'Fake Steve Jobs' lashes out at Apple

Steve Jobs's internet doppelganger is not impressed with Apple's recent behaviour

The Newsweek columnist and industry satirist known as 'Fake Steve Jobs' issued a sharp criticism of his real-world counterpart at the SugarCRM conference in San Francisco yesterday.

Dan Lyons slammed Apple for its policies in dealing with customers and developers in regards to its latest products, saying during a keynote address that the vertical integration Apple is developing as part of its iPad strategy is "worrisome".

Lyons rose to fame in the tech world for his portrayal of the Apple founder and chief executive in The Secret Diary of Steve Jobs.

Apple's policy of controlling the distribution of software through the App Store, and now advertising with iAds, is giving Apple complete control over what the user can see and do with the iPad and iPhone devices.

"They call it this magical and revolutionary device, but my question is for whom?" Lyons said. "People are rushing into this cage and they're not thinking about it. They're roaring into it."

Lyons was particularly critical of Apple's 'walled garden' approach, arguing that policies such as application screening, the exclusion of Flash and new restrictions on non-native programming languages is creating a new type of computer which is controlled completely by Apple.

Lyons also lashed out at Jobs himself, accusing the Apple chief of creating the same 'Big Brother' culture that Apple itself targeted with the iconic 1984 advertisement and the launch of the first Macintosh machines.

"Microsoft in its worst 'Borg' days would never have done this," he said. " The IBM System/360 wasn't as locked up as this. This is crazy."