[shrew]

I thought it was a bit sketchy too and spoke to their support agent about it. It seems this site is run by a partner, SPOT or Service Parts or Tools. Their privacy policy lists servicepartsortools.com as a domain but visiting the domain shows a standard parked domain page. The domain is owned by CTDI[0] which does seem more legitimate. The response I got from the support agent after pressing the issue was:

"Apple has partnered with CTDI for the SSR store and the fulfillment of related parts and tools. CTDI will utilize its SPOT subsidiary, including SPOT customer service agents, in support of SSR store customers."

It makes sense that Apple would offload this to someone else, but I agree it's a rather jarring experience.

[0] https://www.ctdi.com

[danShumway]

> "Apple has partnered with CTDI for the SSR store and the fulfillment of related parts and tools. CTDI will utilize its SPOT subsidiary, including SPOT customer service agents, in support of SSR store customers."

It is certainly still a decision to do that. I would guess that for a launch they actually cared about, especially a consumer-facing one, they either would demand to build the website themselves or demand that CTDI follow some design guides. I can't imagine Apple launching their credit card and saying, "okay, Goldman Sachs, you handle everything about branding. The product page for this credit card doesn't need to have Apple in the URL, and doesn't need to follow Apple branding rules" -- because Apple actually cares about getting the word out about the existence of their card, and they actually care about encouraging people to use it.

I don't necessarily think it's some kind of conspiracy to trick people (see TurboTax's shenanigans), but it does speak a lot to their priorities that they do not care about this site looking good or even official, and that they don't think it's important for it to be a recognizable URL or for it to be obvious that it's an official Apple service. None of those things were apparently important enough to get marketing/branding departments involved in the launch.

[MikePlacid]

Kinda strange that Apple has not used the time-and-customers-tested (and with a nice website) ifixit.com for the task. I only hope that iFixit will not die as a result - it’s always nice to have an alternative.

[OxO4]

It seems that iFixit will officially be selling replacement parts for Google's Pixel phones [0] and Valve's Steam Deck [1], so hopefully, they are not going anywhere.

[0] https://www.blog.google/outreach-initiatives/sustainability/...

[1] https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1675180/view/4347665...

[edrxty]

ifixit is a somewhat political organization, they're pushing right to repair and grade products on repairability. I'd rather they stay independent from Apple.

[NegativeLatency]

I agree that would be cool, and probably a better user experience but I’d suspect apple has large amounts of loathing for a company that criticizes their products.

[ben1040]

On that front, Google and iFixit are partnering, with iFixit selling OEM Pixel repair parts.

https://www.ifixit.com/News/58542/working-with-google

[skhr0680]

iFixit with real QC approved Apple parts would be awesome. I had a bad experience with a laptop screen from iFixit, their support's options were to accept a partial refund or ship it internationally to them at my own expense. I cut my losses and took the cash. In the end I felt like I would have been no worse off rolling the dice on an eBay part.

[status200]

Unless Apple expands the options tremendously, iFixit will be around for a while, since the only parts available currently are for a limited range of the newer iPhones.

[overtonwhy]

They make excellent tool kits for working on electronics!

[treeman79]

In the past I’ve done third-party web work for Apple.

They were beyond demanding that everything had to be pixel perfect at all resolutions. Far more then any other client I’ve had.

Was good in that it upped my game, and attention to detail. So I’m grateful for that. But wow was it annoying at the time.

Surprised they let others get away with low quality.

[mattl]

Did your work end up on apple.com?

[b3morales]

I poked around to see whether Apple was mentioned at all. Interestingly, clicking quickly through the legal links at the bottom, Apple does at least put themselves forward as the provider of the warranty.