Apple doesn’t seem terribly concerned with Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump’s call for a boycott of its products. If anything, it seems pretty proud to have drawn the controversial frontrunner’s ire.
During a phone conversation with reporters shortly after Trump’s call went out, senior Apple executives made their feelings about the campaign known — and their feelings are pretty funny.
The unnamed execs “said they felt they were in good company given the other groups and people Trump has criticized in the past,” Reuters reports.
Those groups include coffee giant Starbucks, which annoyed Trump with its shockingly (to him) non-Christmas holiday cups, and Macy’s department store, which dropped all Trump-branded merchandise after he described immigrants to America as “killers and rapists.”
Apple is currently engaged in a showdown with Federal courts surrounding orders to provide authorities access to an iPhone 5s used by one of the assailants in the San Bernardino mass shooting in December. The court has requested (officially) that the iPhone creator build a version of the iOS operating system that will allow investigators to get around the passcode lock on the device.
CEO Tim Cook responded with an open letter declaring the company’s intention to fight the orders in the name of security and privacy, claiming that agreeing would compromise the integrity of all iOS devices.
Apple still has a couple days to file its official response to the order. Meanwhile, the Department of Justice has piled on the pressure with its own document that says that Apple’s reluctance to comply is part of its marketing strategy.
The company isn’t worried that this case will hurt its sales, but it also directed some fire at the DoJ.
JUST IN: In response to DOJ filing earlier, sr. Apple exec. says company has not said that unlocking an iPhone is technically possible – DJ
— CNBC Now (@CNBCnow) February 19, 2016
We don’t know what effect — if any — Trump’s latest call for a boycott will have, but we can’t help but feel that his position would be stronger if his campaign hadn’t sent it from Twitter’s iOS app.
Evan Killham is a freelance writer who lives in Nebraska and isn’t interested in football, so he has plenty of time to play and think about video games. He has written for Bitmob and GamesBeat and sometimes, he even goes outside. But not too often because he’s heard there are bees out there. Occasionally, companies send free units for review. Evan subscribes to Cult of Mac’s Reviews Policy and also does not keep the items he receives for possible coverage.
29 responses to “Apple responds to Trump boycott with sick burn”
It is a 5c not an iPhone 5s
5c not 5s
I missed the sick burn? Is the fact that the tweet was from an iphone the burn? If so, how is that a burn?
You must be one of those lost trump supporters lol
And which part is the ‘sick burn’? What does that even mean?
The unnamed execs “said they felt they were in good company given the other groups and people Trump has criticized in the past,” Reuters reports.
Is that clear enough for you?
You must be a trump supporter lol
Come on Cult of Mac – blatant link bait.
Pretty soon the headlines are going to reach the apex of crying-wolf style and we will leave en masse—you will have only yourselves to blame. If this is a sick burn, then please allow me to introduce you to the word hyperbole and its dangers: “…The unnamed execs ‘said they felt they were in good company given the other groups and people Trump has criticized in the past,’ ” That was a failing heat lamp at best, not remotely a sick burn.
Between this sort of ‘reporting’ and the constant ‘about that ad blocker’ pop-over, I’m removing CofM from my daily routine. About that ad-blocker, if there was anything worth reading here, I’d happily pay for it.
I agree about the ad blocker pop up, but you obviously do find Cult of Mac worth reading, otherwise you wouldn’t have it in your daily routine now. Why else would you visit a site daily?
That’s a fair question. A few years ago I was very interested in all things Apple, and built up a set of bookmarks – about a dozen sites – that I opened up several times each day (with a command-click on the folder to open all of them at once in tabs) to catch up on news. Lately I’ve observed that as I go to each site, they’re either just repeating what some other site said, or posting obvious click bait such as this ‘story’, and I end up just taking a quick glance before closing the page.
So, it was in my daily routine due to inertia. I’ve now removed this site from my folder, along with most of the other Apple news sites. I still hit Mac Rumors; usually if there’s something interesting happening, it’ll show up there and I can decide if I want to dig deeper.
Generally speaking I hope that someday soon we see a shift away from ad-based revenue being the primary support for web sites. I think that will mean that quite a few sites will just drop of the web unless they can come up with some compelling content rather than just repeating other sources or craft click bait.
You must be a trump supporter
“I think the puppet on the right shares my beliefs.” “I think the puppet on the left is more to my liking.” “Hey, wait a minute, there’s one guy holding out both puppets!” – Bill Hicks
If your answer to anyone that has a difference of opinion is “You must be fo teh other guy! ” then YOU sir are one of the puppets.
You must be a troll. Or an idiot. And therefore both. Only idiots are trolls so QED.
Glad I ain’t making all the mistakes any more!
Sometimes I read the news articles and feel like it’s a scripted movie written by Sorkin. :-)
Where’s the burn?
An oblique reference to Bernie Sanders, perhaps?
Thats actually very funny.
Govt owned and managed work phone. Govt management software set the auto destruct on 10 password tries. Ask yourself why the govt management utility was not used to take the password off the phone? Was/is the phone mismanaged by the govt?
Now, FBI has techies / coders / propeller heads like any other govt agency. Are they not able to break into the phone? Given the Apple ID in iCloud in the phone’s settings were changed, it shows they can fumble their way in and damage things but maybe not smart enough to write hacking software to crack the phone? Does the FBI simply lack the technical IQ to perform cyber crime prevention and should they be defunded in those congressional budget categories?
Something smells like fish in the hot sun. Could the federal govt be simply leveraging a tragedy to try to again blackmail / strong arm / bully Apple into making a less secure system? ; to make it easier on the FBI (and Chinese) to break in? Does this publicity stunt constitute extortion of assistance? Do cyberbully laws apply here? Does Apple have grounds to file suit in federal court against the FBI? Attempting to use the media to blackmail Apple to do something that puts our 4th amendment rights at risk seems to be a misuse of power. Doesn’t FBI’s actions define “extortion”?
Doors do not discriminate between the criminal and the lawful, the corrupt and the ethical. Does the FBI’s actions in the attempt to extort technical assistance from Apple technically constitute ethical behavior? If the FBI had such a back door, would they use it ethically and responsibility? Or would the FBI use this power unethically; use it at-will and violate US citizens 4th amendment rights indiscriminately like the NSA has been caught doing time and again?
In theory the government is accountable to the citizen / taxpayer. So who is investigating the FBI and the CA Dept. of Health (owner of the iPhone and for whom Syed Rizwan Farook worked) to determine if the condition at hand is the result govt mishandling of evidence? Is it Apple’s responsibility to make up for the incompetence of the two government agencies?
One thing is certain… It is nice to know that my Apple iPhone and iPad are secure enough to turn the FBI into a bunch of crybabies.
Sick burn? You guys really suck. They made a calm reserved statement of fact. Assholes.
Trump is such a doofus. He doesn’t think before he starts running his mouth. First of all I heard they did get the Iphone opened by the San Bernardino shooters by using the dead shooters finger. Second of all what “Conservative Republican” would want the government to have a backdoor into EVERYONE’S phone. That is what the government in asking. This goes way beyond the San Bernardino shooters. I thought Conservatives were suppose to be about less government intrusion not more.
well maybe you should stop making up lies, it was an iphone 5c not a 5s
yet they comply with chinese government demands because, you know, money…and don’t pay any corporate taxes in the US, because you know,corporate taxes are for daycare centers, plumbers, and music schools…and pay .28 cents per hour to assemble iphones, because that wont cause any suicides, and you know, money…
actually they negotiated with chinese goverments and they still have the same privacy gudelines there
Taking the 5th. “company has not said that unlocking an iPhone is technically possible.” Sorry, we don’t have the capabilities to do what you are asking. We’ve walled the company out of the devices we built, they are the ownership of the individual. Cloud access, sure (oh, you f’d that up, sorry) but device? No, we don’t have access.
Perhaps someone should suggest to the “Donald” that the FBI could start by “unlocking” his phone to test and see if this really works. I wonder what the Trump camp would stay to that?
This is liberal-socialist LGBT propaganda made to destroy the greatest businessman of the world and a future dictator of the greatest country of the world. I hope we invade 4398573498573 more countries after he took power and ban the Democratic party.