Apple Leaves Journalists Jonesing

Hodejo1 writes "Apple traditionally has big product announcements in the early spring, so around February both the mainstream press and the tech blogs began to circulate their favorite rumors (the iWatch, iTV). They also announced the date of the next Apple event, which this year was in March — except it didn't happen. 'Reliable sources' then confirmed it would be in April, then May and then — nothing. In withdrawal and with a notoriously secretive Apple offering no relief the tech journalists started to get cranky. The end result is a rash of petulant stories that insist Apple is desperate for new products, in trouble (with $150 billion dollars in the bank, I should be in such trouble) and in decline. The only ones desperate seem to be editors addicted to traffic-generating Apple announcements. Good news is on the horizon, though, as the Apple Worldwide Developer Conference starts June 10th." This was in evidence last night, as Apple CEO Tim Cook spoke to the press at the All Things D conference. Cook's statements were mostly the sort of vague, grandiose talk that gets fed to investors on an earnings call, but it's generating article after article because, hey, it's Tim Cook.

Comments

Who cares?

[Anonymous Coward]

^ that is all

Re:Who cares?

[MightyYar]

I'm a Mac fan, and I think the iPhone is all right. I'm not an Apple hater.

That said, I completely agree. We are now reporting about non-news as news?

Re:Who cares?

[Anonymous Coward]

Agreed.

Since when is media hype to get all of the trendy tech journalists salivating "stuff that matters"?

Slashdot is becoming ever the shill site since dice took over.

Re:Who cares?

[SJHillman]

It's sort of like having a small child or a puppy. It's when everything is quiet that you start to wonder what they're up to.

Re:Who cares?

[Vanderhoth]

or more likely they're throwing all the toilet paper they can find in the toilet and pulling the flusher repeatedly flooding your bathroom and making a huge mess that someone is going to have to clean up. They may also be starting a fire.

Re:Who cares?

[sycodon]

Apple is now Just Another Tech Company run by MBAs and Marketing jackwads.

If Steve were here, he would tear the entire iTunes team a new asshole and then fire them all.

Re:Who cares?

[shadowrat]

What kind of dogs did you have?

Re:Who cares?

[Anonymous Coward]

"The end result is a rash of petulant stories that insist Apple is desperate for new products, in trouble (with $150 billion dollars in the bank,"

It's sort of like having a small child or a puppy.

A small child or puppy with $150 billion of other people's money. And someday governments around the world will grow enough balls to take it back.

"I'd call on Apple Australia to either correct the record or provide further detail as to the way it actually prices its products for Australian consumers," Husic told the House of Representatives.

Husic said people may have "raised an eyebrow" at reports that Apple generated $6bn in revenue in Australia but "paid only $40m in tax – apparently because it racked up $5.5bn in costs", but "their eyes would've popped out" at the US revelations Apple had set up an offshore subsidiary that earned $30bn income but had apparently paid no tax to any government for five years."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/may/28/australian-companies-forced-disclose-tax

Re:Who cares?

[lxs]

Also like a small child or puppy, the average owner will spam everybody else with updates and pictures until they are sick of it.

Re:Who cares?

[Savage-Rabbit]

Apple used to be a lot more reticent regarding future products. The fact that Mr. Cook is talking/hinting about future products is confirmation that Apple knows its best days are behind it. Mr. Cook is trying, unsuccessfully it appears, to regenerate the buzz around Apple.

Yeah, maybe it's time to shut Apple down and give the money back to the shareholders.

Re:Who cares?

[Vanderhoth]

Shih Tzu, why do you think it was playing in the toilet?

Re:Who cares?

[chrish]

While I agree with the first part (and hey, they can coast for a decade, so maybe they've got ample opportunity to get moving again), I don't agree with the second part.

iTunes sucked hard for many, many years while Jobs was at the helm, its awfulness isn't a feature of Tim Cook's days.

Re:Who cares?

[shmlco]

"A small child or puppy with $150 billion of other people's money. And someday governments around the world will grow enough balls to take it back."

People gave them money in exchange for a product. That's called business.

As to "growing enough balls", get real. We have corporations that make billions in profits quarterly, pay little to no taxes on them, and then the government turns around and hands them billions more in subsidies and tax breaks. And yes, I'm talking about you, Exxon.

Re:Who cares?

[Anonymous Coward]

A small child or puppy with $150 billion of other people's money.

Sorry, did Apple break into peoples' houses and force them to buy iPads and iPhones and Macs at the point of a gun? Because I'm pretty sure they didn't.

That 150 billion is Apple's - they earned it, it's not "someone else's" money - unless you can prove that they have failed to pay the taxes required of them by law, in which case SOME PORTION of that money certainly belongs to the governments to which taxes are owed.

If Apple has satisfied their legal obligations under the current tax laws, then that money is NOBODY but APPLE's. If the governments want them to pay more money, then the governments should pass some new fucking tax laws, instead of whining about how Apple didn't say "Hey, we only owe $6 billion, but you know what, let's just round that up to $100 billion, and here's a check."

Your expectations and wishes do not constitute a legal obligation on other people. If you want to compel Apple to pay more, by all means - go for it. I'd even agree that they should be paying more in taxes than they are currently. But don't for a second think you're doing anything but whining like a bitch by complaining that they "ONLY" paid what they're "OBLIGATED" to pay.

Oh god, you thick cunts make me lose my mind. And I'm not even an Apple user. This "you didn't pay more than you're obligated to, therefore you're evil" rhetoric is just so retarded it defies comprehension.

Re:Who cares?

[webmistressrachel]

"Slashdot is becoming ever the shill site since took over"

Surely that's just the universal, elitist meme talking, like no-one who's here now is as cool as the original crowd, etc.?

Well sorry for not being cool enough. Blame the Roman Catholic Comprehensive school I went to.

Re:Who cares?

[quadrox]

You think they will stop when we are sick of it? If only that were true...

Re:Who cares?

[shmlco]

Citation? Or do you just have insinuation?

Re:Who cares?

[quadrox]

I don't quite see your point - he has had YEARS to do that, and still never did.

Re:Who cares?

[xQuarkDS9x]

Apple is now Just Another Tech Company run by MBAs and Marketing jackwads.

If Steve were here, he would tear the entire iTunes team a new asshole and then fire them all.

Steve should have fired the team that makes the Windows version of iTunes. That software is in the same league as "The most shittiest software in the world" such as Samsung Keis. iTunes especially is just so much junk.

Re:Who cares?

[tnk1]

That's an excellent point.

That said, the way they turned it around was to re-hire Steve Jobs, their visionary co-founder. Obviously, that option is now deceased.

They could try and throw Woz back in there, but... well... no.

Now they're back to the place where they are a corporation being run by people who are removed from the original vision. The good news is that these guys are Jobs' hand-picked successors, and that they have a lot of money in the bank. The situation is not the same as when Jobs got fired back in the day.

The bad news is that they are a big corporation. Big corporations tend to lose focus, and if Apple succeeded on anything, it was from remaining focused on what they were doing. The question is, whether they fall apart sooner or later. Looking at Microsoft, they can probably afford a lot of mistakes, and still remain in business, and even relevant, for a long time. Perhaps in that time, someone else will come along with the needed abilities.

Re:Who cares?

[Anonymous Coward]

It's sort of like having a small child or a puppy. It's when everything is quiet that you start to wonder what they're up to.

More like being in a cult. You expect your leader to hold weekly masses, and when he fails to deliver one sermon, some of the followers start thinking it's the end of the world.

Re:Who cares?

[tlhIngan]

That said, I completely agree. We are now reporting about non-news as news?

Because Apple stories bring in ad revenue. A lot of it, in fact. If you can attract Android fanboys and Apple-haters to the mix, you can count on a good chunk of ad revenue.

So Apple non-news is the media's attempt to bring some Apple story ad revenue back.

Journalists are hurting for money too, you know,

And Apple's positioned themselves to be the "premium, but accessible" brand. Unlike Google (who simply are ho-hum because they're splashed across the vast majority of web searchines), and Samsung (who you see everywhere for everything - from lowly crap to high end smartphones and appliances).

And Google I/O was a huge bust in terms of reporting. The PS4 and Xbox One announcements tended to be yawners.

Only Apple stories can bring in crowds from Apple fanboys, Android fanboys, Apple haters, and the general public - it won't be long until even the Apple-haters have haters ("I remember when hating Apple was COOL..."). Android stories bring out some Android fanboys, and a few Apple fanboys, but otherwise not much of a stir. Microsoft stories (including Xbox) similarly - the anti-Microsoft rhetoric has died down. Even Google can't seem to pull in crowds.

Except it seems that Apple has throughout its entire life a steady supply of fans, haters, and people interested in their product.

Hell, it won't be long until you see "Tim Cook - help a starving journalist and announce *something*".

Re:Who cares?

[interkin3tic]

Tech journalists. Which seem to be the second worst journalists out there. Financial sector journalists are pretty shitty at what they do, political reporters are generally pretty terrible at doing anything more than regurgitating press releases. But at least both have some importance and occasionally you get decent reports. Tech journalists, on the other hand, seem to be little more than advertisers. And not even very good ones at that. Aside from gawker buying that iphone prototype, I can't think of a single thing done by anyone who reports on mobile phones or consumer electronics that was worth anything, and even that iphone thing was utterly unimportant. Wait a few fucking months.

Still better than celebrity gossip reporters. I'll give them that much. They may be utterly worthless, but at least they don't distract people from important issues as much as celebrity news does.

Re:Who cares?

[QuietLagoon]

Yeah, maybe it's time to shut Apple down and give the money back to the shareholders. [with pointer to sarcasm reference]

You misunderstood what I said. When a company is at its peak, most think it will continue to perform at the same level. In Apple's case, that means very significant growth per year, a growth rate that is very unlikely for Apple to maintain. Apple's "market-changing" products seem to be fewer and farther in-between of late.

.
In May 2003, Apple's stock was around 8, it recently peaked at nearly 100 times that price.

Do you really think that Apple's stock price will increase another 100-fold over the next ten years? Do you really think that Apple can maintain the same growth rate over the next ten years?

Hence my comment that Apple's best days are behind it.

Re:Who cares?

[MightyYar]

it won't be long until even the Apple-haters have haters ("I remember when hating Apple was COOL...")

I think I made that jump with the anti-Bush posts on here. I didn't like Bush - I thought he was awful. But it could be a story about ice cream and the anti-Bush nutters would infest the discussion. I grew to hate people who I was probably idealistically aligned with. :)

Re:Who cares?

[Anonymous Coward]

I cannot comment on most of your post, but

You can't backup your iTunes to a hard-disk or USB key

Now I don't know how iTunes works on a Mac, but on Windows, I can most certainly backup my iTunes directory. Whenever I've upgraded to a new PC, I install iTunes, copy the old iTunes directory over, and everything is exactly as it was on the old PC.

Re:Who cares?

[tnk1]

Hand-picked successors can certainly fail, but it isn't the same situation as being thrown out by Gil Amelio and the Board.

Needless to say, Tim Cook is not Steve Jobs, but that might be "acceptable". One might consider that the Board probably knew that the share value would tank simply because Steve Jobs died. If they were prepared for that eventuality, then they realize that *any* successor would be screwed. If they're going to fire him, they are going to want to do it based on a stock drop that Tim Cook is primarily responsible for.

Now, as for Cook's actual ability to be CEO, two things are unclear.

1. If Apple is tanking, is that simply because Apple's products were entering sort of an iterative phase even before Jobs died? Some had pointed that out in the past.
2. Can Steve Jobs be replaced by anyone at all? Was he like Alexander the Great or Charlemagne in terms of being able to build an empire where no empire should have been able to appear normally? If Apple was built solely on personal abilities of a particular person, instead of on collective leadership, it will need to change significantly to be able to survive without him.

On point two, however, one should point out that Alexander the Great's successors were actually rather successful at maintaining their still-large, if divided, holdings. Tim Cook may not be an Alexander, but he could shape up to be a Ptolemy. In that sense, he might still be the right man for the job, even if everything he does seems to look like failure in contrast to Jobs. Cook might ultimately be successful at maintaining as much of the Empire as he can, but he's probably still going to lose a good chunk of it no matter what he does.

Re:Who cares?

[mspohr]

I'm a little hesitant to reply to you since your tone of voice is so nasty but.. here goes.

When you buy stuff, you really should pay the entire cost of that stuff which should include the costs and benefits of the legal, political, education, and infrastructure (roads, communications, etc.) which went into making that stuff. Some of these costs are publicly funded by taxes.
That is why corporations should pay taxes.
I don't want to underwrite the cost of your latest gadget by paying for all of the public goods which helped create it.
You need to pay for your own stuff.

Re:Who cares?

[gtall]

Their stock price reflected their new markets. When those markets matured, so did the stock price. The pundits somehow expected Apple to break open a new market every 3 years which is a ridiculously high bar to jump over...every three years. And it didn't help that Google and Samsung decided that the measure of success was to ape Apple.

Re:Who cares?

[gorzek]

Apple's not announced any amazing new products! Apple is doomed! SELL SELL SELL!

I don't care much about Apple either way, but the way people speculate about it is so silly. Of course, this is the company that manages to meet its own stated revenue targets but takes a stock hit for not meeting third-party analysts' made-up targets. All I can do is laugh.

Re:Who cares?

[gtall]

Yep, iTune's was never good. It's original problem was that it looked like a file system but wasn't, hence the way we used it clashed with way we used the Mac GUI. Now, it is just too weird for words.

Re:Who cares?

[dgatwood]

How can any CEO keep their job after their stock value was chopped in half in less than a year?

First, it didn't get chopped in half. AAPL peaked at 702, and troughed at 390, give or take. Second, at no point did AAPL lose much more than about a year worth of gains. Every dollar the stock lost was a dollar that it also gained under Tim Cook, at approximately the same rate.

News flash: AAPL is prone to wild swings. Nothing new here. The only difference this time is that there's a whole new crop of pundits who don't remember 2008, 2001, etc.

Re:Who cares?

[amiga3D]

I wish all taxes were corporate. That way all the cost of taxes would be hidden in the product cost. Then I would almost never have to pay taxes because I almost never buy anything. All the people I know who have to have the latest and greatest could thus pay my way. I like it. I have two cars, one a 98 model and a newer 01. I bought a new washer and dryer in 2010, my second set since I got married in 1980. I bought a new TV in 2011, my third in the same period. It's not that I'm cheap I just don't buy shit just to be buying something. I like the idea of those who have the money to buy new crap every other payday taking care of the taxes.

Re:Who cares?

[ethanms]

How can any CEO keep their job after their stock value was chopped in half in less than a year?

The value of the stock, particularly stocks for companies such as Apple, is often based on sentiment with crystal-ball-esque predictions of future earnings and performance. It can take a long time for reality to set in. Frankly the price was too damn high, it was all based on euphoria of Apple producing a never ending stream of must-have products and the idea that the stock will continue to increase... and it did, for the same reason reason people kept buying houses even when the housing market was clearly over-valued.

A solid company, with a good CEO, management and vision, will not start chopping heads just because the stock price is varying. That's just wanting scapegoats and blood.

You don't throw the captain overboard when the seas get rough unless you are certain they steered you into the storm... this is not that case.

Re:Who cares?

[spire3661]

Hes referring to the fact that Apple does not pay a proper amount of tax.

Re:Who cares?

[spire3661]

You dont think business should be paying taxes to support the infrastructure that provides them with the opportunity to do business?

Re:Who cares?

[spire3661]

Apple has nowhere to go. Their systems are too locked down to fill the use-cases Android is filling. I say this owning a mac mini, ipad 2 and iphone 4S.

Re:Who cares?

[krakelohm]

Yup, same on a mac.

Re:Who cares?

[Anonymous Coward]

Apple pays every dime that it owes. The fact that that number is smaller than you think it should be is a reflection on how screwed up the tax code is, not on how Apple does it's business. If you don't like the number, fix the tax code. Don't criticize Apple. Hate the game, not the players.

Re:Who cares?

[spire3661]

This is terrible logic. You equating making BILLIONS in profit with just trying to make a normal living is a joke.

Re:Who cares?

[spire3661]

Relative to their income, they are shirking their responsibility. I didnt say its Apple's fault, but either way we want more money from them.

Re:Who cares?

[Anonymous Coward]

Most of the important infrastructure projects that contribute to a business are funded at the state or local rather than federal level.

Roads? The government pays for only 25% of the highways that carry 85% of all road traffic. source: http://www.cbo.gov/publication/22059

Education? Give me a break: education in America is municipal first and foremost. The federal government makes up only about 10% of education funding. source: http://www2.ed.gov/about/overview/fed/role.html

Communications got support from the federal government, but largely it's a private endeavor in the US. Actual domestic police protection is almost entirely state and local; the federal governments' TSA and FBI don't contribute nearly as much to safety (if at all, which is another debate entirely), while the cop on the beat, who might one day save your life or protect your business, is funded by your local taxpayers.

Federal funding goes to entitlements (medicare and social security, both largely retirement benefits inadequately replacing pensions and family support, and neither much of a capital investment in the future but rather a band-aid for the present) and defense (pointless wars in barren wastelands pitting the latest stealth drones against goat herders, the eternal folly of the rich nation against the poor, for which see Herodotus) and waste; it funds the military-industrial complex, it bails out the banks, it creates credit bubbles by backing mortgages and student loans without addressing the underlying problems of predatory lending and price gouging.

Apple's, or any company's, evasion of federal taxes doesn't impact infrastructure development nearly as much as some would have you believe: it mainly affects corporate welfare for the military-industrial complex and direct payments to the demographic most likely to vote (the elderly) and whose share of the "common" good continues and will continue to grow. Evasion of state and local taxes does—but they're not always (or even often, especially for local revenues) dependent on federal taxation.

Re:Who cares?

[smg5266]

I don't understand, I thought corporate tax is only applied to a company's profits, that is only after the company pays all their expenses etc. Why would this "cost" have to be passed onto consumers?

Re:Who cares?

[shmlco]

And I like the idea of everyone who benefits paying their share. You never drive those cars? Police, fire, paramedics aren't going to come to your house if called? Kids (and you) weren't educated? Power, gas, water, and sewer don't come to your house?

Re:Who cares?

[shmlco]

They pay more taxes here than just about anyone else ($2 of every $40 collected from corporations). Which is more than you get from Exxon, GE, and a host of other major corporations.

Next, why should money made in France (and taxed in France) be taxed again here? Or in Japan? England? Germany?

The big issue is all of the money they've made overseas and would like to bring home and use and invest here in the US, except that doing so would cause it to be taxed again at 35%.

Re:Who cares?

[MightyYar]

China?

Re:Who cares?

[Patch86]

Are we all too cool to copy-paste these days?

Or write a batch script to do it for you. A one line command with xcopy should do the trick.

(I hate iTunes. But I hate it because it's a buggy bloated piece of rubbish which spawns dozens of resource-hogging background tasks and also because it looks terrible. Hating on it for not having a copy-paste button seems like picking nits.)

Re:Who cares?

[shmlco]

"Apple's "market-changing" products seem to be fewer and farther in-between of late."

Please. Apple II released in 1976, Lisa in 1983. Macintosh in 1984. Powerbook in 1991. iPod is 2001. iPhone in 2007. Air in 2008. iPad in 2010. The iPad mini (yet another bestselling product) just last year.

Just how often is a single company supposed to create a "market-changing" product anyway?

Re:Who cares?

[amiga3D]

I'll pay plenty. While not wasteful I do have to make purchases. I like a consumption tax though as those that have money to blow will pay more.

Re:Who cares?

[cayenne8]

When you buy stuff, you really should pay the entire cost of that stuff which should include the costs and benefits of the legal, political, education, and infrastructure (roads, communications, etc.) which went into making that stuff. Some of these costs are publicly funded by taxes.

Err, that stuff is already paid for by my:

Local and State Sales Tax

Local and State Property Tax

Local and State Income Tax

Local, State and Federal Gas taxes...

and other taxes I already pay...these pay for my legal, education, infrastructure, etc used for everything.

I dunno WTF I'd want to be paying for political stuff with my taxes though...unless we in the US were to make all political office stuff 100% publicly funded, which I'd support if it would get the big money out of govt.

But that's a different topic.

But corporate taxes...they don't pay for this shit, they just get passed onto the consumer, which in essence means they pay for all these services TWICE.

Re:Who cares?

[cayenne8]

Relative to their income, they are shirking their responsibility.

What responsibility?

The only responsibility the company has is to its shareholders, and to pay the taxes they legally own by working within the laws in the system.

My only responsibility to the govt/community..is to pay what I own within the system.

If you feel the need to pay more, then by all means, don't bother trying to take all the deductions that you are able to take, and pay more than your fair share.

Fair share is defined by, what you legally owe after all legal deductions.

Re:Who cares?

[mspohr]

Sales taxes are the only taxes which are related to the stuff you buy from corporations.
The rest are paid for by everyone whether or not they buy corporate stuff.
I don't want to underwrite corporations so they can make stuff for you to buy. They should pay their own way and you should pay for the cost of the stuff you buy. Don't ask me to pay for your stuff.

Re:Who cares?

[Dixie_Flatline]

Further to that, it's not clear that the stock price of any given company at any given time is entirely related to its performance. If the world were rational, Apple would still have a high stock price because they still make enormous profits. As a long term bet, they're fairly solid. Their price to earnings ratio is incredibly good.

Apple makes more profits in a quarter than Amazon has, cumulatively, over its entire history. (http://go.bloomberg.com/market-now/2013/01/23/apples-profit-vs-amazons-promise/) So naturally Apple's stock price drops while Amazon's stock price goes up. What?

But this is an offshoot of the weird way that we think the stock market is supposed to work now. It used to be that you invested in the long term in a company because you believed that they could produce something, and their success would mean your success. Now institutional buyers with the ability to lift or tank a stock irrespective of what anyone believes the true long-term prospects are cause wild stock swings and the world looks on and think that means something.

I own 3 shares of Apple. That's all I decided I wanted to afford (at the time I bought them, that was around $1000 of stock). I figure a lot of individual stockholders are like me, with modest investments. We're not the ones causing these swings with buying and selling. The success of Apple's stock isn't really related to what the public thinks of their products or how the public views Apple's future prospects.

Re:Who cares?

[lightknight]

They wouldn't be able to buy laws if politicians weren't selling them.

Re:Who cares?

[cayenne8]

Hey...I don't have kids, I don't want to pay for them (education ,e tc) out of my taxes.

We should make people with kids pay more taxes since they use much more infrastructure...?

Re:Who cares?

[a.d.trick]

Companies don't pay taxes. They pass them off to the customers.

You may be a troll, but I see this argument in real life so I will respond to it.

That is true, but does not help at all. In this case, Apple customers are getting cheaper products at the expense of the rest of the tax payers who pay for the public services that Apple takes advantage of. You see what happened? Tax evasion still costs money. It's just that it's the people who don't buy Apple products that end up paying the cost of Apple's tax evasion.

TL;DR: Tax evasion and government subsidies are functionally the same. I don't want the government subsidizing Apple.

Re:Who cares?

[Plumpaquatsch]

The good news is that these guys are Jobs' hand-picked successors, and that they have a lot of money in the bank..

Not entirely true. Yes Steve picked Tim Cook. God only knows why, the mans so far removed from reality it's mind boggling. How can any CEO keep their job after their stock value was chopped in half in less than a year?

Because he more than doubled it in the year before? Because it is up 17% since he officially became CEO.

Re:Who cares?

[lokedhs]

The stock price was set based on those same third-party analysts analysis, so once the real numbers come out, the stock price adjusts. This is economy 101, and it'd be good to look it up before randomly commenting (I know, I know. This is Slashdot and I shouldn't expect that).

Re:Who cares?

[Hognoxious]

Companies don't pay taxes. They pass them off to the customers.

I don't think tax incidence is quite as simple as you believe.

And if the market would bear it, they'd be charging higher prices already.

Re:Who cares?

[Hognoxious]

Why are you assuming it's already been taxed in another country?

http://www.economist.com/news/business/21578399-testimony-capitol-hill-apples-boss-made-case-corporate-tax-reform-more-ways

"The company is incorporated in Ireland but in effect is managed from America (where its board meetings are held). This lets it claim it is a resident of nowhere for tax purposes, thanks to a difference between Irish and American rules: America bases residency on where a firm is incorporated; Ireland on where it is managed or otherwise controlled. Mr Levin called this the âoeHoly Grailâ of tax avoidance: stateless profits, beyond the reach of all taxmen."

Re:Who cares?

[Hognoxious]

Fair share is defined by, what you legally owe after all legal deductions.

So if the law says X people have to pay a different amount of tax to Y people that would be fair? Where {X,Y} = {male,female},{black,white},{left handed,right handed}...

Re:Who cares?

[Hognoxious]

So he rode up the momentum from when St Steve was in charge, and now it's running out?

journalism

[Tom]

A good example to watch.

A successful company, ahead of its markets, does not need a new product every 6 months.
Journalists, on the other hand, do need news.

Re:journalism

[SJHillman]

It does when "Buy The iDevice++" is their business model. There's a lot of 3 to 5 year old iDevices out there that are still perfectly suited to what their owners actually need, but Apple has made a metric fuckton of money by convincing people to upgrade every year even if they don't need any of the new features. At it's heart, Apple has become a marketing company that happens to also sell what they market. Without that marketing power, iDevices would have all the popularity of the Zune.

Re:journalism

[SigveK]

It may have been unintentional on your part, but I like the use of "Buy The iDevice++" as opposed to "Buy The ++iDevice".

Re:journalism

[Anonymous Coward]

The good news, is that their existing customers don't need to upgrade every year, because the market is still growing. I'm pretty sure that the average lifespan for an iPhone being used by it's first owner is longer than Apple's release cycle anyway, due to the 2-year contracts sold with most phones in the US.

But don't let that stand in the way of the "All of Apple's customers are brainless drones that must buy the new shiny because Apple commands it" meme.

Re:journalism

[Sockatume]

The mobile phone industry was built around getting people to buy new phones every year (18 months, towards the end) for a long, long time before Apple came on the scene, and there weren't new features - needed or not - as an inducement.

Re:journalism

[SJHillman]

I used the generic iDevice rather than the specific iPhone because they use the same model for iPods and iPads. Although iPods have pretty much faded from the spotlight now, that's what Apple began the entire iDevice trend with long before the iPhone was even a rumor, much less a product.

Re:journalism

[Sockatume]

I don't think the tablet market is sufficiently saturated that they're selling iPads primarily to people that already own one, yet. (You may be interested in this piece, which shows through stats just how saturated the iPhone market is, though.)

Re:journalism

[NatasRevol]

$20 million in revenue is generated overnight

They're already making more than that without celebrities.

Re:journalism

[MrMickS]

It does when "Buy The iDevice++" is their business model. There's a lot of 3 to 5 year old iDevices out there that are still perfectly suited to what their owners actually need, but Apple has made a metric fuckton of money by convincing people to upgrade every year even if they don't need any of the new features. At it's heart, Apple has become a marketing company that happens to also sell what they market. Without that marketing power, iDevices would have all the popularity of the Zune.

I think that you are completely and utterly wrong on how Apple views their customers. You are listening to too many rabid fanbois and reading too many awesome tech journals.

Looking at phones in particular: before the iPhone came along software upgrades, though possible, were generally a pain. This was further complicated by carrier software versions preventing manufacturer updates being applied. In general you bought a phone and the software was fixed. Apple continue to support older versions of phones with new software releases with as much feature parity as won't impact the experience. Their aim is to keep their customers happy so that when they come to replace their device they will buy it from them. The philosophy is to build the best that they can and build customer loyalty.

I've had two iPhones, a 3G and a 4S. The 4S is still good enough for pretty much whatever I want to do so I can't see me upgrading this year unless the next phone does something magical. When I come to replace I'll buy another iPhone. Why? Because it does the job I want it to.

Re:journalism

[shadowrat]

While device buying is profitable for apple, i don't think their model entirely revolves around getting you to buy the next device. It's more about digital purchases and locking you into their ecosystem. They are perfectly happy for you to keep your 3 year old device as long as you continue to use their cloud storage, buy mp3s on itunes, and get every new angry birds.

Re:journalism

[UnknownSoldier]

/Oblg. http://theoatmeal.com/comics/apple

Re:journalism

[swb]

There's a lot of 3 to 5 year old iDevices out there that are still perfectly suited to what their owners actually need,

You are either that guy with the latest of everything who thinks he knows what everyone else needs (and it is always less than what you "need") or you are that guy with a prepaid flip-phone who sends emails to webmasters because there aren't enough ALT tags to keep Lynx usable.

Speaking as someone with every iPhone since the 3G still running at home, this statement can only be true for very limited definitions of "actually need".

We use the iPhone 4 as our home phone and streaming source in the kitchen. Updating InstaCast on my iPhone 5 or my wife's 4S is pretty seamless (more so on the 5). On the 4 it works but gets really sluggish and non-responsive and the overall UI experience is much slower than the 4S or 5.

The 3GS is usable as a basic phone but the entire experience is sluggish and slow. It's basically usable as a video watching toy for airplane rides.

The 3G is kind of dead-ended. Many apps won't run on it at all due to the lack of a modern iOS release. I use it for testing email access once in a while but basically it's not usable.

I think there are (and always have been) meaningful performance differences between Apple phones -- it's not just new tail lights and fenders. Now, that being said, I think Apple could do something more interesting than they have over their product iterations, but they have delivered meaningful performance boosts.

Re:journalism

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually everything I have seen says that Apple makes little to nothing on selling music, apps, storage, etc. Sure they generate tons of revenue, but Apple claims most of that revenue pays for the service, royalties, etc. Remember Apple only gets 30% of every dollar in Apps sold. A lot of apps are free, in which case Apple is losing money operationally. Only Apple and the record labels know how much Apple hands over to the record labels on every song sold.

However, making the ecosystem work with all the devices makes you want to buy an iphone, then an ipad, then an iMac, then an AppleTV, etc.

Re:journalism

[Dixie_Flatline]

I'm still on my iPhone 4. I have no particular need to upgrade every year. I've been buying Macs for a long time, and I always sold them when I ran out of AppleCare...I'm hardly on a 1-year upgrade cycle. Now I'm actually still using a 4-year-old iMac and an even older MacBook. (We bought a new Mac Mini to run computational experiments, but it's headless.)

In fact, most of the people I know are still using their iPhone 4. I know one person with an iPhone 5, and he came from a Windows phone.

If there's a policy or climate of consumption, it's societal, not due to Apple's marketing. The idea that you should update as often as possible isn't new to computing. Heck, it's not like it even started with computers. I've known plenty of people that leased cars just so they could get a new one every couple of years. Consumption is the curse of the current capitalist framework that we live in. That Apple exists and exploits that system somewhat shouldn't be pinned on them; they're just a symptom.

I MAY upgrade to what Apple announces this year, but I might not. I may my own determinations based on what my needs are.

Apple doesn't make vast changes to its products year on year. It adds a new feature or two and releases an upgraded OS to a lot of people for FREE. And here's the irony: Android owners are constantly ragging on Apple for this. "Oh man, nothing new out of Apple! Why should I buy their stuff?" They can't win around here. Either they're not making crazy big changes that would force you to buy a new item, or they're releasing new, upgraded products TOO DAMN OFTEN. No way to win.

Re:journalism

[PlusFiveTroll]

I think it's two things related to the software.

1. As you say, there are software upgrades put out regularly, you're not stuck with security holes or old useless phones.

2. Even though the software and devices are upgraded, they stay almost exactly the same from revision to revision. There are new features, but the iphoneX+1 still works almost exactly the same as an iphoneX. That is the important part. People hated having to relearn the interface of their phone every time they got a new one. It's still an issue with Android phones that between models and manufactures there is enough of a difference that it can be confusing. Older phones were a joke when it came to that? Where is the address book? How do I add contacts to this one? Why did that change that? Ugh.

Re:journalism

[Nerdfest]

I find it funny that someone would say "When I come to replace I'll buy another iPhone. Why? Because it does the job I want it to.", when there may be other devices that do the job you want better and cheaper. Unless you've got yourself locked into a product line (which is generally a bad thing to do to yourself), you're buying based on the brand name. Behaviour like that rewards companies that really don't deserve it.

Re:journalism

[AmiMoJo]

Apple continue to support older versions of phones with new software releases with as much feature parity as won't impact the experience.

That's an interesting claim. Whenever people I know who own iPhones have done a major OS update they always complained afterwards that it was slower than before. This is a common complaint echoed on the internet.

There have also been cases of Apple not porting features which others then ported via a jailbreak and which seem to work just fine on older hardware, such as Siri.

Back when I had an iPod 3rd gen I learned how Apple updates work. They give you new features that make them money some way. In my case it was support for a new DRM format to support audiobooks. Useful stuff like gapless playback required a hardware update. The same is mostly true of the iPhone it seems - you get stuff that allows you to give Apple more money, be it through purchases or advertising, but usually not features that might make you spend money on an upgrade.

Of course Apple are hardly alone in doing this, I'm just suggesting that way you claim isn't the case.

Re:journalism

[AmiMoJo]

In fact, most of the people I know are still using their iPhone 4.

Slashdot should have a "-1 worthless anecdote" mod. Not singling you out in particular, just sayin' that Slashdot is full of "everyone I know..." and "it is/isn't good for me, therefore it is/isn't good for everyone".

Re:journalism

[Dixie_Flatline]

Anecdotes aren't data, I know, but my worthless anecdote was a counter to the worthless assertion that the parent made. :)

Re:journalism

[AmiMoJo]

I do that too sometimes, but I usually make the nature of my post clear by saying "my anecdote cancels out your anecdote" at the end.

Re:journalism

[Tom]

Nonsense, all of it.

Apple has multiple revenue streams. Even though I bought the original iPhone and then an iPhone 4, i.e. skipped 2 generations twice, they still made money off me in the meantime, via the App Store.

And mentioning the Zune is just ironic, because MS is the company that's driven entirely by marketing. :-)

Re:journalism

[Plumpaquatsch]

I find it funny that someone would say "When I come to replace I'll buy another iPhone. Why? Because it does the job I want it to.", when there may be other devices that do the job you want better and cheaper.

Yeah, especially when many of those owning those "better and cheaper" devices don't say the same. Gee, I wonder if there is a connection.

Re:journalism

[Hognoxious]

Now I'm actually still using a 4-year-old iMac and an even older MacBook.

Retro snob.

famous for being famous

[shortscruffydave]

Apple seems to be more about the rumours and the stories about their products nowadays, more so than being about their product innovations. Makes me think of 'C' list celebrities, who are really famous for being famous rather than for anything substantive that they might actually do

Re:famous for being famous

[Sockatume]

You read an article which is entirely composed of speculation about Apple's future product roadmap, and you come away with the conclusion that Apple's fame isn't about its products?

Re:famous for being famous

[cdrudge]

If you're referring to this /. artcile, I read an article speculating about journalists speculating about what Apple might possibly do sometime. Maybe.

Re:famous for being famous

[shortscruffydave]

where are the new products now? where is the innovation now? where is the creative vision now?

Re:famous for being famous

[Sockatume]

Yes, but it's demonstrably an interest in Apple's actual products, and not just fame-for-fame's-sake. There's a difference between rampant speculation about the new Star Wars film (because people really care about Star Wars, the end product) and rampant speculation about Harrison Ford's personal life (because fame).

Re:famous for being famous

[sootman]

Sure, they created the iPod, then the iTunes music store, then the iPhone, then the app store, then the iPad... but what have they done lately? They should be introducing breakthrough products at least annually, right? And that time they had the most profitable quarter of any company in history... that was, like, over a year ago! Stick a fork in'em -- they're done.

Guess what folks -- Apple is going to continue to do nothing... right up until the day they do something.

Re:famous for being famous

[Sockatume]

Being announced in the September and Holiday press events, like they were last year?

Re:famous for being famous

[nine-times]

Apple seems to be more about the rumours and the stories about their products nowadays...

I sense you must not be familiar with the Mac community. Rumors are the norm.

You can spin that to be a bad thing, saying, "They have rumors because there's nothing of substance." You could spin it to be a positive, saying, "The market is so excited about Apple's products that they engage in wild speculation." Regardless, the Mac rumor mill has been spinning for decades, and this is not something that has emerged "nowadays".

Re:famous for being famous

[tnk1]

Amusingly, you illustrated the very point you don't understand.

All of those products on the left hand are Apple products. All of the right hand products were created by completely different companies in different time periods.

It's not about who is first, it was about how they were put together. It was a combination of marketing and product design. It produced an end product that was innovative because while all of the pieces were there, no one put them together successfully. We're not talking about technical innovation, necessarily, but creating a product ecosystem that both makes a ton of money, and is useful enough for millions of people to use happily is an achievement.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that what Apple provided was better piece by piece. What they provided was simply much better than the sum of it's parts. That's why they have 150 billion dollars now.

Re:famous for being famous

[firex726]

Please exercise some reading comprehension; OP clearly alleged that Apple themselves created those products; they did not.
"they created the iPod..."

There is absolutely zero difference between an old Rio and iPod other than the iPod is more restrictive and the marketing behind it; and you can hardly argue that marketing is a technological advancement.

Re:famous for being famous

[PlusFiveTroll]

Each of the product categories you listed above pretty much sucked one way or another before Apple came in and gave them a decent interface or better advertising. It was the product integration that made Apple successful. But that also shows your point, what budding product is out there not being marketed or developed for correctly? Apple will be in trouble if there is no where new to move in to. The other manufactures will catch up and start cutting there margins with similar products after a while.

Just a rumor

[puddingebola]

Just a rumor, but I heard it's the iBlender, which will revolutionize kitchen appliance. But will it blend itself?

Re:Just a rumor

[SJHillman]

Not only will it blend* the most hipster smoothie you have ever tasted, but the sleek iBlender can also play music** and videos***, make phones calls****, get you lost in your travels***** and more!

*Blades sold separately in the iTunes store.
**Requires iTunes
***Requires AppleControl iMplants
****Requires monthly tithing
*****Feature, not a bug. Just ask our lawyers.

Apple is in trouble

[AmiMoJo]

Apple doesn't seem to have any new products on the horizon this year and the last lot were already a generation behind their competitors in many areas. For example Samsung just released the GS4, but Apple hasn't even been able to hint at a 5S. Hipsters getting new phones don't want last year's model. Apple is all about features.

They also have a problem with patents, as in they don't have any good ones. There are some design patents that everyone else is either invalidating or working around, but nothing like the tech patents that their competitors have. In the past Apple has just ignored them and tried to tie everyone up in litigation to avoid paying, but things are coming to a head now. It was never a sustainable strategy.

Having money in the bank isn't that helpful if you lose market share. At best you can throw it into advertising, but ultimately you need new products and it appears that Apple's R&D is coming up short right now. Even the last gen products were pretty much more of the same, lacking features that they could have implemented like NFC but appeared to forgo to shave an extra 0.5mm off the thickness.

Then there is iOS. They painted themselves into a corner on that. They can't easily introduce real multitasking, can't break away from iTunes or support standard protocols like MTP. They are stuck with a bunch of odd resolutions and encouraged developers to target them all directly, resulting in debacles like the black bars when they went widescreen. On top of all that they are having to poor time and money into Apple Maps just to bring it back up to where Google Maps was before they ditched it, and in the mean time Google is steaming ahead.

Obviously Apple won't go bankrupt any time soon but it seems clear that they do have some serious issues at the moment.

Re:Apple is in trouble

[MightyYar]

They are stuck with a bunch of odd resolutions and encouraged developers to target them all directly, resulting in debacles like the black bars when they went widescreen.

I have to kind of chuckle because, well, Android...

Re:Apple is in trouble

[Xest]

Android was designed with the potential for arbitrary screen resolutions from the outset, in contrast Apple pretended fragmentation was an Android problem rather than accept the reality that fragmentation is a necessary fact of progress (because for progress to occur, hardware has to change).

The net result is that with iOS you often end up with programs where they either just zoom in and create a pixelated wreck of your lovely retina display, or they just use up an absolutely tiny fraction of your total screen space.

That's what he's referring to, Apple's complete lack of foresight and the horrible mess it leads to if developers don't update their app each time Apple has a screen change.

Re:Apple is in trouble

[moronoxyd]

Tell that to Apple's shareholders.
They don't care much about the money in the bank, but about the new money to be made.

Re:Apple is in trouble

[Xest]

Except they can't get to a lot of that money because it's held offshore and if they bring it onshore they'll lose an awful lot of it in taxes.

What use is the $102bn they hold offshore if they refuse to bring whatever is left of it post-tax into the US when there's little of value that makes sense to invest in in the countries they're holding said money?

Unless they plan on moving their HQ and all their talent to Ireland and such or just accept the tax deduction and bring it into the US (or another country) then it's completely useless. There's nothing in Ireland worth spending $46bn on that will also allow them to recoup the cost.

Re:Apple is in trouble

[lexsird]

Apple got a "two for one" trade in on "innovation" for "litigation" and "legislation."

Re:Apple is in trouble

[moronoxyd]

They are stuck with a bunch of odd resolutions and encouraged developers to target them all directly, resulting in debacles like the black bars when they went widescreen.

I have to kind of chuckle because, well, Android...

You didn't really read gp's post, right?

Google told the Android developers a long time ago that they should prepare their apps for a variety of resolutions and DPIs.

Apple on the other hand told their developers that they can expect fixed resolutions, and are now struggeling with the fact that they have different resolutions, different DPIs and different aspect ratios.

Re:Apple is in trouble

[Sockatume]

I can't say that it's been an issue in practice on either platform. Most iOS apps are either at the native resolution (I can't recall the last time I used an app that wasn't Retina) or a simple 2x upscale which looks nigh-identical to running on the lower-res hardware. Meanwhile Android devices have converged on the small subset of screen resolutions and sizes that are available at high volume from panel fabricators, such that developers only have to target a handful of specifications.

Phone apps run on tablets (and vice versa) are just awful on both.

Re:Apple is in trouble

[jeffmeden]

They are stuck with a bunch of odd resolutions and encouraged developers to target them all directly, resulting in debacles like the black bars when they went widescreen.

I have to kind of chuckle because, well, Android...

You didn't really read gp's post, right?

Google told the Android developers a long time ago that they should prepare their apps for a variety of resolutions and DPIs.

Apple on the other hand told their developers that they can expect fixed resolutions, and are now struggeling with the fact that they have different resolutions, different DPIs and different aspect ratios.

Never mind that they decided their flagship (only) mid-size tablet was going to mimic the screen of the old-ass iPad, low resolution, low DPI, and 4x3 aspect ratio. If the iPad Mini had a better display it would have crushed every tablet competitor, much the same way the "new iPad" did when it was released. But heavens! We can't expect our 20 million app developers to have to wrap their head around one new set of dimensions! Better to just let them re-use code designed for a larger display, and get back to cashing app store checks.

Re:Apple is in trouble

[Xest]

If you couldn't interpret the meaning of my post then I'm not going to rephrase it for you as it means you're obviously too mentally inept to understand anything much.

Re:Apple is in trouble

[shadowrat]

as long most of their time is spent cashing app store checks, what incentive is there to change?

Re:Apple is in trouble

[Xest]

Yeah, I think fundamentally the problem is that Android always made it clear hardware was going to be different between devices, whilst Apple spent a few iterations pretending you could just write for the first few iterations with very few differences, until you couldn't.

Effectively many early Android apps were built to work with different resolutions, iOS apps weren't and so it meant Apple had this scenario where they had a whole app store full of apps not built to support anything other than 320x480 then all of a sudden along comes the iPad and the iPhone 4 and the app store is full of apps not designed for their respective resolutions resulting in the massively letter boxed/tap to double size hack for those apps that didn't get updated.

I agree this doesn't preclude the fact that bad developers can still fuck up on any platform of course though as you quite rightly point out, but ultimately Apple should have been honest with themselves (and with developers) from the outset - that they weren't going to stick at 320x480 forever. Had they done this there would be no need for said aforementioned ugly hack.

Re:Apple is in trouble

[StormCrow]

There was no technical reason why the iPad couldn't have just zoomed iPhone apps to near-fullscreen automatically. The reason it doesn't is that Apple wanted to encourage people to think about how to use the extra resolution rather than just expand the screen. The result is that you get a lot of iPad apps that take advantage of the extra room on a tablet vs. a phone, compared to many Android "tablet" apps that are just blown up versions of the phone interface.

Re:Apple is in trouble

[Xest]

I've never really seen any qualitative difference between Android and iOS tablet apps in recent years though I agree Android had a lack of tablet oriented apps prior to Android 4 so I'm not really sure it makes any difference.

It is however still just an ugly hack that persists to this day with some apps and as Android tablet app quality has improved (along with Android itself) it's become a glaring scar on iOS.

It's also of little benefit to the user, the user doesn't care what the app developer may or may not do, they just don't expect their shiny new tablet to have such an ugly hack. This is a company whose products are supposed to "just work" and it runs completely counter to that ideology.

Re:Apple is in trouble

[MightyYar]

Google told the Android developers a long time ago that they should prepare their apps for a variety of resolutions and DPIs.

They may have "told them", but they didn't get the memo. Android works great when you have one of the most popular devices. Otherwise, you get lots of weird rendered screens, games that "work" on the phone, but really need a tablet-sized screen to work the controls, odd placement as stuff tries to orient itself on an untested screen size, apps that flat-out won't work with your device, etc.

I have an android phone and an android tablet, and I generally like them very much. That said, my mom's iPad is a smoother experience. Even my old iPhone was a smoother - if slower - experience. Maybe the newest contenders (Windows and RIM) have a smoother experience than Apple, but I haven't tried those platforms yet.

Re:Apple is in trouble

[Andreas Mayer]

Then there is iOS. They painted themselves into a corner on that. They can't easily introduce real multitasking, can't break away from iTunes or support standard protocols like MTP. They are stuck with a bunch of odd resolutions and encouraged developers to target them all directly, resulting in debacles like the black bars when they went widescreen.

I get the feeling you have absolutely no clue what you are talking about.
iOS already has 'real' multitasking. Apple actively restricts apps from using it. To change that they could simply remove those restrictions.
No idea what you are getting at with respect to iTunes either. iOS devices don't have to be connected to iTunes any more if you don't want. As for MTP - that seems to be a Microsoft protocol. Why exactly should Apple support that? And why do you think they couldn't if they wanted to?
And please explain how other systems have better support for different screen resolutions. While you can expect to have any of very few different resolutions on a iOS device, it is of course possible to design UIs that support arbitrary resolutions. But the idea that you can design *one* UI that works on all devices is exactly the reason why so many Android apps suck on a tablet. When you have substantially more space, you *should* design your UI differently. iOS has strong support for this. You can design a view such that is simply scales with the device or you can use different views for different resolutions. And I'm not sure anyone has anything as powerful as Autolayout.

Re:Apple is in trouble

[Andreas Mayer]

but ultimately Apple should have been honest with themselves (and with developers) from the outset - that they weren't going to stick at 320x480 forever. Had they done this there would be no need for said aforementioned ugly hack.

That wouldn't have changed anything. Developers are not going to build apps for devices that don't exist. That would cost time and money for no apparent benefit whatsoever. Not going to happen.

Re:Apple is in trouble

[drinkypoo]

My phone has a slightly wacky resolution, the only time I see black bars is during loading screens and the like, games use the whole display, so do apps.

Now granted, I wrote an app in tasker that doesn't do all that magical stuff, but who cares? I've literally never seen any objectionable/notable black barring in anything I've paid for, or any popular app.

Re:Apple is in trouble

[MightyYar]

I don't know if you have an Android or an iPad, but I've never experienced "black bars" on my Android. Wacky stretching, yes. Weird misplaced GUI elements, yes. Apps where the touch area and GUI element no longer line up, yes. Teeny tiny controls on the app as it scales down poorly to my phone, yes. But never black bars.

I don't have an iPad, but my understanding is that some phone apps will use black bars instead of trying to stretch. In light of how Android does it, I can see why they went that route. It may look silly, but at least the app looks exactly the way the developer intended it to.

Re:Apple is in trouble

[Dixie_Flatline]

Apple never hints at its products ahead of time. There was no 'hint' of the iPhone 4. Or 4s. Sure, people expect Apple's upgrade cycle now, but they never hint at anything. The secrecy of Apple is legendary.

Market share, from a business perspective, is only relevant insofar as you can make money off of it. A joke, to illustrate:

Two guys buy a truck full of watermelons. They pay $5 a watermelon, and rush to the market to sell them. They sell each watermelon for $4, hugely undercutting all the other sellers at the market. They quickly sell out of watermelons, and excitedly go and count their take. They recount the money a few times, and eventually realise that they LOST money on the deal. The first guy turns to the second guy and says, "I told you we should have used a bigger truck!"

Android's marketshare is big, but only Samsung makes any real money off of it, and their margins aren't as big as Apple's. Apple makes 70% of the profit in mobile devices. (Samsung makes most of the rest of that 30%.)

It may be that Apple's marketshare will keep dropping--maybe just because the market is getting bigger, but it's possible that their year-on-year sales numbers will drop as well--and so the iPhone might not be the most profitable thing they do anymore in the coming years. But they're good at breaking into new markets with new devices, and $100 billion in the bank, regardless of where it's officially kept, buys a lot of time. (That's why they issued a bond recently, incidentally. They can take on massive debt and people will buy it and make interest off of it because they know Apple is good for it. That money is SOMEWHERE, even if it isn't here. An Apple bond is a really safe investment.)

Re:Apple is in trouble

[Xest]

I can tell you don't work in software development, or at least have very little experience.

It really costs nothing more to write maintainable code from the outset, but if the APIs aren't there to support that then there's only so much you can do. Any programmer worth his/her salt will always write code with future potential areas of change in mind when it's possible as it costs far more to fix a monolithic hardcoded mess later on than it does to just write flexible code from the outset.

That is by the way one of the key reasons why a lot of app developers probably haven't bothered updating their apps now that the functionality is there.

Re:Apple is in trouble

[tnk1]

Well, being a public company is like being in a constant loop revenue/pay-out loop. Having money in the bank is one way of socking something away as a hedge against issues, or to be available for buying companies, but unless you have a strategy, shareholders will want to get paid.

You can't just sock away money to pay employees with forever. Unless you do have a specified strategy, the shareholders can order you, via the Board, to disburse those funds to them. And if they don't control the board, they can still sue you to make you comply with a minority shareholder suit.

That's why otherwise nice companies that have a reasonable amount of money stocked up can't just close down operations and simply pay their employees out of their largesse as some sort of retirement fund. The money belongs to the stockholders, not to the management or employees (unless they are also stockholders).

Re:Apple is in trouble

[tnk1]

Sure, they can bring that money onshore. For instance, they just use that money as security for loans. The process wouldn't be as simple as that, but some multinational bank could hold the money as security in the tax haven, and then loan them the money locally against their foreign assets. And since it is a loan, and not a money transfer, they can actually write it off.

Mind you, I am simplifying. I am sure there are laws to prevent the direct process of doing this, like banks only being able to use nationalized assets as security for loans, but I am also certain that there are loopholes that make it possible indirectly, if you have smart enough accountants and lawyers working on it.

Re:Apple is in trouble

[Dixie_Flatline]

Keep in mind that Samsung's (or HTCs) phones don't cost any less. Apple gives you a roughly equivalent product for the same price.

You can think of it as Apple making money off of its aggressive business dealings with other companies. They set up supply lines and inventory in such a way that they don't pay as much for components, but keep the price the same for me.

All my Apple stuff is high build quality and lasts a long time. It's good value for money, and the resale value is high. I prefer it this way to paying much lower prices and wondering when the other shoe is going to drop. (I'm the same way with bikes. I pay more for certain parts because I know the build quality is exemplary and lasts a long time. I could have some other parts that are lighter and cheaper, but they wear out faster. You get what you pay for.)

Re:Apple is in trouble

[AmiMoJo]

There was no 'hint' of the iPhone 4

Except that one that they lost in a bar.

Re:Apple is in trouble

[Zaelath]

No no, some worthless app that no one cares about looks MUCH better on an iPad than in the abandonware Android version. This proves they ALL look bad.

iLogic.

Re:Apple is in trouble

[Xest]

It's because the moderation system, despite Slashdot's FAQ saying you should focus on up modding good posts is designed for the exact opposite.

On Slashdot, if you have karma bonus, 2 + 2 = 4, but 4 - 2 = 1. Two up-mods gets you to 4, but two downmods takes to you 1 because it also strips your karma bonus. The moderation system is hence skewed towards downmodding because political downmodders always have the advantage. It's been a key component of Slashdot's decline over the years because political down-modding has the advantage over sensible up-modding.

Given how long you've been here I'm surprised you're surprised. If you go into a thread related to Apple and make a post stating facts that an Apple fanboy perceives as negative towards Apple you'll get at least one or two downmods, it's virtually guaranteed.

But at least it's still better than on other sites, even the likes of the BBC's comment system where if someone calls Labour or Tories "nobs" the post is allowed and they wont censor it but if you copy and paste the exact same post which they refuse to revoke and replace Tory with UKIP and call them nobs in the exact same way then it's rapidly censored because the BBC's moderation team is heavily slanted towards the very right/far right. Similarly I've seen posts there attacking European immigrants calling them lazy, benefits scroungers and so forth and that are frankly sometimes even outright racist that they refuse to act on but when I made a very polite post stating "I personally don't have a problem with Polish immigrants, I've found them hard working and often more so than their British equivalents in some professions." it gets rapidly removed. At least here there is some semblance of balance even if it's far from perfect and focussed towards political down-modding because that's still a massive step up from absolutely no balance whatsoever.

Of course, other sites do it even better again, but at least Slashdot's not as bad as it could be. Yet.

Re:The reality distortion field is waning.

[TWiTfan]

Hey, *you* try taking over a cult sometime, buddy! You hand people their Kool-Aid and all they can do is complain that Ascended Father would have sweetened it more.

Re:The reality distortion field is waning.

[Anonymous Coward]

Have you ever been to an Apple conference? Fans would not only drink the iKool-Aid, they would be lining up around the block to PAY to drink the iKool-Aid.

Well, in Steve Jobs' day anyway.

On the bright side,

[dtmancom]

They are saving a fortune on taxes.

Jonesing?

[rossdee]

WTF is Jonesing ?

Are they drinking poisoned cool ade? (Rev Lim Jones)
Speaking in a deep voice? (James Earl Jones)
Singing Tenor (Tom Jones)

I'll admit I wasn't born in the USA, but English (English) has been my main language for over 50 years

Re:Jonesing?

[Sockatume]

When faced with a new word it is often prudent to attempt to deduce its meaning from context. Given that the article is about journalists "in withdrawal" and "cranky" due to a lack of new Apple news, what do you think that "Jonesing" could mean?

Re:Jonesing?

[Xest]

I think it's a twist on the saying "Keeping up with the Joneses" which basically means trying to compete with the neighbours in the context of a middle-class suburban class war, i.e. "Mr Jones next door has a new Porsche, this means we'll have to get a better model!".

In other words they're saying that because Apple hasn't come up with anything newsworthy the media is having to make up stories to try and out-compete each other for views and that one paper saying "Is Apple running out of ideas?" will be followed by "Apple has run out of ideas" in another paper, which will be followed by "Apple is dying, SELL SELL SELL" in another paper, followed by "Apple is dead and has gone bankrupt and has killed all it's employees and it's the EU's fault and gay people don't deserve equal rights" in The Daily Mail.

Re:Jonesing?

[BradleyAndersen]

Sockatume is correct. It basically means something like "in withdrawal", or "in desperate need of".

Re:Jonesing?

[LDAPMAN]

Err, No....http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=jonesing

"Exhibiting a strong craving or desire for something eaten, imbibed, or taken as a drug. Comes from opiate culture."

Re:Jonesing?

[shmlco]

"Jonesing" is drug slang, usually used in regard to heroin. It means I need my next fix, and I need it NOW.

Re:Jonesing?

[Xest]

Well there goes my innocence.

Re:Jonesing?

[Xest]

I'll have to hang around with more heroin addicts to make sure I know all the slang in future.

Re:Jonesing?

[mu51c10rd]

When faced with a new word it is often prudent to attempt to deduce its meaning from context.

In that case...I go with option A:

Are they drinking poisoned kool aid? (Rev Lim Jones)

Re:Jonesing?

[steelfood]

That Slashdot editors gave up on the English language and are making up new words as they go along?

Re:Jonesing?

[Sockatume]

There are more things in heaven and Earth than are dreamt of in your vocabulary.

What's Apple Famous for Again?

[neoshroom]

What's Apple famous for again? Yup, they are famous for being famous.

Well that and popularizing the graphic user interface everyone uses in the first place.

And for having a pretty decent Unix-based operating system while Ballmer drives Microsoft off a cliff.

And for designing the first mp3 player that the mass-market embraced.

And for ushering in the change from feature-phones to smartphones.

And for creating an earthquake in the tablet market such that in the future it is predicted more tablets will sell than PCs.

But yeah...they are just famous for being famous...

...Until they release a TV with a kinect-like interface running iOS. And then Sony's PS4 and the Wii U crashes and burns, (which is sort of already happening...sales on the Wii U are very poor and Sony's electronics wing isn't doing well either), while everyone is playing Angry Birds on their new Apple TV platform and we get umpteen-million articles about the "New Console Wars," which are now between Microsoft and Apple.

Of course then a couple years will go by and people will forget all of history and again claim that Apple is just famous for being famous. Such is the cycle of Slashdot.

Re:What's Apple Famous for Again?

[drinkypoo]

Apple has had great timing.

All of this stuff was bound to happen around when it happened. Apple saw these things coming and was there at the right time, as opposed to first. But then they always just make a shiny shiny, and half-ass it, because that's enough to get most of the dollars. You know, just like everyone else.

Re:What's Apple Famous for Again?

[Anonymous Coward]

Apple has had great timing.

All of this stuff was bound to happen around when it happened. Apple saw these things coming and was there at the right time, as opposed to first. But then they always just make a shiny shiny, and half-ass it, because that's enough to get most of the dollars. You know, just like everyone else.

I have to disagree with you here. I think Apple created their own timing. The only thing they waited on was broadband internet access. When it was introduced, the iPod blew people away; the iPad did something that Microsoft failed to do for over 10 years: get a tablet to be accepted and used by the general public. I would guess that you could give MS another 10 years and they still wouldn't understand the tablet market without what Apple had done. Google wouldn't have even considered creating Android. MS and Google were happy with the status quo in terms of computing devices. Apple really introduced the computing appliance.

Re:What's Apple Famous for Again?

[Dixie_Flatline]

Timing is a skill. If you don't believe me, ask a sharpshooter.

Or, hell, ask actual entrepreneurs. Some people are too early to market. Some are too late. It's been said that timing is everything, and not just for Comedy.

But yeah, hey, it's just timing. If it's just timing, why don't YOU do it?

Re:What's Apple Famous for Again?

[Barlo_Mung_42]

So they're famous for good marketing. That sounds about right.

Re:What's Apple Famous for Again?

[FireFury03]

I have to disagree with you here. I think Apple created their own timing. The only thing they waited on was broadband internet access. When it was introduced, the iPod blew people away;

There were plenty of MP3 players around before the ipod (and good ones too!). What Apple seems to have is the ability to create a religious following for their products. I don't think this is necessarilly down to the product itself - the original ipod really was nothing special compared to the competition - the user interface wasn't significantly better, the size wasn't significantly different, the battery life wasn't signficantly different, yet somehow they managed to become the "defacto" MP3 player.

The iPhone is another good example - when people go on about how the iphone took the market because it was so much better than everything else, I think they forget what the _original_ iphone was like - it was marketted as a smartphone, but it lacked most of the features that other smartphones had - there was no tethering, no 3G(*), no apps. About the only thing that beat the competition was the web browser they integrated into it.

(* I know the US-centric crowd say that no 3G was never a big deal because there were no 3G networks anywhere in the world at that time, but this is patently untrue - across europe 3G was commonplace and the introduction of a fantastic new smartphone that didn't have 3G struck a lot of us as a complete WTF).

the iPad did something that Microsoft failed to do for over 10 years: get a tablet to be accepted and used by the general public.

There are 3 factors here I think, in addition to the aforementioned way that Apple seems to be able to sell anything, irrespective of how it compares to the competition:
1. Technology. 10 years before the ipad, it wasn't possible to make a device that small and light. It simply wasn't. So the MS tablets were always big and heavy - that wasn't MS's fault, the technology simply wasn't there and Apple would've had the same problems at that time.
2. User interface. MS has always tried to shoe-horn their existing software into new markets instead of developing whole new systems where necessarilly. MS's tablets always had their desktop UI shoehorned onto them, whereas Apple realised that wasn't going to work and built a new UI. We can see the continuation of MS's problems with the way they've now produced a UI for tablets and tried to shoehorn it inappropriately onto the desktop. If MS had started off on the tablet market and moved into the desktop market they would've probably never managed to make the desktop take off because they seem to be unable to see that their existing software isn't always suitable for all situations. This has nothing to to with timing and everything to do with MS just being generally terrible at this stuff.
3. Smartphones. At the point that Apple launched their tablet, people had had several years to get used to browsing the web on their phones with decent browsers using mobile apps, etc., so a move towards a tablet for content consumption was reasonable. Without that experience I think people would be a lot less inclined to ditch the keyboard and compatibility with their normal desktop software.

That all being said, whilst Apple was about the first to market with something the size and performance of an ipad, the other manufacturers certainly weren't far behind - if apple hadn't launched the ipad I'm pretty sure someone else would've done the equivalent at around that time.

Google wouldn't have even considered creating Android. MS and Google were happy with the status quo in terms of computing devices. Apple really introduced the computing appliance.

Android was in development for a long time before Apple released the iPhone, as were various other similar projects (for example, OpenMoko; which was never taken seriously by the industry, but basically got quite a long way towards producing somethi

Re:What's Apple Famous for Again?

[Karlt1]

There were plenty of MP3 players around before the ipod (and good ones too!).

Before the iPod, MP3 players were either small with low capacity or used huge fragile laptop drives. They had horrible interfaces and slow transfers.

Android was in development for a long time before Apple released the iPhone, as were various other similar projects (for example, OpenMoko; which was never taken seriously by the industry, but basically got quite a long way towards producing something similar to the iphone quite a long time before the iphone was actually released). Development takes a long time - Google didn't see the iphone and immediately magic up a competing platform, they were both developed simultaneously and Apple happened to get there first.

This was Android before the iPhone.....

http://www.theinquirer.net/inquirer/news/2170500/googles-android-prototype-smartphone-blackberry-rip

Re:What's Apple Famous for Again?

[spirit_fingers]

What's Apple famous for again? Yup, they are famous for being famous.
Well that and popularizing the graphic user interface everyone uses in the first place.

Introduced 29 years ago, by Steve Jobs.

And for having a pretty decent Unix-based operating system while Ballmer drives Microsoft off a cliff.

Introduced 13 years ago, by Steve Jobs.

And for designing the first mp3 player that the mass-market embraced.

Introduced 12 years ago, by Steve Jobs.

And for ushering in the change from feature-phones to smartphones.

Introduced 5 years ago, by Steve Jobs.

And for creating an earthquake in the tablet market such that in the future it is predicted more tablets will sell than PCs.

Introduced over 2 years ago, by Steve Jobs.

See where I'm going with this? We all know Apple's history. The point is: what insanely great innovations have they unveiled since the death of Steve Jobs?
Answer: NONE.

Re:What's Apple Famous for Again?

[AmiMoJo]

Before the iPod, MP3 players were either small with low capacity or used huge fragile laptop drives. They had horrible interfaces and slow transfers.

If by "huge" you mean "slightly larger (2.5" vs 1.8")" then okay, I'll grant that. Those 1.8" drives were no more robust though, and far more costly to replace if they did go wrong.

Horrible interfaces? The iPod had Firewire and wouldn't charge from USB until the 4th gen. You couldn't just copy your music to it or use the application of your choice, you had to use iTunes. iTunes only cared about the file tags so you had to keep them meticulously maintained and in iTunes' preferred format.

Even USB 2.0 was capable of maxing out those 1.8" drives, Firewire was totally wasted on them. Again, 2.5" drives in USB 2.0 devices were faster.

Synaptic invented the click wheel. Hitachi made the 1.8" drives for other applications and you could already buy them in USB enclosures (I still have a 20GB one). Even the looks of the iPod were an almost exact copy of a Braun radio from decades earlier. Don't get me wrong, they did well marketing it, but even so it took a couple of years to really take off.

Re:What's Apple Famous for Again?

[drinkypoo]

Reading comprehension is what you don't have when you infer things that aren't in a comment by reading it.

I'm lauding Apple for their timing. The other thing they have had going for them in the past (parts of it, anyway) was Steve Jobs being an asshole with a compelling vision. He was willing to alienate people to achieve his goals, and his goals were things people would pay money for.

To me, of course, this suggests the question of what Apple will do now. They'd better continue to have very good timing.

Re:What's Apple Famous for Again?

[brxndxn]

Apple made it so MP3 devices became mainstream. Until Apple, no electronics manufacturer would touch the 'evil mp3.' Sony should have been the ones to make mp3 players, but their electronics division and music media divisions had their heads in the sand. Apple was simply unafraid to be disruptive (since they were dying at the time anyway.)

For years, people were begging for good mp3 players.. Maybe you remember 'Braun radio' but I and everyone else sure doesn't.

Re:What's Apple Famous for Again?

[steelfood]

The first iPods had huge fragile laptop drives too. In fact, their all-flash offerings prior to the iPhone were the iPod mini and nano, which did not do nearly as well as the iPod itself.

The real killer feature of the iPod was the circular control. Remember that? Originally, it was a mechanical device. That was not so good. Then they moved to capacitive touch technology and that's when the iPod became really popular.

Re:What's Apple Famous for Again?

[Karlt1]

The first iPods had huge fragile laptop drives too.

The first iPods used 1.8" hard drives - not the 2.5" laptop drives.

In fact, their all-flash offerings prior to the iPhone were the iPod mini and nano

The Mini use 1" hard drives -- not flash. The shuffle and the nano were the first to use flash.

which did not do nearly as well as the iPod itself.

The mini was the best selling iPod before the Nano.

Re:What's Apple Famous for Again?

[Plumpaquatsch]

Horrible interfaces? The iPod had Firewire and wouldn't charge from USB until the 4th gen. You couldn't just copy your music to it or use the application of your choice, you had to use iTunes. iTunes only cared about the file tags so you had to keep them meticulously maintained and in iTunes' preferred format.

Even USB 2.0 was capable of maxing out those 1.8" drives, Firewire was totally wasted on them.

The first USB 2.0 MP3 players came out a year after the iPod, and even those didn't allow charging because USB 2 barely gave enough power to drive the disk.

Re:What's Apple Famous for Again?

[Plumpaquatsch]

So they're famous for good marketing. That sounds about right.

And that despite spending far less on marketing than the competition.

Re:Fanbois don't want to face the truth

[nblender]

You're an idiot. The most expensive MBP w/Retina display is $2799.. I'm sure you could make it $3000 if you added a bunch of options... Certainly not "mid-range". The cheapest MBP w/Retina display is $1199; just slightly more than your $500-$1000 PC laptop... At the local clearance outlet, I see a similarly configured ASUS, on special, for $699, limit 2 per customer, while supplies last...

Sure, you can make any point if you're willing to outright lie...

Not a fanboi; I'm largely indifferent about Apple and I hack linux kernels for a living..

Magical times

[Carnivore24]

Every time this man speaks a unicorn appears.

Re:There is lots of real news in the world

[Samurai Tony]

Good. Use your aggressive feelings, boy. Let the hate flow through you.

Re:The reality distortion field is waning.

[Arashi256]

Jim Jones wasn't forced to drink the kool aid. He didn't drink any of it - he got one of his henchmen to shoot him instead because he was a psychopathic pussy when it came down to it.

Re:The reality distortion field is waning.

[drinkypoo]

The henchmen also didn't drink the kool-aid. Whose henchmen were they? You still think they were his?

People are forgetful

[TheSkepticalOptimist]

This is a typical Apple product cycle state.

Apple typically has a "big year" followed by nothing. Feast followed by famine.

2012 saw major and minor updates of almost every product Apple makes including new product roll-outs.

So I fully expected 2013 to be a very slow year for Apple announcements and full of wild speculation and rumor mongering about what they are planning next. This has been a trend for Apple for almost 15 years since they rolled out the first iMac that iconized their iProducts into stuff people actually wanted.

But people seem to forget history even when it was only a few years old.

Also, I still can't understand how people believe Tim Cook is relevant. He orchestrated a disaster that plunged Apple's stock over $300 a share. I mean, most CEO's do not even have the luxury of having a stock reach a value of $300 a share, but Cook lost this much value in under 6 months. How is he still running Apple??? He has shown lack of vision, lack of passion, and a lack of experience running Apple and people hang on his every word? Make Ives CEO at least and maybe Apple will enter an era of innovation again.

Re:People are forgetful

[harperska]

You contradict yourself. First, you rightly point out that there will be fast years and slow years, and that people forget history in the slow years with their silly predictions of apple's doom.

You then forget history yourself when you bring up pointless bs about their stock price. Seriously, zoom out the stock chart to show the last 5 or 10 years, and you will see in context that the drop of $300 is merely correcting an anomaly. From 2009 to 2011, aapl had sustainable growth. Then in 2012 there was a crazy rise followed by a subsequent correction. The loss of $300 per share was a loss of imaginary value, and it has leveled off over the last couple of months anyway. Plus, the value of aapl is so at the mercy of the whims of the mutual funds and "analysts" in the short and medium term that it will take years to see what effect Cook himself will have had on the stock in the first place. Cook was just as responsible for the $300/share boom in the first half of 2012 as he was for the $300/share crash in the second half of 2012. Not much at all.

Re:People are forgetful

[Plumpaquatsch]

Also, I still can't understand how people believe Tim Cook is relevant. He orchestrated a disaster that plunged Apple's stock over $300 a share. I mean, most CEO's do not even have the luxury of having a stock reach a value of $300 a share, but Cook lost this much value in under 6 months.

Under Jobs, AAPL lost >60% in September 2000, more than 30% in January 2008, and another 40% from late August to September same year. Just sayin.

My lame rumor seed

[zarmanto]

Okay, I'll toss one out just for fun: I think the smart money is on an iPhone 5S announcement on June 10th, which will be a minor speed bump, and the new Mac Pro will wait until one of Apple's short-notice-press-conferences in the fall. I have no evidence for the Mac Pro speculation, other than what Cook has publicly stated about their timetables... but I have anecdotal evidence for the iPhone 5S: According to Sprint employees that I spoke to just yesterday, supplies of the current iPhone 5 are starting to dry up. (They couldn't find me the 64GB models at all... I ended up settling for a pair of 32GB models that they had shipped to the store.) When Apple starts to close off the supply chain for a given product, that's usually a good indicator of an impending replacement, and if memory serves, previous reports have suggested that Apple can flush almost their entire supply within about a week. With the WWDC just around the corner, that seems about right to me.

Re:My lame rumor seed

[anethema]

I don't think any smart money is on an iPhone announcement at WWDC since they haven't done that in quite some time, and it would be a lot less than a year since the i5.

They will talk about their products, how great they are, some of what is coming up in new iOS, and maybe OSX, announce new laptops, and call it a day.

Re:My lame rumor seed

[Sockatume]

The iPhone 5S will be a major speed bump; they do big silicon performance jumps with the S releases, and changes in screen technology and chassis with number releases. Contrary to public perception you get a bigger leap from an iPhone 4 to a 4S than a 4S to a 5.

3GS/4: Single-core CPU with a SGX535
4S/5: Dual-core CPU with a SGX543

Not that it's a lot of data points though. And you won't se the new iPhone until September because they're refreshing the iPod Touch and iPhone at the same time now, in line for the holiday sales period.

Re:My lame rumor seed

[zarmanto]

You couldnt get a 64GB iPhone, so you get 2x32GB phones instead? I dont think you can treat phone space like hard disks

Touche'. To clarify: I wanted two 64GB phones, and got two 32GB phones instead. (My wife has the other one.)

Re:My lame rumor seed

[zarmanto]

I don't think any smart money is on an iPhone announcement at WWDC since they haven't done that in quite some time, and it would be a lot less than a year since the i5. ...

... And you won't se the new iPhone until September ...

To both of you, I will point out that I did say that it was a lame rumor seed... and I also noted that my evidence is entirely anecdotal. I'm sure that in the next week, we will see plenty of additional anecdotal rumors both for and against various speculative product announcements.

That said... give me a break, anethema: ya just gotta use phrases like "the smart money" or "almost guaranteed!" if you're going to try to wrangle in all of those needy journalists with baseless rumors. How else are they going to justify writing up their five page link-baiting works of fiction, otherwise? :-)

(Sorry... I'm just feeling particularly cynical this morning. I'll stop now.)

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

"it's generating article after article...

[markdowling]

...because, hey, it's Tim Cook."

Um, yeah, no kidding. How are the clicks on *this* article doing, non-jonesing Slashdot editors?

Nature of the business

[sootman]

Journalists have to make up news if there is none. If there's no crime, they'll make up something else for you to freak out about, because "225,000 people enjoyed a quiet, uneventful night at home" does not sell papers.

Just because journalists are idiots, does not mean Apple is actually doing anything wrong.

So the story is...

[hammeraxe]

... there is no story.

Like my profession's image could get any worse...

[robp]

To any tech journalists upset that Apple isn't spoon-feeding them product news: Get out. Just leave the business. Please?

Seriously, if you don't know to do your own digging for a story or don't want to, you're in the wrong line of work. And there are plenty of other people who would gladly take your place.

Re:The reality distortion field is waning.

[Nidi62]

The henchmen also didn't drink the kool-aid. Whose henchmen were they? You still think they were his?

The henchmen were in charge of making sure everyone else drank the kool aid, as well as going to the airport to try and kill the senator, the news crew, and the people they were trying to help escape. They were his people, and like everyone else they were brainwashed and just following orders.

Re:The reality distortion field is waning.

[tnk1]

Yes, the press being depressed is something that Apple needs to avoid. They do very well with keeping the Media on their side as much as possible. While press salivation in regard to product offerings seems superficial, it also keeps the reporters, and their editors, interested. And when they are interested, they do their best to keep the gravy train coming. Instead of bitching about Apple's byzantine secrecy, they instead imbue it with a mystique. That mystique builds a product reputation and brand loyalty.

And brand loyalty is one thing that keeps you from having to engage in a full-on race to the bottom.

Jobs was instinctively aware of the need to look good, because if you look good, you feel good, and people think you ARE good. People are willing to pay for quality, even if it is only perceived.

Re:The reality distortion field is waning.

[postbigbang]

We agree. The bloom is coming off the rose.

When the rumor mills starts going hum-ho, oh, something might be happening. Yawn.---- > then Apple is in deep trouble. Oh, wait....

Lost. Lost I tell you.

[sjbe]

Apple is now Just Another Tech Company run by MBAs and Marketing jackwads. If Steve were here, he would tear the entire iTunes team a new asshole and then fire them all.

Without Saint Steve they are lost. Clearly no one else had anything to do with the success of Apple. Those other 70,000 employees had nothing at all to do with the company's success and the company culture died the moment they buried their Dear Leader. [/sarcasm]

Re:The reality distortion field is waning.

[postbigbang]

I also find it amusing that the fanbois have modded me down to flamebait.

what journalists?

[bussdriver]

Calling these twisted entertainers "Journalists" is worse than calling a garbage hauler a "Sanitation Engineer."

The TV faces should be called "news readers" because that is all they really are. These "journalists" are reporters (repeaters) at best.

In the future, address me as "all knowing blog poster" because that is the title I just made up for myself and you should unquestioningly comply with my statement about my credentials; otherwise, I'll post insulting statements about you!
(One shouldn't just hand out job titles simply because somebody might throw a sissy fit.)

Re:Fanbois don't want to face the truth

[H0p313ss]

And you never hacked a fucking kernel in your life, you silly poseur.

"cd /src/linux && make && make install" isn't hacking.

And this kids is what happens when you start drooling on the keyboard.

It's somewhat reasonable to be worried

[tlambert]

It's somewhat reasonable to be worried ... if you are an investor. No one else should much care. So ignore all the journalists who are not business/financial in nature.

Historically, Apple has an approximately 6 month announcement cycle which corresponds to biannual major public events, one for developers in the fall, and one for everyone else in the spring. At these events, it alternately announces its new desktop/laptop hardware, and then its new iDevices.

This is one of the few times they've missed their spring announcement in almost a decade; the last time was when Tiger slipped shipping for over six months, and that coincided with a claim of a new 18 month development cycle which lasted only one release cycle. This was actually occasioned by some major management screw-ups internally, coinciding with the first major drop-off in Steve's health.

Apple has been pretty religious about keeping to this schedule, even through the power shift in 2008/2009 when the taller Oompa Loompsa realized they were more or less in charge of the steering wheel of the chocolate factory, should they want to fight each other to steer.

The iPhone 5 was more or less a fizzle. They're selling OK, but the difference in aspect ratio, made for economic rather than design reasons, combined with the maps change and other changes resulting from non-renewal of contracts with third party vendors, including Google, made it probably the worst launch for an iDevice and an iOS release in Apple history. Technologically, they are a step away from design being the goal in a design/cost tradeoff, and a step backwards in system software.

Mountain Lion sold well, but only because they dropped the upgrade price to practically nothing. It was a more or less bug fix release for things that should have never been released in Lion in the first place, and the "Game Center" was a non-feature (no games), and the "Message Center" was moving iOS features into a desktop OS, which makes sense for some of them, but when Facebook integration failed to materialize, even in updates, it's potential utility went down.

It's pretty clear I called the code on the patient way too early myself, but given that it's hovering at around 60% of its high of about 8 months ago, I'd say it was a matter of "when" not "if" the product pipeline would be drying up.

Re:It's somewhat reasonable to be worried

[Sockatume]

probably the worst launch for an iDevice and an iOS release in Apple history

This meme is simply not true. The iPhone 5 sold more units at launch and has continued to sell at a higher rate than all of the previous models. Blogosphere disappointment with the device hasn't translated into actual loss of sales.

Mossberg

[ThatsNotPudding]

So sick of Walt Mossbergs' oversized influence in consumer tech, not to mention his effusive praise of all things Apple and working for the Wall Street Journal (the unapologetic cheerleader for the unbound, immoral acquisition of filthy lucre by any means necessary).

Re:Fanbois don't want to face the truth

[amiga3D]

To find a decent pc laptop with discrete graphics is more like 1000 dollars. I've shopped them and anything that isn't junk is close to a grand. A lot cheaper than Apple but not anything like the silly 300 dollar laptop you mention. There isn't a single Apple computer with a celeron processor not to mention the crappy lowend AMD processors. The main reason there isn't is that Apple doesn't want to compete in the lowend market. People end up with a piece of shit computer after spending 6 or 7 hundred dollars that is slow as hell thanks to the crapware installed on it and hate the damn thing. They see an Apple user happily using his expensive macbook with no problems and asks how he likes it. The Apple guy of course brags about his expensive toy and guess what? Another convert. Never mind the guy could have bought a shit hot HP laptop for 1500 dollars that is better than the 1500 dollar Apple, he's now convinced Apple is better because of his experience with the shitty walmart acer. Of course to get full enjoyment from the HP he'd have had to wipe the drive and install Arch Linux but he's got no idea that option even exists. Windows 8 by itself will sell tens of thousands of expensive, overpriced Apple laptops. I wonder if the pc makers have noticed there is no crapware on Apple's computers? The dumb asses are crippling their own products.

Absolutely

[ThatsNotPudding]

Nobody steals other ideas better than Apple.

Intel Apple partnership

[shuz]

It would seem reasonable that Apple and Intel, two giants in tech industry, would partnership with Intel's new Haswell chipset. It is well known that Intel wants to compete more in the "mobile" computing markets. Apple has a solid foothold in the market and can benefit Intel greatly but putting Intel chips in all of their new products. If Apple has the "next big thing" planned already then they may also be waiting for June 3rd/4th to make any announcements following Intels expected unveiling of their new chipset designed primarily for the mobile markets. If this is the case then Intel will start the hype, Apple will build on the hype, ?, profit.

The moment's passed.

[MaWeiTao]

This was inevitable. Apple rose on the tide of an evolving industry. But fundamental fact is that Microsoft defined a world that enabled Apple's success. The problem was that while they shaped the industry they became too entrenched and arrogant and failed to capitalize on emerging trends. Some of it was inevitable as computing, the web and mobile technology was evolving too rapidly for anyone to keep up. Given how badly soured the consumer was by Microsoft they were hungry for a replacement. Apple was there at the right time with the perfect line of products. The problem for them is that the industry has matured. It's in an evolutionary mode so it's become a lot harder to make a dramatic impact.

Apple may have grown complacent, but honestly, they've always relied heavily on their marketing machine. It was easy to believe the hype, however, when they introduced the iPod and culminated with the iPhone. Those were two devices that were uniformly better than anything else on the market at the time. Sure, competitors might have been superior in certain ways, but they didn't bring together the entire package like Apple managed to do.

Since then, however, everyone's not only caught up, but far surpassed them. And at this point, given that this particular market has matured, there's not much for them to do but copy existing functionality. I don't see any new concepts on the horizon; it's all looking like iterations of the same thing. Revolutionary concepts have never been Apple's strong suit. That's always been Microsoft's and Google's purview; they've always engaged in far more R&D than Apple ever has.

I think the moment has passed for Apple because I don't really see how they could realistically reinvent themselves. There's too much pressure from external forces and I don't think they have they have the people to pull it off. They're too set in their ways. Steve Jobs might have had the vision and stubbornness willingness to risk it all in an effort reshape the company, but even then I have my doubts. Without evidence to the contrary over the coming year I think it's becoming evident that the moment has passed for Apple.

I think this is what has the journalists all antsy.

Re:Fanbois don't want to face the truth

[steelfood]

Since we're all neophytes running AMD Athlons, it's helpful to remind people that portable computer prices have dropped drastically in the past 10 or so years, ever since the netbook came out. Even Apple's had to cut their prices down (or really, increase their feature set) to stay competitive.

A $1k laptop is really, really well spec'ed, comparable with what $3k used to get relatively speaking. The Alienware laptops that used to go for upwards of $5k are no more than $3k now.

Admittedly, I didn't realized this myself until a month or two ago when I went to buy a new laptop and found that even the best spec'ed stuff isn't as expensive as I thought it'd be, and the mid-range stuff was far cheaper than I expected.

Douche-canoe

[gunzy83]

Tech journalists are terrible. That is all.

Re:There was a spelling mistake in the article!

[gunzy83]

I prefer "All Things Douche-canoe conference" but I like yours too.

Re:Fanbois don't want to face the truth

[Plumpaquatsch]

Apple's products are now just very expensive toys built for an economy that has gone away.

Are you actually claiming the economy is worse now than 3 years ago during the recession? During which Apple thrived?

It's called a backorder

[Hognoxious]

Perhaps it was your joke, but of course one can't actually buy a ++iDevice ; that is always the next model.

Isn't that exactly how kickstarter works?

I told you so.

[neoshroom]

Just wanted to add: I told you so.