Here's a statement of the obvious: The opinions expressed here are those of the participants, not those of the Mutual Fund Observer. We cannot vouch for the accuracy or appropriateness of any of it, though we do encourage civility and good humor.
I am beginning to remind myself of the average American. I don't like "American Big-Money way !" but I do love, so much, my Apple Watch 10 and don't know how I ever lived without it. Yep, just ole me, the dirty American.
I still use their products (b/c I avoid Windows like the plague) but I am nowhere the Apple fan I was 5, 10, 15, or 30 years ago, that's for sure. Their QA has slipped noticeably in recent years and they're engaging in dirty tricks to keep their walled garden monopoly -- as the Epic case illustrates. But while I use their hardware, much of my data (files, contacts, calendars, email) are portable and/or used on other services b/c I refuse to be completely locked in.
Their knowingly false advertising about (so-called) 'Apple Intelligence' last year was another example of them misleading people by offering them hopium in their quest to drive iPhone sales during their annual release cycle.
(No, I did NOT intend for my post turn this thread into a general Apple-bashing thread.....)
I haven't bought any Apple products in 15 years. I got tired of Apple deciding that I needed to update, being that I continued (and still use) old products that still work. Apple's policy was to "update" your product, and make it so it doesn't work like it used to. And, to top it off, you couldn't undo the update. Plus, the older products I have still work, but the Mac Mini I had didn't last long. The ipod touch 3G I have still works, and so does an ipad 2, but the ipod 4 has all of the buttons frozen. Don't miss their products.
I'm currently married to a MacBook Air. It's been freezing on me, rarely. An initial update blacked-out my screen. Additional updates, which I initiated with trepidation, worked. I definitely do not like the way that Apple wants to own me and every function I might need. I don't use their Safari. My emails are not from Apple. Don't look at Apple news. Still use a flip-phone from Consumer Cellular. T-Mobile was full of promises about correcting the junk that was wrong on their phone. Even the replacement phone did not work. T-Mobile could not hit water if they fell out of a fucking boat.
I tried switching from my iPhone to a Google Pixel a few years back.
I lasted one day. Returned the Pixel and sped to the Apple Store begging them for a new iPhone ... and to be let back in the family. Damn the cost. Slave for life.
The iOS vs Android choice turns out to be one of the most important decisions you will ever make.
At Charles. I am a very price conscious consumer. Once I got my first i phone I have never looked back. Same with my i pad. And great support from Apple.
I tried switching from my iPhone to a Google Pixel a few years back.
I lasted one day. Returned the Pixel and sped to the Apple Store begging them for a new iPhone ... and to be let back in the family. Damn the cost. Slave for life.
The iOS vs Android choice turns out to be one of the most important decisions you will ever make.
GrapheneOS can be installed on Pixel devices for enhanced privacy/security.
"GrapheneOS is a private and secure mobile operating system with great functionality and usability. It starts from the strong baseline of the Android Open Source Project (AOSP) and takes great care to avoid increasing attack surface or hurting the strong security model. GrapheneOS makes substantial improvements to both privacy and security through many carefully designed features built to function against real adversaries. The project cares a lot about usability and app compatibility so those are taken into account for all of our features."
"GrapheneOS is focused on substance rather than branding and marketing. It doesn't take the typical approach of piling on a bunch of insecure features depending on the adversaries not knowing about them and regressing actual privacy/security. It's a very technical project building privacy and security into the OS rather than including assorted unhelpful frills or bundling subjective third party apps choices."
Nothing but Apple here for 25 years. Never a serious problem. One hack into my DejaOffice App years ago. I learned from that to conceal passwords and not store them so conspicuously they could be stolen.
Years ago before I understood how to “clean” an ipad when through with it I attempted to smash an old one up in the driveway using a 10-12 lb long-handled sledge hammer. Impossible to destroy. It cracked, shattered and wrinkled but refused to break apart.
IPads galore. Use my 5 year old MacBook so seldom it seems unfamiliar and awkward. Best for some applications like preparing taxes or selecting theater seats. Used it to update an old Garmin recently.
What I started to say is that considering all the things that could go wrong with a device I feel pretty fortunate to have had such good luck with Apple. For subscriptions you’re generally better off dealing thru Apple, though I realize they skim profits from providers. So easy to start or cancel, whereas many providers make cancelling difficult.
Unix, windows, android until 2 phones ago... I have been assimilated. (still use windows, only use ipad when traveling) My kids have iPhone and iPad but it seems iPhone is used 99.99999% of the time for everything.
KaiOS for me - just a flip phone. $2/year (T-Mobile legacy plan) to keep the line active, 10¢ per min or text, prepaid. I've got about $100 prepaid which should last me a lifetime.
My SO was gifted a high end iPad several years ago. The front of the frame has begun to separate from the body. Taped it for now. Went to an Apple store, figuring that they would best know how to repair it. Their solution? Buy and upgraded iPad. Planned obsolescence on expensive hardware? No thank you. Not getting locked into that.
exclusively linux for personal use since 2014, would never return to mac nor windows.
irl preferred post-covid vaccine, so have been a voice\text minimalist. android obs is annoying, but have not plunged into an android for open source swap.
Apple is the only company I ever banned. This is based on 1) Steve Jobs mistreated his employees, co-workers, and family members. When Steve Jobs fired an employee, he would call other companies and tell them not to hire this person and lie about how bad this employee was, pretty vicious in my book. 2) It was Jobs's decision to charge ridiculous prices for a very high profit and Apple continues to practice it. 3) Apple doesn't offer cheaper prices, because they don't have to; their customers are a cult. 4) Apple makes it a lot more difficult to get out of its environment. I know Apple has great products, but I don't have to participate in that.
Decades ago, the Apple laptop was about 4 times as expensive as a PC. Yes, I know it had fewer problems, but not anymore for many years. In over 20 years and using several PCs, my wife and I had only one virus, which I fixed in 5 minutes. Apple phones are great, but we have been using Moto phones for decades at about 20% of the cost of Apple. Now we use a refurbished Pixel. Sure, Apple is better, but I'm not going to pay 4-5 times more when Pixel is excellent. I would not buy an expensive Samsung either, but at least they offer much cheaper phones. A couple of years ago, I bought a refurbished business laptop for just $250K. Thinkpad with 16GB RAM, Windows 11 pro, and SSD=250 GB. This PC should be good for 95% of users. Two weeks later I bought a refurbished Pixel 6A for $170 and both are great. There is no reason to pay 3-4-5 times and get only 20% more, and I have plenty of money. BTW, the service advisors at Kia and Hyundai told me that 90+% of the complaints about phone-to-vehicle services are about Apple phones.
My tracker watch costs $27.99 and it does most of the stuff Apple Tracker does that costs $300-400. I keep replacing it every couple of years.
My current earbuds are another example: I paid just $11, half the price at Amazon. I have been using them for over a year. They are fantastic.
To get the top 5-10% of electronics, you will pay 3-5-10 times more. Remember, in 2-3 years, technology advances, so why pay so much more instead of replacing cheap electronics with a new one?
But, Apple has many obsessed/loyal customers, especially in the USA but not in the biggest growth markets of China and India.
despite having lived in california, i ran\run into a lot of apple cultists unable anymore, or too lazy, to learn how to use a different system. china seems to be an exception where the majority rapidly switch to any (allowed) tech deemed superior. local prices also help.
I’ll stick with Apple. Very happy with their infrastructure and durability of their products. Sometimes I save by buying used or refurbished. A 3 or 4 year old iphone is fine for my needs at perhaps half the cost of brand new. We had Apple 2es when they first came out where I worked. And I bought one for at home. A big improvement over my Vic 20 at the time.
Apple products are expensive but generally okay if not frustrating for power users like me. However I don't trust their cloud architecture farther than I could throw it and it'll take a lot to convince me that it's reliable enough. I especially don't like how their cloud is extra-proprietary and levered to their hardware ecosystem.
When I retire and likely won't care about things like interoperability, data portability, and flexibility, I'll probably be happy to go all-in on Apple just for simplicity's sake.
As an Apple shareholder I demand that they lie under oath, delete evidence by random fires, hard drives crashes and weekly purges of hard drives. In addition, they must conduct all important business on Signal by joining the drunk guys chat group. Sorry your honor, all evidence is of national importance and can’t be shared with the court.
I mean why not? It’s amazing that Judge has no power to sanction the guys lying under oath. Why can’t Judge jail executives for contempt? All the Judge can do is refer it Justice Department, who has fired many lawyers and closed all corporate investigations. People are saying that half the lawyers in the Justice Department iare working on suing Harvard for not bowing to them.
Comments
Their knowingly false advertising about (so-called) 'Apple Intelligence' last year was another example of them misleading people by offering them hopium in their quest to drive iPhone sales during their annual release cycle.
(No, I did NOT intend for my post turn this thread into a general Apple-bashing thread.....)
I lasted one day. Returned the Pixel and sped to the Apple Store begging them for a new iPhone ... and to be let back in the family. Damn the cost. Slave for life.
The iOS vs Android choice turns out to be one of the most important decisions you will ever make.
I know.
"GrapheneOS is a private and secure mobile operating system with great functionality and usability. It starts from the strong baseline of the Android Open Source Project (AOSP) and takes great care to avoid increasing attack surface or hurting the strong security model. GrapheneOS makes substantial improvements to both privacy and security through many carefully designed features built to function against real adversaries. The project cares a lot about usability and app compatibility so those are taken into account for all of our features."
"GrapheneOS is focused on substance rather than branding and marketing. It doesn't take the typical approach of piling on a bunch of insecure features depending on the adversaries not knowing about them and regressing actual privacy/security. It's a very technical project building privacy and security into the OS rather than including assorted unhelpful frills or bundling subjective third party apps choices."
https://grapheneos.org/features
Years ago before I understood how to “clean” an ipad when through with it I attempted to smash an old one up in the driveway using a 10-12 lb long-handled sledge hammer. Impossible to destroy. It cracked, shattered and wrinkled but refused to break apart.
IPads galore. Use my 5 year old MacBook so seldom it seems unfamiliar and awkward. Best for some applications like preparing taxes or selecting theater seats. Used it to update an old Garmin recently.
What I started to say is that considering all the things that could go wrong with a device I feel pretty fortunate to have had such good luck with Apple. For subscriptions you’re generally better off dealing thru Apple, though I realize they skim profits from providers. So easy to start or cancel, whereas many providers make cancelling difficult.
My SO was gifted a high end iPad several years ago. The front of the frame has begun to separate from the body. Taped it for now. Went to an Apple store, figuring that they would best know how to repair it. Their solution? Buy and upgraded iPad. Planned obsolescence on expensive hardware? No thank you. Not getting locked into that.
irl preferred post-covid vaccine, so have been a voice\text minimalist. android obs is annoying, but have not plunged into an android for open source swap.
1) Steve Jobs mistreated his employees, co-workers, and family members. When Steve Jobs fired an employee, he would call other companies and tell them not to hire this person and lie about how bad this employee was, pretty vicious in my book.
2) It was Jobs's decision to charge ridiculous prices for a very high profit and Apple continues to practice it.
3) Apple doesn't offer cheaper prices, because they don't have to; their customers are a cult.
4) Apple makes it a lot more difficult to get out of its environment.
I know Apple has great products, but I don't have to participate in that.
Decades ago, the Apple laptop was about 4 times as expensive as a PC. Yes, I know it had fewer problems, but not anymore for many years. In over 20 years and using several PCs, my wife and I had only one virus, which I fixed in 5 minutes.
Apple phones are great, but we have been using Moto phones for decades at about 20% of the cost of Apple. Now we use a refurbished Pixel.
Sure, Apple is better, but I'm not going to pay 4-5 times more when Pixel is excellent.
I would not buy an expensive Samsung either, but at least they offer much cheaper phones.
A couple of years ago, I bought a refurbished business laptop for just $250K. Thinkpad with 16GB RAM, Windows 11 pro, and SSD=250 GB. This PC should be good for 95% of users.
Two weeks later I bought a refurbished Pixel 6A for $170 and both are great.
There is no reason to pay 3-4-5 times and get only 20% more, and I have plenty of money.
BTW, the service advisors at Kia and Hyundai told me that 90+% of the complaints about phone-to-vehicle services are about Apple phones.
My tracker watch costs $27.99 and it does most of the stuff Apple Tracker does that costs $300-400.
I keep replacing it every couple of years.
My current earbuds are another example: I paid just $11, half the price at Amazon. I have been using them for over a year. They are fantastic.
To get the top 5-10% of electronics, you will pay 3-5-10 times more. Remember, in 2-3 years, technology advances, so why pay so much more instead of replacing cheap electronics with a new one?
But, Apple has many obsessed/loyal customers, especially in the USA but not in the biggest growth markets of China and India.
Where else that manufactures consumer electronics for low cost?
despite having lived in california, i ran\run into a lot of apple cultists unable anymore, or too lazy, to learn how to use a different system.
china seems to be an exception where the majority rapidly switch to any (allowed) tech deemed superior. local prices also help.
https://www.amazon.com/Lenovo-ThinkPad-T480-14-Laptop/dp/B091B8GVVV/ref=asc_df_B091B8GVVV?mcid=e7eea0eaab763e0697a9517829524284&hvocijid=14606640136559253452-B091B8GVVV-&hvexpln=73&hvadid=721245378154&hvpos=&hvnetw=g&hvrand=14606640136559253452&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=&hvdev=c&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=9010799&hvtargid=pla-2281435177898
You can also buy a bigger SSD=512 for just $216.
=============
Pixel 6A at $153, see
https://www.amazon.com/Google-Pixel-6a-Version-Charcoal/dp/B0B9JVZQTH/ref=sr_1_1?sr=8-1
And him bein' so damn smart and all. Go figure...
I’ll stick with Apple. Very happy with their infrastructure and durability of their products. Sometimes I save by buying used or refurbished. A 3 or 4 year old iphone is fine for my needs at perhaps half the cost of brand new. We had Apple 2es when they first came out where I worked. And I bought one for at home. A big improvement over my Vic 20 at the time.
I'll run Linux before I run Windows again.
Apple products are expensive but generally okay if not frustrating for power users like me. However I don't trust their cloud architecture farther than I could throw it and it'll take a lot to convince me that it's reliable enough. I especially don't like how their cloud is extra-proprietary and levered to their hardware ecosystem.
When I retire and likely won't care about things like interoperability, data portability, and flexibility, I'll probably be happy to go all-in on Apple just for simplicity's sake.
I just wanted to supply the information if someone wants to use it
I mean why not? It’s amazing that Judge has no power to sanction the guys lying under oath. Why can’t Judge jail executives for contempt? All the Judge can do is refer it Justice Department, who has fired many lawyers and closed all corporate investigations. People are saying that half the lawyers in the Justice Department iare working on suing Harvard for not bowing to them.