"he amassed his fortune through monopolistic practices "
Big fucking deal, welcome to business. Jobs/Apple would/is doing the same thing every chance they have. When Jobs starts to spend his billions for charity (yes Steve you will be obligated some day) are we going to complain because he threw his weight around ala MS in the industries Apple dominated? No, we'll hopefully be able to thank him for his huge gift to humanity just like we should be doing to Gates right now. I'm sorry but whether or not Flash is allowed on the iPhone doesn't mean a a whole lot in the grand scheme of things.
When you're saving lives around the world by the millions suddenly what browser shipped with your OS back in the 90's looks like a whole lot less important.
This is the kind of reasoning that rationalizes all sorts of terrible behaviour after the fact. If saving lives around the world is that important, instead of stealing his fortune through illegal business practices, Gates should have simply established his foundation back in the day and told people that by choosing Windows they were helping to save lives.
p.s. Apple has been investigated for improper options grants. That is a far cry from breaking monopoly rules.
What Apple is doing with their App store policies is far worse than packaging IE with windows or using proprietary .doc format by default for word files.
It would be hard for Apple to reach market shares as great as MS, if they do you will see them hit equally hard for breaking monopoly rules.
The thing people forget is that Apple is not a monopoly in the smartphone market, not by a long shot. Hence you cannot apply the same anti-competitive reasoning. Sure, what they do sucks for the people who have adopted their platform (both users and developers), but it's not anti-competitive (if it was, Android would be dead in the water). If you want an analogy, Apple's pissing in their own walled garden which is surrounded by a nice big open field (Android). You are always free to leave the garden through the big open gate (well, excepting the contract termination fees, but those aren't due to Apple). In contrast, Microsoft was equivalent to a feudal lord who owns the right of commerce over the local market (MSDOS) and comes by and destroys your little shop (Dr. DOS). OK, that last analogy is a little strained.
>It would be hard for Apple to reach market shares as great as MS, if they do you will see them hit equally hard for breaking monopoly rules.
By which you mean, not at all (US government dropped the ball on the case against Microsoft)..
EU didn't. Microsoft had to add the stupid browser select screen. Support odf in Office. And do a lot more documentation work on all their API that few people outside Microsoft use. Plus the fines. And while Microsoft was dealing saving its arse err... Windows and Office, they dropped the ball in the online and mobile markets
Big fucking deal, welcome to business. Jobs/Apple would/is doing the same thing every chance they have. When Jobs starts to spend his billions for charity (yes Steve you will be obligated some day) are we going to complain because he threw his weight around ala MS in the industries Apple dominated? No, we'll hopefully be able to thank him for his huge gift to humanity just like we should be doing to Gates right now. I'm sorry but whether or not Flash is allowed on the iPhone doesn't mean a a whole lot in the grand scheme of things.
When you're saving lives around the world by the millions suddenly what browser shipped with your OS back in the 90's looks like a whole lot less important.