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261 Comments
- BulkHedd, on 10/10/2007, -4/+171The ringtone thing is just ludicrous. The iPhone is legally allowed to play digital music. The iPhone has a speaker so you can play that music out loud any time you want to. But if you want that same music, which you already own, to play when someone calls you, you have to pay another dollar.
It is cheaper than the other phones/carriers but so what? It really feels like Apple IS becoming the new Microsoft. - SirCrumpet, on 10/10/2007, -16/+140Damned good article. I Agree 100%.
- najdorf, on 10/10/2007, -5/+76iPhone and iTouch have incredible potential but it's wasted without proper support for third party apps.
- euphemizeme, on 10/10/2007, -17/+63Only ***** idiots allow themselves to be bullied into buying things. Are you insinuating that Apple users are mindless fanboys who will do anything the good lord Steve tells them to? I agree completely.
- kwick, on 10/10/2007, -10/+50Hard hitting analysis.
- JonnyTrombone, on 10/10/2007, -1/+38There are eight iPhone stories on the Apple section frontpage right now. Even if Apple has given up on its users, they haven't given up on Apple.
- miniboss, on 10/10/2007, -0/+30Don't take this as an attack on them. Apple is having a fantastic year and their products are still great. BUT they are also making a few choices that are really disrupting the "reality distortion field" and exposing them to be less of a deity and more a corporation just like every other one out there. And the worst of it is that now it's very apparent how they view customer loyalty to be just another resource for quick cash.
I'm still interested in their stuff, but I'm definitely hesitating now more than I ever have in the past. - rcw3, on 10/10/2007, -1/+29All of that will be pretty meaningless if you have no customers because you've run them all off (i.e. Apple in the 90's)... You know, shareholders are great and all, but not very useful without customers...
- franklymister, on 10/10/2007, -0/+25I love Apple. I still have my Apple ][+ from 1980, and I've had more Macs than I can count. Sadly, though, I agree with this article. I hope this one actually gets to Steve Jobs.
He needs someone like Woz at Apple again who can challenge him. Apple couldn't be Apple without Jobs, but it needs more than just him. - Arru, on 10/10/2007, -7/+31The comparison wtih Google China and with "old, crappy Apple" is spot-on! I sure hope Apple won't screw up trying to make a quick buck again...
- tmbrwolf19, on 10/10/2007, -3/+21Hate to say it... but they have always been a Microsoft. Apple is a corporation. Corporations are out their to make money. Steve Jobs isn't building Macs for the sake of humanity, he is doing it to make some money. Apple used to at least listen to their users and were in a position where customer loyalty mattered (because of such a small market share). Microsoft has always had our balls over the fire with their market dominance, so they really didn't care to much. Now that Apple has a good market share in terms of mp3 players, its started look for ways to make more money at our expense. Sad truth is, thats the way it works, and it isn't going to change any time soon.
I now await the fury of diggers everywhere. - jakem1, on 10/10/2007, -2/+19Apple have traditionally tried to tie their users down to their products much more than Microsoft. For goodness sake, the fact that they even dictate what hardware you have to run the software on is ample proof of that. While Microsoft have tended to be much more open about what they intend to do and how their software works, Apple prefer to keep everything a big secret prefering to control the entire user experience. Take the iPhone for instance - whereas Windows Mobile uses the .NET framework making the whole thing easily accessible to any programmer, Apple choose to provide no programming tools for their iPhone instead telling programmers to go out and make little websites for mobile safari. When programmers eventually decide to hack their way into the iPhone OS, Apple simply breaks their apps with each new firmware update. That's much worse than Microsoft has ever been.
- bonusjuice, on 10/10/2007, -4/+20Well said sir and well written, I and hopefully many more share your view.
- HappyScrappy, on 10/10/2007, -0/+15This lock-in stuff reminds me of Adobe Type 1 fonts a long time ago. Adobe was the only company that could make Type 1 (scalable & hintable) fonts for PostScript. They had it locked up with some crypto stuff, and no one was getting in there.
So Apple made TrueType (fonts) and MS made TrueImage (page description language) and cross-licensed them with each other, vowing to break Adobe's type and page layout stranglehold.
At the same conference where MS and Apple announced this, John Warnock (of Adobe) came up to the podium for his talk, nearly in tears and announced that Adobe would open up Type 1 fonts to others.
Apple is involved again this time, but on the other side. Apple will try to control this market until one day they realize they've lost their grip and finally have to open up.
I agree with the article mostly, I don't agree with the games thing. If I buy Guitar Hero 3 for PS2, I don't get a free upgrade to GH3 for PS3 when I buy a PS3. - dlsspy, on 10/10/2007, -1/+15> But if you want that same music, which you already own, to play when someone calls you, you have to pay another dollar.
It's not even that easy. My wife manages a band and although she has rights to do whatever she wants with the music, the tracks on iTunes don't have the little bell, so there's no chance.
Some of the bands I like just put their mp3s on their web sites. I can't use those.
One of my friends wrote a theme jingle thing that I typed up on my old ericsson, but I can't use that.
Apple has historically been a provider of tools for artists, but when you can't use your own stuff how you want, it rather sucks. - BayAreaKing, on 10/10/2007, -2/+15Apple can do better than what their doing. They've got the style and innovation down, but they SERIOUSLY have to work on durability and quality. One great thing they've done is that iPhones and iPod touches seem to be very good against scratches on the screen.
- andburn1, on 10/10/2007, -2/+14Wow. I really wish Steve Jobs and could read this.
- Chakat, on 10/10/2007, -0/+12And if they piss off their customers through excessive greed, they won't. Profits cut both ways.
- KevenM, on 10/10/2007, -2/+13Not trying to pick a fight here, so please take this with a grain of salt. Apple will keep doing what it's doing for as long as their revenues and profits go up year over year. Despite cries of unfair, evil, milking the consumer, ... the fact remains that what they're doing just works, and people DO buy it. They may have pissed off the majority of the Digg community, but the numbers just tell a different story. Sorry guys, for once, I think that we're pretty much the minority with this dissatisfaction.
- inactive, on 10/10/2007, -15/+26And they're still doing it.
Why do you think they gimped the iPod Touch's storage? So they can start back over at a low storage, then work their way up by releasing larger capacity drives every 6 months. Has nothing to do with the technology - some usually justify it by saying, "BUT DUDE, it's flash storage!" Well, they CAN release a 60 gb version right now, they just wanna milk the earlier models first.
Just like they did with the video. And the nano. And everything else.
So while people might think "that's fine, i don't need the storage space", they don't realize exactly what's going on, or realize that they're paying $25/gig now instead of the $2 and $3 set by the classics.
Eventually it just hinders progression and innovation. I'd love to buy an iPod Touch, but most certainly not one with gimped storage.
Those of us who know the marketing trends know exactly what's going on, while those who HAVE to have the lastest flashy expensive gadget tend to pretend it's not there. - dinkola, on 10/10/2007, -3/+14A 60gb flash version? How much do you think that would cost? People would bark at the price. You think the factories can knock out millions of 60gb drives really quickly? Dont think so
- FaytlND, on 10/10/2007, -5/+16I smell a bit of a double standard when it comes to these comments. Where are the "They are a business, they are supposed to try and make money." and "They do what's best for their shareholders" comments int he 'OMG M$ IS THE SUX0RZ!!!!" stories? You can't have it both ways. Either the companies have obligations to their customers first, or they have an obligation to making money first. The answer can't be different depending on the situation because you own a MacBook.
Commence burying this comment. - Pureeviljester, on 10/10/2007, -6/+16Business 101 - a companies #1 job is to survive
- OutThisLife, on 10/10/2007, -1/+9Some people like seeing other point of views, for one.
- masgrada, on 10/10/2007, -0/+8Customer alienation kills revenue. That hurts the bottom line more.
- Lutz, on 10/10/2007, -0/+8Ok so, what? Are people realizing just now that Apple want to make money? Apple has always been greedy in that sense. They have huge profit margins and grant resellers 10% profit margin from their products (at least here in sweden).
This is not something new. - NyteStarNyne, on 10/10/2007, -10/+18iAgree
- dlsspy, on 10/10/2007, -0/+8Better than any other carrier? I never cared much for ringtones, but my wife made hers for her old phone in garage band, and then dropped them on her blackberry using the built-in bluetooth stuff. She was able to use any music she has any listening rights to. How is this better?
- theprokaryote, on 10/10/2007, -0/+8I agree with 99% of that article, good stuff.
- SpyDerMann, on 10/10/2007, -1/+8This is very interesting indeed - I just viewed the Intel presentation about Open Source and why it's good for business. Steve might as well read that presentation.
- brianbennett, on 10/10/2007, -3/+10I wish I could Digg this a few times.
- Swimming_Bird, on 10/10/2007, -0/+7What the author is arguing is that in the long run Apple will make more money if they try to work for the customer rather then the bottom line.
- BlinderBomber, on 10/10/2007, -2/+9They aren't the new Microsoft, they are a different one. Apple has kept itself viable by creating incredibly good, and lucrative, closed systems. The iTunes / iPod pairing is their best example, followed by the iTV / iTunes combo. Both create a closed system in which only Apply can supply the content (for purchase). They aimed to do the same thing with 3rd party apps on the iPhone as well, but (I believe) backed down.
- ogremidget, on 10/10/2007, -1/+8I liked John Gruber's response:
"The best thing that could happen to Apple this year would be for Microsoft’s Zune 2.0 to be a kick-ass product, both technologically and in terms of being designed to make customers happy, not entertainment conglomerates. Apple needs competition."
http://daringfireball.net/linked/2007/september#th ... - posure, on 10/10/2007, -1/+8"Imagine upgrading to a new computer, and having to buy a brand new copy of Windows Vista for it... Oh, wait, Microsoft does that, don't they? MICROSOFT does."
That's a bit out of place, I had to pay for OS X when I bought my Mac too. Other than that, great article. - ahawks, on 10/10/2007, -3/+10But it has 3rd party apps!
Oh.... you mean asside from tetris and pong. - mrsteve007, on 10/10/2007, -0/+7Is that why my windows mobile based phone lets me use any mp3 as a ringtone? Face it, Apple is just out to make a buck. Imagine the horror if Microsoft started charging people to put ringtones on their smart phone.
- NSResponder, on 10/10/2007, -1/+8"Why do you think they gimped the iPod Touch's storage? "
Here's a little exercise: find out what 8 gigs of flash ram costs. Then figure out what 60 gigs would cost.
-jcr - jazh, on 10/10/2007, -2/+9It's not evil.
But is it right to squeeze EVERY penny out of consumers? Buying the iphone, contract and music wasn't enough. They went one step futher and charged for the ringtone. It's insane. It Microsoft did something like that on its windows phones people would go ballistic. - WiseWeasel, on 10/10/2007, -0/+6Apple can satisfy both their customers and their shareholders at the same time. Shareholders aren't going to be happy if Apple drives all their customers away...
- superkendall, on 10/10/2007, -3/+9I disagree in relation to opening up FairPlay - if FairPlay is opened, or Apple supports PlaysForSure then iTunesPlus will be dead in a year and all other DRM free trials currently underway will fold. The only reason music companies are getting into DRM free music is that Apple managed to hold onto all the DRM controls - so the only way to break free is to go open. Make DRM truly ubiquitous and it will go everywhere, just like DVD CSS is in wide acceptance today.
- masgrada, on 10/10/2007, -0/+6....through customer satisfaction.
- theprokaryote, on 10/10/2007, -0/+6I don't think lowering prices has anything to do with what the article was talking about. You generally pay more for Apple with the understanding that you are getting a generally better product. Most Apple fans have accepted this fact, otherwise we would be spending out money elsewhere. (edit: ok, its not a "fact," before a windows fan calls me out on that! :P Just an opinion.)
The article is focusing more on the idea of locking us in software-wise. - Phasmorphage, on 10/10/2007, -0/+6Yeah, you pretty much nailed that last part down...
Every mac fan i know is always trying to get me to buy something by apple - inactive, on 10/10/2007, -2/+8They can't because flash storage is still expensive, they are probably still using 1/2/4GB chips to keep the price low and they simply cant fit enough chips in at that size. When you go up to 8GB chips your looking at a lot more than double the price of a 4GB one. 16GB even more again.
When the flash prices drop it is because the manufacturing process allows them to fit more memory on a single chip - until they can fit 16/32GB on a single chip you are not going to get them in HD like capacities at a reasonable price. - Bartboy919, on 10/10/2007, -1/+7*****, you should ot try to pawn off blame to some other greedy ass group. This is apple's problem, the RIAA don't HAVE to be on itunes, they want to be, apple is now pulling the strings in terms of itunes pricing.
- heifetz, on 10/10/2007, -1/+6because he has something intelligent to say, and you don't.
- championchap, on 10/10/2007, -0/+5Doubt it will happen to be honest, you seem to have made some good points.
You score a + from me anyhow. - WiseWeasel, on 10/10/2007, -0/+5Customers hesitate to give them money, and will jump ship to a competitor at first opportunity...
- MacParrot, on 10/10/2007, -0/+5Way to once again miss the point zybch. You seem to specialize in that.
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