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Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, who can be the brand new proprietor and CEO of Twitter, bashed Apple this week after claiming the corporate has threatened to take away the Twitter app from its App Store, accusing the corporate of hating “free speech.”
The Twitter app remains to be accessible for iOS gadgets, and there is no signal that the favored social media app is at actual danger of getting booted by Apple.
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The Tesla CEO’s livid tweets recall how Musk has lengthy taken photographs at Apple, and highlighted simply how a lot energy the tech juggernaut nonetheless has over the world’s richest individual.
Meanwhile, Apple as an organization by no means engages in public trash discuss towards Musk or Tesla, and has even averted taking veiled photographs at them, versus the frequent indirect criticisms geared toward Facebook.
Behind all of the assaults, Musk has nice admiration for Apple’s authentic founder, Steve Jobs. Musk has even begun working with Steve Jobs’ biographer, Walter Isaacson, on his personal official biography.
A one-way disagreement
Musk’s newest spate of Apple insults started final week. This week, Musk claimed in a tweet that Apple had principally stopped promoting on the Twitter platform.
He tried to impress Apple CEO Tim Cook right into a public dialogue in regards to the discount in promoting on Twitter, asking him if Apple hates “free speech in America” and “what’s going on here.” Cook didn’t reply.
Apple just isn’t alone in lowering its campaigns on the social media platform since Musk took over.
After Musk closed a leveraged buyout deal on Oct. 28 and appointed himself CEO, a spike of anti-Black racist and antisemitic hate speech flooded the platform, partly due to raids that have been coordinated by customers on on-line chat platform 4chan.
Musk additionally started making steep cuts to Twitter’s workforce, gutting gross sales groups, groups accountable for measuring Twitter efficiency metrics and content material moderation groups, amongst others.
Twitter has been shedding advertisers and advert income ever since, with civil rights teams and former advertisers on the platform pressuring Musk to show that his a lot smaller crew can responsibly handle content material moderation, advert campaigns, cybersecurity and extra.
Whether correct or not, Musk’s allegation that Apple has “threatened to withhold” Twitter from its App Store might resonate with different builders.
Apple is infamous for offering few particulars when notifying app makers that their apps are prone to struggling delayed updates or elimination from the App Store. Responses inside Apple’s App Store Connect platform are terse, normally citing a rule, however not elaborating on what particularly an app maker ought to do to repair the issue — for instance, Apple would possibly say the app has a “metadata problem” or makes use of a banned utility programming interface.
Musk additionally chafes below Apple’s platform charges, that are between 15% and 30% of complete digital gross sales, just like the $8 Twitter Blue subscription that Musk has stated might be a significant product for the corporate. Musk stated it was a “de facto global tax” on the web earlier than he took over Twitter, however in his new position as an app proprietor, he has attacked it with growing vigor.
This week, he tweeted and deleted a meme that steered he would moderately “go to war” than pay 30% to Apple.
Apple earlier this week declined to touch upon the alleged risk of suspension or Apple’s advert spend with Twitter.
An extended historical past of competitors
Tesla and Apple are neighbors within the San Francisco Bay Area, which implies that they’ve competed for expertise for greater than a decade. Now that competitors has prolonged into Texas.
Both firms want mechanical engineers, industrial designers, supplies science and battery specialists, and expert software program engineers.
Apple has additionally invested closely in growing its personal electrical autonomous car know-how. If the so-called “Apple Car” ever got here to market, Tesla and Apple could be direct rivals.
In that context, early examples of Musk tweaking Apple might be seen as pleasant rivalry.
When Tesla was nonetheless an underdog and upstart, Musk used to name Apple the “Tesla graveyard,” in keeping with a number of former Tesla staff who spoke with CNBC. Internally, he would encourage sad Tesla staff to go apply for a comfortable job at Apple.
He finally introduced this up in a public interview, saying that Apple employed individuals who have been fired from Tesla.
In 2018, dozens of former Tesla staff landed at Apple, together with some who have been laid off and others who merely jumped ship from Tesla. At that point, the EV maker’s North American PR crew informed CNBC, “Tesla is the hard path. We have 100 times less money than Apple, so of course they can afford to pay more.”
One of probably the most notable individuals to modify sides was Doug Field, who began at Apple, joined Tesla after which rejoined Apple. Now he works for a extra direct Tesla competitor, Ford.
Last summer time, Musk laid out a few of his issues with the best way Apple does enterprise on a Tesla earnings name, though he was cautious to not title the corporate at first.
He began by criticizing the quantity of cobalt, a mineral linked to human rights abuses, which Apple makes use of to make batteries in its gadgets. In 2018, Musk pledged to remove Tesla’s use of cobalt in its manufacturing totally. Tesla has shifted a good portion of its automobiles to a kind of battery referred to as an LFP, or lithium iron phosphate battery. However, it has not managed to remove want of cobalt utterly but.
In its most up-to-date Impact Report, Tesla wrote, “we expect our absolute cobalt demand to increase over the coming years because our vehicle and cell production growth rate is forecasted to outpace the overall rate of cobalt reduction on a per cell basis.”
On the charging entrance, Tesla is experimenting with methods to offer different EV drivers entry to its community. But the corporate hasn’t opened up charging on a mainstream foundation but.
Later within the earnings name, Musk criticized Apple’s “walled garden” enterprise mannequin when answering a query about when Tesla chargers would possibly have the ability to cost different car makes.
“I think we do want to emphasize that our goal is to support the advent of sustainable energy,” Musk stated. “It is not to create a walled garden and use that to bludgeon our competitors, which is used by some companies.”
In case anyone missed the reference to Apple’s App Store, which Apple maintains because the unique option to distribute apps to its gadgets, Musk then faked a cough and stated, “Apple.”
Musk additionally has used Apple’s title to generate buzz. In September, when Apple introduced satellite tv for pc connectivity in its new iPhone 14 fashions (with satellites being operated by GlobalStar) Musk steered that Apple had seemed into utilizing Starlink, which makes use of completely different know-how.
“We’ve had some promising conversations with Apple about Starlink connectivity,” Musk tweeted, complimenting the iPhone crew. Apple has by no means acknowledged any negotiations and even dialogue with SpaceX.
Cook and Musk
Have Apple CEO Tim Cook and Musk ever spoken in depth?
According to Cook, the reply isn’t any.
But Musk claims that Apple declined his proposal to accumulate Tesla years in the past, when the EV maker’s market cap stood at a fraction of its present worth.
“During the darkest days of the Model 3 program, I reached out to Tim Cook to discuss the possibility of Apple acquiring Tesla (for 1/10 of our current value). He refused to take the meeting,” Musk tweeted in 2020.
Another model of the story comes from “Power Play: Tesla, Elon Musk, and the Bet of the Century,” a e-book by enterprise journalist Tim Higgins.
Around 2016, in keeping with the e-book, Musk and Cook spoke about Apple probably buying Tesla. It was scuffling with excessive prices and points delivery its Model 3 automotive on the time. Apple, with its experience in manufacturing and huge quantities of money, would have been an ideal acquirer.
Except, in Higgins’ telling, Musk had one situation: He needed to change into CEO of the mixed Apple-Tesla.
“F— you,” Cook stated, in keeping with the e-book.
Source: www.cnbc.com”