Why the Apple phone will fail, and fail badly (2006)
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Why the Apple phone will fail, and fail badly (2006)
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Re: Why the Apple phone will fail, and fail badly (2006)
#2>As customers start to realise that the competition offers better functionality at a lower price, by negotiating a better subsidy, sales will stagnate. After a year a new version will be launched, but it will lack the innovation of the first and quickly vanish.
Any other great insights Bill Ray?
>Mobile phones are not complex to use because of bad interface design, they are complex to use because they are complex devices with a myriad of features.
Reminds me discussions about how "shells are fine" and couldn't possibly be much better.
Re: Why the Apple phone will fail, and fail badly (2006)
#3Glad I dodged a bullet there by not buying Apple stock back in 2006'
Re: Why the Apple phone will fail, and fail badly (2006)
#4> As customers start to realise that the competition offers better functionality at a lower price, by negotiating a better subsidy, sales will stagnate. After a year a new version will be launched, but it will lack the innovation of the first and quickly vanish. Any other great insights Bill Ray? > Mobile phones are not complex to use because of bad interface design, they are complex to use because they are complex d…
Have you ever been wrong on anything, and should you still be listened to?
Re: Why the Apple phone will fail, and fail badly (2006)
#5> As customers start to realise that the competition offers better functionality at a lower price, by negotiating a better subsidy, sales will stagnate. After a year a new version will be launched, but it will lack the innovation of the first and quickly vanish. Any other great insights Bill Ray? > Mobile phones are not complex to use because of bad interface design, they are complex to use because they are complex d…
Have you ever been wrong on anything, and should you still be listened to?
Wrong? Plenty of times.
That wrong? No.
Re: Why the Apple phone will fail, and fail badly (2006)
#6The second Apple debuted that smooth as fucking butter interface it was clear as day how badly behind people were at the time. Pre-iPhone the form of phones was incredible but the function was dogshit garbage. Small displays rendering everything in software and failing to hit 15fps on a good day because these poor little ARM chips were being abused to within an inch of their lives. If you were seriously lucky you might get blitting in hardware.
Then iPhone comes in with a high spec ARM, a GPU, and Core Graphics. If I was Nokia/SE/Motorola I would have been shitting myself watching Steve demo the iPhone knowing that I'm at least five years behind now.
Re: Why the Apple phone will fail, and fail badly (2006)
#7I think the key part of his argument is:
> Mobile phones are not complex to use because of bad interface design, they are complex to use because they are complex devices with a myriad of features. The fiercely competitive mobile phone business has driven interface development at an astounding rate: it has become de rigueur for every new handset to feature a revolutionary new interface mechanism.
> Apple is extremely good at creating simple interfaces, and it is likely that the Apple phone will have a pleasing interface which is relatively easy to use and recognisably iPod branded, but it won't need to appeal to the iPod users, it will need to appeal to the network operators.
e.g. adding a camera to the phone can justify an additional price to the phone.
I'd say it's somewhat interesting this was wrong.
IIRC, the touchscreen, mobile internet, and (walled-garden) app store allow for a shift from "phone + widgets" to "smartphone".
Re: Why the Apple phone will fail, and fail badly (2006)
#8Matches the same prediction for Tesla - the hardware companies ‘will catch up’ to the software ones.
Yes cars and phones are hardware, but that’s relatively easy compared to the software. In cars people think software is just infotainment, but it’s really hundreds of controllers all networked and often each written by different vendors.
Tesla has brought most of them in house, and made them updateable. Enabling features like watching your dog safe and live in your car as you eat at a restaurant. Or turning down the cabin fan so the noise doesn’t interfere with a phone call.
It’s funny in like 15 years, everyone who has tried a phone OS has failed except Android.
Re: Why the Apple phone will fail, and fail badly (2006)
#9So how did Apple manage with the issues mentioned in the article? Namely the subsidies to operators.
Re: Why the Apple phone will fail, and fail badly (2006)
#10They did fail … for technologists. I don’t ever see “normal” people complaining about mobile phones. Some people love them, and have no sense that anyone could dislike them. I’m definitely not criticizing technologists here, either. I really hate mobile phones, but I’d have to be blind to see how much people enjoy them.