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iPhone 5 First Weekend Sales Top Five Million

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Re: iPhone 5 First Weekend Sales Top Five Million

#91

Post by vibrunazo »

calinet6 wrote: post #9

Turns out people just wanted a more refined iPhone with 4G. Who would have thought? Seriously though, I remember naysayers about the iPod back when it was first released, bemoaning the interface, design, and pointing out dozens of other mp3 players with longer feature lists at better prices. Yet the iPod still won out because it offered a consistent and predictable user experience, from the purchase to the day-to-day…

> The tech crowd tends to look at devices as bricks with feature lists attached to them, but consumers don't.

That's one unusual conclusion. One could argue that the main difference is that the tech crowd knows what they're buying better than average misinformed consumers.

We have a saying where I live. Billions of flies eat shit every day, but that doesn't mean so should we. Apple certainly doesn't sell shit, their products are great for sure. But there are also a lot of valid criticism to be made. And breaking record sales doesn't mean, in any way, the criticism is any less valid. You're confusing two very different things.

I understand here at HN people can get very personally offended if I even hint that Apple's sales success might not be exclusively a result of technical engineering or design innovation. But doing so would be unfair to Apple's sales and marketing team. Who are genius at what they do, and deserve a lot of recognition for their important role in driving sales.

Re: iPhone 5 First Weekend Sales Top Five Million

#92

Post by OhArgh »

recursive wrote: post #80
OhArgh wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or even what defines a mobile operating system. Curiosity is technically mobile and has an operating system...

I doubt curiosity's OS is very advanced from the mobile phone marketing perspective. I'd think it's very conservatively written.

So no martian HTML5 support then? :P

Re: iPhone 5 First Weekend Sales Top Five Million

#93

Post by lwhi »

flyinRyan wrote: post #81
lwhi wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah, but they don't just make products. They also specialise in litigation ;) I'm sorry for the negativity - but the way Apple is behaving at the moment makes me angry. It was different when Apple was the underdog; I could understand why they were worth supporting. The company, as it currently stands, has completely lost my sympathy.

Why does Apple make you mad? Most companies do this. Remember when Oracle bought Sun and said "don't worry, Sun's IP is safe with us" and then started suing people for using it? Ellison was on camera saying "I don't know if Java is free". Well you knew when you bought it! MS has some incredibly slimy stuff. And there are companies that don't even make anything, they just sue. I can't imagine a reason to single out Ap…

I believe Apple is becoming too prescriptive; both in terms of its iOS ecosystem (e.g. policing and moderation of the AppStore) and in terms of the way it interacts with its customers (e.g. the connectors available to users).

While many people will say "it's their product, they can do what they like", I find this argument disingenuous, especially when the company in question begins to aggressively attack market growth in the court room.

I believe Apple's aggressively litigious actions are at odds with competition and innovation. I don't agree that they have every right to go after Samsung - and I find the idea that simple interface features can be patented absurd.

This kind of litigious behaviour highlights much of what's wrong in current society IMO.

I believe that the philosophy behind Apple's recent actions, potentially prevents innovation and if left unhindered will lead to a world that's arguably less free.

I agree many companies may behave in a similar way, I don't think this excuses the behaviour - especially when Apple's marketing message is based upon the idea of 'thinking different'.

Re: iPhone 5 First Weekend Sales Top Five Million

#94

Post by 6ren »

calinet6 wrote: post #9

Turns out people just wanted a more refined iPhone with 4G. Who would have thought? Seriously though, I remember naysayers about the iPod back when it was first released, bemoaning the interface, design, and pointing out dozens of other mp3 players with longer feature lists at better prices. Yet the iPod still won out because it offered a consistent and predictable user experience, from the purchase to the day-to-day…

Yep, people buy benefits, not features.

But getting greater CPU power than, and equivalent GPU power to the iPad 3, into a tiny, smaller, lighter phone, is a pretty impressive feature. Because the CPU power isn't spread over 4 cores, it's easier to utilise than Tegra 3 phones. And... 2x in a year even beats Moore's Law.

Re: iPhone 5 First Weekend Sales Top Five Million

#95

Post by josephlord »

bornhuetter wrote: post #73
josephlord wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Doesn't matter, you still can't tell the true demand until there is general availability whatever the cause is. I don't think that they artificially limit supply initially but they almost certainly do launch before they have enough to fully meet demand. If you thought there was demand for 10,000,000 phones would you really wait until you could stockpile $5Billion worth of inventory before you pressed the launch butto…

> I don't think that they artificially limit supply initially I'm pretty sure they do. It would have been deeply embarrasing for Apple if they couldn't claim that "demand outstripped supply" - and it would hurt them on their next launch, because people would be less inclined to pre-order.

What you take 'artificially limit supply to mean?

1) Launch before you can fulfil supply.

2) Resist taking too much from future supply by limiting use of air shipment. Also saves shipping costs. [I'm more used to TVs, phones may be mostly air shipped normally]

3) Have warehouses of stock backed up ready to release.

(2) can be similar to having floating warehouses while items are sea shipped.

I guess that Apple are doing (1) and possibly (2) but I would be surprised if they are doing (3) apart from some supplies so that if some locations don't sell out they can prioritise others rather than to have fully committed everything at the start. If they are doing (3) on a large scale there will probably be evidence of the excess inventory in their quarterly figures.

If you think they are doing (3) in a big way can you suggest why that would work or what the benefit of the approach would be?

Re: iPhone 5 First Weekend Sales Top Five Million

#96

Post by sbuk »

polshaw wrote: post #85
seiji wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Millions of people have a significant investment in iTunes media. They don't understand DRM-vs-not. They don't understand sideloading or frontloading or rearloading. They just want to plug-n-go. Pick some well off high school nearby and ask kids how often they buy something on iTunes. You'll cry when a large portion of them say multiple times per week. You'll go catatonic when they mention regularly spending over $10…

>ask kids how often they buy something on iTunes. You'll cry when a large portion of them say multiple times per week [citation needed]

Petty. There has been a lot of hyperbole from both sides, but to demand a citation for the success of the iTunes platform is wilfully ingnoring the obvious.

Re: iPhone 5 First Weekend Sales Top Five Million

#97

Post by sbuk »

lwhi wrote: post #93
flyinRyan wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why does Apple make you mad? Most companies do this. Remember when Oracle bought Sun and said "don't worry, Sun's IP is safe with us" and then started suing people for using it? Ellison was on camera saying "I don't know if Java is free". Well you knew when you bought it! MS has some incredibly slimy stuff. And there are companies that don't even make anything, they just sue. I can't imagine a reason to single out Ap…

I believe Apple is becoming too prescriptive; both in terms of its iOS ecosystem (e.g. policing and moderation of the AppStore) and in terms of the way it interacts with its customers (e.g. the connectors available to users). While many people will say "it's their product, they can do what they like", I find this argument disingenuous, especially when the company in question begins to aggressively attack market growt…

Why should they, or anyone else, sit back and watch a competitor get rich off of their work? That's the crux of the matter, isn't it? The validity of some of the patents is undoubtedly questionable, but then Samsung are suing based on FRAND patents that have already been paid for. That's far worse IMO, yet this is constantly glossed over. Samsung are no mor innocent than Apple are guilty. Hate on a corporation all you want, but vilifying consumers for their choice of phone? That's crossing a line. It's inverted snobbery. It like how Apple fans used to behave...

Re: iPhone 5 First Weekend Sales Top Five Million

#99

Post by adestefan »

vibrunazo wrote: post #91
calinet6 wrote: post #9

Turns out people just wanted a more refined iPhone with 4G. Who would have thought? Seriously though, I remember naysayers about the iPod back when it was first released, bemoaning the interface, design, and pointing out dozens of other mp3 players with longer feature lists at better prices. Yet the iPod still won out because it offered a consistent and predictable user experience, from the purchase to the day-to-day…

> The tech crowd tends to look at devices as bricks with feature lists attached to them, but consumers don't. That's one unusual conclusion. One could argue that the main difference is that the tech crowd knows what they're buying better than average misinformed consumers. We have a saying where I live. Billions of flies eat shit every day, but that doesn't mean so should we. Apple certainly doesn't sell shit, their…

> That's one unusual conclusion. One could argue that the main difference is that the tech crowd knows what they're buying better than average misinformed consumers.

Or people just don't care about the "other stuff." Most people just want something that makes calls, sends text messages, surfs the web/facebook/twitter, and plays games. I see the latest Samsung commercial about the S3 and I really don't care that I can bump to share playlists (1. because I barely listen to music on my phone and 2. who actually makes playlists anymore?) or the list of 20 other features that I'll never use. I don't even care about 4G/LTS because 3G is fast enough and I'm not going to pay more for less data from the carriers.

Re: iPhone 5 First Weekend Sales Top Five Million

#100

Post by madoublet »

untog wrote: post #29
calinet6 wrote: post #9

Turns out people just wanted a more refined iPhone with 4G. Who would have thought? Seriously though, I remember naysayers about the iPod back when it was first released, bemoaning the interface, design, and pointing out dozens of other mp3 players with longer feature lists at better prices. Yet the iPod still won out because it offered a consistent and predictable user experience, from the purchase to the day-to-day…

I agree that the criticism of the iPhone 5 was overblown, but I don't think these figures are a tremendous validation of the iPhone 5, either. The simple fact is that the vast majority of people are on two year cellphone plans, and it's been two years since the iPhone 4 came out. They took the upgrade in front of them. The iPhone 5 was good enough that people didn't want to switch to Android, but that isn't the stron…

Well, the Nokia 920 is a genuinely better alternative: better screen, better camera, better OS. And, the HTC 8x is close. But, the awareness is not there.
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