There is always a point in every Robin Hood film where Robin stops robbing the rich to feed the poor and doffs his hat to King Richard, stepping back and allowing the monarch to take his rightful place as “protector of the realm”. In a feudal system, the lord must prevail because the lord is the peasants' only true guarantee of peace.
I have had this in mind since Apple announced its response to the EU's Digital Markets Act. The rules Apple published are constructed precisely to make alternative methods of distributing apps both unattractive to customers and both toxic and unprofitable for developers. Tonally, it's also a big "fuck you I won't do what you tell me to" to the EU, one of the most bitter and resentful public statements I have seen. It reminds me of Bill Gates' sullen deposition to regulators when Microsoft was being investigated back in the 1990s – and we all know how that case ended up.
It amazes me how quickly successful, rich companies and people turn into sulky teenagers the moment even the most minor demand is made of them. Success, it seems, breeds little character of worth and encourages a kind of childishness which most people grow out of by the age of 21. Usually, I would expect that from Elon Musk or Donald Trump, but it seems Tim Cook has had a dose of it too.
Rich people gonna rich. But what amazes me more is how many cheerleaders they have. Now Apple has always had cheerleaders — lord knows, at times I've even been one of them — but the latest wave of online criticism of those of us who would very much like Apple to allow us to use the computers we bought in the way that suits us, rather than the way that suits Apple, strikes me as different. Louder. More vocal. More focused on the idea that not only is wanting this stupid, but that it's somehow a threat to other people's security.
And as we all know, when people feel their security is threatened, they act a little weird. Moral panics, and all that.
But then I remember another characteristic of feudalism: many people are most comfortable when there is a feudal lord to protect them and make decisions for them, and so vociferously attack when anyone suggests that, perhaps, the existing social order needs to change.
That's not simply because they long for the attention of the rich and powerful and see protecting them as a way to gain favour. Feudalism survived by ensuring that the peasants were always helpless, always in need of protection, and of course always threatened. The lord protected you from anarchy. Unable to imagine another world being possible, the peasant can only support the lords' right to rule because to do otherwise would mean either a more cruel lord, or dangerous lawlessness.
As we move into technofeudalism, where instead of owning technology we rent it, those old peasant instincts are resurfacing. There is a big, bad world out there of hackers, thieves, scammers, and other ne'er-do-wells, and only feudal lord Apple can protect us from it.
"But You have to protect people"
I have some sympathy for the argument that people require protecting. We still get, on a weekly basis, scam calls on our landline from people claiming to be from Microsoft, wanting to “sell” my now-departed in-laws protection for their PC. My father-in-law had dementia, used a computer, and managed to sign up to every kind of dubious data gathering exercise known to man. We are on many lists. I have become very used to calmly asking the person at the other end of the line whether their parents know they attempt to steal old, vulnerable peoples' savings for a living.
Having protections available is a good thing. Having them as the default on very widely used devices like smartphones is also a good thing. But having no ability to turn them off, no matter what? Not so good.
Having protections doesn't mean everyone has to use them. Those who want to opt-out should be able to do so. No one is suggesting that the App Store should be closed down, and anyone who wants to be protected by Apple should be able to carry on.
But then there's the protection argument again. If it can be turned off, the argument goes, then bad people will persuade the vulnerable to do just that.
All of which is a good argument for “parental control” systems, which allow the vulnerable to be protected by someone they know, but not a good argument unless you believe that everyone out there is stupid and needs feudal lord Apple to protect them.
Ah.
I'm not going to link to the original post or put a name on it because I know the person who wrote it means well, and they are by no means the only one making much the same argument:
I get what you’re saying and that’s fine for nerds, but the average punter isn’t able to decide that, is terrified of tech, and doesn’t even know what software is. They are the sorts of people who will tell you their password if you tell them it’s for a survey The result of them making such decisions is very predictably going to be like hyenas around a corpse
I fundamentally disagree with this view, which I find exceptionally patronising towards ordinary people, bordering on misanthropic. Back when the iPad was launched, Cory Doctorow wrote eloquently about why he wouldn't be buying one:
But with the iPad, it seems like Apple's model customer is that same stupid stereotype of a technophobic, timid, scatterbrained mother as appears in a billion renditions of "that's too complicated for my mom" (listen to the pundits extol the virtues of the iPad and time how long it takes for them to explain that here, finally, is something that isn't too complicated for their poor old mothers).
Unfortunately, it looks that Apple has been very successful in persuading people that not only is "your mom" too stupid to understand what software is, they've persuaded a lot of them that the non-existent "mom" is actually the majority of people.
But this is also a view of human relationships to technology which is self-perpetuating: if you never bother to teach people how to do something, such as protecting themselves against scams, unsurprisingly they never become particularly good at doing it. Likewise, if you never let your children play outside, guess what happens?
Learned helplessness is a thing, and it always benefits the most powerful.
And, as Dan Moren points out, Apple's dire warnings of terrible consequences should you be foolish enough to allow an application to be installed from any other source than the App Store are pretty hilarious when you consider that they are implementing the same system of notarisation which keeps Mac apps free of malware. Evidently, Apple believes that someone who spends £1000 on a computer is significantly more tech-savvy and able to look after themselves than someone who spends £1100 on a smartphone.
Unless, of course, ultimately Apple believes it's for the best if Macs are as locked down as iOS.
Hmm.
20/20 Hindsight is 20/20
In retrospect, Dan Gillmor was right:
A few months ago, when Apple introduced its iPad Pro, a large tablet with a keyboard, CEO Tim Cook called it the “clearest expression of our vision of the future of personal computing.” That was an uh-oh moment for me. Among other things, in the iOS ecosystem users are obliged to get all their software from Apple’s store, and developers are obliged to sell it in the company store. This may be Apple’s definition of personal computing, but it’s not mine.
At the time, I shrugged off Dan's arguments. Wasn't there room for a powerful computer, but incredibly easy to use? Where there was never going to be a worry about malware? I think I saw the iPad as just a tiny step on from the Mac: the real computer for the rest of us.
I was wrong. Dan was right. As was Cory Doctorow in 2006. As was Mark Pilgrim the same year.
Apple isn't a bunch of evil geniuses wanting to rule the world. Ultimately, Apple is driven by the same forces as every public company: the demand from “the market” for continual growth. As anyone with a passing interesting in compound growth will tell you, that becomes significantly harder as a company gets bigger. For Apple, 10% revenue growth in 2004 meant adding just $800 million. By 2014, that required an additional $18 billion. In 2024, that will require $38 billion.
There are no more devices as big as the iPhone to be launched, no more hardware markets worth tens of billions of dollars which Apple can magic into existence to keep their share price growing (and no, Apple Vision Pro is not it). So the only way of keeping that revenue growth rolling is to squeeze more from customers, and to ensure that not one cent of current revenue slips from the feudal lord's fingers. And that includes the tens of billions of dollars of revenue it makes from the App Store.
The only way for Apple to keep growing is to not only retain the control — and thus revenue — it has, but to tighten the screws and get more control. To ensure you can't buy an iPhone without also paying them a monthly tithe for storing photos. To ensure that no application gets sold without Apple getting a cut. The role of the feudal lord is one that Apple is choosing to play because it makes more money that way.
Turning points…
I have never been one to entirely excuse Apple its control-freakery, but I've also respected them and liked the products they make. I'm started writing this on an M2 MacBook Air, and it's the best laptop I have ever owned in many ways, not least the battery life. Without Apple's determination to do its own thing, to "own the whole widget" as Steve Jobs would have said, that battery life wouldn't be possible.
But: the Mac model of (relative) openness is not the one which Apple has chosen to pursue. Instead, its focus is on keeping things closed, reducing developers to digital serfs paying a tithe to the feudal lord whose land they are allowed to plough. And of course, ensuring that its customers, who pay a handsome margin to the company simply to buy its products, cannot choose what they do with those expensive devices.
Just as the release of the iPad Pro was a turning point for Dan Gillmor, Apple's response to the Digital Services Act feels like one for me.
I started writing this on the MacBook Air, but I'm finishing it on a ThinkPad X1 Carbon running Fedora 39 Linux. I'm using the same tools to write on both: Obsidian, configured just how I like it, even down to using LanguageTool to proof it.
The MacBook Air will almost certainly be the last Apple product I buy. When the time comes to replace my iPhone, maybe towards the back end of this year, I'll look for something I can install a de-Googled version of Android on.
I've been playing with a Pixel 6 running Graphene, which even lets you install Google's apps on it, but restricts them and prevents them from doing the full range of spying on you. I like that idea: taking a dangerous but handsome animal, and ensuring you can admire its beauty while stopping it biting you.
Perhaps one day Apple might let me do the same with the device I paid them a thousand pounds for. But I'm not going to hold my breath.
And no, I am not switching fealty from the Apple feudal lord to the Google one. I love this, from Dave Megginson:
When Apple fleeced and Google spied,
Where, then, should our loyalty lie?
The answer to that is simple: to people. Not to feudal lords, no matter what colour their flag.
