Cory Doctorow
Cory Doctorow  ·  last month

Content Warning

Every artist, performer and creator on Patreon is about to get screwed out of 30% of their gross revenue, which will be diverted to Apple, the most valuable company on the planet. Apple contributes nothing to their work, but it will get to steal a third of their wages:

https://news.patreon.com/articles/understanding-apple-requirements-for-patreon

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If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this thread to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/08/15/private-law/#thirty-percent-vig

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A Vaudeville dancer on an old-fashioned stage, caught mid-dance-step, standing in front of a Patreon logo.. His pockets bulge with cash. He has been decapitated and blood fountains from the stump of his neck. His decapitated, bloody head lies in a pool of blood on the stage next to him. Over the stump of his neck is an original six-color Apple logo, modified so that the 'bite' is actually a bloody, fang-filled mouth. The scene is surmounted by the Apple 'Think different' wordmark.
A Vaudeville dancer on an old-fashioned stage, caught mid-dance-step, standing in front of a Patreon logo.. His pockets bulge with cash. He has been decapitated and blood fountains from the stump of his neck. His decapitated, bloody head lies in a pool of blood on the stage next to him. Over the stump of his neck is an original six-color Apple logo, modified so that the 'bite' is actually a bloody, fang-filled mouth. The scene is surmounted by the Apple 'Think different' wordmark.
A Vaudeville dancer on an old-fashioned stage, caught mid-dance-step, standing in front of a Patreon logo.. His pockets bulge with cash. He has been decapitated and blood fountains from the stump of his neck. His decapitated, bloody head lies in a pool of blood on the stage next to him. Over the stump of his neck is an original six-color Apple logo, modified so that the 'bite' is actually a bloody, fang-filled mouth. The scene is surmounted by the Apple 'Think different' wordmark.
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Cory Doctorow
Cory Doctorow  ·  last month

Long thread/2

How is this possible? Enshittification:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/01/30/go-nuts-meine-kerle/#ich-bin-ein-bratapfel

Enshittification starts with companies being good to their end users. In this case, Apple made a high quality product - the Iphone and Ipad - and carefully tended to its App Store. That lured in a lot of customers, many of whom made owning an Apple device part of their very identity, as though buying a popular brand of consumer electronics made them part of an oppressed religious minority:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/01/12/youre-holding-it-wrong/#if-dishwashers-were-iphones

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Cory Doctorow
Cory Doctorow  ·  last month

Long thread/3

At the same time, Apple was locking those users in, selling them media that they couldn't play on non-Apple devices and tying their use of a mobile phone to their email, two-factor authentication, family photos, working files and consumer credit. Apple also avidly participated in the expansion of "IP law," which is to say, "laws that let Apple control the conduct of its customers, critics and competitors":

https://locusmag.com/2020/09/cory-doctorow-ip/

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Cory Doctorow
Cory Doctorow  ·  last month

Long thread/4

In particular, Apple fought for a expansive understanding of Sec 1201 of the 1998 Digital Millennium Copyright Act. That's a law that makes it a felony to help someone jailbreak a device, even if this doesn't lead to an instances of copyright infringement. Once removing a digital lock becomes a crime, then Apple can make *anything* into a crime - if Apple designs your device so that doing something you desire requires disabling a lock, and then doing that thing becomes illegal.

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Cory Doctorow
Cory Doctorow  ·  last month

Long thread/5

For example, Apple designs its phones so that they won't accept new parts without a manufacturer-supplied unlock code. That means that even if you install an Apple part in your Apple phone, it won't work unless you get Apple's permission (not cheap!) to activate that part. This is called "parts pairing" and it's pure rent-seeking, and Oregon just outlawed it:

https://www.theverge.com/2024/3/27/24097042/right-to-repair-law-oregon-sb1596-parts-pairing-tina-kotek-signed

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Cory Doctorow
Cory Doctorow  ·  last month

Long thread/6

The reason Oregon had to ban parts-pairing is that bypassing parts-pairing is a felony under DMCA 1201, punishable by a five-year prison sentence and a $500,000 fine. That means you can't just buy a tool that some clever reverse-engineer made that fakes the parts-pairing code - not because this is technically impossible, but because it is very, very illegal.

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