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Apple is a traditional business

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Re: Apple is a traditional business

#71

Post by greymeister »

0xcafecafe wrote: post #35
gambiting wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the point here is that Apple is not innovating in "stupid" areas(for the author) - like cashierless stores, automated cars, surveillance speakers etc. In a way, yes, that is admirable - I think all other tech giants are going in the "wrong" and harmful direction, while Apple still concentrates on making good hardware with matching software(their abysmal attempts at MacOs fixes notwithstanding).

Isn't it naive to criticize cashierless stores and automated cars as "stupid areas"? Arguing that those will cost jobs is akin to saying a 100 years back that the "iron horse" will cost jobs. Mankind has to continue to innovate and it is disingenuous to argue that a cashierless store is a "minor convenience".

My current experience with just about any cashierless option at a grocery or department store is far from a minor convenience, it's almost entirely an inconvenience. I now get to do what I did over 20 years ago and bag groceries, except then I was paid for it.

However, it allows the store to place one minimum wage employee over multiple lanes versus having to have one per lane (or even two if it was like the grocery store when I grew up that actually had backers AND checkers).

So, like many innovations, it adds little to no convenience but is a very effective way of cutting labor costs. By Grabthar's Hammer... what a savings.

Re: Apple is a traditional business

#72

Post by ocdtrekkie »

collyw wrote: post #26
ocdtrekkie wrote: post #2

I probably now fall into this camp as well. I made fun of Apple for years, but while I still hold an emotional and likely completely irrational dislike for their products, if someone were to ask me for a recommendation on a phone today, the only phone I could recommend in good conscience is an iPhone, because it's the only option that takes privacy and security seriously right now.

Ubuntu phone? (I had one, but it wasn't very good, as it just didn't have the apps).

I can't really recommend abandoned/dead OSes to people. Otherwise I'd recommend Win10 Mobile, which is still my personal favorite and (for the moment) still receiving extremely prompt security updates.

Re: Apple is a traditional business

#73

Post by monocasa »

antris wrote: post #52
whatok wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

21% of Apple's quarterly revenue was from China. China is not well-known as one of the richest parts of the planet.

Apple is luxury in China too. Do you really think it's the average Chinese that are buying iPhones?

A worker at Foxconn has about the same discretionary income as blue collar workers in the states; their food and housing is covered by Foxconn, but isn't normally listed as part of their salary.

Now, albeit, they're slightly on the higher end of Chinese workers, but it's not just the shitty aristocrat's kids spending money on iPhones. The people making the things make enough money to buy one, just the same as my hairdresser does.

Re: Apple is a traditional business

#74

Post by MBCook »

beamatronic wrote: post #58
emodendroket wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Steve Jobs did not single-handedly invent the iPhone.

For those of us who were PDA users in the late 90s and Treo users in the early 2000s, the iPhone is an incremental improvement on those ideas. The presence of ubiquitous wireless networking (I am lumping cellular wireless and WiFi in together) was the real game changer. If you are not convinced, try this thought experiment: Imagine yourself in 1998 standing on the street in a major city holding a Palm pilot. It has a…

It was not an incremental leap. It was MASSIVE.

Yes, all the technology was there. We had smartphones and they would have continued without the iPhone. The value of the internet in your pocket is too big for the smart phone not to become a huge thing.

Eventually.

But Apple NAILED the UI. They made it so simple that 3 year olds can use the UI and are confused when other computers don’t work through such great touch controls.

How long would we have been stuck with tiny screens (relative to the original iPhone) or giant devices (like the sidekick) to get a decent sized screen?

How long would it have taken to get the App Store? Would we get one? That single innovation (making it trivial for people to find/buy software) has been transformative for our industry.

The iPhone pushed us ahead years. Maybe a decade. We skipped a ton of teething time and got straight to it.

Remember, RIM thought the iPhone demo was faked and impossible. That’s how far ahead Apple was.

Re: Apple is a traditional business

#75

Post by gm-conspiracy »

zer00eyz wrote: post #54
fhood wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I occasionally loose sleep, wondering what products were lost due to Jobs' early death. Edit: Ok, fine. I loose sleep wondering what ideas were out there that languished because Jobs wasn't around to see their potential and capitalize on them. The argument "he wasn't that important because he didn't actually invent X" is played out, and it fundamentally misses the point.

Not worth it. Jobs was, for all intents and purposes a phenomenal business person in spite of the fact that many people early in his career didn't see it. Name a product apple invented that was HUGE? Go ahead and think about that. GUI & Mac was Xerox, the iPhone was Xerox and palm and... Simply put he was a master at finding good things and refining them into great things. Lets look at the design side. MacBooks for a…

No, you don't get it.

The internet is just a bunch of sand, some pieces of metal and wood poles from dead trees?

He had an amazing ability to synergize technologies into products.

Re: Apple is a traditional business

#76

Post by __david__ »

pseudometa wrote: post #34

Having been a fan of Apple for over a decade now, over the last year I've come to the opposite point of view. Their iPhone and airpods are great products and of course they can ride a long time on those, but in every other area from Macs and accessories I feel they are falling flat on delivering great user experiences. From FaceTime to Siri, to crappy Apple TV remotes, Home Kit... there are just a LOT of mediocre pro…

Interesting you say that about the Apple TV remotes. I thought they were all horrible but I really like the new one. The speed at which I can move around and the precision of selecting things is really great.

Re: Apple is a traditional business

#77

Post by cromwellian »

0xcafecafe wrote: post #35
gambiting wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the point here is that Apple is not innovating in "stupid" areas(for the author) - like cashierless stores, automated cars, surveillance speakers etc. In a way, yes, that is admirable - I think all other tech giants are going in the "wrong" and harmful direction, while Apple still concentrates on making good hardware with matching software(their abysmal attempts at MacOs fixes notwithstanding).

Isn't it naive to criticize cashierless stores and automated cars as "stupid areas"? Arguing that those will cost jobs is akin to saying a 100 years back that the "iron horse" will cost jobs. Mankind has to continue to innovate and it is disingenuous to argue that a cashierless store is a "minor convenience".

I wonder if th author uses ATMs or if he still writes checks and interacts with a bank teller.

Re: Apple is a traditional business

#78

Post by wpdev_63 »

ocdtrekkie wrote: post #2

I probably now fall into this camp as well. I made fun of Apple for years, but while I still hold an emotional and likely completely irrational dislike for their products, if someone were to ask me for a recommendation on a phone today, the only phone I could recommend in good conscience is an iPhone, because it's the only option that takes privacy and security seriously right now.

Just keep in mind that the NSA has remote sudo access to everything on your phone[0]. It's not completely secure and they're known to abuse their power time to time.

[0]: https://wikileaks.org/ciav7p1/

Re: Apple is a traditional business

#79

Post by fhood »

noxToken wrote: post #40
fhood wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I occasionally loose sleep, wondering what products were lost due to Jobs' early death. Edit: Ok, fine. I loose sleep wondering what ideas were out there that languished because Jobs wasn't around to see their potential and capitalize on them. The argument "he wasn't that important because he didn't actually invent X" is played out, and it fundamentally misses the point.

> ...like smart speakers, with their threat of big brother-style surveillance in exchange for a minimal increase in convenience It seems like everyone in this thread is forgetting that the HomePod[0] is a thing. Apple's privacy practices are better than the other listed companies, but they do have a smart speaker just as capable as the others. [0]: https://www.apple.com/homepod/

Right, but I am not worried (at the moment) that the HomePod will be used to collect my private information to be sold later on. I think this is false equivalence. How is the HomePod any different from connecting my iphone to a speaker?

Re: Apple is a traditional business

#80

Post by gm-conspiracy »

logfromblammo wrote: post #55
fhood wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I occasionally loose sleep, wondering what products were lost due to Jobs' early death. Edit: Ok, fine. I loose sleep wondering what ideas were out there that languished because Jobs wasn't around to see their potential and capitalize on them. The argument "he wasn't that important because he didn't actually invent X" is played out, and it fundamentally misses the point.

All I see is a bunch of proprietary connectors and dongles, and I sleep like a log. Jobs was just the salesman. Those products aren't lost, but they may have had a harder time getting to market without the "visionary" around to hype them up.

Salesman is an oversimplification. He was a productizer that could sell. :)

Also, does anybody know what cable the longest (number of years) a specific Apple cable/connector has remained compatible with the ever-changing hardware?

I am guessing it is this thing:

https://www.apple.com/shop/product/MK122LL/A/power-adapter-e...

Apple has always had BS connectors, like the Powerbook 5300 (1996)and G3, G4 laptops power connector - an male RCA plug, but the inside contact replace with a 3.5mm headphone plug.

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