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

Apple Confirms Its $3 Billion Deal for Beats Electronics

nytimes.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

231–240 of 351 posts

Re: Apple Confirms Its $3 Billion Deal for Beats Electronics

#231

Post by callmeed »

zorpner wrote: post #219
callmeed wrote: post #198

Honest question: is there a statute of limitations on what the tech world will tolerate with regards to misogynistic behavior (or bad behavior in general)? Or do people just pick and choose what they want to fight? I ask because everyone rallied behind RadiumOne's CEO being canned after he beat up his girlfriend [0]. Similar with the Mozilla CEO (granted, the offense was different ... but it's interesting to point ou…

There no "the tech world", there's just people who are, indeed, choosing what they do and do not want to fight about. If you feel so strongly about this, get people involved, get a Twitter campaign or boycott going, and just like in every other such situation, if enough people make noise then you may or may not get results. Much like open source, if you see a problem and do nothing, that's on you, not the community.…

I disagree that there's no "tech world". Maybe that's the wrong term but hey.

I do feel strongly about bad behavior (and I try to do some small parts)–but not about the lack of balance. I just find it intriguing and possibly worthy of discussion. I'm inclined to call it "hypocrisy" but maybe that's not the correct term.

I'm naive enough to think I can change what people choose to fight. Like open source, sometimes you find a bug but don't know how to fix it. What can you do besides submit an issue in GitHub?

Re: Apple Confirms Its $3 Billion Deal for Beats Electronics

#232

Post by eliasdelatorre »

forgottenpass wrote: post #223
callmeed wrote: post #198

Honest question: is there a statute of limitations on what the tech world will tolerate with regards to misogynistic behavior (or bad behavior in general)? Or do people just pick and choose what they want to fight? I ask because everyone rallied behind RadiumOne's CEO being canned after he beat up his girlfriend [0]. Similar with the Mozilla CEO (granted, the offense was different ... but it's interesting to point ou…

Dre doesn't get hounded because he doesn't pay lip service and apologize for who he is. For a quick explanation of the sociology at work see: http://partialobjects.com/2011/06/why-is-tracy-morgan-in-tro... I'm not saying I like this, I'm saying this is the interpretation that seems to make the most sense.

I didn't know that post until now. I kind of like that explanation.

Re: Apple Confirms Its $3 Billion Deal for Beats Electronics

#233

Post by arrrg »

grimtrigger wrote: post #206
callmeed wrote: post #198

Honest question: is there a statute of limitations on what the tech world will tolerate with regards to misogynistic behavior (or bad behavior in general)? Or do people just pick and choose what they want to fight? I ask because everyone rallied behind RadiumOne's CEO being canned after he beat up his girlfriend [0]. Similar with the Mozilla CEO (granted, the offense was different ... but it's interesting to point ou…

Side point: beating up a female reporter doesn't make you a mysogynist (it makes you an asshole). Wasn't sure what you meant because of your wording. Our tolerance for entertainers seems to be much higher than for executives. And I doubt many in the tech world think of Dre as a "real" executive. He's there for marketing reasons, but doesn't have much oversight of the day-to-day and the damage he can do is limited. Th…

Well … in isolation you are right, but violence against women can be an expression of misogyny. Or not. It depends. (Though I would agree that focusing on that discussion is not particularly worthwhile. I would focus on the violence.)

Re: Apple Confirms Its $3 Billion Deal for Beats Electronics

#235

Post by gdilla »

smackfu wrote: post #84
jotm wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not really true - Sony and Sennheiser (as well as AKG and other less known companies) had the market covered already.

I think the idea is that Beats expanded the market for $200-400 headphones. Yes, Sony sold headphones in that range, but they didn't sell them to every high school student who wanted to look cool.

Yup, they're the Air Jordan's of headphones. It's a fashion choice, not an audio quality choice.

Re: Apple Confirms Its $3 Billion Deal for Beats Electronics

#236

Post by callmeed »

IBM wrote: post #224
callmeed wrote: post #198

Honest question: is there a statute of limitations on what the tech world will tolerate with regards to misogynistic behavior (or bad behavior in general)? Or do people just pick and choose what they want to fight? I ask because everyone rallied behind RadiumOne's CEO being canned after he beat up his girlfriend [0]. Similar with the Mozilla CEO (granted, the offense was different ... but it's interesting to point ou…

That incident was 23 years ago and he did his time for it. He's also shown remorse for it and wishes it never happened.[0] He's a 49 year old man now and he's been married for 18 years. I think he's past that kind of stuff. [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=btc1MflBSeQ&feature=youtu.be...

That's precisely why I asked about a "statue of limitations" ... I am curious.

Thank you for posting that video. I hadn't seen it. I'm generally skeptical of any celebrity's "remorse" when they get caught but it does help frame the current context.

Re: Apple Confirms Its $3 Billion Deal for Beats Electronics

#237

Post by arrrg »

jotm wrote: post #79
apalmer wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Factually true, but as they created and own pretty much the entire market for $300 headphones, one has to concede they have the title of high end headphones... high end doesnt necessarily mean highest quality.

Not really true - Sony and Sennheiser (as well as AKG and other less known companies) had the market covered already.

Audiophiles (broadly speaking, even if - like myself – they really don’t want to be called that) and people working with audio bought those, hardly anyone else. Those aren’t the people who buy Beats. That’s a totally different (and much smaller) market.

Getting people who don’t care about how their music sounds that much and who don’t work with audio to seriously consider buying $300 headphones, that’s the achievement.

Those people used to either use the headphones that came with their devices, or they bought some cheap headphones (way under $100, probably even way under $50). Beats managed to attract those people to their products and managed to sell them to them for substantially more than they were previously ready to spend on headphones.

That’s what’s meant when people talk about Beats creating a new market. Buying expensive headphones just wasn’t a mainstream thing before Beats.

Honestly, I don’t even have much of a problem with that. People spend more money on better headphones. Sure, they spend too much for merely average headphones, but those are already better than anything they had before and once they buy into them I think it becomes way easier to convince them to try other headphones. Who cares if they spend too much?

Re: Apple Confirms Its $3 Billion Deal for Beats Electronics

#238

Post by [deleted] »

jotm wrote: post #79
apalmer wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Factually true, but as they created and own pretty much the entire market for $300 headphones, one has to concede they have the title of high end headphones... high end doesnt necessarily mean highest quality.

Not really true - Sony and Sennheiser (as well as AKG and other less known companies) had the market covered already.

[deleted]

Re: Apple Confirms Its $3 Billion Deal for Beats Electronics

#239

Post by yabatopia »

abalone wrote: post #70

The most interesting reveal from Tim Cook's quote is that he only mentions the music service and the talent, not the headphones. That's super interesting. It basically means Apple looked at this like a typical Apple aquihire / component technology purchase (of the service), that just happened to have a multi-billion dollar profitable accessories business attached to it. That makes it a very unique kind of deal.

This makes it the third fashion (aqui)hire for Apple, after Angela Ahrendts (Burberry) and Paul Deneve (Yves Saint Laurent). But 3 billion for a fashionable headphones company/music service? I don't know, the feeling I get of this deal is like Nike buying Crocs in 2007, when Crocs shoes were at the peak of their popularity.

Re: Apple Confirms Its $3 Billion Deal for Beats Electronics

#240

Post by dublinben »

001sky wrote: post #203
dublinben wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A company like Pandora or Spotify? Two debt-financed companies that still can't turn a profit from music.

Pandora and spotify are structurally unprofitable because of their licensing problems/payments. Apple is %500Bn company-- big enough to become a label--has the marketing expertise (iTunes) and Capital ($X0Bns cash) to be a next-generation 'label'. Or maybe I'm missing something?

If Apple (or Google) had wanted to buy out the record labels and their catalogs, they could have done so years ago. They obviously didn't, probably because it's a dying industry that isn't nearly as profitable as their current products.

The very idea of a 'record label' is a relic of the 20th Century, when all recorded music was distributed on heavy physical artifacts.

Post reply on HN