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In 2007, on the same day that Apple Computer founder Steve Jobs announced the company’s new mobile phone, the iPhone, he dropped the word “computer” from the company’s name. In this, as in so many other things, Jobs was a visionary.
Apple makes all kinds of great gadgets (designed by Apple in California and assembled in China), but it’s also made the company billions of dollars in profits, rising, rising, and on top of the world. It’s not laptops, desktops, or iPads, but iPhones. A valuation worth trillions of dollars with billions of iPhone sales.
Nothing is more important to Apple than the iPhone, and the iPhone is extremely tightly controlled by the company.
The Department of Justice and 16 states and the District of Columbia filed an antitrust lawsuit against Apple yesterday in response to tighter controls on the iPhone, the most expensive smartphone on the market. The lawsuit was filed in Newark, with New Jersey as the lead state, but the list of plaintiffs also includes the home states of California and New York.
Attorney General Merrick Garland said yesterday that the United States will only go to court if there is sufficient evidence and the United States typically wins. We don’t know if the government’s case is enough to prove its case and win, but it’s up to the Department of Justice to prove it.
Mr. Garland used yesterday’s announcement to quote directly from the complaint (page 39, paragraph 92). “In 2022, Apple’s CEO was asked if Apple would fix messaging from iPhone to Android.” The questioner replied, “It’s nothing personal, but you can’t send certain videos to your mom.” he added. Apple’s CEO replied, “Please buy your mom an iPhone.” ”
Garland did not name him, but the complaint names Tim Cook.
My mom’s Android had the same problem. Her Android smartphone worked fine for calls, emails, and text messages, but it wasn’t great for text messages sent to and from her iPhone, which is used by her children and grandchildren. . So we paid her extra money and gifted her her iPhone.
This is a good blue bubble (iPhone to iPhone) and bad green bubble (iPhone to Android) scenario and is why Apple set it up that way. Apple was intentionally going to downgrade the Android experience as an incentive to buy the iPhone.
Imagine if they did the same thing with phone sound quality, so iPhone to iPhone calls would sound clear to your ears, but iPhone to Android calls would sound scratchy and harsh. (We’re not trying to give Apple any ideas).
There’s nothing wrong with Apple making a great product and charging a premium price for it. But the federal government and states allege that Apple went too far in making it difficult or impossible for consumers to use competitors’ devices. For example, Apple Watch only works with iPhone. Again, this was Apple’s choice for him to lock out other machines.
Apple has a number of high-powered lawyers defending it, as does Google, which is also being sued for alleged illegal monopolistic practices. The same is true).
Bigger isn’t necessarily bad. However, a company’s overwhelming size is not allowed to be used to impose anticompetitive barriers to the market.
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