Re: What, exactly, is Apple's iPod business model?

spinoza1111 wrote:
On Sep 4, 11:37 pm, Jeffrey Goldberg <nob...@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On 9/4/07 12:20 AM, spinoza1111 wrote:

On Sep 4, 12:50 pm, Jeffrey Goldberg <nob...@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
It's working out much better than the alternative.
How would you know that?
I lived in Hungary for six years including during the tail end of socialism.

A thug takeover supported by the Soviet army wasn't "socialism".


It is too easy an escape to say that Soviet socialism really "wasn't socialism." It was started by serious socialists and fell prey to a weakness of socialism in all socialist countries: socialism empowers bureaucracy without adequate checks and balances. Soviet socialism and socialist evangelism went way off the tracks, but it started on the tracks.

Even admirably functioning Scandinavian socialism engendered so much nannying, that right-wing parties regularly defeat socialists. I think only mixed socialism and capitalism function in enough competition to keep each party aware of its weaknesses and ready to bridle some misconduct.


Yes. Although it goes against what I know of economic theory, it does
work far better than the broken system in the US. It is true that there
are long waits and "rationed" services, but those issues are no worse in
Britons deny this.
I suppose that if you select your Britons very carefully you can try to
maintain your claim. I also lived in the UK for six years. My daughter
was born there.

I always choose my friends with care. Look, any economist will tell
you that queues and rationing are what you get when you limit the free
market. The problem (as even Adam Smith seems to have known) with the
complete free market operating within a sphere of human endeavor is
that in place of queues and rationing you get access into
"unity" (right this way, Mr. Creosote, no waiting in line) and
"zero" (hey, Gomer, get out of my emergency room).

Most people worldwide choose some queueing and some (nonmarket)
rationing in health care, even in the free-market paradise of Hong
Kong, because the demand for health care, operating as it does at the
horizons of life, has a different and unique combination of elasticity
(more Botox for Mr. Creosote) and inelasticity (thanks, but one enema
will do just fine).



And uncontrolled socialism, especially in poor countries like Russia, empowers bureaucrats, who arrogate to themselves the best fruits of education and health service. And it also empowers nepotism, so the families of bureaucrats are first in line for education and health services. And "President-for-Life" is a title more the rule than the exception in most socialist countries outside of Western Europe, to say nothing of hereditary monarchy in North Korea and Cuba. I don't know of any reigning and ruling "Presidents-for-Life" in developed capitalist countries (constitutional but powerless monarchs don't count), although capitalist governments do find amenable "Presidents-for-Life" in exploiting undeveloped countries.


But this helps illustrate my approach. I'm relying on experience to
tell me whether markets in general work better than socialism. With
socialized medicine, socialism works better in my experience (even
though I'm not sure why). In just about every other domain socialism
works worse (and I have pretty good ideas about why).
How would you know?
Does one have to have direct experience of something to have a well
reasoned opinion? As it happens, I do have some limited experience of
socialism.

Nicaraguan and Hungarian. The former under continual United States
pressure, in effect a war socialism (the United States was convicted
of a violation of international law in its 1986 mining of Nicaraguan
harbors, as you know). The latter a murderous takeover and mirror
image, in the execution of Imre Nagy after the popular and anti-Soviet
revolution of 1956, of Chile 1973: a country which the "great" powers,
including the US, allowed to be bullied so they could have the
identical free hand in their own spheres: to bully in such a way that
inspires, indirectly, the behavior in this thread.

The Hungarian revolutionaries of 1956, 1968 and even 1989 were NOT
demonstrating for the right to be a source of cheap labor and guest-
house operators. They were, for the most part, demonstrating for
democratic (and therefore Scandinavian/British style) Fabian socialism
in each of those years.



There has been a considerable waffling between right-wing and moderate socialist government, including reformed Communists on both sides, in most Eastern European countries.

Cuba is no more free of geography than Finland. Fidel Castro has praised the virtues of Albania's Enver Hoxha, North Korea's Kim Il-sung, and Libya's Muammar Qaddafi, and the United States is under no moral or legal obligation to trade with any government that picks its friend by their degree of enmity to the United States. If Finland has to conform itself to Russian pressure, Cuba will eventually have to recognize that it can only prosper by living peacefully with its demanding neighbor. However good the Cuban education and health care system is now, its economic system was tops in Latin America before Castro and now ranks with Haiti; evenly distributed poverty is no more of an accomplishment than ill-distributed prosperity was for Batista.


Actually, I am in sympathy with socialism and Canadian socialized medicine, but I am no admirer of self-absorbed Presidents-for-Life. And I am still using my second-generation iPod, because it still works after several years, and I have no problem playing classical music downloaded from the iTunes store and mostly from my favorite cd's. I plan to buy a new one in good time. Our anecdotal experience differs here, too.


...




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