibilities.
> Everybody knows Apple is a shark, but Google really hustled us.
I find this (rather pervasive) attitude quite curious. If Google had actually committed grave ethical breaches and caused gross harm to its users I would understand it. Google actually puts "don't be evil" into their code of conduct - it's part of their employment agreement with their employees and they spell out in detail what it means. That is actually a real concrete difference to these other companies. So I am curious how you think they have they "hustled" everybody? They are surely not perfect, but the way people talk like this I can't help wondering, where's the gigantic breach of faith you are talking about?
I think people are clinging to the idea that Google is greatly morally (or at least strategically) different than Apple. They're anthropomorphizing. Corporations have no personalities, they have brands. Decisions are made by designated people within them, and the mix of decisionmakers at both companies are fairly identical in temperament.