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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

#201

Post by pjmlp »

In the old days Apple were super expensive and hardly present in Iberian Penisula, Portugal only had Interlog in Lisbon, we saw adds on magazines, no one bought them.

First time I actually managed to see some LC in person, I was already attending the university, and there were only used in two places, a single room on the computer lab building, and the administrative assistants on the IT department, no one else across the whole campus had them.

I got to use and learn NeXTSTEP, because my thesis was to port a visualization software away from it into Windows, as my supervisor was the only owner of one, and they were getting rid of it, as NeXT wasn't having a great future on those years, already having pivoted to software only.

So the turn around with OS X felt interesting, and kind of revigorating, given how close Apple and NeXT were to be gone.

That Apple is long gone.

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

#202

Post by von_lohengramm »

grues-dinner wrote: post #190
wvenable wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If the latest product seems good, buy it. If not, don’t. There is another aspect to this though. As a user of an ecosystem, you're committed in many ways. As Apple or Microsoft or Google releases a new version of their operating system you're going to run that on hardware you already own. You're going to run software that you already own on that the OS. And you're doing to use skills and knowledge of that software…

To be honest I sometimes feel that my aversion to getting looked into an ecosystem is actually a detriment in some ways. I have a horrible mishmash of apps and programs and nothing integrates really well long term (story of life on a Linux desktop, really). Maybe life would really be better if I just hand over control and become a true believer!

I used to go through phases where I would try this. I gave Windows + WSL a shot. I gave embracing the Apple ecosystem a shot. I gave GNOME a shot. I gave KDE a shot. I was even crazy enough to give ChromeOS as my daily driver a shot. And so on and so forth.

I found every single time that it just wasn't worth it. There was always some critical failure that was either completely underlooked or a 20 year old bug/shortcoming that had every patch to fix it rejected. I genuinely don't understand how people tolerate the dogshit being forcefed to you on all of these controlled platforms. People say that everything is getting worse, and it's true, but it's also true that you're actively choosing to use the things that are getting worse.

I've eventually settled on NixOS and XFCE so I can tweak things to my particular needs while also benefiting from an army of unpaid labor continually improving nixpkgs and other flakes. This setup isn't perfect, but I've optimized for maximal comfort & utility while exerting minimal effort & time. Things really only break when they're self-updating under the hood, which thankfully is rather rare in nixpkgs.

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

#203

Post by pjmlp »

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…

The day XCode runs on the iPadOS, the classical Mac is gone.

They already got rid of servers and the workstation market, apparently losing those customers to Windows/Linux wasn't seen as something to worry about.

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

#204

Post by josteink »

anonzzzies wrote: post #177
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 lo…

> In my hands the 16 pro max looks small. I only care about battery life really and it is really not great

The Max version may have room for a bigger battery, but it needs to drive a bigger screen so it’s a double-edged sword. I’m not sure if you end up ahead or not.

If battery life is an issue you can turn off some the more gimmicky «pro» features like the always on screen.

I have a «regular» 15 pro and I think battery life is good. I haven’t had a single day where overrun out of battery so far.

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

#205

Post by pjmlp »

raw_anon_1111 wrote: post #78
avidiax wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple is a hostage of its own marketing. A modular iphone that has an easy to replace battery, easy to replace screen and is maybe 2mm thicker to account for it? That would be a sellout. A convertible Macbook Air with a touch screen? It would be sold out. Neckband-style airpods with all-day battery life? Might not sell out, but would be popular. A best-in-class TV powered by Apple TV? Would probably sell well. But al…

And this is why you shouldn’t listen to the “less space than Nomad. No Wireless. Lame” tech crowd [1]. A TV is bulky, race to the bottom commodity that is only replaced every 5-8 years. > Neckband-style airpods with all-day battery life? Might not sell out, but would be popular. I don’t think Apple has any issue selling AirPods. But honestly, I do like my $70 Beat Flex for traveling. I don’t have to worry about them…

No, a TV is replaced when it dies, regardless of the years, all of my are older than 10 years.

Same applies to everything else electronic that I own.

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

#206

Post by 2muchcoffeeman »

wvenable wrote: post #158
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…

> If the latest product seems good, buy it. If not, don’t. There is another aspect to this though. As a user of an ecosystem, you're committed in many ways. As Apple or Microsoft or Google releases a new version of their operating system you're going to run that on hardware you already own. You're going to run software that you already own on that the OS. And you're doing to use skills and knowledge of that software…

I’m a long time Apple user. But I never do anything that locks me into Apple in a way that makes me dependent on Apple. I could move to Linux tomorrow and everything I depend on would be fine. There’s no Apple service I actually need.

I think Google and Android is worse in this way. The backup Android I had years ago forced me to login with my Gmail or I couldn’t use it. My old iPhone happily runs without being logged in. I just lose the cloud features. Whatever.

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

#207

Post by kshacker »

rectang wrote: post #80
daedrdev wrote: post #50

I do feel like there is some man shaking fist at cloud here. The post dismisses airpods, yet they are one of the most popular products in the US, with like 75% of young people owning a pair, great quality, features, and battery life. I dont think a swappable battery is even a good feature, the parts would be tiny and break easily given their size not to mention how often they could get lost

I used to hate Airpods in videochats since they made the person wearing them sound bad because of dropouts, had heinous latency, and frequently disconnected causing meeting interruptions. But people think they're "better" than [wired] Earpods, which have none of those problems. /me shakes fist at cloud

Sometimes it takes an event to change your view. I bought my first noise canceling sennheiser about a dozen years back. Hated it. Tried the noise canceling on my airpods. Hated it. Kept Airpods on transparency since most of my usage was during walking and I wanted to hear ambient sound, and never drown that out.

Then never tried noise canceling this week while on the plane. I was like ... what happened? Now I am actively looking forward to it.

I also used to hate airpods for their disconnects but they have become more reliable, especially if you tell them to remain connected to the last device you manually connected to.

Meetings / video chats are an anti-pattern for sure. There is so much communication loss because of other factors - someone forgot to mute, someone forgot to mute, plus what not. You want your side of the communication to be pristine, and even if airpods flake out 1/20 times, it is not good. I agree with you on that.

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

#208

Post by mulmen »

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…

Ok but who do I buy from? I agree Apple isn’t good but who is better?

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

#209

Post by kshacker »

adastra22 wrote: post #159
musicale wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple transforms product categories from time to time, and the rest of the time improvements are incremental (though usually good). In the last 5 years or so Apple Silicon has transformed expectations, not just for Apple products but for the whole industry, starting with the M1 MacBook Air, then with the M1 MacBook Pro, and more recently with the M4 Mac mini. (Meanwhile Mac Studio refactored Apple's desktop lineup, p…

Vision Pro's only problem is the price. At $1k I think we would see a lot more adoption. I say this as a former skeptic and who gets VR sickness from other AR/VR devices, and hates the idea of strapping a device to my face and being isolated from my surroundings. I got an AVP for work (long story), and was blown away. No VR sickness. I can work from anywhere with my laptop while enjoying a massive, wrap-around high r…

From what I have heard, it weighs on you. Maybe you can tolerate for an hour, and maybe you can do more than me, but I think the weight is the second parameter which puts off people.

Reduce weight by 1/3 and same thing for the price, and I will likely buy it.

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

#210

Post by rsanheim »

pi-err wrote: post #199

Clickbait built on 2 fantasy notions: 1- that Jobs would somehow be the hero of a mythical arab/syrian culture and diversity politics who would have behaved differently than Cook towards Trump. If anything, Jobs cherished the white working suburban middle class of the west coast that has been destroyed in the last generations. He _never_ behaved as a white knight and nobody knows what he would have done (and nobody k…

uhmm... wat?

where was there any mention in the OP of Jobs about diversity or his Syrian background?

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