Noted, not surprised and I was going to point out the ‘carve outs’ happened even earlier than I thought really. I knew they were coming. I feel a bit ‘meh’ though about Apple I have to admit, not sure why exactly even. I will reach out to the DEVONthink 3 team and assure them that I am still on board; this must have been a few sleepless nights for them. Though they are really pretty cool, ‘make a living not get greedy’ (like Steven and David) folk and that is another reason I like the app.
Guess the appearance of Tim Cook at his inauguration paid off? Or the obvious logistical problems of re shoring electronics were too much even for Trump sycophants. The fact that millions of Americans believe the crude economic model being relied on here is a cause for worry, including the idea being expressed by Trump and his base that young Chinese women wearing themselves out for peanuts screwing iphones together is somehow ‘ripping us off’. Though the women do say quite often they are happy to work for “China’s future”. How sincerely is moot, I believe it often is I will say.
In my view, tariffs is now more a tool, or will become more a tool to consolidate his own influence than anything else. The Founders noted this specifically and that is why they specified that taxes and the purse should be controlled by Congress, it is an element of checks and balances that is now gone. We are in deep deep trouble but I think readers here should note the more political aspects of this as it were.
The idiotic formulae used to determine the taxes initially used has been taken by some pundits as a sign of Trumpy ‘5 Dimensional Chess’. The sycophants were full of ‘the Art of the Deal’, a book ghost written for Trump in fact. How did we get here?
I think others of us over think too, though the strategy was clear enough from the start. I do understand, from statisticians who worked in Atlantic City, that Trump is, actually innumerate or near. He actually believes that trade imbalances are a kind of ‘theft’. "We need to do something different "though apparently. Agreed maybe reform the electoral college and I kind of agree with what Karl says in a general way.
The Guardian (Gruniad) today.
The Trump administration published a rule late Friday night that appears to exempt many electronic parts and devices from at least some of the president’s punishing tariffs on China, including smartphones and computers.
“Trust is hard-earned, easily lost, and difficult to reestablish.”
At this point, the trust in the US as a partner and an ally is in freefall and diminishing quickly. Take travel to the US from European countries, for example, and this is just in one month. These have been the closest US allies for 80 years. There’s no reason to think it will be any different in other sectors, tech included.
You are predicting long term outcomes based on short term actions and results. This crisis has been a long time coming. Acting like nothing is wrong with the world and just doing the “same old, same old” is not going to cut it. Rearranging the United States economy vis-à-vis the rest of the world is going to take some time.
But there is nothing systematic to his approach. The man imposed tariffs on an Island that is inhabited by Penguins. That is not a sign that he is playing 4D chess, that is a sign that he is a man his aids have to prevent him from eating the pieces. Yeah, we need to be doing things different but his “America First” is having the outcome of “America Alone” and if we aren’t the world’s superpower. I hate to tell you this but there is a tiger across the Pacific that is waiting to take our place and that is not a good outcome for the western world.
Not as far as you can tell, perhaps. But a strong will, a good team, and the ability to keep the entire world paying attention is just what is needed by the leader of the world’s most dominant economic and military power.
His tariffs have no basis in reality or economics. It is strictly to get power or concessions, like a mob boss goes around collecting protection money.
And I guess it works. Apparently all tech products are now exempt. The inauguration payoffs worked for Apple.
I’ll probably still get a new MacBook Air soon. My intel model is sputtering about lately.
If my living room is a mess and I begin to throw lit matches into the piles of things on the floor because nobody tidied them, one wouldn’t have to wait a long time to predict the long term outcomes
While a bit of shake up can be a good thing (and you’re likely right that some shake up was necessary), there are very, very good reasons why international politics tend to move at a slower pace: Large perturbations in complex dynamical systems rarely have the predicted outcomes over time.
While it’s probably impossible to have this conversation without some political content seeping in, I’m really glad that we seem to be able to do it (most of the time) politely.
To keep this mildly on topic, someone please talk me out of buying a bunch of Apple equipment that I neither need nor can afford
And apparently new tariffs on electronic are to be announced soon. Something different each week!
On Sunday, Mr. Trump wrote in his Truth Social post that his administration is examining the semiconductor industry and the electronics supply chain in its national security tariff investigations.
Those issues were highlighted Sunday by Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick in an interview with ABC News, when he said that the exemption on some electronics was only temporary and that they would be subject to “semiconductor tariffs” that would likely be introduced in a month or two.
I’m hoping for a long-term and dramatic shift away from US tech: Apple, Google, Microsoft, etc. Even better if it can be a shift towards FOSS and away from proprietary, difficult-to-repair hardware.
I charged my M2 iPad Pro to 80% and turned it off. It’ll be a back-up when I have a client that requires files to be delivered in Affinity native formats.
I’ve started doing design/layout using Scribus, Inkscape and GIMP running Linux on a 2018 Thinkpad t480s (excellent condition) bought used for $250 on eBay. An easy to replace battery and generally easily repaired.
Whatever happens with the tariffs, there are excellent and very affordable options outside of the new-product supply chain. And given that that affordable hardware can run fully featured, capable FOSS software, it’s possible to start over without reinvestment in an expensive software ecosystem. Of course, YMMV, depending on the work one needs to do.
That could happen relatively quickly with Apple hardware. And possibly Google, if a number of smaller companies could successfully gain large percentages of its marketshare. But it could take decades, IMO, to pry Microsoft away from the corporations and governments, etc. that rely on its software.
Just a little reminder that while it is very hard right now, we strive to keep politics at bay in the forums. Gonna leave this open but let’s try to focus on the tech news angle.
Ah, I’ll let you off because you’re not British, but when I was a lad there was a TV advert around election time that started with the phrase “I don’t do politics” and proceeded to show all the things people moan about that are political decisions, all the way from local government to international affairs. The intention, of course, was to get people to vote.
The OP effectively asked what best to do, the answer to which is fundamentally proscribed by politics; there isn’t a meaningful technical answer to the question.
Part of the problem with modern society is a lack of fora in which the real impact of political decisions can be discussed in a civilised manner and disparate views heard and critiqued. I haven’t seen anything but respect and curtesy in this thread.
“The Mad King” and “Trumpland” is respect and courtesy? It’s political name-calling, which is exactly what is not supposed to be allowed in this forum.
For what its worth the person thats being name called often is the worst offender. Doesn’t make it right but it makes it difficult to have a civil conversation when the person who sets the tenor for discourse is so noxious.
