Pie chart: The world's worst way to display time-series data. http://o.aolcdn.com/hss/storage/adam/2c59e6862a532820a9854bd...
A look at Apple's R&D expenditures from 1995-2013
61–70 of 71 posts
Re: A look at Apple's R&D expenditures from 1995-2013
#62Pie chart: The world's worst way to display time-series data. http://o.aolcdn.com/hss/storage/adam/2c59e6862a532820a9854bd...
For the statisticians and data scientists in the room : do pie charts ever have a valid use case (as defined by being superior to another form of visualization)?
Re: A look at Apple's R&D expenditures from 1995-2013
#63Pie chart: The world's worst way to display time-series data. http://o.aolcdn.com/hss/storage/adam/2c59e6862a532820a9854bd...
I disagree, that was a very effective use of a pie chart. By looking at it for a couple of seconds you can tell that the last 4 years take up over half of the total.
Re: A look at Apple's R&D expenditures from 1995-2013
#64Earlier quoted context omitted.
"100 failures for every 1 success" There aren't a lot of examples of big tech companies dumping money into R&D - with no end goal in mind - and then cashing out big time. Even companies that that have gotten useful discoveries from hiring smart people to sit around and invent (Bell Labs, Xerox Park, Microsoft Research etc.) don't ever seem to end up raking in the big bucks. The only thing that comes to mind is MS and…
All of the startups you're talking about are sitting on the shoulders of much longer term R&D that was funded by corporate labs or government/academic R&D. When was the last time a small startup produced a huge breakthrough in physics or manufacturing that did not build off of research funded by the public or big consortiums, corporate labs, or universities? I don't care if Bell Labs didn't cash out, just like I don'…
Yeah, well that's nice that you don't care - but Apple's shareholders do. The point is that this kind of R&D doesn't pay-off. Companies have tried it in the past and it didn't work.
If you want R&D then I completely sympathize, but you'll have to go get your government to fund it - don't expect Apple do it as a charitable donation to society.
PS: Examples like Leap Motion come to mind.
Re: A look at Apple's R&D expenditures from 1995-2013
#65A time series of $$$ allocated to R&D is basically going to show when the company's growing and when it's shrinking, the same way a heat map of who clicks on furry porn is basically going to show population density.
I realize there's a chart of $$$ allocated to R&D as a percentage of sales but that's not quite right either.
Re: A look at Apple's R&D expenditures from 1995-2013
#66Earlier quoted context omitted.
All of the startups you're talking about are sitting on the shoulders of much longer term R&D that was funded by corporate labs or government/academic R&D. When was the last time a small startup produced a huge breakthrough in physics or manufacturing that did not build off of research funded by the public or big consortiums, corporate labs, or universities? I don't care if Bell Labs didn't cash out, just like I don'…
"I don't care if Bell Labs didn't cash out" Yeah, well that's nice that you don't care - but Apple's shareholders do. The point is that this kind of R&D doesn't pay-off. Companies have tried it in the past and it didn't work. If you want R&D then I completely sympathize, but you'll have to go get your government to fund it - don't expect Apple do it as a charitable donation to society. PS: Examples like Leap Motion c…
Invented: * DES * Hard Disks * DRAM * RISC * Relational Database * Laser Eye Surgery * Barcodes * PC
Apple shareholders apparently care, because the company is currently being valued as if there are no more disruptive breakthroughs that will produce significant growth in its bottom line.
Also, to say Bell Labs didn't cash out is to be charitable. Ma Bell dominated for decades before the government broke them up. Did they fail because of failure to cash out on inventions, or because Bell Labs was split off from the parent company that was funding them.
Also, if you suggest the government fund it, then maybe the government tax Apple's cash, I wonder how their shareholders will like that?
Re: A look at Apple's R&D expenditures from 1995-2013
#67Pie chart: The world's worst way to display time-series data. http://o.aolcdn.com/hss/storage/adam/2c59e6862a532820a9854bd...
Re: A look at Apple's R&D expenditures from 1995-2013
#68Earlier quoted context omitted.
For the statisticians and data scientists in the room : do pie charts ever have a valid use case (as defined by being superior to another form of visualization)?
Of course. Pie charts look natural and easy to comprehend when visualizing things like market share of certain products, for example browser market share ( http://www.netmarketshare.com/browser-market-share.aspx?qpri... ). In fact I'd argue that that's a much better representation than a bar chart, like http://www.w3counter.com/globalstats.php , because the former makes it easier to comprehend roughly what proportion…
Well, I guess you could make a fat bar and still run into problems... Ah, visualisation!
Re: A look at Apple's R&D expenditures from 1995-2013
#69Earlier quoted context omitted.
They brought some chip design in house. Chip production is quite expensive that only a few companies do it in house.
I know this is a hearsay but at the height of the apple/samsung law suit I was following a story and one of the commenters claimed Apple's chip R&D was being done in a borrowed facility at a Samsung owned chip factory in Austin, TX. Intrinsity based in Austin had been doing work with samsung and since Intrinsity was bought out by Apple, I think there's some chance it's true. No way I can verify if it's true it'd be p…
Re: A look at Apple's R&D expenditures from 1995-2013
#70Earlier quoted context omitted.
Is there a link to substantiate that claim that doesn't put the information behind a paywall?
Not one that I know of. Charlie isn't the typical blogger though, and I prefer his paywall style over the ad-based models that other sites have done. When Charlie wrote a few honest (but blasting) reports on various companies a while back... the ad-companies held his revenue hostage. They didn't like him writing the way he did. As such, he stopped doing ad-hosted content and was forced into the paywall model. Now to…