> Overall it's very interesting to see Apple invest so significantly in something that will benefit relatively few users
Maybe Apple wants to encourage more (non-classified) government use of iPhones? Maybe they have a big juicy contract they could take if they just get their OS into the right shape for it?
Government purchase-orders used to be the main thing that kept RIM/Blackberry afloat: they were a Canadian manufacturer, and so were (or could be validated + closely scrutinized to be) trustworthy as a supplier for American government communications systems. This is 90% of why the Blackberry ecosystem was... the way that it was.
Apple is now in (nearly) the same position. And their ecosystem has also been strange for the last 6-or-so years, in that particular "there's no clear reason for this, unless the government asked you to do it for supply-chain-integrity purposes" way (e.g. a self-serve repair program that requires you to pre-register a device for repair before ordering parts, and then report the part IDs to initiate online pairing.)
Maybe Apple wants to encourage more (non-classified) government use of iPhones? Maybe they have a big juicy contract they could take if they just get their OS into the right shape for it?
Government purchase-orders used to be the main thing that kept RIM/Blackberry afloat: they were a Canadian manufacturer, and so were (or could be validated + closely scrutinized to be) trustworthy as a supplier for American government communications systems. This is 90% of why the Blackberry ecosystem was... the way that it was.
Apple is now in (nearly) the same position. And their ecosystem has also been strange for the last 6-or-so years, in that particular "there's no clear reason for this, unless the government asked you to do it for supply-chain-integrity purposes" way (e.g. a self-serve repair program that requires you to pre-register a device for repair before ordering parts, and then report the part IDs to initiate online pairing.)