Latest iOS Update Shows Apple Can Use Software to Break Phones Repaired by Independent Shops

To: Secret Agent Man

Would you buy a brand of car if you could only get parts and service and maintenance at the dealer’s shop?

Aside from maybe routine oil changes and tires, I go to my auto dealership for all major maintenance. Why? Because they have certified factory-trained techs that only work on the brand of car that I have. Because they use genuine OEM parts. Most of all, they want to keep their clients happy so that they keep purchasing their car brand. They have a vested interest in making sure their clients have a good experience with that particular brand of car.

Yes, it costs a little more to get my car serviced at the dealership as opposed to Joe's garage down the street that works on every car that happens to drive in but I probably pay more in the long run due to inferior parts being used and for unnecessary repairs due to the issue being misdiagnosed by a third rate mechanic.

41 posted on 10/14/2017 7:09:06 AM PDT by SamAdams76

To: Secret Agent Man

Would you buy a brand of car if you could only get parts and service and maintenance at the dealer’s shop?

Let me see you get a computer component replaced at any place other than the dealer. Lot of stuff like filters and oil changes are available, like chargers and cases for phones, but not the proprietary stuff.

42 posted on 10/14/2017 7:18:12 AM PDT by itsahoot (As long as there is money to be divided, there will be division.)

Updated to IOS 11 and my bluetooth hands free speaker phone quit working.

43 posted on 10/14/2017 7:39:11 AM PDT by red-dawg (I want a statue of TRUMP in my city.)

People buy Tesla’s. Good luck finding aftermarket parts or repair shops

Yeah, no-one seems interested in doing oil changes on them. I can't figure it out!

44 posted on 10/14/2017 7:39:38 AM PDT by Disambiguator (Keepin' it analog.)

Or you could just not put sensitive information on your “phone”.

Now that would be silly. Why would anyone exercise such common sense when it's so much easier to blame someone else?!

I never conduct financial transactions on my phone, period as a rule. I do that on my home PC and only after I've run virus and malware scans on it prior to doing so. That and when I'm not directly using it, it's turned off.

There is no such thing as being too safe these days.

45 posted on 10/14/2017 7:51:17 AM PDT by usconservative (When The Ballot Box No Longer Counts, The Ammunition Box Does. (What's In Your Ammo Box?))

To: jalisco555; PIF

Care to share the details? My 6S stopped working so I went to the local Genius Bar. They couldn't fix it so they gave me a new one (under AppleCare). No fuss, no muss.

That was essentially my experience, the exact same phone (6S Plus but still) but with a dramatically different outcome.

First a little background on the phone in question. That was actually a replacement to the original 6S Plus I bought about a year prior to this incident (so in 2015, I bought it when they first came out). My very first phone had this issue that where it would constantly restart itself, it got so bad that it would be every 10-15 minutes, very annoying. So I took it back to the store I bought it from, blissfully unaware of this "Genius Bar" requirement (requirement to make an appointment online first). I was informed they wouldn't be able to help me unless I made such an appointment, or waited on the waitlist (which was about an hour or maybe longer, and I wasn't even going to be guaranteed a slot even if I waited that long).

Now I'm sorry, to all Apple-philes out there but that is a ridiculous business model: if a product doesn't work and is under warranty where the warranty guarantees a replacement for events of defective manufacture, then you should be able to go into the store you bought it from and get a replacement right away or at least wait in a line and be guaranteed a replacement. You shouldn't have to make a dang appointment to have a defective product replaced in other words!

But there's no reasoning this obvious point with any Apple employee. They've been trained well. So I made such an appointment, went back 3 days later for said appointment, and got a replacement. This was after trying to work out the issue on the phone with the tech support to no avail in the interim 3 days.

So now I'm on my second phone in just as many months. But that phone I'll say lasted almost another year with no problems. But then THAT phone (the replacement) suddenly for no reason whatsoever (no trauma to it, no dunking in water or anything like that) just up and died. It was still under warranty (paid for the Apple Care Plus plan), so I knew I'd be able to get a replacement. But I also knew the "system" by then and knew I'd have to schedule a "Genius bar" appointment first.

So I tried calling tech support first seeing if that would save me a trip. Basically they couldn't do anything for me over the phone and gave me two choices. I can either go into the store (after again, making a Genius Bar appointment first) to exchange it for a new phone or, I could mail it back to Apple and they'd then send me a new phone after performing "diagnostics" on that broken one to ensure it was really broken.

So I didn't want to fool around with mailing the thing through the mail and maybe it getting lost (but read below for that fun anyway), so I went to the store, again after making a Genius Bar appointment (and I ended up having to wait a week for that).

So again, realize, I now have a brick in my possession, a worthless hunk of metal and glass, that by every reading of the Apple Care Plus plan I'm thus due a new phone! But I have to wait a week for that (really more much more of a wait but read below), instead of just going IN to a store to exchange it immediately? I mean I can certainly understand they don't want people exchanging phones for trivial reasons or if the phone can be fixed first, but for a phone that's DEAD, there should be the option of being able to go into the store and get one IMMEDIATELY! That's just how a business who cares for their customers operates. At least in my opinion.

But this is not Apple's way, evidently. So I made the stupid appointment and waited a week (a week!) for my new phone I was due anyway. But when I went to the store, again the actual store I bought the first one from (remember this is the second phone), the Genius Bar rep gave me a slightly, but significantly DIFFERENT set of options: He said I could either mail the phone in for "diagnostics" (again not an option) or I could give the one that's not working I have now up to them and they'd mail it for me for such diagnostics, but in the meantime all they would give me is a "loaner" phone.

When I asked what that meant, he told me that it would be a loaner phone that I'd give my CC info for, but I would be expected to bring that loaner phone back when the diagnostics were done and either my old phone was fixed or they were ready to give me a new one. Otherwise, if I didn't give them my CC info, and/or give them the loaner phone back, then I'd be forced to just give up my broken phone and wait for a repaired/new phone in the mail. Or if I gave my CC info and took the loaner phone, but didn't bring the loaner phone back, I would be charged for the loaner phone even IF they found that my old phone was broken through no fault of my own (which of course they eventually discovered).

So you see the screw job here? I don't know what your experience was, but I wasn't about to give my CC info for a "loaner" phone I was expected to bring back ANYWAY, to potentially be charged for something that wasn't my fault! There was no way they were getting my CC info in other words, because I didn't trust they wouldn't find some reason to blame the malfunction on me, and thus charge me for the replacement (in violation of the Apple Care Plus warranty but of course I'd never be able to prove that, I'd never be able to prove that their claim of my fault was wrong, since they would have the phone at that point not me).

So I was stuck, in a catch 22 if you will. There was one more option that I then elected to take: Give the broken phone to the Apple store, and they would mail it for me for the diagnostics. Then I would be given the repaired phone back or a new one, by mail. I elected to do that since I did NOT want to give them any CC info, but at the same time I didn't want to have to mail it myself. I figured it had the best shot of getting to where it needed to go if they mailed it and not me.

Think about that also for a minute: Why the HECK couldn't they do the required "diagnostics" there right there in the store?! I asked that very question of the hapless Genius Bar rep and he said they can do some diagnostics there but for a phone that won't even start (which was my condition) they would have to send it off to some location in Dallas to verify the diagnosis they were getting in the store. What kind of lunacy is that? It's just a dang excuse to make it as difficult as possible to exchange a broken phone for a new one, which was my right under the Apple Care Plus plan. But of course, being the greedy corporation they are, they look for ways to avoid that. Yes, they gave me a new phone already when the very first one kept starting and restarting on its own. But even that was a hassle, having to work with the tech team over the phone and in the store, that whole process took 2 weeks, it wasn't like I went to the store and got a new phone "no fuss no muss". Just as I wrote above.

So they took my phone but this is where the real drama really begins, not ends. Because to make this long post somewhat shorter, they eventually discovered that there was no reason that phone should have died (DUH), so I was due a replacement under the Apple Care Plus agreement. Note though, this "diagnostic" took over a week, another week without my phone, because it had to get to Dallas then be looked at, then decided it's broken.

Well first of all when they decided that, they never sent me an email confirming the shipment of the replacement. I had to end up calling the support line to ask "It's been over a week I haven't heard about my phone what's up?"

THEN they told me, "Oh, sorry, we should have emailed you but yeah you have been issued a new phone it's on its way". Thanks for that! Thank you Apple! You're sending me a new $800 phone in the mail and I have no way of tracking it? I didn't even know it was coming? Yeah real good customer service there (again).

But the drama STILL doesn't end there. I never got any tracking info for the phone, even though the tech line said they would send me such info, so again, after ANOTHER week, I called them to demand such information. They only told me initially it was being sent UPS, when I asked for the tracking number they said I'd be emailed that but never was. So I waited a good week for it to see if I'd ever get it, each day still calling to get it anyway but still being given the same answer ("you'll get an email with the tracking info, we don't have it in our computer"). LOL I'm sorry but that's the most incompetent answer EVER. You don't have the tracking info in your OWN computer for a package YOU sent to ME? Out-RAGEOUS!

So again, I kept calling for the tracking info never getting it for a week. Finally, got the tracking info after about 10 days, from someone who finally was able to get it from some other department (called the shipping department, I was never allowed to talk to directly). Yes, you read that right, the "shipping department" never actually talked to me, I was always going through an intermediary I reached by calling the Apple Care phone number.

Anyway, finally got the tracking info and realize, this is now a full 2 weeks after the phone was ostensibly shipped to me. I punch that tracking number into UPS's website and what do I discover? That the package has been LOST at the Baltimore distribution facility. "Lost" is more a CYA term, of course it was stolen.

Well, I won't bore you with the details of fighting with UPS about that (took them another WEEK to complete their own "investigation" into the matter), but suffice to say when I called Apple to report the "lost" phone, they told me I needed to deal with UPS directly and wait for the conclusion of their investigation into the matter. I said to Apple, "Ok that's fine they are investigating, I don't care about that, but YOU, Apple, should send me a new phone NOW, because it's not my fault it got lost by UPS/You/whoever "lost it" stole it whatever. That's not MY fault, so I shouldn't be out a phone for this reason. So you can wait for the investigation, but send me a new phone NOW".

Well they wouldn't do that, period. I demanded to speak to a supervisor at the Apple Care tech line, and when I did the supervisor told me the same thing. I need to wait for the end of the UPS investigation. When I demanded to speak to HER supervisor, she refused saying essentially she was the last person to speak to. (Are you kidding me, I was speaking to the one in charge of everything at Apple? I was about to ask her if her name was Steve Jobs but I figured I'd just get hung up on and never get my phone back).

So I waited for the investigation at UPS to be concluded, which basically took a whole week for them to just say what the original tracking number query told me all along: that the package was "lost" at the Baltimore distribution facility (which is really in Sparks MD), and there is no other information on it. They (UPS) didn't say they would foot the bill for a replacement of the package, they said nothing else.

So I went to Apple with this "conclusion", and Apple THEN said the following (after apparently taking this to their lawyers because I had to wait ANOTHER week for this response, yes it's now a full month since my phone was supposed to be shipped to me, a full FIVE WEEKS after the second one broke): They told me at this point that I'd have to prove the phone they were sending to me was mine, by providing the original purchase receipt for the phone.

Now, let this sink in. Read that last sentence in the paragraph above, again, let that sink in. Do you see the absolute, abject lunacy there? I need to prove the phone they were ALREADY SENDING TO ME (but was "lost", i.e., stolen) was in fact MINE? In what alternative universe does that "logic" make sense? Any Apple apologist want to dare try to spin that one in Apple's favor? You can't, it's insanity, pure lawyer inspired insanity.

So I said pretty much that very thing when this situation was explained to me but got a stonewall response, robotically repeating the same line: "You need to send us your original purchase receipt to get a replacement phone sent to you at this point."

Insanity. Recall, dear FRiend, the incident I described up above, where the first phone I had had the problem with restarting itself every 10 minutes a year prior to all this mess. That phone, of course, had its own serial number and IMEI (I think that's the term) number. The phone now in question, the phone that was mine that I brought to the store that started all this mess by just refusing to start all of a sudden, THAT phone had, of course, it's OWN serial/IMEI number. Well, that caused a problem again with the lawyers, well really another problem for me, because when I sent them my original receipt for the FIRST phone they said, "Wait, that's not good enough, because the serial numbers don't match on this receipt and what you sent us a month and a half ago".

Haha yeah, you're reading this right. Well, I explained what I did above to them, that the original receipt of course doesn't have the same serial number of what I sent you recently because that first phone kept restarting and I was given a new one then, and that's the one that just died! Now also note, that whole exchange (giving them the original receipt and getting an answer back, that took ANOTHER week, so now we're a full 6 weeks out without a phone, since I took mine back to the original store I bought the first one from, all of which could have been avoided if they would have just given me a new phone right then, "no fuss no muss").

So I said "Look, I don't have any receipt that shows the exchange from a year ago of my first phone for the second", and I didn't, it was the truth I didn't have such a receipt because the store I did THAT exchange in, which was the same store all along for all of these things, never sent me a receipt for that exchange!

They STILL said, "we need a receipt proving the phone was yours" (again, proving the phone they already tacitly agreed was mine by sending a replacement for that was "lost", they required I prove was mine). I said again I didn't have such a receipt the store I BROUGHT IT TO should have such a receipt YOU get that from them it's not MY job to get what YOU should have already in your own computer system! You need to send me a new phone NOW and get whatever receipt you "need" from them!

Not good enough, again, kept getting the same line "You need to prove the phone was yours". So finally I ended up having to spend half a day on the phone with the people at that store tracking down the exchange of the first phone for the second, over a year ago. Two different people had to work on that, because apparently that receipt was archived by this point thus not readily available. BUT, they WERE indeed finally able to track down the exchange receipt showing the original serial number and the new (second) serial number on the same receipt of exchange.

So FINALLY I had what I was being asked for, which shouldn't have even been my responsibility in the first place (not by any reasonable interpretation of any warranty/shipping agreement), but I finally had it and thus sent it to Apple (the Apple Care tech center). I had to send it to them because again, as I wrote above, I was never allowed to speak to anyone in shipping directly, only to a tech team rep who then forwarded it to shipping (and this is absolutely STUPID, because at this point it's not a tech problem it's a SHIPPING problem).

But because of these additional hoops to jump through and because of time off that particular individuals in charge of my case, it took another 2 weeks to sort all of that above out. So now, 8 weeks, TWO MONTHS since my phone broke, through no fault of my own, that I had to surrender to avoid giving CC info for a "loaner" I'd have to bring back anyway, 2 months I'm out of a phone I paid just over $1000 for (including this "wonderful" Apple Care Plus warranty extension, which I paid to precisely avoid situations just like this). Two months it took for Apple to finally agree to send another phone because the replacement (that again they should have just given me in the store if they really cared about their customers) got lost through no fault of my own.

Well they did, and when they did, I said "Look with the problems with the last shipment, why can't I just go to the store and get another one at this point", they wouldn't let me do that, even after I proved what they were sending me anyway was mine, they wouldn't let me go to an Apple Store to pick up another to avoid the next one getting "lost" (i.e. stolen) again. No, I had to wait again for it to be shipped.

This time they shipped it via FedEx and had a tracking number they provided right away. I had to end up taking a half day from work to ensure I was home when it arrived because it wasn't allowed to go to a FedEx sorting facility for me to go pick up. But that was fine, ultimately, because I ultimately got it delivered to my hands. Again, a full 2 months after this entire nightmare of "customer service" started.

So I dare any Apple lover try and defend that sorry excuse for "customer service". I don't know why I received the treatment I did and you got what I think SHOULD be done, which is to issue a new phone IMMEDIATELY, IN the store when a broken one is taken in that's under warranty. THAT'S what should be done, not the comedy of errors that was on full display for me and my case. I'll never be convinced though mine is just an aberration, you can find similar stories online of people being screwed out of their phones when Apple decides, apparently at random and on a whim, that the fault of defect lies with the consumer and not them. And given the treatment I received from Apple Care, it seems to me that it's policy rather than incompetence to look for ways to deny people replacements for defective products by Apple.

Maybe I should have written to Jobs as PIF said earlier upthread all along. I doubt I would have gotten any satisfaction though (despite the fact he was quite sick by the time all this was happening). It seems Apple has grown way beyond caring about their customers, and now looks at them as someone who should simply shut up and take whatever decision Apple makes about anything.

Unfortunately, as I wrote in the post to which you replied, I can't think of any other phone that's better technologically speaking for the reasons I stated in that post. But Heaven help you if anything goes wrong with anything you buy from Apple. You might as well just give up hoping to be satisfied by anything they'll do for you (or more precisely WON'T do for you). In my experience at least.

46 posted on 10/14/2017 11:15:24 AM PDT by FourtySeven (47)

To: tennmountainman

This should be illegal.

Sp Apple should be required by law and forced at gunpoint to support anything anyone decides to attach to an iPhone?

47 posted on 10/14/2017 5:52:13 PM PDT by ReignOfError

Show me a phone that runs iOS that isn’t sold by Apple. Also, how much demand would there be for an Apple branded smartphone that ran Android, Windows, Symbian, etc? Zero. You don’t pay more for inferior hardware without a good reason: software company. QED.

48 posted on 10/14/2017 7:27:52 PM PDT by MountainWalker

To: MountainWalker

You need to buy Apple’s hardware to get their software. It’s a software company with a hardware lock, if you will

YOU still have that completely backwards.

Apple is a hardware company. It develops its OSes to support their devices. No other company is allowed to develop OSes to run their devices. Apple does NOT develop OSes or application or services for other devices made by other manufacturers. A software company does not concentrate on its own devices. Thus, Apple is only developing software that only supports their hardware. IOW, their hardware comes first, and then the software is developed around THEIR hardware.

Microsoft, on the other hand, is a software company with interests in supporting ALL hardware out there, plus their own. That's the opposite of what Apple does.

Android OEMs don't lock in their customers. Their customers are free to go elsewhere for their next device, or back to the same maker. I don't like Android, but, it's "free" and allows their users to seek and use software from MANY software developers. For Apple devices, there is only one company that determines what you can use, even if the app is developed by a third party. The Apple ecosystem is about locking in their customers, thus, the Apple device users are NOT free to seek and use things that are not made by Apple or approved by Apple. There are no other OSes that can be used by Apple device customers, and if there were, those customers would lose their device and software warranties. Are YOU able to tell the difference yet?

49 posted on 10/14/2017 8:36:02 PM PDT by adorno (w)

Sorry to hear about what happened to you. I’ve had nothing but good experiences with the Apple Store by me.

50 posted on 10/15/2017 3:24:56 AM PDT by jalisco555 ("In a Time of Universal Deceit Telling the Truth Is a Revolutionary Act" - George Orwell)

Samsung is a hardware company. They make hardware and drop in open source Android. They even make the new amoled screens in the new iPhone. What do you call a company that uses their own proprietary closed source software on their main competitor’s hardware? A software company.

I hold this certification below, as well as many others from this highly-regarded security training institute. I could excerpt the section from my class materials backing me up, but somehow, I don’t think it’ll matter.

https://www.sans.org/course/mobile-device-security-ethical-hacking

51 posted on 10/15/2017 4:52:29 AM PDT by MountainWalker

To: MountainWalker

Unlike Apple, Samsung is a service company, and a software company. Bet you forgot that service part, which is primarily what Samsung is. Samsung is still a service company even as they design and develop software to support devices, which are almost all manufactured by the Android OEMs. Samsung does not manufacture their own devices, though they claim a bunch of them under the Pixel label and other brands.

But, on the computer/IT side, Samsung is a service company, with Google Search being it’s bread and butter. Not they’re into the cloud. They’ve been on the Android side for over 10 years, but that’s still software meant to be used with their SERVICES sides, meaning “search” and “cloud” and a host of others. Hardware is their minor side. Google is also attempting to be a big player on the autonomous vehicle space, but then, that is mostly the software side of the business. The hardware would be from the automakers and the makers of the modules that would be controlled by that autonomy software.

Samsung is mostly like Microsoft, and Apple is mostly like... Apple.

Amazon is also a services company, where they design software to be used by their services, like the cloud. Alexa is software and their Eco devices are hardware, but the whole scope is mostly software, where even 3rd parties can design apps for the platform. That platform is served via Amazon cloud. Amazon cloud is their bread and butter, and that’s the services side of the company. Amazon is mostly known to people as the Amazon store, but the store is nowhere close to being as productive as the Amazon cloud. Amazon does have a few devices, but then, Amazon is not known as a hardware company, and whatever hardware they do have were produced in order to be served by it’s services and cloud and software. IOW, Amazon is kinda like Google and Microsoft. Among the three, Google/Amazon/Microsoft, it’s MS that is the furthest along to being a hardware company and a software and services company.

Apple does not fit into the “software” category, though they do provide software to service their hardware. Apple’s software CANNOT be used outside of the Apple ecosystem. It’s that distinction which you can’t seem to fathom.

Your “certification” does not qualify you to be the judge for categorizing what a company’s main focus is. Most IT people have always categorized Apple as a hardware company, and I’ve actually NEVER heard of any one that has any kind of credibility in the IT field that has spoken of Apple as primarily a software company.

Samsung is a hardware company, and they make complete stand-alone devices, and components to be used by other OEMs to manufacture their own stand-alone devices. When it comes to their own devices, Samsung has attempted to be like Apple, where they’ve come up with “their own” OS to run their devices, and additional software and services to support those devices. But, they haven’t been successful with their own OS or their own apps/applications/services. Samsung is basically dependent on Google and Microsoft for software and services. In that sense, Samsung is not like Apple; they don’t lock people in with total control of their ecosystem, like Apple does. Amoled screens are hardware, and any OEM can use Samsung’s screens, thus, there is NO LOCK-IN with Samsung’s hardware.

YOUR materials that YOU think qualify YOU to determine how a company should be qualified, is totally useless. What matters is what a company does with whatever hardware and software and services it offers. YOUR “ethical” hacking certificate is not better than what the business and software and hardware and services professionals say. In fact, I’m pretty sure that I’m a lot better qualified to categorize corporations than you with your “hacking” certificate. I’ve been in the IT industry for over 40 years, though now retired. I saw many hardware and software companies come and go, and I understood quite well what all of them had to offer in hardware and software and services. I still do, and I keep up with the industry. YOU believe that your “hacking” credentials are better qualifications, but I look at exactly what is happening in the REAL world of hardware and software and services, where what a company does is well-defined by what their primary missions are.

BTW, NEVER throw degrees or certificates out as support for whatever you want to espouse. That kind of tactic does not work to make you any more credible in a discussion.

52 posted on 10/15/2017 6:21:52 AM PDT by adorno (w)

You can stop writing your screeds. If I wasted my time reading the ignorant rants of every crank on the internet, I wouldn’t have time actually working on things which you don’t but pretend to be an expert on anyway.

53 posted on 10/15/2017 8:44:02 AM PDT by MountainWalker

To: MountainWalker

You can stop writing your screeds

IOW, please stop hitting my with so many facts, I can't stand it and I have no credible responses.

If I wasted my time reading the ignorant rants of every crank on the internet

Have you bothered to check and double-check the pure nonsense you posted? If you can't recognize the "crank" in you, then, you're totally hopeless.

I wouldn’t have time actually working on things which you don’t but pretend to be an expert on anyway.

I never claimed to be an expert at anything, but you did, when you thought that you're an unquestionable authority because you have a certificate in hacking. BTW, "certificates" can be "earned" by just attending seminars, and by even reading lectures. And, YOUR certificate isn't even related to the subject at hand. Do you think I should be an authority on rocket science, since I earned various "certificates" on computer "science"?

Next time you decide that you're the expert on anything, make sure that you're talking to kindergarten children, because, there's certain to be somebody reading that can destroy your argument(s).

54 posted on 10/15/2017 3:12:20 PM PDT by adorno (w)

You have some strongly held ignorant opinions which you mistake for facts. That makes you no different than 95% of the yokels on the internet. But, at least you admit you’re not an expert, as if that wasn’t glaringly self-evident. Nevertheless, you’re a legend in your own mind.

Sans doesn’t hand out certifications for breathing air in their classrooms for 5 straight days. Their exams are pretty challenging and rigorous. You have a pretty big mouth for someone with no professional expertise in the field of mobile device computing.

55 posted on 10/15/2017 7:44:28 PM PDT by MountainWalker

To: MountainWalker

You have some strongly held ignorant opinions which you mistake for facts.

YOU worded that completely different from what you should have written.

Okay, I'll explain to you were you went wrong.

I have a lot of strongly held very informed and educated opinions about what the FACTS really are. That's completely different from what YOU appear to be, with your totally nonsensical and ignorant opinions.

That makes you no different than 95% of the yokels on the internet.

That's funny, because, most people in the IT field would thin about YOU as being part of the 95% (made up statistic, btw, and thats' unbecoming of someone that is attempting to talk about facts and credibility) of "yokels" on the internet.

But, at least you admit you’re not an expert

Where did I mention being or not an expert on anything? I'm not an expert on a lot of things, but I'm pretty sure that I'm a "better" expert in the IT field than you with your "hacking certificate". Like I said, I worked in the IT field for over 40 years, and I've been around PCs for more than 30 of those years, but my best experience was in software design and development for the big mainframes. PCs were considered toys in the mainframe world, but, I suppose they've been improved on, and which is why I've been developing applications and other software for PCs longer than you've been around.

Nevertheless, you’re a legend in your own mind. Never claimed to be a legend, though I've always made sure that I rose to the top of whatever field or project or company in IT I was ever involved in. The one that came across as the "expert that can't be challenged" was YOU, with your "certificate in hacking". Your "short-term" memory is failing you. Consult a doctor for that problem.

And, don't talk to me about certificates. Earning a certificate in anything is not the same as being an expert in the field or in the general field of IT, which YOU claimed to be, with your "I have a certificate therefore, I'm the expert and you can't challenge me. Nana, nana, nana!". What you actually did was to come across as an experienced dope.

And, again, and like I said, I'm pretty sure that my expertise in computer and in software, is more varied and more deep than anything you have ever done.

So, take your "hacking certificate" and sh... IT

56 posted on 10/15/2017 9:04:56 PM PDT by adorno (w)

To: MountainWalker; adorno

WOW! Stain me impressed! Your five day certificate sure trumps Adorno’s forty plus years and my thirty-six years working careers (mine in owning a business in computing and business consulting) in computers and IT, with some of mine as a CEO of a fairly large corporation . . . Not to mention my degree in Economics! I may be wrong, but I’m pretty sure that Adorno has some pretty good sheepskin on his wall as well.

Your five day certificate in "ethical hacking" surely qualifies you to determine the market segments multinational corporations occupy far better than my four years studying micro and macro economics with a minor in Business Administration as well as a post-graduate stint teaching both, no doubt due to the, what, two minutes(?), your seminar may have spent mentioning business market segment Economics while you were supposed to be emersed in learning some kind of ethical hacking, an oxymoron, if I ever heard one.

That really had to have been some in-depth, five-day course you attended with SANS. Tell us, did they cover nuclear physics and brain surgery as well? How about Logic and such things as Logical Fallacies like the fallacy of The Appeal to Authoritiy Fallacy?

Frankly, the only one spouting strongly held, ignorant opinions as facts here, obviously based on an exaggerated opinion of the value of a limited value or perhaps worthless five-day seminar (of which I would venture Adorno and I have attended, presided at, and/or lectured for, or even presented papers at, as paid presenters for, at many such seminars in our careers) , is YOU, MountainWalker, a certified member of that 95% Internet yokel cadre. Send me $95.99 and I’ll send a finely faux engraved, full-color certificate, suitable for framing, that you can hang on your wall next to your "Ethical Hacking Certificate" attesting to your Internet Yokel Membership.

Both of them combined might get you just as much weight as we educated, experienced and informed professionals who DO KNOW WHAT WE ARE TALKING ABOUT, have already been giving your load of twaddle, zip.

PS: Consider yourself hoist on your own petard, Moutain Walker.

57 posted on 10/16/2017 1:58:19 AM PDT by Swordmaker (My pistol self-identifies as an iPad, so you must accept it in gun-free zones, you racist, bigot!)

Like I said, you’re a self-admitted non-expert on mobile computing, which makes you a clown of sorts when spouting off drivel on the subject matter. But you’re not even an amusing clown - just an angry one.

But, that’s not going to stop you in mocking a certification on the subject matter from the gold standard in security training institutes that you’d fail quite spectacularly if you ever attempted. I’m sure that if they changed the exam so that wackos like you could pass it, you would then hold it in high regard. However, the people who actually pursue the certification are more interested in making a living in the field that getting into internet arguments with angry clowns on the internet.

58 posted on 10/16/2017 2:49:10 AM PDT by MountainWalker

To: MountainWalker; Swordmaker; adorno

I read the arguments, it started as a classic "tastes great, less filling" argument and devolved from there. The Apple is a hardware company versus software company is pretty much moot. They do both. Sometimes they pioneer hardware or at least take Xerox hardware and bring it to the masses. Other times they provide a seamless and simple environment.

My experience base is mostly with computers, not phones, so I see the Apple HW as a good base for open source development and deployment without much or any Apple GUI involved. Most other users like (or love) the Apple software environment with consistent GUIs, relatively deep functionality, etc. I like the HW, most people like the SW and also appreciate the HW although similar HW is offered with MS software on it.

Mobile adds a wrinkle. The vast majority of users are using the platform for the SW. The Android SW ecosystem is a giant mess with Google providing stuff to OEMs who crappify it and send it to network providers who crappify it even more. I use it because I didn't want to spring for a iPhone.

Apple OTOH has a complete mobile software environment. Granted people still add third party apps, but they don't need to. Then you get a usable phone with very nice hardware. In constrast the Samsung hardware is quite good too, but every bit of SW added by Samsung (and in my case Sprint) is crap.

Thus, those are not software companies. Thus, apple is a software company that happens to have nice hardware too.

59 posted on 10/16/2017 3:22:07 AM PDT by palmer (...if we do not have strong families and strong values, then we will be weak and we will not survive)

To: MountainWalker

60 posted on 10/16/2017 3:30:57 AM PDT by mad_as_he$$

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