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I feel Apple has lost its alignment with me and other long-time customers

morrick.me

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Re: I feel Apple has lost its alignment with me and other long-time customers

#171

Post by markemer »

jandrewrogers wrote: post #104
dmbche wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't most people use nondescript earbuds?

I rarely see any earbuds except AirPods in the US, they are the overwhelming majority. Several other countries I’ve worked in also have pretty ubiquitous AirPods penetration, though not quite at the level of the US. I have a few friends that bought every inexpensive alternative to AirPods, had a poor experience with all of them, finally relented and bought AirPods. Now they won’t use anything else. They spent more mo…

Especially if you're in the ecosystem. I can use them with all my devices, and they switch seamlessly.

Re: I feel Apple has lost its alignment with me and other long-time customers

#172

Post by fallous »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #113
snowwrestler wrote: post #89

> it’s a company that I feel has lost its alignment with me and other long-time Apple users and customers. When OS X debuted there was a daytime radio talk show in my area called “The Computer Guys.” They capably covered all sorts of computing topics, but were clearly long-time Apple dudes. And they spent weeks complaining about what a disaster OS X was. The Dock was useless and violated Apple’s HIG. The Finder made…

I believe the term is "parasocial relationship". I found this article quite weird. It would be one thing if it were (yet another) "Company X has lost its way..." kind of article. But this post seemed more along the lines of "Apple built these things that I don't care about." Umm, so??? Obviously some people do, and this article struck me as someone complaining that Apple isn't building exactly what he wants. Furtherm…

No, it's not a parasocial relationship. Those are one-sided and usually a passive consumer of media believing they have a real relationship with those who appear within said media.

If you are a customer you most assuredly have an actual relationship with the company. Your options when dissatisfied with that relationship is to end it, send your complaints to the company, or decide the dissatisfaction is overcome by the value you receive.

Re: I feel Apple has lost its alignment with me and other long-time customers

#173

Post by baq »

ars wrote: post #95
snowwrestler wrote: post #89

> it’s a company that I feel has lost its alignment with me and other long-time Apple users and customers. When OS X debuted there was a daytime radio talk show in my area called “The Computer Guys.” They capably covered all sorts of computing topics, but were clearly long-time Apple dudes. And they spent weeks complaining about what a disaster OS X was. The Dock was useless and violated Apple’s HIG. The Finder made…

> And a text terminal? Like DOS?? Who the hell is ever going to want to use that on a Mac? Me. I have to use a Mac at work, and I use the text terminal more than anything else on the computer. It doesn't help that Mac's don't have a good UI, everything is hidden behind extra key-presses, and switching between windows is a PAIN. On a mac every window for an app is considered the same, so there's no concept of switchin…

Of all the things you can dislike you pointed out a few features which actually make some sense. Cmd+` works well, even better than alt-tab most of the time, though it’s a major pain in the ass if you want multiple windows laid out from multiple apps on a single screen, and god forbid you have more windows of any in the background. The click to focus stops accidental clicks and gives a way out when the only visible piece of an app is a button.

I’d rather focus on Apple refusal to support standard dpi displays (hat tip betterdisplay), basically broken .0 releases, gimped docker implementation, useless window management and broken multi screen windows.

Re: I feel Apple has lost its alignment with me and other long-time customers

#174

Post by kelnos »

snowwrestler wrote: post #89

> it’s a company that I feel has lost its alignment with me and other long-time Apple users and customers. When OS X debuted there was a daytime radio talk show in my area called “The Computer Guys.” They capably covered all sorts of computing topics, but were clearly long-time Apple dudes. And they spent weeks complaining about what a disaster OS X was. The Dock was useless and violated Apple’s HIG. The Finder made…

> Save your customer loyalty energy for businesses where you can actually establish a connection, like a restaurant you like, or a local handyman.

Couldn't agree more. But I'd add that some (smaller?) businesses, where you still can't really establish a connection, can be worth your loyalty if they have a mission that resonates with you, and they are actually true to that mission. Of course, be prepared for the day when they get too successful and start acting in ways against the principles they were founded upon.

But yeah... I think the best place to use our energy is by evangelizing people first and foremost, not businesses. Send people to your favorite restaurant because the owner is always there, chats with customers, and seems to love what they do. Recommend the person who regularly cuts your hair and cares enough to remember you and ask about your life. Refer that great handyman to others, who you trust to be a straight-shooter, pride themselves on the quality of their work, and not gouge you on cost.

Re: I feel Apple has lost its alignment with me and other long-time customers

#175

Post by MisterSandman »

hedora wrote: post #94
avidiax wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I want that speculation to be true, but I also don't think that the Air is a stepping stone towards that. The risky parts on a folding phone are the bending screen and the hinge and the software features. The iPhone Air tests none of those things.

It tests their assembly lines and supply chain by producing 100 million titanium cases. They did something similar when they transitioned the product line to aluminum. (As a product, it’s the opposite of what I’d want — worse battery, bigger screen, worse camera, but they’ll certainly sell enough to debug the assembly lines.)

That doesn’t make sense, the 15pro and 16pro were already titanium, and they moved AWAY from titanium for those phones in the 17pro.

I don’t disagree that it has something to do with supply chain, but it’s not the titanium cases.

Re: I feel Apple has lost its alignment with me and other long-time customers

#176

Post by fallous »

linguae wrote: post #122
snowwrestler wrote: post #89

> it’s a company that I feel has lost its alignment with me and other long-time Apple users and customers. When OS X debuted there was a daytime radio talk show in my area called “The Computer Guys.” They capably covered all sorts of computing topics, but were clearly long-time Apple dudes. And they spent weeks complaining about what a disaster OS X was. The Dock was useless and violated Apple’s HIG. The Finder made…

I’ve also come to this realization as a longtime Mac user. Granted, I’m not old enough to have used the classic Mac OS as a professional, though I did use it in my childhood. However, I was in high school and college during the Jobs era of Mac OS X, and that’s when I started using Macs as my daily drivers from 2006 until 2022 when I retired my 2013 Mac Pro and 2013 MacBook Air and switched back to PCs running Windows…

Prior to the iPhone (but within the years Jobs was in charge), Apple was a company whose target demographic was the professional/semi-professional creative market. Once iPod and iPhone demonstrated a huge sales potential the company abandoned the creatives market and became a consumer-oriented company that provided means of media consumption.

Re: I feel Apple has lost its alignment with me and other long-time customers

#177

Post by anonzzzies »

freetime2 wrote: post #76

Regarding the iPhone 17 Pro: > People who have no use for all these pro video recording features shouldn’t waste their money on it. Unless they want a big chunky iPhone with the best camera array and/or have money to burn. I feel like people who “want the best camera array and have money to burn” probably describes a significant percentage of HN readers. I’m honestly pretty excited that they’ve finally put the larger…

In my hands the 16 pro max looks small. I only care about battery life really and it is really not great so I wouldn't mind a double thickness: larger dimensions all over in favor of battery and screen. Huawei used to have one (in 2016 or so?) that was perfect: massive slab, super battery. But then we needed all slimmer and smaller (after the asia phablet hype?). Battery life on iphones is not good if you use it a lot. I am in a coworking space and literally all iphone users have to plug in somewhere during the day as most use it all day and it conks out: I am on my chinese android all day and end of the day it's 60%+. I guess my hands are an exception, but I cannot stand dragging all kinds of crap with me because everyone wants the thinnest, smallest devices.

Re: I feel Apple has lost its alignment with me and other long-time customers

#178

Post by calf »

snowwrestler wrote: post #89

> it’s a company that I feel has lost its alignment with me and other long-time Apple users and customers. When OS X debuted there was a daytime radio talk show in my area called “The Computer Guys.” They capably covered all sorts of computing topics, but were clearly long-time Apple dudes. And they spent weeks complaining about what a disaster OS X was. The Dock was useless and violated Apple’s HIG. The Finder made…

This is such a unfair interpretation, it's a false equivalence argument. "OS X added Terminal and throwing out HIG for a UNIX-y UI" is a moot point.

It's not about loyalty, it's about Apple's own coherence and vision as a creative-technology company, and a bunch of sophisticated users offering a critique of it over time. Read it that way and it makes a lot more sense.

Beneath the Apple "fandom" or any fandom there are valid reasons why they came to be (the quality of the product), and we ought to elevate that than call customers naive for not adopting the very corporate cynicism that is a result of anticompetitive economics.

Re: I feel Apple has lost its alignment with me and other long-time customers

#179

Post by VogonPoetry »

gmueckl wrote: post #152
VogonPoetry wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everything humans do is carbon negative. Breathing, eating, driving, pooping (Westerners: toilet paper, All: waste management) and building. Getting every human to be carbon neutral would be an amazing thing! From searched / online numbers, Apple has shipped 150 million AirPods since 2016. The AirPods 3 weigh 5.5g. The gross weight of a basic Tesla model 3 is 1760Kg. I picked a Tesla because it has plastic, metals, m…

A few random notes: - Your model neglects the charging case with its own battery and microcontroller. - A Trsla is more likely to be recycled properly than the same amount of earbuds. Itbis also more recycleable because ofnthe high amount of steel and other bulk materials in it. - The ratio of semiconductor electronics to total weight is extremely different between the two products. And semiconductor manufacturing is…

Many of these are all excellent points. I did exclude the case.

The car recycling v.s. electronics recycling question is interesting. I once had a very interesting conversation with an electronics recycler on a plane trip - phones could not be recycled like other electronics because of some of the metals content - in particular beryllium copper content (used in spring contacts). He described it as a lot of electronics is ground up and a chemical processes used to extract the valuable elements. With phones the grinding up was the toxic / dangerous prohibited part.

I think the semiconductor numbers are more subtle though. It is sq. mm in the product and yield that are factors. A single power switching element in a Tesla will likely exceed the total silicon sq. mm usage in an AirPod. There is a lot of electronics in a Tesla. Some of the Tesla circuitry is more exotic, Silicon Carbide or GaN. I need to look into how much recovery / reprocessing silicon mfg is using for the reagents. The waste produced isn't as bad as it was in the Silicon Valley heyday where every original mfg site is now a superfund site with very large plumes of toxic waste in the subsoil.

Re: I feel Apple has lost its alignment with me and other long-time customers

#180

Post by stellalo »

wrs wrote: post #49

I think the only way you can consider iOS “amateurish” is according to a ridiculously high standard for phone software that Apple itself is responsible for normalizing.

The transparencies and slightly laggy animations (at least on iPhone 15: this overall hurts usability for me) do bring Windows Vista memories though
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