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Apple To Shut Down Lala On May 31
dirk and a large number of other distressed readers let us know that Apple is shuttering Lala, the music service they bought last December, on May 31. "Apple will transfer any remaining money in a user's account to iTunes, and will credit users (via iTunes) for any web songs that were purchased. It's a real shame, as Lala was a much better music service, offering songs in straight MP3 format. Its web service was innovative and ahead of its time. And it was one of the few places that would let you listen to an entire song to sample it (after one complete listen, you then could only hear a 30-second sample)." Reader Dhandforth adds: "10-cent favorites will now cost 9.9x more. What's worse, a community of music fans (followers and followees) will disappear on May 31. Evil. Sigh."
...I know people who did, and none of them are happy about this. I've herad nothing but good things about Lala, it's a shame that it will be going away :/
Living With a Nerd
Because anyone actually thought that Apple was going to keep running two competing music stores?
It's? Really?
Steve jobs sticks his fingers in his ears.. "LALALALALALALALALALA"
There was a bit of a storm forming as it started and the wind picked up when Steve Jobs took the stage. The CEO of Lala looked very nervous. Heat lightning started arcing through the clouds as Steve finished his speech. Then he gestured to the Lala CEO who obediently got down on his knees. Steve drew a giant claymore from behind the podium and said very loudly as the storm climaxed, "There can be only one." And lopped off the head of Lala's CEO. Steve stood there shaking with ferver and excitement as user after user account was transferred to iTunes Music Service, rendering him many millions more in revenue. While particularly gruesome, heartless and violent to the eyes of women and children in the crowd, in the business world it's a perfectly natural cycle.
My work here is dung.
What prevents anyone from starting a new service to fill the void?
someone doesn't want the remaining balance transferred to iTunes? Can they get a cash refund? (I don't use Lala.)
Embrace
Extend
Extinguish
I'll try anything once. Twice if it tastes good
LaLa Hey Hey Kiss It Goodbye
Fellowship 9/11
Now I might be missing something, but what did they gain through this acquisition? Why buy a one of the many competitors.. I mean yes it was a great service but there are others out there as well... I just don't get Apples gain from this purchase in the first place... Having two services is pointless one had to go and I have a feeling iTunes is kinda bigger..
Oh and, "Damn the man, save the empire"
~Mekkah
I just wanted to thank each and every Apple fanboi for supporting this company by overpaying on standard PC parts for YEARS.
Hey man, get with the program - it hasn't been standard PC parts ... they've got a certain je-ne-sais-quoi embedded in each apple branded piece of hardware that gives it crazy-high resale value. (Although other than that, spot on... depending on your definition of standard PC parts - PowerPC?).
You should get a refund of your money, not have it be transferred to iTunes.
What you agreed to pay for was Lala's service, not iTunes'.
Apple has always been more innovative than Microsoft. Their desktop OS has been years ahead of Windows for most of the past decade, and now their malicious business approach is beginning to surpass that of Microsoft's.
What's this distressd, and what's this disturbing trend to daemonize all our emotions?
I am literally 3000 tokens away from the chaotic crossbow --Stephen
It's too bad you have such a distaste for the free market, but you have options. Take a look at the large number of Communist and Socialist nations you could emigrate to.
Can slashdot
a) create a Steve job version of the Bill Gates borg icon.
b) change the MS icon Ms instead of the Bill Gates borg icon.
I just think it's time.
Is it just me, or are the number of stories on /. that are about (apple doing something to piss people off) increasing every day?
use rhapsody - as much music as you like for $10 / month. Now works on iphone and ipod
So if I have an account at lala already (they're not taking new accounts now), I can buy a bunch of web songs at 10 cents a piece, and in return I'll get full downloadable versions from iTunes next month?!? That's an absolute bargain! I'm off to go do some shopping.
I just go to Amazon and download straight and clean mp3 files. Everyday, something good is on sale. I just pop them on my Sansa player, $50@Amazon, and go. I have multiple 8GB SD cards loaded up wiith different kinds of music. The other day, I let a friend use the card I was not using and he doesn't even have an mp3 player. Unless you count his laptop as an mp3 player! :)
Apart from the 'cool' factor, why do people use Apple's locked down crap?
Although, I gotta give ccredit where credit is due, I love that Apple is pissing at Flash. What a horrible piece of garbage that thing is.
Reader Dhandforth adds: "10 cent favorites will now cost 9.9x more. What's worse, a community of music fans (followers and followees) will disappear on May 31. Evil. Sigh."
Evil? Evil?
You keep using that word but I don't think you know what it means.
The kind the government was supposed to be protecting us from .. like standard oil, the early railroads, carnegie steel and coal, etc.
Since they can't be bothered protecting our boarders, the environment or the financial health of the country, why should we expect them to protect us from monopolies, either?
I guesS it's gonna take a revolution ..
You missed the other distressing case of apostrophe abuse at "user's account". That is unless there really is only one user, and only one account.
Victory for Father Steve! Hail Father!
buy it while you can afford to, and then dismantle it..
I requested a refund check in the mail instead of a iTunes credit for the 20 cents left in my wallet... If only I could get a refund for my hundreds of web songs :(
Hikery.net - The best hiking site ever. Made by yours truly.
Lala was a much better music service, offering songs in straight MP3 format.
If the format is your sole criteria, then you have made a grave mistake. If you meant DRM-free, then you should have said that, but all of the formats Apple offers through iTunes are technically superior to mp3. And the DRM is not tied to the format, meaning, I use the formats Apple uses, but I don't use DRM. And my music library just sounds better than your mp3 library.
The real reason it's bad that Lala is going away is that variety and competition is good, less variety and competition is not as good.
The Admin and the Engineer
> Lala was a much better music service, offering songs in straight MP3 format
Are you calling AAC homosexual?
Chances are the technology will resurface in a web-based iTunes client one day soon. What are the dates for WWDC again?
When CMP shut down Byte right after I renewed my subscription they didn't send me a check, or even offer me one.
Best Slashdot Co
Commandant Jobs?
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Or maybe it's just that their business model didn't work.
Bizarre that Apple would front cash money for a failing operation. It would probably have been a bit smarter to simply let them fall flat on their face instead of spending so much cash, right?
Everyone's favorite companies are those that are giving free services and running at a loss, and then they complain when they turn to advertising, subscriptions, or just go belly up. iTunes is a sustainable business model, and Lala is not. Deal with it.
What the hell are you talking about? On Lala, you could pay 10 cents per song to stream it as much as you want, or $.99-1.29 to own it outright. And that was not sustainable? They simply offered more options than Apple, they didn't give songs away. Where are you getting your information ... ?
My work here is dung.
despite all the sour stunts they pulled just in the last week (nearing 5 in number), and eclipsing microsoft in regard to evilish behavior per week rating, apple still cant be evil.
...
because it just cant.
if a friend of any of us behaved like apple, i wonder how many of us would keep him/her around them
Read radical news here
The whole reason I was using Lala was because my computers (Linux) don't seem to work with iTunes.
Replacing my purchased web songs with an iTunes credit that I can't use doesn't really help me out.
So sad, I love LALA. Tuesdays were filled with random new albums. I'm guessing my next best option is to go with zune monthly pass. Nice job on pushing me towards your competition Apple.
this sucks.
(Interview with Notorious Lawyer Jacques Vergès).
'There Is No Such Thing as Absolute Evil'
He has met Mao Zedong, Pol Pot and Che Guevara. He defended 'Carlos the Jackal' and Nazi war criminal Klaus Barbie. Jacques Vergès, 83, is probably the world's most notorious attorney. His latest client is Khieu Samphan, the former head of state of Cambodia under the Khmer Rouge, who is on trial for war crimes.
SPIEGEL: Mr. Vergès, are you attracted to evil?
Jacques Vergès: Nature is wild, unpredictable and senselessly gruesome. What distinguishes human beings from animals is the ability to speak on behalf of evil. Crime is a symbol of our freedom.
SPIEGEL: That's a cynical worldview.
Vergès: A realistic one.
SPIEGEL: You have defended some of the worst mass murderers in recent history, and you have been called the "devil's advocate." Why do you feel so drawn to clients like Carlos and Klaus Barbie?
Vergès: I believe that everyone, no matter what he may have done, has the right to a fair trial. The public is always quick to assign the label of "monster." But monsters do not exist, just as there is no such thing as absolute evil. My clients are human beings, people with two eyes, two hands, a gender and emotions. That's what makes them so sinister.
SPIEGEL: What do you mean?
Vergès: What was so shocking about Hitler the "monster" was that he loved his dog so much and kissed the hands of his secretaries -- as we know from the literature of the Third Reich and the film "Der Untergang" ("Downfall"). The interesting thing about my clients is discovering what brings them to do these horrific things. My ambition is to illuminate the path that led them to commit these acts. A good trial is like a Shakespeare play, a work of art.
SPIEGEL: Are there any people whose defense you would not take on out of principle?
Vergès: One of my principles is to have no principles. That's why I would not turn down anyone.
SPIEGEL: Let's say, Adolf Hitler...
Vergès: I would have defended Hitler. I would also accept Osama bin Laden as a client, even (US President) George W. Bush -- as long as he pleads guilty.
SPIEGEL: You can't seriously be mentioning Hitler, Bin Laden and Bush, and their failings, in the same breath.
Vergès: Every crime is unique, and so is every criminal. That alone makes such comparisons impossible.
"Kill 'em all and let Root sort 'em out"
It's the absolute worse bloat/security nightmare.
You're new to assimilation, aren't you?
The best part of LaLa was the ability to listen to music once to decide if it was worth purchasing. Sure other places provide samples or a song or two, but having a centralized location to listen to the album being reviewed on pitchfork or anywhere else that included the LaLa link was a great feature. Perhaps Apple intends to still provide such a service to be used as direct advertising to Itunes. Not a bad strategy at all.
Or maybe Apple is planning to do something interesting with their acquisition. Naaaahhhh. Let's just moan and hate.
Large print giveth, and the small print taketh away
As opposed to "crooked" AAC with better aural quality at lower bitrates, and no DRM? You know AAC is the modern industry standard for audio encoding, don't you? There's nothing about AAC audio files on iTunes that is any more or less encumbered than MP3 audio files from Lala.
Get a grip.
Edith Keeler Must Die
i started using this service after it was included in Google SERPS... billboard music also had integration with it... i payed in like 20$ and still had a balance on my wallet. its a very small option in the legal terms but you can request a check for your refund... i really dont care for apple store and thats why i was using lala in the first place... i could feel this happening when they aquired the company a couple months ago apparently they just wrote enough code to kick everyone off
1. iPod
2. iPhone
3. Windows Media Player
last I checked, you're still able to buy music from any record store, Amazon.com, or Wallmart online to name a few. I don't think that puts it in the monopoly category.
because if it did, you could, you know, go to a Windows computer, download your music, and put it on a flash drive/CD/network share to transfer to your Linux machine...
It remains to be seen exactly what Apple will do with the assets they acquired when they purchased Lala. Since most companies don't make purchases without intending to use them (Assuming Apple didn't buy the company just to keep it out of the hands of Google.) in some manner, it's likely that they have something planned. There's always the possibility that those plans won't come to fruition, but Apple seems to have been executing well lately.
It would be nice if they incorporated some of Lala's features (e.g. full song previews, web access to purchased songs.) into iTunes in the near future. I liked being able to use Lala to preview an album that I wanted to hear before buying, but I never bought anything from Lala itself. Web access to purchased music (They offered 25 free web-access songs if you registered an account.) was nice, but only really useful if you forget to bring your portable music player or other device with your music collection along.
I think that this just highlights that issue with renting music rather than actually purchasing it. If you don't actually own the music, you're completely at the mercy of the other party. We've already seen other music stores with the rental or DRM model vanish, leaving their customers stranded. I don't know if Lala was profitable, so it's entirely possible that their web service would have vanished of its own accord without Apple pulling the plug. Anyone who actually paid the full $.89 to download the mp3 won't have any problems. At least Apple is giving users some form of credit (Albeit to their own store, so it's not exactly the most selfless act.) which is more than most users get when a company goes out of business or discontinues a service.
Let's hope so.
About a week after lala goes dark.
Why don't the people responsible for it just make a new service that does functionally the same thing?
That would not change what the service does. Patents affect what something does not where it came from. So it does not matter at all where the code came from, you could have written it yourself, if it does functionally the same thing as what is covered by the patent, then it is infringing. That goes even for functionality that does something you think is wholly new and original, but turns out to have been granted a patent 16.999999 years ago. That's why software patents suck and should stay out of Europe and why, in the case of patents, US law should be harmonized with EU law.
Don't confuse patents with copyright.
Beta is broken and the link to classic doesn't work. Stop wasting our time or there won't be anybody left here.
your idiotic comment could really be made about anything: all cars are basically blends of different standard metals and plastics... There is such a thing as design, marketing, software... You should read up about it, or shut up.
The Cloud - because you don't care if your apps and data are up in the air.
I was actually listening to a totally FREE, CLEAN MP3 from Lala (found by Google search) when I clicked on Slashdot.
Will this cause me to run out and buy Apple products? H*** no. The only reason I even know that Lala exists, is because stuff got yanked off YouTube, and I started Googling for replacements.
Look, I grew up making cassette tapes off the radio. There's no way I'm going from free to paying. Not gonna happen.
For all intensive purposes, "whom" is no longer a word. That begs the question, "who cares"?
Apple will introduce a streaming music service. Apple knows revolutionary ideas when they see them. They do have to renegotiate the licenses.
Am I happy? No.
But I realize there is evidence that Apple is launching such a service.
Can a company but a competitor just to shut it down?
friends, neighbours, schools, libraries, your local computer store. Surely you can find a Windows box somewhere nearby that you can use/borrow long enough to download your music from iTunes. Once you've used your credits up, you won't need to use iTunes again. Which begs the question, why don't you have all your songs already downloaded and saved in MP3 format from LaLa?
Apple is preparing for Steve's departure. by consolidating their IP and becoming draconian in it's fenced garden. This is very simial to the last time steve started preparing to leave.
I honestly don't see apple surviving long without him at the helm.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Easy fix from the distress(oo) manpage: /sbin/distressd stop.
#
# stopping distressd
#.distressd stopped
it is that people will never learn from history. During the good old days, the Apple II came out and revolutionized the industry. Their systems supported a a community of enthusiasts who build great software, and ushered in the revolution. Then they became arrogant. They developed the Macintosh. It was now my way or the high way. You could no longer build / buy expansion cards. People moved over to the IBM PC, which all though it was ugly, did not force you to be what apple wanted you to be.
For a long while after this apple sucked. Mr. jobs was forced out. Then the competition became arrogant and bloated. Mr. Jobs came back, OSX was introduced, and Apple no longer sucked.
Now I am happy to say the tide is once again changing. ITunes used to be a good music player. Now it is a combination Music player, Video play, video game player, shopping store, all wrapped in one file that take up 900 GB of space. Apple is forcing you to program the way they want you to program (witness flash). They are shutting down sites that are better at music then they are. Hence the cycle is complete. It is only a matter or time before someone new (or old comes back into the game).
This cycle corresponds to the cyclical nature of world powers. Once upon a time. China, and Europe with all those kings, emporers, and endless wars sucked. The cool people left and came to the USA, or were kicked out and went to jail. The USA was so great, that we kicked everyones butt. Then we too became arrogant, and allowed to many lawyers into our country. Now China rocks, and Europe is cool. So it is all one big cycle.
-Time to sell you stock in Apple.
Vergès: I believe that everyone, no matter what he may have done, has the right to a fair trial.
It's a sad day for the world when opinions like this are enough to make you "notorious"
i think this is all about google music search. apple wants itunes to be THE place where people search for music.
Great job FTC, way to allow the biggest distributor of digital music to purchase and then shut down a competitor.
Unfair business practices anyone?
Wait... what's that?? The Apple police are banging down my door!
No! Stop! I swear I didn't steal your prototype phone!!!
Don't tase me bro!!!
...Although I'm having some connection problems. "Server not found?"
Well......
I hear people objecting about media consolidation.[...] so they can control what gets shown or not shown on broadcast
Except the Internet is a totally different world.
Old world distribution channels are limited by the number of venues, whether those are radio stations, TV channels, concert halls, or feet of shelf space on record stores. In the old world, artists would be shut out if radio stations wouldn't play them or if Wal-Mart and Barnes and Noble wouldn't put them on the shelves. Consolidation in the old world meant even fewer venues, and fewer venues meant less variety.
iTunes sells every song it can get a license to sell. There's no limit to its shelf space, or how many channels it has. New artists aren't going to be shut out of iTunes because there isn't enough room.
The only risk for consumers is that the lack of competition will drive up prices. Luckily, there are still Amazon and other online stores competing with iTunes. And really, since the RIAA cartel restricts the prices for iTunes and everyone else, that's not really an issue anyway.
Well I left home just a week before
and I'd never ever cd's before
but Lala smiled and
took me by the hand
and said "Dear boy
I'm gonna make you a man"
Then Apple broke her spine,
and I'll never trade cd Again.
oh my Lala, la-la, la-la, la la Lala!
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
So many different good things are killed off when they get threatening to the commercial sellers. LaLa of course being very cheap compared to Apple's iTunes songs! I understand the implications for Apple, of course I do, but still a shame. If you can listen to a song fully before downloading (and paying for) it a lot of people will undoubtedly record them and keep them for themselves, but still.....
Be yourself and aim high!
It's not just for Microsoft anymore!
Well I left home,
just a week before
and I'd never ever traded CD's before
but Lala smiled and
took me by the hand
and said "Dear boy
I'm gonna make you a man"
Then Apple broke her spine,
and I'll never trade cd Again.
oh my Lala, la-la, la-la, la la Lala!
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Embrace
Extend
Extinguish
This gets +5 insightful?
EEE does not mean "buy out your competition." EEE means "subvert and discredit your competition, forcing them out of business."
An EEE strategy in this case would be:
1. Embrace: Announce that iTunes will become a Lala client, with full support for all Lala features
2. Extend: Offer new, proprietary features through iTunes that are not available through the regular Lala website, fostering dependence on iTunes as a Lala client
3. Extinguish: Remove support for Lala from iTunes, leaving all Lala users dependent on iTunes
In an EEE strategy, Lala would not have gotten a dime from Apple. Apple did not EEE Lala, Lala sold out to the man, plain and simple.
After 1 complete "listen" (is that noun now?), I don't need to bother your web-site for the same song ever again, thank you.
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
If only I could get a refund for my hundreds of web songs :(
Serves you right for paying for a license to listen to music instead of a downloaded file that you keep.
Anyone know of a service that sells downloadable, DRM-free music that you can copy to unlimited computers, burn to CD, back up, and maybe use with iPods?
I think the Amazon music store can do that. I wonder if there are any others....
What Apple is actually going to do is shove a beam saber through Lala's head...
Bow-ties are cool.
Steve Jobs said today that they shut down Lala because "Flash causes most of the Safari crashes". The apple faithful who attended the press conference looked confused for a moment, but then Jobs waved his hand around for a second and then they smiled and started nodding their heads.
It's very difficult to find people that are pure evil. One memorable conversation a few nights ago revealed that Pat Robertson, for all his horrible business dealings and grotesque perversions of Christianity, is not completely evil: He is environmentally conscious and was one of a handful of demagogues to appear on a series of commercials imploring the public to unite to preserve the planet's health.
Sure, he's still 99% evil, but not 100%. Jobs isn't even 99% in my book.
~ C.
You can request a refund from Lala if you do it before May 31st. I don't know if it will help with the songs you purchased for unlimited streaming, but you can try for a refund, at least. The situation is still disappointing, even if you do get a refund. :(
./~ If you don't know Tux from SCO, GTFO. ./~
since you're so strong in your conviction to not use the iTunes store ever, can I have your iTunes credit when Apple sends it to you?
If the price goes from $.10 to $.99, isn't that 8.9x more, and not 9.9x more as stated?
Evil empire blah blah..
MS = Evil Empire
Apple = Evil Empire
Oracle = Evil Empire
If it isn't free (as in sex lol) it must be evil...
Now if only I could get my Evil Empire (muhahahahah)
Really? They own LaLa now?
sigh.
Of course, I had to google that. Here's the full interview:
http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,591943,00.html
An extraordinarily interesting interview, to say the least. Well worth a full read.
Want to improve your Karma? Instead of "Post Anonymously", try the "Post Humously" option.
This is much ado about nothing. When Apple's evil, it's OK, because, hey, it's Apple. They're just so great at everything they do. But when Microsoft does this exact thing, the switchboard lights up and it's hell on earth. See, this is what's known as a "double standard." Look it up on your fucking iPhone. I'm sure there's some god damn $1.99 dictionary app that's so fucking cool and trendy and stupid. Maybe it interfaces with GPS for some reason.
Fuck Apple. Fuck Steve Jobs. Fuck the iPad. Fuck the iPhone. Fuck your Macbook.
I can't wait for the day when everyone wakes up from their iStupor and realizes that Apple has become more powerful and more evil than Microsoft. I'll raise a glass to that day.
as Lala was a much better music service, offering songs in straight MP3 format
iTunes offers 256kbs DRM-Free AAC. AAC is a much, much, much better format then MP3.
No, I will not work for your startup
Oh but it is. The essence of competition is eliminating competitors. Successfully competing means you win. How do we not understand this. Everybody seems to think that in order to have a product you must have competition, when in fact the perfect business model flourishes on no competition.
Successfully competing in business means you make money. As long as you're profitable you're doing well. How much or how little is a value judgment.
Of course making money isn't the only thing in life:
One prospers when one renders benefit to others.
-- Tadao Yoshida, founder of YYK, world's largest zipper company
... not Apple's. Apple has always been very Machiavellian.
However, it's made up for it by providing the best toys and by using those somewhat slimy?? slick?? hmm... liquid ethics in the service of usability. Apple was never about "Do no evil". Apple has always been about "Do neat (and, occasionally, insanely great) things while retaining a healthy profit margin."
Nothing to see here - just another company buying market share.
That is all.
Why does a Citroen C1 cost less than a Peugeot 107, despite being literally the same car (and I do mean literally), but with a different badge on the front?
Packaging makes a lot of difference, and the external design of the box that holds all those standard PC parts, as well as the OS that runs on it differentiates a Mac from a PC. It's really no surprise that they cost different amounts - they are priced at a point the market will bear, and clearly people buy them.
Whether the price is worth it to an individual consumer, however, is a personal decision.
For me the cost of my iMac was well worth it for the form factor of the machine itself. I could have built a hackintosh for a lot less, but then I would have been missing out on the iMac's form factor, which was a big part of the reason I bought it.
Not everything about buying a computer boils down to "what specific RAM does it have, and specific hard drive type, and specific CPU". There are other things that go into making a product.
It's also not a stretch to see why some things cost more - the MacBook Pro case is made from a single piece of machined aluminium - is it any wonder that costs more than the plastic case a Dell is made out of? I'm not saying the Dell is junk, but the fact of the matter is that it is literally cheaper to make the case, even if the internal parts are the same (like the Ram, HD and CPU).
Some things cost more, some things cost less.
You can request a refund from Lala if you do it before May 31st.
I have.
I don't know if it will help with the songs you purchased for unlimited streaming, but you can try for a refund, at least. The situation is still disappointing, even if you do get a refund. :(
It won't.
Or rather, I should say that I won't fight tooth and nail for a nicety. I enjoyed it while it lasted, and at the price I paid, I ought not complain.
Isn't it just the worst when people don't recognize the obvious superiority of your opinions and get in line? Stupid fucking free will.
In the case of the CPU, the HDD, and the RAM, these are commodity items which you, solely because of your fanboiism, happily pay Apple more for.
You can attempt to justify it by saying putting a Ferrari badge on a Ford Mustang makes it worth as much as a Testarossa. Don't kid yourself as it's only attempt; putting a Ferrari badge on a Ford does not increase it's value.
These rebuttals center around the "magic" quality that is supposedly the Mac PC. Your arguments amount to the following: "Apple sprinkles each commodity part with magic, so of course it costs more!"
I am thinking that you are either completely blinded by fanboiism, or you are simply oblivious to the truth that Apple is overcharging you for off the shelf parts.
And you are completely omitting the fact that the products are different.
Apple aren't simply putting an Apple badge on a Dell and putting the price up, they are building a different computer.
Yes, the internal parts (HD, Ram, CPU etc) are indeed commodity parts - I am well aware of that (and in fact, use that fact to my advantage since I do a lot of upgrades and it's nice to be able to buy off the shelf parts). The box that they put them in, and the software supplied is where the added value comes in *to some people*.
You are being disingenuous that it's like putting a Ferrari badge on a Mustang - there are differences that separate the products.
I mentioned in my post that a Dell laptop and a Macbook Pro have very similar internal parts, but that the case of the Dell is injection moulded ABS plastic and the Macbook Pro case is made from a single piece of machined aluminium. The Macbook pro costs more - do you really think it's merely that they are charging more for the internal pieces?
Not to mention that the OS is different - buying a Mac is the only way to officially get OS X, and that is worth it for some people.
I think it is you who is blinded by Apple hate or some other misunderstanding of how a market works to see that for some people, the value of an item is not solely determined by how it is made up.
What if you took two products - a Mustang and a Ferrari 360 and melted both of them down in a giant furnace and recovered all the base elements from them and separated them out. Which one is worth more now? Presumably the heavier one - so likely the mustang, since you'll get a lot of steel out of it. The 360 has a lot of carbon fibre, so break that down and you get elemental carbon as a large potion of that, which is very cheap.
The value of products is not just about the parts it is made from. Commodity PC parts are part of Apple's products - this is not what makes them more expensive.
The cost of commodity parts from Apple is pretty standard - look at the price for extra RAM in BTO models. The costs are very similar to what other retailers are charging, even retailers like Crucial, who sell the same modules for almost the same price (within a few dollars/pounds). Their upgrade prices for hard drives are also similar.
I'm extremely glad Apple uses off the shelf parts. It was very handy when I put a new hard drive in my iMac.
That je-ne-sais-quoi is the Mac OS X: the secret sauce that makes everything work nicely.
-dZ.
Carol vs. Ghost
Man, your history is off.
Before the IBM PC, before the dark times, there were numerous personal computer manufacturers, the predominant home computers being made by Apple, Radio Shack, and Commodore. Apple was arguably dominant, but there were thriving communities around all of them. However, you can't judge them by today's standards. The communities were very small by today's standards, and there weren't many computers. There are thriving communities around a lot of Linux distros today, and that might be a good explanation.
Then IBM issued their Personal Computer, and personal computing changed irrevocably. IBM was able to sell into the business in a way that no previous personal computer company had been able to. The size of the personal computing market increased dramatically, but it was almost all due to the PC business. Various companies tried to compete in the business market, and were unsuccessful. To name one, Radio Shack did its best to produce computers better than the IBM PC but not quite compatible, but that didn't last long.
The other problem was that the IBM PC was, at least potentially, much more powerful than the older computers. The 8088 had upgrade paths much better than the 6502s and Z80s and 8080s that had dominated personal computing, and it was already capable of directly addressing much more memory. The Apple II got upgraded to the 65816, if memory serves, but it wasn't a match. This meant that the old communities were doomed. There was no smooth upgrade path for the Commodore owner to something comparable to the IBM PC AT, with a screaming 8MHz 80286.
They developed the Macintosh not out of arrogance, but out of necessity. The Apple II line was running out of steam. The Apple III was a failure. No attempt to come up with something that wasn't an IBM PC clone was working. At this point, Radio Shack sold IBM PC clones, Commodore and Atari were limping along with dead-end products, and Apple wasn't in better shape.
Apple needed to come up with something different from the IBM PC, and succeeded. At first, there were the "toaster Macs", which were very hard to upgrade. (I upgraded the RAM on one, and it wasn't easy.) Then they moved to an open chassis, which was far easier to get into, similar to IBM PC clones. They always provided good developer support, aside from coming along and changing things unexpectedly.
So, you're wrong in several ways. The Apple II was not the industry leader, but rather an industry leader. People had been moving to the IBM PC (and far more of them just started with it) for a long time before the Macintosh, and the Mac is what started them moving back.
If we learn one thing from history, it's that people will never learn history. Instead, they'll mash together some odd anachronistic facts to suit their own prejudices.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
it's a song about the topic, how the fuck is that off topic?
-1 horrid maybe, but certainly not off topic.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
I stand corrected. However, I don't think these change the original premise (that apple got arrogant, and declined because of it).
The 68K processor was better the the 8088. If I recall the Motorola line of processors was alway considered better the the Intel line (back in the day). The Macintosh just never had the support that the Intel based PC's developed. I would claim that this was because they insisted on 'controlling the scene' rather then let the scene develop and play itself out.
I would say that apple only came back because the competition really sucked, and things were ripe to be shake up. Would Microsoft still be selling some updated version of windows XP, if OSX had not come out?
EMI, Day the Music died-MD45, American Pie
this stinks, unless something identical comes along - this was a remember when (moment in time) when you could access any music, any time you wanted, in your own home, w comfy clothes, sipping your fav brew. Something I only dreamed & imagined about. I listened to all kinds of amazing music, ragtime, new groups, something I may never do again. It was in sync w utube to cross ref a song to see a video. The wealth of info of artists bio's. It is out there & now it will sit on some rich guy's shelf - It was :) heaven
Like these comments: Apple will Never understand what was built here. Oh they'll roll out something "similar" It'll have a lot of bangs & whistles, overpriced. But it'll never have the Warmth, the Fun, or the Soul of Lala. This was a community And now Destroyed
Hey Lala, Congrats, I would have sold to Apple too. Enjoy the money. Working sucks. Best of Luck. I would add PS Enjoy St Barts island.
I will be hear when they shut out the notes RIP Lala ~ Now I have to cram listen to this fabulous music.