Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Tim Cook's Impeccable Timing

stratechery.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

191–200 of 438 posts

Re: Tim Cook's Impeccable Timing

#191

Post by twoodfin »

ecshafer wrote: post #48
snowwrestler wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tim Cook refreshing his 401k page every day to see if he’s ready to FIRE.

I know this is a joke. But when I was at Vanguard, something like 95-99% of our users literally just logged on, checked their balance and logged off. A decent percentage of the user base does that every day. So only a few percentage a day actually made a trade or anything else. I always found it pretty odd before I realized I only make a trade 1 or 2% of the time.

The mobile app now shows you your aggregate balance on the login screen as soon as you authenticate, which can be via Face ID.

Re: Tim Cook's Impeccable Timing

#192

Post by plomme »

csunbird wrote: post #168
alex7o wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fight me but I miss the touchbar, it was customizable to be super useful with better touch tool

I think the problem with touch bar was that, it completely replaced the function keys, instead of complementing them. Other than that, I actually liked it.

Hah, that reminds me! My first work issued Mac didn't have the ESC key, just the touch bar. IIRC a program hung in fullscreen, freezing both the app and the touch bar. So I had to reboot to get out of it because the esc key didn't work.

Re: Tim Cook's Impeccable Timing

#193

Post by varjag »

sneak wrote: post #170
jmyeet wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This was the last gasp of Johnny Ive. And yes, it was terrible. It got us ending the incredibly successful Macbook Air for the too-compromised 12" Macbook (1 port, remember?), the pointless Touch Bar and the terrible butterly keyboard (remember how dust could kill it and I'm sure Apple spent a fortune on replacements?). Why did we get all these things? It wasn't just thinness. It was to raise to Average Selling Price…

I collect the 12" macbooks, even today. It really only needs one port; the vast majority of people never plug anything but power into their computer ever. I would pay huge sums for a modern Mx 11-12" ultralight macbook with a reliable keyboard.

Same. Using my MacBook 12" of Theseus still at home. It's a fantastic machine for travel or field work if configured to 16GB. That 1" down from Air makes a huge difference on a seat tray.

Re: Tim Cook's Impeccable Timing

#194

Post by davedx »

pjc50 wrote: post #59
steveBK123 wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe Ternus is the kind of leader who could bring 0->1 innovation back to Apple in some form. Maybe an Alphabet "other bets" type setup? Or simply just taking more chances on completely new product lines that may or may not pay off in 5-10 years (like VisionPro). I mean when was the last big new bet previous to VisionPro? Wearables, with the Apple Watch in 2015 is probably it, a decade prior. (AirPods are huge but f…

For a while people were talking about the "Apple car". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_car_project ; seemingly they gave up on it because they realized that FSD wasn't quite going to work. I'm not sure why they wouldn't just pivot back to making a regular EV, it would still be guaranteed to sell millions of units at a premium price point by being a Tesla without (a) That Guy (b) build quality issues like panel ga…

Making cars is just a low margin business with a huge manufacturing footprint. They'd have been competing directly with Chinese EV makers. Dodged a bullet IMO

Re: Tim Cook's Impeccable Timing

#195

Post by dpark »

sroussey wrote: post #135
steveBK123 wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The other thing that always got me about the car was.. I wondered if the executives at Apple had all become too rich? Apple sells premium hardware but generally sells products in the 10s or 100s of millions of volume, so pretty mass market consumer good. The car seemed to be solving the "what if we could make a $100k car"? At some point of wealth people become so disconnected from normal everyday life of normal peopl…

The Apple Lisa was the first GUI computer Apple made. Starting price $9995 (or $35,000 in today’s dollars). Yes, Apple has gone down market these days, but their history is really premium. Or they start premium and then move down market like they did when they released the Macintosh ($2500 then or $8000 today). And the Mac didn’t do much more than the Lisa and had no software. (The LaserWriter didn’t come for another…

> If we had the innovative Apple of yore it would push out crazy new and very expensive products and iterate

Vision Pro sells for >3 grand. Their strategy still seems consistent with exactly what you describe.

Re: Tim Cook's Impeccable Timing

#196

Post by davedx »

steveBK123 wrote: post #26
monkeydust wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What big hardware bets are people expecting him to take?

It doesn't even have to be hardware. Maybe the guy from hardware who created and maintained excellence under his org can bring that level to where Apple has fallen - software. Maybe the next innovation will be a software/service we haven't contemplated.

- go head to head against google workspace

- apple public cloud

Lets go!

Re: Tim Cook's Impeccable Timing

#197

Post by wtallis »

csunbird wrote: post #168
alex7o wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fight me but I miss the touchbar, it was customizable to be super useful with better touch tool

I think the problem with touch bar was that, it completely replaced the function keys, instead of complementing them. Other than that, I actually liked it.

I think the lack of haptic feedback is what doomed the Touch Bar. If they'd been able to solve that problem, it could have been an acceptable replacement for the function keys.

Re: Tim Cook's Impeccable Timing

#198

Post by PopAlongKid »

aworks wrote: post #43
retired wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Being eligible for Medicare, Cook can finally afford to retire.

Likewise he can probably defer his Social Security payments until 70, in order to get the higher benefit... +1 for Medicare for the non-rich, though. I'm a retiree and the monthly payment is about 1/4 of what I was paying for health insurance before I was eligible.

> the monthly payment is about 1/4 of what I was paying for health insurance before I was eligible.

Maybe not, if you take into account the >$500/month subsidy of your Medicare Part A benefits (assuming you had the minimum number of calendar quarters paid in). And your Part B payment (the one usually deducted from your Soc Sec payment) is also partly subsidized unless your income is high enough to trigger IRMAA adjustment.

Re: Tim Cook's Impeccable Timing

#199

Post by layer8 »

raw_anon_1111 wrote: post #127
ryandrake wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I do think the challenge for Apple going forwards (but also for Android) is going to be how to best take advantage of AI. IMO one of their great advantages so far is that they have not blindly bought into the AI hysteria and wasted $billions on it. They've shown you can still have a great company without chanting the "AI is the future" mantra day in and day out. It would be pretty disappointing for a new CEO to dra…

You can’t compare Apple to any other company. Apple is the only successful consumer hardware company (with Samsung being a distant second). They can afford to sit out the AI arms race. You can’t be a software company without an AI story to tell.

That must be a very restrictive definition of “successful consumer hardware company”.

Re: Tim Cook's Impeccable Timing

#200

Post by davedx »

Aeroi wrote: post #49

Apple owns the hardware, they own the ecosystem, and as mathematics and compression prevail, smaller param models will live on device via purpose built chips. The lack of action will in the end be apples saving grace. Even if they don't go that route, the data from icloud, cash on hand, and partnerships with sota labs, still position them as a frontier competitor that just hasn't launched yet. Anyway you shake it str…

Huh, if you don't own the models then you don't own the ecosystem end to end though?
Post reply on HN