Apple has a better positioning in the world of web business. It owns the iOS store and that means it is a very major gatekeeper in the digital economy. Its business model is to sell proprietary hardware like iPhone packaged with exclusive software systems.. Because it does not rely on advertising for revenue, Apple runs a playbook where privacy is strong for those customers who have paid through subscriptions or bought the fashionista hardware products.
Facebook, on the other hand, depends on advertising revenue. To make that business work, it needs to “invade” users’ privacy. By giving out that privacy, users get Facebook for “free” since advertising subsidizes most services within Facebook ecosystems.
Everything looks balanced until when you see how Apple is making it harder for Facebook to have access to the data it needs to stay in business. Apple in this fiesta bowl does not care since it is making a business decision, as the world knows that there is no core principle here, since in China Apple is violating all the codes it is preaching it is protecting in America. For example, it moderates apps, deletes the ones the government does not want, etc.
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The latest is that Facebook is facing real challenges from the Apple world and Mark Zuckerberg was quoted as saying, “We need to inflict pains”. Yet, I do not see the kind of pains Facebook can inflict on Apple since the social media giant has no leverage in any aspect of Apple’s business. Before Mark executes this playbook, does anyone know how it can do this to Apple?
In private, Mr. Zuckerberg was even harsher. “We need to inflict pain,” he told his team, for treating the company so poorly, according to people familiar with the exchange.
It wasn’t the first time—or the last—that Mr. Cook’s comments and actions would leave Mr. Zuckerberg seething and, at times, plotting to get back at Apple. The escalation of grievances erupted late last month in a rare public tit-for-tat between the two tech giants that laid bare the simmering animosity between their leaders, who exchanged jabs about privacy, app-tracking tools and, ultimately, their dueling visions about the future of the internet.
I am not sure Mark has any leverage against Apple whose luck continues; this week, North Dakota politicians spared it a scare.
Apple just landed a monumental victory. In a case that sparked controversy in the tech realm, the North Dakota state senate voted down legislation that would have forced app stores to let software developers use their own payment processing software. Other states, including Arizona and Georgia, have proposed similar bills in an attempt to limit Apple’s power. Critics of these efforts argue they would “destroy the iPhone as you know it,” while those pushing for regulation, led by Fortnite’s creator Epic Games, claim Apple’s policies “stifle innovation and subject mobile developers to crippling restrictions.”
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Must Mark cause others pain to be in business? That’s very awkward…
We know that Facebook has some high dose of notoriety, but Apple cannot just be allowed to get away with some of the powers it seems to have, else the folks there can wake up any day and kill any company they don’t like; that should never happen.
Both iOS and Android are public utilities, they are not just entities for few people, so the argument of ‘if you don’t like the rules, go build yours’ cannot hold, since every digital company cannot be manufacturing hardware and creating operating systems; how many devices will users carry in their hands?
This is one of the areas government needs to come in, with an Independent Commission, the various sides of the arguments can be heard and debated on, and objectively assessed. If we allow these behemoths to sort themselves out, the most powerful could end up annihilating others.
Without Facebook, billions of people might not have a voice on the web, that should never be taken for granted, Apple would have kept billions in the dark, since their annual earnings can’t even purchase iPhone charger, let alone the phone itself. Elitism does more harm than good, the big man cares about security while the poor man just wants to have a voice!
Reason needs to prevail over emotions here.