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Comment by grumple | Hacker News Reader

Engineers and their companies are super users on whom the whole Apple ecosystem depends. If we can’t run our applications on Apple’s operating system, or they break things for our users, we will leave.

Take that lesson back to your company as well. It is easier than ever to switch between clouds and AI providers. It’s easier than ever to replace any software in house. This isn’t an idle threat; I’ve already moved off of several software platforms this year for other providers, and I’m probably doing the same for millions of dollars worth of business every year in the future as well. And my company isn’t immune to it either - our biggest customers are always looking for options to bring software in house. The more we disrupt them with “small bugs”, the more likely they are to leave.

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That is just plain false and assigning over-importance to yourself.

Apple's ecosystem depends on every middle-class person around the globe wanting to be able to signal that they have an Apple phone and use the same features as their social group. Engineers are a small subset, they barely move the needle.

It’s true and I’m not. If the engineers can’t build software for your OS, your users won’t have software to use.

We’re also talking about MacOS, not iOS. Engineers make up a big segment of MacBook users. Apple is only 9.5% of the personal computing market.

Ask the average Apple user if their device experience is getting better or worse over time. Most I know tell me things like they see small bug now where they didnt before, sometimes things dont work as they should, and more things needs a reset or even hard reset to fix. All very generic user reports.

All the bugs users are seeing are things developers picked up on earlier than users did, and shouted about in forums and bug reports. The fact Apple is not listening to its canaries down the coal mine is leading to the general slipping of its reputation.

Apples ecosystem replies on every middle class person around the globe having the frictionless experience Apple is known for. They erode that, and they slowly erode their customer base.

Actually, it seems like the people don't really give a shit, because Apple is still making bank, and is growing year-to-year like never before: https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/charts/AAPL/apple/revenue

In fact, since Covid and LLMs, the ARR has sped up its growth. They should really be eroding under all this shitty software, no?

Check out the graphs posted in this comment, it seems like maybe its beginning:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50143703

> Apple's ecosystem depends on every middle-class person around the globe

I have terrible news about the distribution of iPhones and the middle class globally.

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