Apple more closed than Microsoft

[techbeck]

Please keep comments mature and appropriate. This post is not meant to start a flame war. :)

Thanks

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/12/04/ap...than_microsoft/

[Ricardo Gil]

First you post an article from El Reg, then you say it's not meant to start a flame war. What is it then? :p :rofl:

[techbeck]

First you post an article from El Reg, then you say it's not meant to start a flame war. What is it then? :p :rofl:

It was an article I thought was an interesting read and TheRegister is a reputable tech news site. Been around for a long time. I stated to keep our comments appropriate and mature because a lot of people like to get carried away in these type of discussions/debates.

:)

[Nomad_]

Apple more proprietary than Microsoft, survey finds

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13505_3-10113278-16.html

In the interest of finding an alternative to the Microsoft overlord, we may be rushing headlong into a new, even more proprietary overlord. Its name?

Apple.

According to a recent poll that The Register ran with its readers, 55 percent crown Apple as the King of Closed, while only 21 percent awarded that dubious distinction to Microsoft. Twenty-four percent think they're equally bad.

While I'm a big Apple fan, and like using it as the foundation for a wide range of open-source software that I happily run on my Mac, I can sympathize with the sentiments of The Register's developer audience:

[Neo003]

You're right apple is a closed company but in the end the company itself isn't the problem we consumer are the one. We put them on a pedestal and hope everything in fine and dandy, well it's not. We did that 13 years ago with Microsoft and I am sure we'll do the same did the same with apple.

[LTD]

Apple more proprietary than Microsoft, survey finds

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13505_3-10113278-16.html

In the interest of finding an alternative to the Microsoft overlord, we may be rushing headlong into a new, even more proprietary overlord. Its name?

Apple.

According to a recent poll that The Register ran with its readers, 55 percent crown Apple as the King of Closed, while only 21 percent awarded that dubious distinction to Microsoft. Twenty-four percent think they're equally bad.

While I'm a big Apple fan, and like using it as the foundation for a wide range of open-source software that I happily run on my Mac, I can sympathize with the sentiments of The Register's developer audience:

Been working fine so far. I could care less whether Apple is closed, open, or just ajar. As long as the software remains of high quality, that's all that matters to me.

Besides, it's Apple's policy to keep very tight control over their hardware and software. That's at least in part responsible for their success so far.

I have no complaints. If over time, this turns out for the worse, I have no problem jumping ship.

[Malisk]

So? If you're looking for an open system, look in the way of Linux? But then at least I also see the problems with trying to be completely open, and have had enough for now with messing around with semi-stable community developed drivers from reverse engineered stuff. An advantage with being closed that Apple has grown quite used to exploit to their advantage during the years is that you streamline the OS and reduce the complexity immensely by knowing what you develop the OS for. (for the end user, that often means less crashes and bugs) Microsoft don't know this, and neither do the Linux devs. And I'm personally quite sick of the problems that leads to... :p

[Chicane-UK Veteran]

Exactly. Linux exists for a reason.

Companies should know that their customers will only stand being pooped on so much. Microsoft used to completely and utterly own the OS space back in the days of Windows 98/2000.. back then Linux wasn't a massively viable alternative and there just were not that many Mac users. People obviously yearned for alternatives - the Linux market exploded and Apple just went from strength to strength. Microsoft have (hopefully) learned from their mistakes and Apple should have watched where Microsoft went wrong.

And ultimately Linux will always be there and will always be open. So if either MS or Apple get too big for their boots, there is always a viable way out.

[The_Decryptor Veteran]

The original article is fairly stupid (It seems half of the respondents haven't ever read any of the patch notes they're talking about).

Apple is more open than MS, in the software sense, in the API documentation sense they're about the same.

[Malisk]

The original article is fairly stupid (It seems half of the respondents haven't ever read any of the patch notes they're talking about).

Apple is more open than MS, in the software sense, in the API documentation sense they're about the same.

They're talking more about Apple tailoring their software or hardware and thus "closing" it from outside competition than about the pure software development aspect, but yes, development-wise, Apple is quite open. But yes, the comments to that article are just plain stupid. :s

[bobbba]

I think apple is extremely closed however, given their market share in terms of PC's and the fact that they are less business centric it has far less impact than MS.

Examples of this would include:

Windows mobile vs iphone

wma/wmv drm vs fairplay itunes drm

Many hardware vendors vs one

The whole idea of this article is flawed anyway as a survey is not going to reveal what the situation is, it's only going to show what people think it is which is frequently very different.