Imagine prostrating yourself to Trump in this embarrassing way. Sheesh.
Gay man gives gift to anti-lgbtq president.
Just proves that you can be gay and still be an absolute parasite billionaire. Fuck your pride apple watch bands.
Peter thiel, the architect behind Vance and trump and bilderberg and palantir, is also gay.
So gay, he had his former lover killed.
https://www.jezebel.com/death-of-gop-billionaire-peter-thiels-kept-man-is-being-1850259839
https://www.advocate.com/peter-thiel/peter-thiel-model-jeff-thomas
https://theintercept.com/2023/03/23/peter-thiel-jeff-thomas/
vance who is also mostly closeted too. peter thiel defenestrated his model bf.
It must be nice to be so rich that you can fit an entire living room set in your walk-in closet.
Well fuck, Clarence is basically a black white supremacist.
his sugar daddy is a nazi, harlan crow.
It’s pretty clear by now that the character Stinkmeaner is based wholly on Clarence Thomas
Thiel showed the way.
Ernst Roehm did it first
Class is the only identity that matters to them
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No war, but the class war.
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we’re gonna need more luigis.
I understood this reference! Probably because I, too, am a dinosaur.
i loved that show. ended so dark
Worst part was we all knew the ending but didn’t see it coming
I’ve only seen a fraction. Did it end with a global environmental catastrophe? That was ignored because of profit?
giant meteor
Ready player 2!
🎮🎮
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Whoa whoa there, slow down. You’re talking crazy. Let’s be reasonable.
The only way to get any sort of reliable data is to let BOTH camps go nuts and see which one gets more attention and results.
Wasting effort and resources on either will bring less results.
Because the CEOs will biy the new people. Better to off both.
Republicans don’t have the spine to run at risk of death, and elections only happen every two years meaning until then DNC would have the first real supermajority since 1979.
Tax them into the dirt, then there will never be more billionaires.
Do you think neoliberals would do that?
Do you think liberal is an insult? Oh, I’m so sorry that promoting human rights inconveniences you.
You’re misunderstanding. I said neoliberal for a reason. I wouldn’t call either party liberal, and the issue I have is labeling them as such.
Right okay, the parties fighting for liberty, fairness, and true democracy aren’t liberals they’re “neoliberal”. Whatever that means.
You do know that they will buy more? Legislators are a dime a dozen for oligarchs.
an army of them is what we need.
Tim Cook, and Apple, is supporting a pedophile. Remember that when you walk into an Apple Store, if you can afford to.
“Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai visited Trump at Mar-a-Lago after the election, and Google donated $1 million to the inauguration fund”
So is Google and every major company
You’re right it’s both now can we fuck off with the “buh buh buh the other company!” bullshit?
Article is about Apple not Google.
On nerdy sites like Lemmy people tend to fawn over Google and they can do no wrong
And every slight Apple does is The Worst Ever
If Google does the same thing, out come the excuses. 😀
On nerdy sites like Lemmy people tend to fawn over Google and they can do no wrong
[Citation Needed]
On nerdy sites like Lemmy people tend to fawn over Google and they can do no wrong
Uhhhh… What. My experience has been the literal opposite. People here hate Google
And still rock an Android phone proudly
I don’t know about “proudly.” Preferred to Apple? Sure.
Simping the worlds largest ad company is weird to me
But that’s just me 🤷🏻♂️
That may have been true a few years ago but not anymore. Google gets lots of hate on Lemmy, Reddit, and various other tech sites.
I buy pixel phones, because out of the sea of bullshit, it’s at least capable of being rooted/flash to a new os. The PinePhone sadly isn’t ready.
I don’t use apple for the same reason I don’t use fisher price as an adult. You are free to use your technology made for babies that’s beside the point. The point is that the article in discussion is about Tim Cook and Apple providing a recent bribe to Trump.
Your comment is providing no value. You are attempting whataboutism and really shows the type of person you are more than anything.
To be clear, if googl was caught bribing and someone said “buh buh buh Apple!” Id be saying the same thing. Stop sucking dick like they owe you something to take a side.
When Google bribes Trump with a 24k gold gift let’s discuss Google then ok?
So if it’s only an 18k carat gift it’s just fine? Because Google are the good guys
Is the article about Google or Apple? Really easy question for you.
real big yet you participate in society energy
I bet most of the people here replying in the comments are typing on what helped pay for that gold plated ass kissing device.
Is this a “you criticize society yet you participate in it” thing?
Ayy yo we got Ben Shapiro on Lemmy? 🤣
Great reply, from your iPhone.
I have an android. I hate them both but at least I can install any application I want.
To any & all Android users: you should install Grayjay. But don’t do it from the Play Store because that’s the stupid nerfed version.
I bet you’re using electricity from the power grid!
Ya but I am pretty sure Google has done a lot to help Trump. Any big tech company wants to be on the good side of Trump.
Exactly, they all are sucking that orange teet now.
With the degree of information, and capacity to profile individuals at scale and model complex systems, Google likely knew Trump would be in the white house long before anyone else. They fired up the bribery train early on.
Nope.
I am typing on a slab of the biggest AI alop search machine with a capital GMaybe if we were on reddit, here I really don’t think that’s true.
I’m typing this on a Lenovo laptop keyboard (V14 series, the plastic casing is just a catastrophe near the lid hinges, though I’ve seen the same with the magnesium casing, it has plastic parts inside).
I’ve also pirated some Apple TV attempt at Foundation episodes, but honestly felt like The Arc. Sci-Fi with some right initial ideas, but ultimately thoroughly idiotic.
In case of Apple TV’s Foundation, I couldn’t help thinking that they were trying to make it “look expensive” and “feel elitarian” similarly to their products, first priority, make it feel “diverse” and in social interactions representing a certain prestigious set of political ideas, second priority, make it feel nuanced and intelligent more than be nuanced and intelligent, third priority.
Honestly even with 90s Apple stuff virtualized I feel something bad, like nausea, I wouldn’t be able to use it probably. Too much visual design flexing.
Don’t forget the $200k gold bar bribe attached to it
that’s maybe $200k if it’s covered in gold, but if that’s an actual gold bar, then it’s worth a couple million or so.
Gift? You mean bribe.
Yes this is a bribe. Period.
Is it a bribe or ransom? Trump is extracting favors by threat.
More bribe. Ransom is “Do X or I do Y”. Bribe is “If I do X, you will do Y”.
OK let me play devil’s advocate for a moment: it’s the only language he speaks. You must stroke his ego, and give him an opportunity to look down on you.
Of course it’s still corporate cronyism.
Yeah the real story here should be hey everyone, look how transparently easy it is to manipulate the President of the United States
Cost of doing business in a country ruled by a dictator who LOVES shiny shit
It is a gift. The same gift that the Noble gave to their King, so they would not get replaced or lose power. It is a Hail to the King move.
Uhh acktchually its sparkling lobbying
Release the Epstein files
Surely they will throw him in prison!
Giving him a literal gold bar (though disguised as a stand) is stereotypical buying El Presidente in a Banana Republic bullshit.
I had to look it up: 24 karat is the purest form of gold. So yeah it’s a gold bar 100% lmfao
Cook isn’t handling it like solid gold though (it looks too light). I bet it’s 24 karat gold plated zinc.
You might be right. Looks light indeed for true gold.
Sounds like the US’ chickens coming home to roost. After creating those conditions with their CIA elsewhere for decades.
I don’t get why people are NOW saying he’s trying to appease trump. He’s been doing it for years. He was front row at his inauguration right next to other billionaires.
This is my own conjecture, but I’m willing to bet that playing nicely with Pres. Trump somehow saves Apple billions more in lost revenue to tariffs and legislation because Trump rewards those who are on his good side. I’m also willing to bet Tim / Apple is pressured to do this and has a very different attitude behind closed doors. Not that this excuses anybody for their actions, but it’s clear they’re trying to game the system the best they can in the name of “business”.
Keeping our morals behind closed doors is what’s wrong with the world.
Almost like it’s a completely bullshit excuse, like “just following orders”.
Crime isn’t suddenly okay because it’s profitable, no matter how much capitalism wants you to believe it.
It’s like nuclear weapons
Unless everyone gets rid of them nobody will
Being the only one not to “bend the knee” will just hurt you if everyone else kisses his ass
Nobody should get rid of their nukes. In fact, more countries should have nuclear arms.
Such is life on planet earth.
This is apple we’re talking about. Not some random company.
There are bigger random companies who are bending the knee like Meta, Amazon and Google
All 3 of those are smaller than Apple. The only 2 companies with bigger market caps than Apple are Nvidia and Microsoft.
Market cap isn’t everything.
Meta by itself has a bigger cultural impact globally
That’s not how companies are measured against each other though. How are you even quantifying the cultural impact? You could have said many companies are bigger than Apple because they have a bigger physical footprint, bigger customer base, larger number of staff, bigger area of operation, larger mass of product or many other things but the fact is when we compare the “size” of companies, we are referring to their market cap.
You’re probably right.
That doesn’t change my opinion, though, that everyone at Apple can go suck-start their own asshole, and they’ll never receive another cent of my money for as long as I live.
I already wasn’t buying their shit but this has signed and sealed that for the rest of eternity.
I don’t know, I mean if any corporation can eat the loss, it’s apple with their insanely high margins.
I’m more inclined to believe there’s some form of quid pro quo going on behind the scenes.
Besides, I simply cannot picture Tim Apple as any kind of a hero in this picture. No way he got bullied. He’s getting something out of it. You scratch my back. I’ll scratch yours.
Such a disgusting display. Most normal people don’t want anything to do with rapists and child molesters, yet here’s Tim.
Honestly I am pretty sure this is a bribe to exempt Apple from tariffs. Billionaires care more about their profit than children being harm. It’s the sad truth.
It’s a bribe in disguise. It’s a tribute and a public spectacle of loyalty. And the top voted comment thinks Tim is playing 4d chess with Trump…
Nothing will improve until these people are eliminated from their positions of power. Stop giving Apple your money.
It’s all public spectacles. These people are there not for the money - they are there to make a point, that being that their ideas of authority are what we all must obey.
Preventive obedience, lack of mandate borders, authority not requiring justification, a demand for justification being itself disobedience, implicit trust to authority, and so on.
These are all people who’d be not very respected or listened to in any normal kind of group. They dreamed of getting to a position where they will be, due to hierarchy. And that’s an abuse of any system, so they are hostile to any immunity mechanisms detecting and fixing such an abuse.
So the whole point is in them taking power and showing us all that it’s their rule and their time and it works like some thief feudalism with spectacles of loyalty, spectacles of cruelty, spectacles of stealing and getting away with it and demonstrative abuse of any legal principle.
I respect Cato institute people very much, they somehow manage to say this same thing without my emotion in their various materials.
Not really much of a disguise
All in plain sight. Brass and shameful. Why has this been normalize? 😡
Brass
Brash
Why has this been normalize?
Trump’s ego.
Brass
Brash
No, I mean brass: “figurative. Taken as a type of insensibility to shame: hence, Effrontery, impudence, unblushingness.” (DEFINED)
Brash would not have been appropriate (defined as “self-assertive in a rude, noisy, or overbearing way”). Tim was not rude, noisy or overbearing, but he was absolutely shameless!
brass: “figurative…”
Huh, TIL. That’s a very uncommon usage in my area.
Trump has no idea what he is doing he just want free gifts like the stupid used airplane
Jesus short memories.
Apple phones have been built in by Chinese kids in buildings with suicide nets on them since the beginning.
When the fuck did Apple EVER give a shit about anything other than its value?
Maybe in the early days when the Apple II was hot on the market but idk even then. Capitalist are going to do their capitalism.
At this point it seems like half of them became billionaires just to be the ones harming the children.
He pretty much says it, right? 'here’s a 24k gold bar… to hold the plaque we engraved your name on
But Apple cares about children. They were the first to run CSAM scans on their cloud storage and devices.
/s
“Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai visited Trump at Mar-a-Lago after the election, and Google donated $1 million to the inauguration fund”
Apple’s Tim Cook donated $1 million personally to Trump. Not Apple Inc, Tim Cook. And now he’s donating this as well. These are not the same.
literal fucking bribery
And I can’t even accept a gift voucher due to anti-bribery rules? Fuck off.
Do stocks go up from such a cringe-move?
Apple stock did, and unfortunately it even makes sense why. Considering how self-centered Trump is, and how easily swayed he can be by a literal shiny rock being given to him, this was probably a legitimately good trade for Apple.
They spend some money on a gold brick with some laser-cut glass, and the president of the entire country either gives them preferential treatment, or simply doesn’t take any more extreme actions he was planning to take against them.
trump loves guady gold plated pieces, he thinks its the epitome of fine furniture or wealth.
The shareholders should be ashamed… That’s not good business, that’s evil.
But it’s good for bussines, isn’t it?
Only when it’s accepted by the people. If law dismantled the company then it’s very bad for business.
Can you imagine Apple break down in foreseeable future? Because I can not.
EU have slapped their shit a few times but I suppose it’s their game to lose.
Those fines are always pocket money for these companies. Until it’s % of revenue based, it’s destined to be a joke.
They sure did!
Bribery is now not just legal, but mandatory
