If gamers weren’t so against it, honestly NFTs could actually be that thing.

Sure it shouldn’t be used like this. But incrementing a number isn’t enough to steal someone’s identity.

Isn’t it the address being leaked with it that makes this notable?

You can’t add a number to a SSN and also add a number to the street address to then narrow down which full names are associated with that SSN to then possibly be able to use it.

I didn’t think the number had any use on its own

I also hate every part of this and will turn it off as soon as it shows up.

But in terms of who actually wants this. If an AI assistant were to exist, and if it was actually going to be useful to someone, it would need to know just about everything in your life. At least in theory… In order for an assistant to be useful you would want to be able to ask it “what was Italian restaurant I was thinking of trying” and you would want a response.

I’m not sure this privacy nightmare of an implementation is the correct path to that, but that’s roughly what I suspect the desired outcome is.

Well of course not. These game studios were selling games at 60-80$ each. Microsoft bought them, then started providing the all the games for a flat fee of 15$ per month.

I assumed their strategy was to lose money in the medium term while they worked on getting people used to playing games on subscription. Where they make their money back is when they stop outright selling games at full price and make them only available on subscription, and then they slowly start increasing that monthly subscription cost.

In order for that to work they need a large library and like 5-10 years.

Apple users don’t have a choice.

Users should still have choices after they pick their OS. This isn’t a new concept, Microsoft has been dealing with this same thing for decades. Just because Apple is now being asked to play by the same rules you’re having a hissy fit. It’s hilarious! 😂

I’m confused. You do seem to understand that apple developers don’t have a choice, but PC/game developers do. But you fail to understand that those are different?

I don’t think I can help you understand.

Apple: if you want to sell apps to iOS users you have to pay Apple, there is no other option.

Valve: if you want to sell your game on our platform you can, but you don’t have to, there are many other options you can choose to distribute your games.

Does that help you understand?

I thought I listed a bunch of cases where there were options (and not monopolies). But yes, 100% inside many ecosystems are monopolies, and those ecosystems/walled gardens have been slowly expanding every chance these companies have.

I’m saying the competition can only exist because products that actually fill the same need.

If you decide that you need product A, and have multiple options on where to get that, you have competition.

So if you’re looking for a Cola, you have options.

If you’re looking to play StardewValley, you have options where you want to buy it and which platform you want to play it on, you don’t need to buy a new game system to play it.

If you’re looking to play the latest Zelda game, you don’t have options, you need to buy a Switch.

If you’re looking to watch Ozarks, you don’t have options, you can only watch Netflix.

If you’re looking to just have something playing on TV and don’t really care what it is, you have options.

If you’re looking to listen to music, you have options, most of the steaming services have most of the music.

If you’re looking to be able to text friends, you have options, any phone will work.

If you’re looking to be able to iMessage friends and for your case only iMessage will work, iPhone is your only option.

Competition is complex and is more dependent on a consumer needs than just classification of what a product is. In your earlier point you used Apple as an example of a company that can increase prices despite competition, but really Apple is a prime example of a company putting up walls to an ecosystem making it really hard to leave once you’re in.

Generally in the current tech landscape there barely is any competition outside openish platforms. But with tech, you often can’t look at competition as product A vs Product B. Like while we can say that Window competes with OSx, it’s harder to say that a Mac laptop competes with a given Dell laptop (because what you can do with each OS is different to different people).

This is why I like to think of all the tv streaming services as different types of food stores. There is no supermarket that supplies everything, you’re forced to have memberships to the single butcher, the single milk man, the single bakery, etc. if you want a particular food, there is currently no (or very little) competition. You can certainly survive on just bread, and people are happy to do that, but that bakery can and will increase prices whenever because they aren’t really competing with the butcher.

I still think you’re looking at competition slightly wrong.

Coke and Pepsi do compete with eachother, along with the rest of the drink market. And overall prices in that industry are pretty low, some people will buy other competitors (the store brand Cola’s). But overall competition is working.

Apple only kinda competes. Sure a phone is a phone and a laptop is a laptop. But unless someone is entering the market for the first time. They already have applications they are looking to use, so if you need an iPhone, you need an iPhone, and same for a Mac. But if you’re an android or Windows user, suddenly you have a lot more choice because there is lots of competition!

The reason companies setup walled gardens, or pay for exclusive access to a piece of media is to erode competition. If a user wants that thing, they can only get it from that one place.

It’s only competition if they provide similar products.

The current landscape is like farmers markets and butchers. Sure they both provide food, but they don’t really directly compete with eachother.