Speaking as an old graybeard UI guy.... we have just come up with more and more complex solutions to the same old internet "one weird trick" of putting your information on someone else's computer.

Yeah, I remember "Server Side Rendering"... we called Java Servlets or JSPs or PHP or ASP. There were clear divisions of labors and boundaries were respected.

Even when we had to go to make everything feel like an app, at least RESTful stuff still had those boundaries.

Now that everyone needs the same code running front and back, and JS (I'm not a hater of JS by any means but still) stuff like this is bound to have happened.

10-15 years ago there was such a split for web engineering. They wanted to make everything on the web look like an app, and a lot of backend guys hate anything looking like UI, so lets have an amicable divorce and do everything through these god awful endpoints, so the backend folks don't have to touch UI and the frontend folks can think they're "more real" engineers by making stuff that looks like it's a black box app vs enjoying the natural versatility and iterability of the old web.

I'm sure I'll never get hired for it, but good ol PHP (hell for most things I skip the MySQL; poor mans no-SQL w/ JSON files on the file system works and scales well for so many things)... vanilla Javascript can even be beautifully declerative when you want it to, with string templates building up whatever new DOM you didn't get from the server. I have these sites that last for decades, and when it comes time to add something, they're easy to figure out and adapt and there's no library hell (browsers have gotten so GOOD yet still so backwards compatibile over the years)

So I look for like minded souls using terms like "buildless" and "evergreen". But it's like an underground movement...

I'm more interested in Skype vs Zoom...

I'm 50, in UI, and feeling similar.
I don't mind agile per se (but it's difficult to come in on a very established project - so many decisions were made, and you don't even have the full context to judge them properly. It's like learning a new language, basic fluency is hard won)

What I do mind is how much flavor of the month there has been - a lot of complexity and difficulty in following code path for very theoretical gains . Any redux project smells so much like 2019, it's sad.

So like 20+ years ago, Wired declared "free wins".
I think people - after being nickel and literally dimed by 10-cents-per-SMS - were rightfully shy of "pay per transaction", because thy weren't sure what their usage would look like and that shit adds up.

So two decades later we have this sad fork in the road, two main paths:
* "free", but shitty with ads or other ways they figured out how to commoditize your attention
* subscription, where they can keep collecting rent no matter how little you use it.
( with "pay per usage" the third way less traveled)

Cow Clicker did it first. Or at least, earlier.

Probably right that it's just catnip for people hunting Chevos or whatever the kids are calling them now.

You don't get to come back a year (or a century) later and say, "Hey, I just found out what that painting is actually worth. Give it back."

Actually... Why not? You said yourself you're in the wrong and you certainly acted in bad faith, so why shouldn't your victim have their demand to annul the deal enforced?

As opposed to people with nativist and inward looking views, companies like Apple HAVE to work overseas, and if you keep following the US govt kool-aid, then you will only be able to do business with Western Europe and other allies.

Try to understand that a big part of the world actually sees the US as the big bad empire that they portray China to be and it makes sense that they ask Stewart to tone it down a bit.

It's not that China is a big bad empire, it's that Xi is an emperor who's unable to placate his people with promises of a better tomorrow due to China's economy having caught up enough that the rubber band has gone slack and dictatorships being inherently incompatible with the rule of law which a strong economy requires, so his only hope for survival is to placate them with promises of glory which makes a confrontation with China and West pretty much inevitable, and Xi knows that. It's the same deal as with Russia, US is simply being wiser than EU was.

Basically, what's business to Apple is a weapon to China, and China is a fundamentally hostile nation to anyone who doesn't think Xi would make a great world leader, which he wouldn't judging by everything I know about life in China and also because he's a genocidal tyrant. That's not "nativist" or "inward looking", that's simply realism.

I recently saw a very insightful interview where dictatorships are defined by things you cannot criticize, like the CCP in China, Kim Jong-un in Korea, etc. In the US the thing that will absolutely get you canceled will be talking about the Israeli lobby and the influence such a small group holds over US culture in general.

Seriously? You're equating getting canceled with getting disappeared?

Note that such a system would also prevent Slashdot from leaning left and censoring conservatives, which they're doing now by institution an idiotic "karma". Slashdot karma is all about politics. And Slashdot is left leaning. One could express that cutely as "CowboyNeal is an imbecile".

But you're not being censored. Your comment is right here, readable for all who care to engage with users with bad reputation. That you have managed to earn a bad reputation through your own actions does not reflect badly on Slashdot or CowboyNeal, it reflects badly on you. It is the consequence of your actions, in other words, your karma.

That most people ignore you doesn't mean you're being censored, it just means that they think you and your opinions are not worth listening to. That your response to this is that the government should force them to pay attention just serves to demonstrate that their judgement is completely right. It's not a political judgement, it's a judgement about you as a person.

Given your vitriol here, I think you know that too, and judging by the fact that you keep posting on Slashdot despite hating the place I doubt you're more welcome elsewhere either. So perhaps you should reflect on the only common factor for a change, try to see your self from other people's eyes and maybe, just maybe accept that you might actually be the one who's in the wrong and needs to change? It's painful, but so is eternal bitterness, and there is no government big enough to make other people like you, so those are your options.

I'll believe it when I (don't) see it.

As you're already aware, making a new platform is an extremely dicey proposition. The "fax machine" effect is huge. Do you really think Truth will give Trump the attention he needs and he'd actually resist the siren call of his old soapbox?

https://ancillary-proxy.atarimworker.io?url=https%3A%2F%2Ftwitter.com%2FRealSexyCy... points out -- rather selfish mentality. If you get the virus some other way, you are jus a walking virus fan.

One more positive interpretation is you can think of cases as a user-selectable customization and personalization!

I use a case, more with an eye out for scratches than for bending (which I've never seen as a problem) but also because silicone rubber feels great in the hand - on a big phone its pleasingly like a flat hockey puck - plus it's bright yellow to make the phone easier to find, and with a few stickers too because I'm a dork.

So thin phones have been "bragging rights" for manufacturers, and I think most phones out there are tough enough that you can "go commando" if you want. But by being so thin, it means when they ARE fully dressed in a case, they aren't unwieldy bulky....

Aye, laddie, you are trying to call out a "true scotsman" argument when you use weasel words like "mature markets", as in

> but as with the iPhone and iPad they've rarely managed to break 20% in mature markets

??? Like the US, which is a solid split, isn't a "mature" market?

Looking at https://ancillary-proxy.atarimworker.io?url=https%3A%2F%2Ffortunly.com%2Farticles%2F... , I see Apple at 12% of combined desktop/laptops. Like, over one in ten of every damn computer made? Yes, HP and Dell each make a lot more, but to try and pretend one in ten computers is trivial is just stupid. (You make it sound like its Linux or ChromeOS ~2% numbers)

I agree "Get a job that pays, then you can afford one as well." is a shitty as hell line - it's great that low cost phones and computers are available. But if Apple IS able to take ~50-80% of the profits in smartphones every quarter... you gotta figure they're doing something right. I mean even if you're hella cynical about the brand/prestige/sheeple aspect, you just don't have that kind of success unless you read as providing value. (And at scale. I can't figure out how "Bentley" is doing profit wise, I assume the over all amounts are too small to register on the charts I can find... am guessing much less than Toyota or VW or even small players like Mazda)

I think it is a point that Apple goes high end. Like trackpads etc in the $300-500 market are truly dreadful. Yes you can get many things done with a cheap ass PC, but Apple products provide good longevity and great build quality, and a GUI with a lot of great first party support, on a decent Unix-y base. Sitting in my little garden of work and personal Apple, my clipboard leaps from device to device, I can drop files on a whim, and use my iPad as a handy pen-on-screen tablet. It might not be for everyone, but is absolutely value for money.

Their way of providing for the low end of the market are older and/or used models. Particularly true for iPhones. But Macs have terrific longevity - my Air was still a decent main machine from 2013-2020, and while its retina replacement gave way to a larger screen 16" after a year, I expect this one will last me a long, long time.

Mac is a Unix-base (unlike Windows) with good first party support.
(I've been fooled trying to get used to the linux desktop before - MacOS has its quirks but Linux has a lot more rough edges)

Being able to seamlessly share a clipboard w/ my phone, iPad, and computer, or using an iPad as an extra screen or pen-on-screen tablet? It feels amazing, and a true reward for living within this walled garden.

It may not be the end all be all of OS but it has a good feel, good design, and a proper terminal shell.

(to be fair Apple probably gets a boost in perception for avoiding the "race to the bottom" of cheap ass PCs. Just the thought of trying to live with the trackpad of one of those $400-wonders makes me curl up! Like, I'm sure there are great quality hardware PCs out there but they're about as expensive as the Macs)