“Apple CEO Tim Cook plans to donate $1 million to Donald Trump’s inauguration fund, reports Axios. The donation will be a personal donation directly from Cook rather than a donation from Apple”
I’ll defend Apple as being the least shitty of the big tech giants but I can’t defend this.
These CEOs are funding hate, violence and the end of American democracy - they have enough power, money and influence to oppose, yet they don’t. They decided that a few must be sacrificed for the greater
goodprofit.Something happened on the 4th of December. Today is the 4th of January. Just in case anyone’s calendar app is stuck closed. Interesting if true…
Well… they saw that they can show their real face.
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This country makes me sick to my stomach. What a fucking joke.
If you can find a way: get out.
For everyone else, you have my sincere sympathy.
And go where? Where in the world is safe right now? I thought about living in the Philippines with my family, but China is probably waging war soon. Europe? With the way America is headed and the war is going? Let’s assume Ukraine wins: Europe is out of gas and will militarize and right wing governments are rising with German nationalism leading the battle drums, Ukraine gonna be in an economic slump, Russia is gonna be subservient and dependent on China because its economy is gone without a win.
That leaves countries with metropolises that are suffering from westerners gentrifying their neighborhoods with the USD being strong in these places. We are really going to make the poor in other nations pay the price for our government’s doing again, but this time by our own choice? That’s not any better imo. Unless you are leaving with the specific intent on making the place you are going better, stay home please
Do you mean safe or safer than the U.S.? Because you can’t be guaranteed of absolute safety anywhere. If you’re queer or brown, there are a lot of countries where you’ll be safer than the U.S.
Fair point. If you are in immediate danger then yeah, not gonna argue. But if you are able to stay and do something, that should be preferable.
I am brown (Filipino). I won’t be leaving. My sister lives here. My nephew. They can go somewhere safe, but there aren’t many places safe from a hot, land war in this world like the US observably is. Mayyybe Canada, but enjoy that economy.
Tim Apple.
After that slip he still bends the knee. Good old classic reliable Tim Apple
Way to go, Tim Apple
Tim Cook is hoping to be spared when Trump starts purging gay people.
Hey, he’s a billionaire. Being gay is only illegal if you’re poor like everything else.
No war, but the class war.
What a little bitch…
Amazon, Meta, Uber, OpenAI’s Sam Altman, Goldman Sachs, Bank of America, Coinbase, Toyota, Ford, GM, AT&T, Black & Decker, and Charter Communications are also making donations to Trump’s inauguration fund.
I guess I never really paid attention before but is it normal for companies to donate to an inauguration fund? It sure seems like a government sanctioned protection racket.
Perfectly normal, but not like this.
Oh wow, this is really informative. Thanks for the link friend
Speaking of forgetting what’s perfectly normal… the days before uniting the citizens…
Obama capped money for his inauguration at $50,000 per person - still, more than 10 times what individuals could give to his campaign.
ABC News reported that Trump’s second-inauguration haul is on track to shatter the previous $107m record, as pledged contributions have already exceeded a $150m fundraising goal. Barack Obama’s inauguration raised $53m in 2009 and $42m in 2013, and Joe Biden’s raised $63m in 2021.
Only since Citizens United.
you’re thinking of FECA probably. inauguration vs campaign funds are different things, and Citizens United was about campaign funds.
It certainly has a FECAl smell about it.
least shitty
Wat!?
They’re the only one selling physical products as their main business so they can afford to give you marginally better privacy and UX than say, Google, who’s built their business on tying tracking and advertising into their open source products like Chromium and Android.
Better UX what
It’s a very low bar
$1 million seems to be the going fealty price for these people.
Fuck that. Not cool.
I’ll defend Apple as being the least shitty of the big tech giants but I can’t defend this.
Why would you do that though? The only thing I’m aware of that they do even remotely better than anyone else is privacy. But it’s not that much better, and it comes at the cost of gestures at everything else
Like I said, they’re the least shitty. Can you think of a corp that’s better? Google? Fucking Meta? Microsoft?
I have my own problems with them, but off the top of my head I think the following tech companies all do better than Apple: Red Hat, Canonical, Framework, Purism, System76, Fairphone.
Microsoft didn’t spend multiple decades trying to force their own chargers and ports over universal standards. Not saying any of them are good, but apple is in no way better and has spent years creating contention between consumers. It’s just as likely they sell your tracking data as anyone else, they spend developer time every month making sure their ecosystem is considered better for cultural reasons while being ostensibly worse than competitors for most things. Their phones are generally a year or more behind competitors but they have made-up features that serve no purpose consumers rally around like imessage. They have a tiny sandbox to play in without completely voiding your warranty - Themes instead of real customization. “Blue bubbles”? Are you kidding me? How about allowing any form of tinkering beyond a garden path? How about supporting repair of devices at their actual branded stores? They’re easily up there as one of the worst for consumers at large.
I’m really not interested in a long, drawn out debate about this, suffice to say that if you think all the things you listed, most of which are your opinion rather than indisputable fact, somehow make Apple worse than Google, Microsoft, or Meta … well let’s just agree to disagree.
The things he listed aren’t opinion lol, they’re proven facts.
Why don’t we just say that all these mega corps are evil, period?
It’s Lemmy lol if you don’t use your own airgapped Linux distro you’re a complete cuck
TempleOS master race rise up.
At least with android devices there is a possibility of swapping the operating system and windows computers can always be made Linux.
IDK why people say they have better privacy: They just settled a lawsuit over evesdroping using Siri. I think they probably have less interest than Google in selling data for advertising, mostly likely using it internally for their ecosystem so they probably come across more privacy focused but I assume they snoop just as much as any other big tech company.
less interest than Google in selling data for advertising
Google don’t sell data. The data is what makes them valuable, so it wouldn’t make sense. If they did sell data, the other big tech companies would just buy their data to remove their competitive advantage.
What Google actually sells is your attention. Advertisers can target people based on demographic data, things you like, etc, but the advertiser never sees the data used for targeting.
You can use Google and Facebook’s Ads Manager sites yourself and see exactly what advertisers see.
On the other hand, Apple mostly keep their collected data for their own ad network. Yes, they have one - it’s mostly just used for ads for “recommended” apps in the app store, but last I heard, they have plans to expand it.
Yeah apologies, that’s a good point - thanks for adding more context!
No worries - it’s a pretty common misconception that tech companies sell data. I’ve worked on ads systems at big tech companies so I’ve seen some parts of how it works. The companies are very protective of their data as it’s essentially their highest-value asset. Employees can’t see any of your data either - it’s very tightly locked down, with strict ACLs and audit logging.
Large advertisers generally don’t get any special access either - the tools/apps that large advertisers use are mostly the same as what small advertisers / individuals can see and use.
They just settled Siri snoop case for a fee pennies…
“Privacy”
would a nice $20 bill appease the peasantry?
The only thing I’m aware of that they do even remotely better than anyone else is privacy.
Where did you hear this? Its my understanding that they are one of the worst when it comes to privacy.
Siri “unintentionally” (because it’s a sentient being right?) recording entire conversations def feels pretty terrible.
They do better about privacy because they make enough money from their inflated prices and blind brand loyalty where they dont have to become an ad company like google. Google is very good at protecting their users data from third parties, as long as they can still collect all of it.
Apple (currently) doesn’t collect a lot of data which allows them to design products with security as a primary component instead of as an afterthought
They collect everything. Every detail of your usage. They may not sell it, but your entire life is on an apple server
I’ll get downvoted because Lemmy has a weird hate boner for asking for proof but do you have any proof that they “collect everything”?
The proof is in your iCloud.
How so?
When you log into your phone with an apple ID, they hold a record of every interaction you have using it. Download an app, song, or backup your phone using icloud? Use their health app? It’s all stored and associated with your apple ID and phone serial number as well as other device unique identifiers. They reserve the right to analyze this data in-house or 3rd party and how you use their products and services to improve them, produce new, market to, etc.
This isn’t proof, is it?
They’re all “donating” the same amount.
And also this is the largest inaugural fund in history. In comparison to his previous which was $107m this is so far over $150m.
Considering Bidens and both of Obamas were between $50m and $70m is this not ringing alarm bells with anyone? Or is this something to “look” in to in like 7 years time when no one gives a shit.
Beggars belief.
This is how things are going to work going forward.
Even if it is illegal, these people are above the law. Internet just exposing obvious corruption.
Paying his tribute to the king. He’ll have to donate more if he wants to usurp Elon. How much has Zuck donated?
Also 1M to the inauguration. It’s a shakedown IMO, though FWIW 1M is pennies to these guys.
Why does such a thing as an inaugural fund exist? Seems like it’s just to facilitate more corruption!
It’s coercion but somehow legal.
It doesn’t usually. The ‘why’ in the case is because Trump and his team refuse to sign the ethics agreement to get the normal funding from the government.
Thanks, it must be amazing for Americans to have a president who won’t sign a standard ethics agreement.
Americans have been convinced to sell themselves out.
Every trump supporter is either a dipshit or someone taking advantage of dipshits.
Up here in Canada, we’re only ever 10 years behind at most.
Germany, too, is poised to follow suit at the upcoming elections in February.
Can’t wait for the leopard to eat this face.
