Steve Jobs: If you want porn, get an Android

[daigong]

So I heard talk that HiPstaz getting Android phones? This just convinced me I should too! 


 (Credit: CC Whatcounts/Flickr)

Pornography, like disappointment, is a hard thing to avoid.

As both production and access have become easier and cheaper, there seems an endless number of (free) opportunities to discreetly partake of the same scenes over and over again played by different actors with different surgical histories.

However, if the latest e-mail purportedly sent by Apple CEO Steve Jobs to a customer called Matthew Browning is, indeed, genuine, then Apple seems to be reaching for some moral high ground, which may or may not be virtual.

Browning wrote to Jobs because he was concerned that Apple was choosing to become something that I don't remember seeing on "The Wire": a moral policeman. Browning worried that Apple's initial blocking of an app by satirical cartoonist, Mark Fiore, sent a dubious signal. He then went on to discuss Apple's stance on porn.

According to TechCrunch, he wrote: "I'm all for keeping porn out of kids hands. Heck--I'm all for ensuring that I don't have to see it unless I want to. But...that's what parental controls are for. Put these types of apps into categories and allow them to be blocked by their parents should they want to."

To the untrained eye, ear, and moral compass, this seems like wise logic. However, the Apple CEO reportedly replied: "Fiore's app will be in the store shortly. That was a mistake. However, we do believe we have a moral responsibility to keep porn off the iPhone. Folks who want porn can buy and (sic) Android phone."

It's a peculiar moral dilemma for cell phone manufacturers, this porn thing. Google's Android, having hoisted its flag of openness, must sail by it. Perhaps it will, at some future date, decide whether there's a point at which the doors are excessively ajar. However, late last year, a company with the dubiously cute name of MiKandi was the first to brag about its Androidable porn store and I've not noticed reports of people on the streets with placards desperate for the stoning of its CEO.

It's not hard to consider this a debate about image rather than reality. There is surely nothing to stop you, should you be so inclined, from opening up the Safari browser on your iPhone and surfing for as much porn as your little heart cares to consume.

I'm not suggesting you should, merely that you can. Isn't the truth that Apple can't stop porn from appearing on the iPhone, but it can attempt (the Playboy app being just one curious exception) to avoid the perception that the company is directly making money from it?

by Chris Matyszczyk

[Amplifier]

Suddenly, iPhone sales plummet.

Getting me an Android phone ASAP

[RoyMoy]

I think this is just in respect to apps.

iPhone OS still has a "fully featured" web browser. Plus you can sync whatever pictures and movies you have on your computer to take with you. I don't know why you would want to look at it from a inflexible app unless it was a porn producer that wanted to put their content behind a paywall. Even then a paywall can be implemented through the web browser anyways.

[frblckstr1]

^ Webbrowsers are sooooo yesterday, if there is no app for it, its not worth using it (if you have a i*  )

[RoyMoy]

^ Webbrowsers are sooooo yesterday, if there is no app for it, its not worth using it (if you have a i*  )

I've heard of inane apps that just take you to a webpage using the built in browser engine. There is always jailbreaking though.

[nachdenki]

I wonder, is that also related to why all the idol PB apps were deleted? Would be lame, kind of.
Though I don't really care since I don't have any Apple products and didn't plan to get any but their control and restrictions are kind of scary.

[frblckstr1]

I wonder, is that also related to why all the idol PB apps were deleted? Would be lame, kind of.

Yes, that effectifly was the precursor to this comment.

Although it seems you can still download the PlayBoy app.

[RoyMoy]

I wonder, is that also related to why all the idol PB apps were deleted? Would be lame, kind of.

Yes, that effectifly was the precursor to this comment.

Although it seems you can still download the PlayBoy app.

Another issue is the clear double-standard that is going on here. Apple PR explains it away by saying that playboy is a well known brand. But the cynical explanation could possibly be Apple is afraid of antagonizing a large media conglomerate with a large legal department.

[daigong]

lolwut

[adventwriter]

I'm getting an Android phone then.

[Slack]

Eh. You got Safari? Guess what? You got porn!

Got Photo app? Porn!

Heck, if you can encode videos, you got porn playing on your iPod video!


It's ridiculous to think that you'll deter people from getting porn on their phones:



I personally don't care if Steve Jobs says some "sexy wallpaper" app doesn't get into the store.
I prefer my own stuff anyway.

[Domenech]

That comes from a man with even a child from an affair? Well I guess he must be happy using his iPad now for porn. 

[roktdemon]

Steve Jobs can just go suck it. Apple is such a stupid company pushing nothing but an image and shiny trinkets with fruit on them. I laughed when I read an article about the iPhone retailer in Japan having to basically give away phones because the ones on the market were already better than it.

[RoyMoy]

What I found out recently is that both Apple and Google retains remote deletion capability on iOS and Android respectively. Google recently made use of this on their end.

http://www.engadget.com/2010/06/25/google-flexes-biceps-flicks-android-remote-kill-switch-for-the/

[Domenech]

Steve Jobs can just go suck it. Apple is such a stupid company pushing nothing but an image and shiny trinkets with fruit on them. I laughed when I read an article about the iPhone retailer in Japan having to basically give away phones because the ones on the market were already better than it.

Consumer Reports recently issued an article about iPhone4's antenna reception issues and suggested: "We do no recommend iPhone4". Some people decided to discuss it on Apple support forums. You guessed it right. Then this happened: http://www.tuaw.com/2010/07/12/apple-drops-consumer-reports-discussion-threads-down-memory-hole/

AT&T seems particularly happy that for probably the first time, something's not their fault. Yet another article suggests Apple should get a grip. This situation would hamper their "reputation" (I think Apple owners are typical n00bs). http://www.appolicious.com/finance/articles/2324-the-iphone-4-s-biggest-problem-is-not-its-antenna

Yes not for the first time, it's Apple that's a bigger problem and not the antenna.    After all we just gotta learn how to adjust ourselves to suit iPhone, NOT the other way round! 

[Wataru]

LOL buy a andriod for watching porn??
why not watching it at home more comfortable

[kaelzzz]

i like my iphone, but I don't like how all they did for the recent updates was take popular jailbroken apps, and call it their own.

[epsolon]

Hopefully with a Jailbroken phone users will be able to create and release apps through means such as Cydia and it shouldn't matter what Mr. Jobs says