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Mac Mini and iPod Hi-Fi Over-Hyped?
RX8 writes "Analyst Michael Greeson takes a look at Apple's new products, the Mac Mini (Intel based) and iPod Hi-Fi and explains why they were over-hyped and how that can damage Apple. Michael explains that when you are 'an industry innovator - when your products fall short of being truly original, your own success becomes your worst enemy.'" Update: 03/04 00:07 GMT by Z : As many posters have pointed out, the article here has little to do with the synopsis. This article is mostly about the design for the mac mini and its remote, which is a fairly interesting topic. Mea culpa, folks.
Apple held an event in it's 'Cafeteria(*)' fer chrissakes!
When they pull out the stops, it isn't in an event of this level.
Overpriced leather case aside, the stuff they rolled out was worth holding a minor event over...That's what this was, a minor event.
*=yeah, it wasn't the Cafeteria, but it was held in a location they already own, it's cheap floorspace to hold an announcement.
"Draco dormiens nunquam titillandus."
Zonk's an idiot. I think this has been fairly well established by now.
I usually pay pretty close attention to the products Apple introduces, and I have to say that I nearly missed the most recent introduction entirely. I may have been a bit inattentive, but when there's a really big announcement coming from Apple, everybody knows about it. For one thing, Apple generally introduces important products at major events, such as MacWorld or WWDC. This time, though, they just invited a bunch of reporters to show up and see their new products.
Overhyped? More like hardly hyped at all.
Thank god you're not in charge of making business decisions at Apple. People are already buying iPod HiFi systems - Bose, Altec Lansing, etc. Apple wants in on that. They know they can charge a premium for their system, and they're gonna do it. And you know what? People are going to buy it. In droves.
Most of your complaints can be traced back to the iPod itself. When it was first announced most people around here laughed it off as being nothing new and overpriced. Don't underestimate Apple's excellent product design and marketing expertise.
There wasn't any hype. "Come and see some fun new products" was all they said. How exactly could they have played it any less? "We've some new stuff, it's pretty crappy, but someone might want it I suppose."
And they could have hyped this. Look, they announced the switch to Intel last year and said they'd have Intel Macs in June this year. It's March, and already they have a mid-range desktop, high-end notebook, and two low-end desktop machines out.
~~~~~ BigLig2? You mean there's another one of me?
Where? I see a Firewire and a DVI port, no composite, S-Video, 75ohm coax, or component video you'd expect for the term "dedicated TV output". Indeed, from the specifications:
So Apple makes a scan converter, which could probably be used with any of their machines. It still doesn't make the DVI port a "dedicated TV output".
Oh, say does that Star-Spangled Banner entwine / The myrtle of Venus with Bacchus's vine?
I'm sick of Zonk articles too, and the come in waves, 6 at a time. I notice it as the times when I read /. are the time when he posts a heap of articles. Can't there be some more effort put into getting this right?
Sadly, I don't think the summary was a troll or a joke, rather an expression of how poor many people are at truly reading news articles for meaning, as opposed to the habit of skimming over them in 30 seconds and getting a few key words to highlight mentally.
I've written articles for a few sites in the past, not as anything professional, but come across the same problem. Enough of the feedback in site comments or email comes from people who betray their lack of comprehension by their comments. I'll write about how to install an apache module for example, and specifically state three steps to be taken in order to get everything working; the responses indicate people have jumped in and tried only step three, done all steps in a random order, or in some cases completely misread the point of the article. "Hi B, I'm writing about your article on how to get eaccelerator working, and I'm getting errors decompressing the archive according to Step 2"... so I reply "Hello user, I have never written an eaccelerator article, step 2 is how to decompress the archive for installing mod_gzip". Any & every permutation comes back at me. It's possibly a reflection of bad writing skills, but honestly I don't think my writing is THAT poor.
So it goes on, and I blame half-hearted attempts in school to introduce speed reading, where anybody can be taught in minutes to skim over two paragraphs and get words like "hype" "apple" "mac mini" and "intel" then make up their own story in-mind, without getting any real context or meaning from what's read.
16.2 fps in doom 3 @ 640x480, nice.
How many people do you know who bought a Mac mini for cutting edge gaming?
Would you whine about your new Dodge Neon not doing very well in the NASCAR standings?