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Apple's naming conventions are a mess

medium.com

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Re: Apple's naming conventions are a mess

#14

Post by davnicwil »

appplication wrote: post #2

Sure I agree they’re a bit confusing, but the iPhone is arguably the single most recognized product name on this planet. Totally lost me with the shift from iPhone to Apple Phone.

I agree, and also there's something communicated by the brand iPhone that is important.

"Apple phone" communicates that this is merely Apple's version of a thing, the phone, that many manufacturers produce.

"iPhone" is a noun, its own distinct category of thing, that you can only buy from Apple.

Re: Apple's naming conventions are a mess

#15

Post by pxoe »

Sometimes things like this only make the present naming conventions look like they actually kinda make sense. It's kinda like "what if brand recognition or backwards compatibility didn't exist". (and i'm sure even changing iphone to "phone" would somehow be a breaking change in some places.) I'll take "iPhone 16 Plus" over "Apple Phone 6.7" 2024".

As for the litany of suffixes, it's so much easier (and actually makes more sense) to not take them so seriously or literally, because it's all just vibes based. "What's more Pro-er than Pro? maybe it's Max, maybe it's Ultra, whatever "sounds right". The way people get some kind of impression from a product or brand or a name isn't gonna be so neatly lined up ever. Like, this is one of those cases where advertising and branding shows up as kind of an actual art aimed to convey and evoke some kind of emotion, as opposed to just 'lining it all up'. Apple's branding is so focused on emotional appeal, so something like this just removes it. It doesn't matter what "Air" means, it's just a vibe. (and people do just want that, which they did find out when they tried to leave macbook air behind)

Re: Apple's naming conventions are a mess

#16

Post by wenc »

deafpolygon wrote: post #8

I don’t really see an issue with the product naming at all: just look at other companies… often you have NO clear indication that it’s recent or older. iPhone 16 everyone knows this, and anticipates the next iPhone (presumably 17).

Aiming for consistency in branding achieves brand legibility (customer can figure out progressions and segments intuitively) but branding is about so much more than that.

It’s about name recognition, cachet, aspirational qualities, etc. which are all way more important than consistency. Inconsistency is sometimes a tool for achieving differentiation.

Re: Apple's naming conventions are a mess

#17

Post by nerdjon »

There are only 2 parts of this I agree with.

First the naming convention for all of the iPhone models needs a cleanup. "iPhone 16 Pro Max" is weird. But not fully sure of an alternative.

and "iOS". It no longer makes sense to be generic and should just be "phoneOS" to match everything else. But at this point "iOS" is also largely solidified but not sure how much sense it makes to change and how many people outside of tech actually fully realize that "iOS" and "iPadOS" are now different.

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