7 mo. ago • 80%

Elizabeth Warren slammed for wanting to ‘break up Apple’s smartphone monopoly’

www.bostonherald.com Elizabeth Warren slammed for wanting to ‘break up Apple’s smartphone monopoly’

U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren says she’s not a fan of “green texts on iPhones” and that it’s “time to break up Apple’s smartphone monopoly,” but statistics show the tech giant doesn’t have exclusive c…

74 comments

I'm getting really tired of the word slammed, maybe writers need to pick up a thesaurus (it's a dinosaur that knows a lot of words).

290
- I quite like it because you can spot shitty journalism from a mile away and not click the link
  
  102
  
  But you just did...
  
  -43
- I studied news journalism in college and they kinda hammered in that in news journalism it's more important to communicate information consistently and to target a wide audience than it is to make "good writing."
  
  There are style guides you have to follow and words like "slammed" end up getting used a lot despite not quite being accurate because they're words that are used a lot.
  
  The other thing is that usually the person writing the headlines isn't the journalist.. and sometimes they do a lot of versions of the same headline and when people click more because of the word slammed it ends up sticking.
  
  49
  
  Your comment perfectly encapsulates one of the central contradictions in modern journalism. You explain the style guide, and the need to communicate information in a consistent way, but then explain that the style guide is itself guided by business interests, not by some search for truth, clarity, or meaning.
  
  I've been a long time reader of FAIR.org and i highly recommend them to anyone in this thread who can tell that something is up with journalism but has never done a dive into what exactly it is. Modern journalism has a very clear ideology (in the sorta zizek sense, not claiming that the journalists do it nefariously). Once you learn to see it, it's everywhere
  
  26
  
  So they use the word often, because its often used by them? Pretty ass backwards, but also makes sense for sensationalist "journalism"
  
  5
  
  How hard is it to ban the word slammed in your style guide? Excuses are the nails to build a house of failure.
  
  2
- Boston Herald Slammed On Lemmy By ChihuahuaOfDoom For Its Verbal Tone
  
  20
- Angry reader slammed article due to a word in its title - you might be surprised to find out which
  
  15
  
  Journalists hate this one secret
  
  4
- the journalist version*thersaurus hyperbolus * is a much lighter animal.
  
  8
- Slammed...
  
  5
- "waffle stomped"
  
  4
o shit she was slammed???

slammmmmed

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- Every time I read SLAMMED in an headline, my brain damage grows exponentially worse. I can't keep taking these kind of blows..
  
  20
- Some say the slam was so hard the shockwaves were felt on the other side of the globe.
  
  10
  
  The slammer was thrown down so hard the pogs just went fucking everywhere.
  
  3
S L A M M E D

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- Absolutely fucking STOMPED ON
  
  13
  
  ELIZABETH WARREN OUT HERE GETTING CRUSHED LIKE TURTS
  
  4
- COME ON AND SLAM
  
  11
It‘s a duopoly and I doubt the US will tackle this problem. At least the EU has started doing something about it.

58
- Some nuance to that. The software platform is a duopoly, the hardware is not.
  
  Not that it matters too much, because anticompetitive practices don't need a 100% or even a 50% market share.
  
  33
  
  and even then, Android is mostly open source.
  I've personally updated the kernel to my Amazon Fire tablet (and believe me, the 3.18 branch doesn't contain as many security backports as they'd have you believe)
  
  8
  
  Correct. But hardware is not the problem here, I‘d say.
  
  2
- US won't tackle it because it's a hegemon and in mercantilist terms benefits from it.
  
  The EU and everybody else are, in fact, interested in changing this.
  
  But - if nobody remembers, there was a certain TRON Project in Japan. Read up how it ended. Now, US threatening Japan with trade sanctions to preserve some oligopoly and US threatening EU with trade sanctions with the same goal are two different things, the latter is harder.
  
  EDIT: And I don't want this to rub someone in a wrong way, but this is a rare case where something possibly called "states' rights" could have made sense. If the federal government was stripped of ability to do such things.
  
  9
  
  You‘re right. That‘s why we need a strong EU and multilateral partnerships to counter US and Chinese ambitions.
  
  10
"Unprecedented" and "Slammed"

I read those two words in any article and I'm immediately second guessing my will to read more.

37
- At least it didn't say "game-changer"... the worst of them all.
  
  5
  
  Now that's really a game changer of a comment!
  
  3
Article text if you can't be bothered getting around the subscription popup.

--

U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren says she’s not a fan of “green texts on iPhones” and that it’s “time to break up Apple’s smartphone monopoly,” but statistics show the tech giant doesn’t have exclusive control over the market.

The Department of Justice announced a sweeping antitrust lawsuit against Apple in March, accusing the California-based company of engineering an illegal monopoly in smartphones that boxes out competitors, stifles innovation and keeps prices artificially high.

Warren took to social media this week, displaying her support for the suit that takes aim at how Apple allegedly molds its technology and business relationships to “extract more money from consumers, developers, content creators, artists, publishers, small businesses, and merchants, among others.”

Warren specifically called out how people who don’t have iPhones are blocked from sending blue iMessages as messages from Androids and other devices are green. Those without iPhones also face other restrictions, the Massachusetts senator added.

“Green texts on iPhones, they’re ruining relationships. That’s right,” Warren said in a video posted on X Thursday. “Non-iPhone users everywhere are being excluded from group texts. From sports teams chats to birthday chats to vacation plan chats, they’re getting cut out.”

“And who’s to blame here? Apple,” she continued . “That’s just one of the dirty tactics that Apple uses to keep a stranglehold on the smartphone market. … It’s time to break up Apple’s monopoly now.”

Critics quickly called Warren out for spreading misinformation and for focusing on what they believe is a non-issue.

“It would be nice if Android users could use iMessage features,” an X user responded, “but why would anyone think this sort of micromanaging of businesses is the legitimate role of the government?”

An alert attached to Warren’s post shows context that readers added and “thought people might want to know.” It includes data from Statista highlighting how the iPhone had a 57% market share compared to Android’s 42% in North America, as of January.

The alert, which was removed as of Friday evening, also contained information from Investopedia around how a “monopoly is exclusive control, or no close substitutes. The current market share of iPhone v Android does not meet that definition.”

Attorneys general from 16 states filed the lawsuit with the Department of Justice in federal court in New Jersey. Massachusetts AG Andrea Campbell did not sign onto the suit which seeks to stop Apple from undermining technologies that compete with its own apps — in areas including streaming, messaging and digital payments.

The suit is the latest example of aggressive antitrust enforcement by an administration that has also taken on Google, Amazon and other tech giants with the stated aim of making the digital universe more fair, innovative and competitive.

“If left unchallenged, Apple will only continue to strengthen its smartphone monopoly,” Attorney General Merrick B. Garland said in a statement last month. “The Justice Department will vigorously enforce antitrust laws that protect consumers from higher prices and fewer choices.”

Apple has called the suit “wrong on the facts and the law” and said it “will vigorously defend against it.”

If successful, the lawsuit would “hinder our ability to create the kind of technology people expect from Apple — where hardware, software, and services intersect” and would “set a dangerous precedent, empowering the government to take a heavy hand in designing people’s technology,” the company said in a statement last month.

27
- Actually that's the case where she, being incompetent, found the right point to press.
  
  She literally attacks the use of network effect to preserve oligopoly. Not knowing that.
  
  And yeah, there is deniability for Apple in the sense that "this isn't intentional, normies are just creating these ape social dynamics all by themselves", but their ads etc have pretty consistent emotional messages. Yes, they do endorse it.
  
  And they couldn't refrain from their usual bullshit even in the answer to this.
  
  11
  
  Blue texts are sent using proprietary encryption. Green texts are standard SMS/MMS protocol. Apple has pressed GSM to include encrypted RCS for SMS/MMS. The government is not a fan. She can be upset, but there’s no reason for Apple to give away proprietary encryption software or foot the server cost for transmission.
  
  1
- Thing is with the iMessage argument is nobody is forced to use it. If green bubbles really are “ruining relationships” wouldn’t Americans be installing WhatsApp or another messenger like the rest of the world?
  
  There are plenty of good reasons to criticise Apple’s behaviour. But I’m not convinced the popularity of iMessage is one of them.
  
  -5
  
  How will you move to WhatsApp if everyone else uses iMessage? Europe has the same issue, but reversed. Everyone uses WhatsApp and can't jump to Signal/Telegram because they're not as popular.
  
  26
If I read someone getting slammed in a headline I instantly lose all interest

22
- That's how The Herald rolls, it has long been the most sensationalistic Boston newspaper.
  
  6
Here's a link to anyone who wants to know why apple is considered a monopoly Is Apple an illegal monopoly?

20
- Here is an alternative Piped link(s):
  
  Is Apple an illegal monopoly?
  
  Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
  
  I'm open-source; check me out at GitHub.
  
  6
gonna SLAM this writer

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Slammed and thrown off a cage through the announcer table...🙄

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If you use slammed in your headline I already know it's going to be the most garbage bullshit I've ever read. I went delve into it.

5
The originality in these comments. Thought I was at bot city.

4
Angry reader slammed article due to a word in its title - you might surprised to find out which

3
Well the article title sucks, but also it's not a monopoly so idk what she's bitching about.

3
I didn't know Apple was a monopoly...

They are absolute dicks with iMessage, but they are not a monopoly.

I am an iPhone user, and I don't get why people look down on the green bubbles, I have several friends with Android phones, we can all send images and texts to eachother, sure the photos are reduced in size, but it's fine.

Just implement the new message standard, Apple and stop being dicks

-11
- You kinda walked that back by yourself, I think. The point of anticompetitive practices isn't having a 100% market share, it's having a position of strength to enforce your control of the market.
  
  So... you know, being dicks.
  
  Enforcing a single form of in-platform commerce where you get a share and banning all other ways to sell or install software, downgrading the quality of media generated by your competitors, bundling your own unrelated software and adding roadblocks to competing alternatives... all of that is part of what's being discussed here.
  
  25
  
  The point is that there is a resonable alternative in Android, no one is forcing you to buy an iPhone, nor is the market lacking in available alternatives.
  
  Yes, Apple are dicks, but they don't have a monopoly.
  
  1
- They haven't implemented RCS because it's a dumpster fire with no redeeming qualities.
  
  "RCS" only works on Android because Google did a bunch of their own shit outside the spec to make it remotely functional. They're trying to use legislature to bully their way into controlling the standard by forcing Apple to use it.
  
  -5
  
  Yup, and pretending otherwise is just head burying
  
  3
  
  Google Messages is to RCS what WhatsApp is to XMPP.
  
  And Apple is going to be no different as they deal with Google and plug into their system.
  
  2
  
  Well, it partialy works, but it just uses google's servers and there isn't any alternative apps for it.
  
  2
  
  I'm so surprised by the way this has gone in the US. The weird ass blend of SMS and messaging iMessage uses for no reason and the fact that it's sorta-kinda platform exclusive but not really is just an absolute mess of dumb engineering.
  
  The fact that RCS is even part of this conversation seems so weird. Surely the real answer is for iMessage to just... have an Android port that works like the iOS port, right? That's how every other messaging app does it. I mean, sure, over here in Androidland where everybody uses Whatsapp (which has its own issues), RCS is a thing. If you open your text messaging app for some reason there is a Google prompt to switch it to RCS as a one-time optional choice. I just... never bothered. Because who the hell uses either SMS or RCS anyway?
  
  Would I switch to iMessage if there was an Android port? No. Because everybody I've ever known with an iPhone uses Whatsapp, so that'd be as useful as switching to carrier pigeons. But it's worth pointing out that the only reason the EU hasn't forced interoperability for iMessage is exactly that. If it hadn't already lost the messenger app wars in Europe they would have been forced to sort this out one way or another.
  
  -1
I own a Samsung... So.

-16
What monopoly?

Users have choice. If they want an open system, choose android. If they want a closed system, choose Apple.

What’s the fuckin problem. Let’s deal with real issues, not this bullshit.

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