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Apple to wind down electric car effort after decadelong odyssey

bloomberg.com

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Re: Apple to wind down electric car effort after decadelong odyssey

#111

Post by paxys »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #14
riddlemethat wrote: post #3

This is a smart move. Apple seems so far behind in generative AI it's making Google look innovative.

> Apple seems so far behind in generative AI Apple is a best-in-class second mover. With the clusterfuck that has been generative AI (from OpenAI’s corporate drama to Google renaming and reörganizing their products every fifteen minutes) this seems prescient, with the only savvy player so far being Microsoft.

> Apple is a best-in-class second mover.

Apple's biggest successes have come from being the first mover in a brand new space.

Apple II, Macintosh, iPod, iPhone, iPad, Airpods, Watch were all category defining rather than "me too" products.

In fact Apple is terrible at throwing its hat into an already crowded space, and doubly so when it comes to software.

Re: Apple to wind down electric car effort after decadelong odyssey

#112

Post by jcgrillo »

ezfe wrote: post #62
jcgrillo wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But what's it for? I can tell what an electric car is for, can you tell me what "generative AI" is for? A car can transport goods and people, really good non-deterministic typeahead is just.. well, I don't know what I'd use it for, do you? EDIT: what I really mean is what makes people think this is a commercially viable thing to spend time and money on? Like, say one of these companies hits some magic jackpot and dis…

Generative AI won't lead to AGI any time soon but it does make our computers at lot better at understanding us. Simple example: Adding something to a reminder list, but the name of your lists don't exactly match the list you said to add to. Prompt: "Add milk to my shopping list" Siri: "I didn't find a shopping list, do you want to create one?" ChatGPT (when asked to pick from my actual lists), properly identifies the…

Does a computer understanding me make it better? I find that attempts the computer makes to understand me, "delight" me, etc. just end up pissing me off. It's a tool. All I ever want a tool to do is be completely invisible and become an extension of my body, which enables me to get a task done. Computer software which does anything other than exactly what I tell it to fails at this, because it instantly breaks my connection to the task I'm trying to do and refocuses my attention on the software itself.

I wouldn't dream of trying to use a Siri, it sounds absolutely maddening. All I expect is that when I press a key on the keyboard the character I commanded with my key press shows up on the screen before I can blink, and does so exactly once.

Re: Apple to wind down electric car effort after decadelong odyssey

#113

Post by dash2 »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #25
jcgrillo wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But what's it for? I can tell what an electric car is for, can you tell me what "generative AI" is for? A car can transport goods and people, really good non-deterministic typeahead is just.. well, I don't know what I'd use it for, do you? EDIT: what I really mean is what makes people think this is a commercially viable thing to spend time and money on? Like, say one of these companies hits some magic jackpot and dis…

> can you tell me what "generative AI" is for? Better keyboard text prediction and power management. A competent Siri.

"A competent Siri."

This, but it is really exciting because for the first time, you can just tell your computer what to do. Not just a given set of tasks, but e.g. "go to my gym and book a slot with my personal trainer"; "contact Shauna and set up a meeting to talk about X, then book me tickets to get there".

Think about how much monkey-work we all do with our smartphones. We might look back in 10 years and laugh at the idea that we had to press buttons all the time.

Re: Apple to wind down electric car effort after decadelong odyssey

#114

Post by dbbk »

filmgirlcw wrote: post #18

Good. This was an idea that never made any sense to me. It’s high overhead/low-margin and requires infrastructure, sales and after-sales support that just aren’t aligned with how Apple does business. It’s one thing to create a new car company (even tho those attempts usually fail), it’s another to purposefully take it on as a business line when your existing business groups prints money and have 40%+ margins. Especia…

Apple was never going to release a product that would inevitably kill lots of people. Absolute non-starter.

Re: Apple to wind down electric car effort after decadelong odyssey

#117

Post by skmurphy »

bcx wrote: post #105

I still think it's reasonable to have Apple consider building a car. Their core competency is in design, integrated platforms/ecosystems, and outsourced manufacturing. Assuming that they could use their supply chain expertise to simplify and outsource manufacturing, the cars of the future likely looks more like a software enabled consumer electronics device than a consumer mechanical device, and there are some really…

It's a highly regulated product, something they have no experience with.

Re: Apple to wind down electric car effort after decadelong odyssey

#118

Post by acdha »

wredue wrote: post #104
filmgirlcw wrote: post #18

Good. This was an idea that never made any sense to me. It’s high overhead/low-margin and requires infrastructure, sales and after-sales support that just aren’t aligned with how Apple does business. It’s one thing to create a new car company (even tho those attempts usually fail), it’s another to purposefully take it on as a business line when your existing business groups prints money and have 40%+ margins. Especia…

Apple started work on this car when vehicles were still reasonably priced. I’d wager this cancellation is purely due to there being no chance in hell Apple could get the Apple premium for it when vehicle sales are stagnating due to massive price increases.

The much-overstated “Apple premium” largely reflects that they don’t compete in the lowest end of the PC/phone market. They’d be competing with BMW, not charging even more.

Re: Apple to wind down electric car effort after decadelong odyssey

#119

Post by brandall10 »

madeofpalk wrote: post #45
UncleOxidant wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What surprises me is that it took this long to kill the product Maybe I'm misremembering, but I seem to recall that it was killed once before?

It's been killed, restarted, scaled down, scaled up about every 9 months for the past 10 years.

Is this current news more irreversible?

Re: Apple to wind down electric car effort after decadelong odyssey

#120

Post by dbbk »

paxys wrote: post #111
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Apple seems so far behind in generative AI Apple is a best-in-class second mover. With the clusterfuck that has been generative AI (from OpenAI’s corporate drama to Google renaming and reörganizing their products every fifteen minutes) this seems prescient, with the only savvy player so far being Microsoft.

> Apple is a best-in-class second mover. Apple's biggest successes have come from being the first mover in a brand new space. Apple II, Macintosh, iPod, iPhone, iPad, Airpods, Watch were all category defining rather than "me too" products. In fact Apple is terrible at throwing its hat into an already crowded space, and doubly so when it comes to software.

You just described second movers.
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