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iPad Owners Are 'Selfish Elites'
An anonymous reader writes "It's not exactly official, but should also surprise no one: According to a new study the psychological profile of iPad owners can be summed up as 'selfish elites' while have-not critics are 'independent geeks.' Consumer research firm MyType conducted the study, in which opinions of 20,000 people were analyzed between March and May. The firm's conclusion was that iPad owners tend to be wealthy, sophisticated, highly educated and disproportionately interested in business and finance, while they scored terribly in the areas of altruism and kindness. In other words, 'selfish elites.'"
The way I see it the iPad/Phone/Apple in general is like a very large, beautiful prison cell. Sure, WE might walk far enough to reach the walls and be unhappy about it, but to the average consumer (who doesn't walk far and never reaches the walls), it feels like beautiful freedom. It's like the restrictions don't exists.
Sampling Bias?
Is this site about news for nerds, or gratuitously bashing companies and/or their customers for no discernible logical reason?
It's official. Most of you are morons.
News at 11.
Seriously ... it's a fairly pricey, non-essential gadget. The demographic they are describing is exactly the one that can afford such a thing and not think twice about it. They also buy many other non-essential shiny things.
You could say the same thing about Mercedes automobiles.
That's exactly what they want you to think, via marketing. You're falling right into their diabolical trap!
No, their market is actually douchebags with more money than sense. Which this article is just confirming.
Comment of the year
Who wrote this? Pol Pot?
I'm not going to apologize for having an education and (finally) having a bit of money - although I still rent and have worked food kitchens. But hey - I'm an intellectual - shoot me and evacuate the cities for farming already. My skull will look good on a shelf.
(seriously this is thing is covered in Teabagger language - are they serious?)
Or any other Apple product. But any study that comes off this way must be seriously flawed and is in no way scientific. First we have the problem of defining what a "selfish elite" is. Call me when the whole world agrees.
This is nothing but a smear campaign. Oh wait, the article says that this "data" was obtained by a "Consumer Research" firm, not the American Psychological Association, or some scientist. If we follow the money, I wonder who hired this company...
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
In other news :
Expensive luxury products are bought by people with lots of money who want luxury for themselves. This probably goes for quite nearly all apple products.
- Captain Obvious
Well yeah, considering that, for most of them (judging by the iPhone users and other macfans), that consists of "it's shiny and makes me look hip."
My mother has an iPad and she fits your gross generalization in no way whatsoever. In fact, she fits into a completely different category I would just call 'convenience based end user.' She cares almost nothing for what others think of her aside from how good her casserole was at the pot luck or if she was a good hostess for Thanksgiving. I'm really tired of the /. mentality on what an Apple product user is.
Reply to That ||
How did this bullshit troll article make the front page? C'mon editors, this is ridiculous.
I assume, then, that you have examined the study's methodology and discovered that is invalid, and are not simply being a knee-jerking iFanboy who has suddenly discovered sand in one's own vagina?
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Because it's not a rule. It's a really broad generalization, based on some subset of iPad owners.
At best the sample is sketchy ...
So, it's a heavily self-selected set of Facebook users (who might themselves be selfish elitists moreso than everyone else), which may or may actually be representative of anything. To top it off, the typical iPad critic:
So, people who like the product are elitist bastards, and the people who don't like it are knee-jerk elitist geeks who live in their mothers basement and are responding viscerally as opposed to rationally. (And, yes, I'm intentionally injecting some slant to that.) But, I do mean the elitist geek -- the kind of person who believes that since they know something about technology, everybody else is misinformed and stupid. That's about as elitist as you get, and just as anti-social as the conclusions arrived at by the 'study'.
I think people are responding to this so strongly because it takes a sample of 20,000 people, drawn from the Facebook pool who already voluntarily self-selected themselves to participate. In my estimation, that makes the statistics pretty worthless since it's not drawing on a representative sample. Heck, as I said, do Facebook users themselves have a tendency to be elitist, narcissistic selfish bastards? It almost seems like drawing entirely from Facebook gives you a sample bias towards people who like Facebook.
I just don't see any validity to the sample, methods, or conclusion of this article. Any time anybody tries to make such a broad set of statements, people are going to get their hackles up, because it sounds like the worst sort of stereotyping.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
The thing that really strikes me these days is the hatred for ordinary Americans by the elites.
I've heard this sort of claim before and I never really got the classification system here. Who are the "elites" exactly? Is it based on money? Because a lot of the people railing against the "elites" have more money than the "elites" they rail against. Is it based on self-perception? The big city professional may look down on the Bible belt housewife as unsophisticated, tacky, and ignorant, but the Bible belt housewife may look down on the big city professional as immoral, degenerate, effeminate, and communist. Does that make the housewife an "elite"?
I'm not sure when liking a product that meets your needs turned you into some sort of fanboy deserving of an epithet, but it's sort of sad. I use a Mac ( a 5 year old one at that, but it suits my needs as a developer to have a UNIX machine with a good user interface and still be able to play an MMO game once in a blue moon). I also have an iPad, and I really like it for surfing on the couch. It's not that I have more money than sense, it's just that I like it, and I have enough money to buy it, so why shouldn't I? I use a Nokia N900 too, does that make me a socialist? I like Diet Coke, does that make me a shill for a sugar water company hellbent on making Americans fat and complacent? Maybe so, but somehow that's not how I identify myself.
People can be independent thinkers. Buying a product doesn't force you to assume a company's brand identity as your own.
- Vincit qui patitur.
> Nearly every Apple *fan* that I've met
> has been a pretentious prick.
Congratulations, you've derived the definition of the word "fan", short for "fanatic." Owner != fan. Most sports fans are pricks, too, at least when it comes to "their" team.* Same with Ford/Chevy fans and all the rest. At least Apple fans have some class--I've yet to see an iPad with a decal of Calvin peeing on a tablet PC.
Back on topic, this article is absolute trollish bullshit--nothing more than a generalization. I can guarantee you that my 62 year old mom, 54 year old aunt, and 76 year old neighbor (all Apple users, one iPad (so far) among those three) are neither selfish nor elitist. What's next, a front-page Slashdot story proclaiming that Windows users are all mouth-breathing lusers and Linux users are either arrogant greybeards or basement-dwelling loners?
* hey, at least Apple fans do something with what they're fanatical about. Ooh, you paid money to go sit in a stadium and yell at a bunch of millionaires who wouldn't give a shit if you died in the stands? Good for you.
Dear Slashdot: next time you want to mess with the site, add a rich-text editor for comments.
6 iPads is about $3000. A nice HDTV-centered home theater can easily cost as much.
I think you missed my point entirely. The average family does *not* spend $3000 on *either* a "nice HDTV-centered home theater" OR 6 iPads. The average family buys a 42" HDTV from Walmart for $500 and has either a dish or cable hooked up to it.
You replied to a post that implied that mostly the rich are buying iPads.
In your post you seemed to be offering a counter point to that - but in doing so you seemed to reinforce his point (and the summary)*and* you seemed to say that *your* household usage was in fact normal and not unusual. This is where you swerved into "self parody" and "lack of insight".
Both are for "consumption"; one is portable.
The average person would never use the term "consumption" when describing the use of an entertainment device. Again you showed here that you are far from average personally, apart from iPad ownership issues.
Some of us, having such disposable income,
There is a recession going on - what percentage of American families do you think are blowing money on multiple iPads? I'm guessing it is in the .005% range.
You spend your money your way, I'll spend mine my way. Neither is evil based only on size/quantity of screens.
Again you misunderstand my point. I am *not* a liberal. I have no interest whatsoever in how you choose to spend *your* money. You earned it - you spend it.
Humor from a Genetically Molested Mind