@froggie I still don't know what to make of these moves in context. Truly no corporation is more capable of drawing applause from a pittance than Apple, the pioneers of ROM chips that detect when they're being reused for repair and self-destruct, and who sold phones for 15yrs on a broken ethic of "privacy" that quickly earned the trust of the world, building a data empire that readily hands you over to states when it's not using your biometrics to set your health insurance premiums.
@froggie But who knows, maybe Apple is recognizing its shift out of being the "mobile device company" that Tim and Steve lamentably announced back in ~2010, instead into the *data company* it has clearly become today. I suppose that would be most evident if they started offering more affordable devices again, but easing off all the constantly screwing service customers is a first step. This would nullify any remaining threat of a Louis Rossmann, if he ever even presented one.
@froggie The latter, at least, if you'll take seriously the prognostications of salivating shareholders. There are plenty of others leveraging Apple's reputation to make similar incisions to your privacy right now. (like, I bet Credit Karma sells everything it can access, down to my tapstream data, to reporting agencies, and that's relatively benign!) https://www.forbes.com/sites/barrycollins/2022/10/18/apple-will-launch-health-insurance--in-2o24-says-analyst/?sh=11deb92162db