>>> Apple supports nearly 672,000 European jobs, including 530,000 jobs directly related to the development of iOS apps.
A bit off topic and NOT just Apple related:
When corporates list such achievements as above, they need to do full disclosure like how many old type jobs are destroyed due to their actions/products/services and how much time it took for the effected people to readjust to new reality.
Press statements as above -which we see from several organizations- give the impression of all positives and no negatives which is not true. Public companies are supposed to inform complete truth to public (since some of them are shareholders) and statements as above are not complete truth. Their actions may be innovation to the organization concerned but it is not for the affected. Personally, I feel, now-a-days, modern organizations and their executives are showing the habit of abusing the word of innovation[0] for whatever they do.
This is not just applicable to Apple only but to every other organization in the world. Amazon has to list how many brick and mortar stores are effected in addition to creation of new jobs and similarly vehicle, energy companies has to list the pollution they/their products caused across the world. Cities like Beijing has polluted air and is it not human made through innovated products developed few decades before? If they are proud of positives, they should feel sorry and/or pay for negatives as applicable. Is n't it?
In some cases, measurement may not be easy or indicators/metrics are not defined yet like "number of jobs ...etc". Governments and other competent organizations need to define and enforce them just like enforcing in the cases similar to harassment/discrimination/workspace issues/environmental issues. Even reference year also needs to be defined.
Jobs alone is not indicator and it is just tip of the iceberg of the total effect due to the actions of organizations.
> they need to do full disclosure like how many old type jobs are destroyed due to their actions
Except that in the case of Apple, they single-handedly created a whole new industry (app development), empowering individuals to be able to write software without support of, for example, an investor, publisher, or major company backing them.
As far as I can tell, the only things that Apple and smartphones and whatnot helped out of business was those crappy ringtone and text message subscription services. Of course, new laws also helped with that.
You also mention Amazon, who did introduce a ton of new entry-level jobs, yes, but if the stories coming from the order pickers are correct, they're not really great jobs. Plus Amazon is working on making those positions obsolete with further automation (robots and stuff).
Smartphones also totally marginalized GPS devices, portable music players, point and shoot cameras, portable gaming devices, heck even flashlights are less commonly used than a decade or two ago. (of course all of these products still exist in meaningful ways, but they are certainly a fraction of their former market size)
You could also say that the iPhone had a direct relation to the loss of millions of jobs at RIM/blackberry and Palm.
I don't think i agree with the parent, however, that a company should ultimately be responsible for the losses a product can create in the economy, that would create a huge disincentive for any kind of innovation. and frankly, the effects of products in this way are likely incalculable.
Certainly, but an old cell phone camera wasn't a threat to a point and shoot - with features like facial recognition, flash, zoom (whether its optical or digital), video capabilities, expandable storage, ease of syncing with computer, night and other various modes.
Smartphones ushered all of those features into the device you already always carry with you.
And as i said, these markets still all exist in significant ways, but are a fraction of what they were at their height before strong competition from cell phones.
When corporates list such achievements as above, they need to do full disclosure like how many old type jobs are destroyed due to their actions/products/services and how much time it took for the effected people to readjust to new reality.
How could anyone put a definitive number on that? It would be an exercise in creative economic writing at best. Plus another stack of papers no one read beyond the abstract in the press release.
And what would be the goal, the desired outcome? Should we not pursue innovation that leads to increased productivity in existing sectors? Would those jobs not disappear if Apple built a datacentre in Iceland or on the east coast of the US?
>>> How could anyone put a definitive number on that?
If existing metrics are not sufficient, then we need to innovate :) and define new set of metrics to get complete picture.
Actually it is not difficult. Let us register all existing people jobs and one year later register again and you can get the list of jobs that got changed and if you can survey the reasons for change, then you can measure negative/positive impact. There may be refinements to this idea and there can be new ones too.
>>> should we not pursue innovation that leads to increased productivity in existing sectors?
Definitely, you need to pursue innovation but what I call "responsible innovation" which is inclusive of society and environmental concerns rather than mere profits.
The problem is, it just doesn't matter. Even if 90% of the people making apps came from different industries, if those industries are decreasing, that's hardly Apple's fault. To use the old analogy, the sales of whips and saddles went way down after the invention of the car. What does it matter by how much the sales went down? It doesn't matter.
There's no negative impact. There can't be. If Apple destroyed any industries with their products, that just means those industries aren't things people want anymore. It's not like Apple is giving their products away or forcing people to use them. They're high-end, premium products. If people still wanted a GPS unit, they would buy one. If people still wanted whatever Apple replaced, even if people left their jobs to create apps for Apple, others would fill in the old jobs.
The number isn't counted because it doesn't matter.
A bit off topic and NOT just Apple related:
When corporates list such achievements as above, they need to do full disclosure like how many old type jobs are destroyed due to their actions/products/services and how much time it took for the effected people to readjust to new reality.
Press statements as above -which we see from several organizations- give the impression of all positives and no negatives which is not true. Public companies are supposed to inform complete truth to public (since some of them are shareholders) and statements as above are not complete truth. Their actions may be innovation to the organization concerned but it is not for the affected. Personally, I feel, now-a-days, modern organizations and their executives are showing the habit of abusing the word of innovation[0] for whatever they do.
This is not just applicable to Apple only but to every other organization in the world. Amazon has to list how many brick and mortar stores are effected in addition to creation of new jobs and similarly vehicle, energy companies has to list the pollution they/their products caused across the world. Cities like Beijing has polluted air and is it not human made through innovated products developed few decades before? If they are proud of positives, they should feel sorry and/or pay for negatives as applicable. Is n't it?
In some cases, measurement may not be easy or indicators/metrics are not defined yet like "number of jobs ...etc". Governments and other competent organizations need to define and enforce them just like enforcing in the cases similar to harassment/discrimination/workspace issues/environmental issues. Even reference year also needs to be defined.
Jobs alone is not indicator and it is just tip of the iceberg of the total effect due to the actions of organizations.
[0] Some background on origin and growing popularity of the usage of the word "innovation": http://www.business-standard.com/article/opinion/r-gopalakri...