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All His Life Has He Looked Away, to the Future...

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Re: All His Life Has He Looked Away, to the Future...

#111

Post by Steko »

DougBTX wrote: post #106
Steko wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple makes money chiefly by selling devices to the public. Joe needs a phone, walks into an Apple store plays with an iPhone and buys one. Suprise works here because of the burst of publicity and the ease of purchase. This approach is based on limited supply and tries to maximize dollars per unit. Microsoft's Windows platform makes money chiefly by selling OS licenses to hardware companies like Dell. Every month the…

> and tries to maximize dollars per unit. I've never really understood this line as applied to Apple, since I don't recall them dropping prices after the initial release. If they did I'd expect a "wait two months for the prices to drop" meme, but I've never heard that recommendation.

There's no guarantee that supply increases indefinitely. At some point it will negatively affect your margin per unit. Until you get to that point I guess the goal is to manage demand by staggering releases to different areas and segments.

Even so sometimes your margin goes down but the consumer price is the same like when Apple expanded ipad sales thru Walmart/Best Buy/Target/whoever 6 months after the ipad launched when their supply started to ramp up. Their margin for an ipad at Best Buy is what 15% lower then if they sell it direct but the customer pays the same price.

Re: All His Life Has He Looked Away, to the Future...

#112

Post by objclxt »

Steko wrote: post #111
DougBTX wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> and tries to maximize dollars per unit. I've never really understood this line as applied to Apple, since I don't recall them dropping prices after the initial release. If they did I'd expect a "wait two months for the prices to drop" meme, but I've never heard that recommendation.

There's no guarantee that supply increases indefinitely. At some point it will negatively affect your margin per unit. Until you get to that point I guess the goal is to manage demand by staggering releases to different areas and segments. Even so sometimes your margin goes down but the consumer price is the same like when Apple expanded ipad sales thru Walmart/Best Buy/Target/whoever 6 months after the ipad launched…

...than if they sell it direct through the online store, perhaps. I would imagine the overall margins to Apple on an iPad sold in a Best Buy and an iPad sold in an Apple Store are similar, because Apple Stores are typically located on extremely expensive real estate and have much higher running costs than Best Buy stores.

Apple obviously would prefer you to buy it in an Apple Store, because they have more control over the consumer relationship and experience - but running a physical retail store is not cheap, and that's a cost Apple has to cover if they sell direct, which they don't if they sell via Best Buy.

Re: All His Life Has He Looked Away, to the Future...

#113

Post by trebor »

kkowalczyk wrote: post #8
trebor wrote: post #2

Strategies like "release early, release often" and "version 0.1" don't work for massive corporations that can afford to finish a product before actively hyping it. I'd respect Microsoft more if they'd actually imitate that facet of Apple.

This is apples (iPad - a hardware device) to oranges (an operating system). Apple is doing exactly the same thing as Microsoft when it comes to os. First beta version of iOS 5 was released 3 months ago at WWDC, Apple's equivalent of Build conference, and is not shipping yet. The same goes for Mac OS X - beta builds are available to developers long before the final retail build. Neither Microsoft nor Apple can just sh…

That is true.

Yet I constantly think about the various companies that hype their Windows-powered tablets which never are released. Due to that happening a number of times with HP, and others, I've been expecting Microsoft to one-up the hardware companies and make their own tablet. Just get done with it. Or, stop the idiots from hyping incomplete products.

That's why I mixed issues like that together.

Re: All His Life Has He Looked Away, to the Future...

#114

Post by neutronicus »

barista wrote: post #87
neutronicus wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I downvoted you because you used the word "fanboy". It's my policy.

You sir, must have a busy life here on HN.

Unfortunately, yes. I haven't been able to get it to catch on.

Re: All His Life Has He Looked Away, to the Future...

#115

Post by eykanal »

ubernostrum wrote: post #105
varunsrin wrote: post #22

> "I simply wish to direct your attention at how utterly different the two companies are." >"Me? I’d be appalled if Apple were to unveil something in the half- (if that) finished state of Windows 8 for tablets. I enjoy writing about what’s real" What Gruber claims to understand, but actually doesn't, is that the Microsoft ecosystem is a very different beast than the Apple ecosystem. Microsoft, unlike Apple, does not…

Of course, the other other side of this is that Microsoft has, over the past decade or so, become a company that specializes in three things: 1. Shipping Windows, Office and XBox. 2. Showing demos of revolutionary "coming next year" technologies that never ever ship. 3. Occasionally shipping something that's not Windows, Office or XBox, and then killing it as quickly as possible. The last two have especially dogged M…

This is an excellent point. For some reason, this pre-release has everyone all excited. There hasn't been this much buzz in the tech circles over a Microsoft product in probably over a decade. Uber's comment below makes me wonder what everyone else is seeing that I'm missing.

Re: All His Life Has He Looked Away, to the Future...

#116

Post by shriphani »

ubernostrum wrote: post #105
varunsrin wrote: post #22

> "I simply wish to direct your attention at how utterly different the two companies are." >"Me? I’d be appalled if Apple were to unveil something in the half- (if that) finished state of Windows 8 for tablets. I enjoy writing about what’s real" What Gruber claims to understand, but actually doesn't, is that the Microsoft ecosystem is a very different beast than the Apple ecosystem. Microsoft, unlike Apple, does not…

Of course, the other other side of this is that Microsoft has, over the past decade or so, become a company that specializes in three things: 1. Shipping Windows, Office and XBox. 2. Showing demos of revolutionary "coming next year" technologies that never ever ship. 3. Occasionally shipping something that's not Windows, Office or XBox, and then killing it as quickly as possible. The last two have especially dogged M…

On the other side of your other side : this is the only company that shipped a device as revolutionary as the Kinect - a device that is pretty badass.

At this point MS has a 580bn ecosystem. I know that America only deals in trillions now but still 580bn is nothing to scoff at.

[Disclaimer : former intern]

Re: All His Life Has He Looked Away, to the Future...

#117

Post by tvon »

shriphani wrote: post #116
ubernostrum wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course, the other other side of this is that Microsoft has, over the past decade or so, become a company that specializes in three things: 1. Shipping Windows, Office and XBox. 2. Showing demos of revolutionary "coming next year" technologies that never ever ship. 3. Occasionally shipping something that's not Windows, Office or XBox, and then killing it as quickly as possible. The last two have especially dogged M…

On the other side of your other side : this is the only company that shipped a device as revolutionary as the Kinect - a device that is pretty badass. At this point MS has a 580bn ecosystem. I know that America only deals in trillions now but still 580bn is nothing to scoff at. [Disclaimer : former intern]

> this is the only company that shipped a device as revolutionary as the Kinect

Were you an intern in the marketing department, perchance? ;)

Re: All His Life Has He Looked Away, to the Future...

#118

Post by TorgoGuy »

Gruber is no idiot. However, he missed the mark and has his Apple-blinders on here. Apple pre-announces nearly all of its operating systems and give developers access to betas. (Didn't I read Gruber talking about pre-release versions of OSX Lion? How about his recent posts about iOS 5?) The vendors have to provide information ahead of releases so that developers can write applications for them.

Thurrott isn't an idiot either. He has long been frustrated by Microsoft's boneheaded mistakes and tweeting his excitement over all the things Microsoft seems to be finally getting right with Windows 8 in a humorous way doesn't equal some kind of prediction. However, he conflated a software-only platform (Windows 8) with an integrated hardware/software platform (iPad/iOS). No doubt decent tablet hardware will arrive for Windows 8, but we'll see how well they'll work together.

Re: All His Life Has He Looked Away, to the Future...

#119

Post by shriphani »

tvon wrote: post #117
shriphani wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the other side of your other side : this is the only company that shipped a device as revolutionary as the Kinect - a device that is pretty badass. At this point MS has a 580bn ecosystem. I know that America only deals in trillions now but still 580bn is nothing to scoff at. [Disclaimer : former intern]

> this is the only company that shipped a device as revolutionary as the Kinect Were you an intern in the marketing department, perchance? ;)

Nope, sharepoint search :D
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