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Despite Patent Settlement, Apple Pulls Bose Merchandise From Its Stores
Apple has long sold Bose headphones and speakers in its retail stores, including in the time since it acquired Bose-competitor Beats Audio, and despite the lawsuit filed by Bose against Apple alleging patent violations on the part of Beats. That's come to an end this week, though: Apple's dropped Bose merchandise both in its retail locations and online, despite recent news that the two companies have settled the patent suit.
And so is Apple.
What?
Both Bose and Beats are fairly ordinary products that have simply learned to dazzle the public with good marketing. An element of fashion is also involved, as Bose used to be marketed in posh fora and Beats has a distinctive look and Dr Dre endorsement. So, I can't feel sorry for either party -- or for Apple whose own acquisition of Beats betrayed their own tradition of fairly decent sound -- in a bitter patent battle. For what it's worth, after evaluating a few Beats 'phones and being immediately disappointed, I invested in a pair of AKG 701s (see my Amazon review) that offer what one immediately recognizes as better sound, and are around the same price (and well below audiophile woo-woo).
I imagine Beats/Apple isn't too happy with Bose's shenanigans regarding telling NFL players they can't wear their Beats headphones until 90 minutes after the end of the game.
Of course the players do it anyway, and Beats apparently pays the fines for them... but still.
Incidentally, the NFL isn't doing very well with regards to their endorsement deals - first Microsoft, and now Bose.
#DeleteChrome
Don't pick a fight with someone above your weight.
Apple has more money than any other company on the planet, and quite likely (though I haven't checked) more money than the ENTIRE audio industies top players net work combined.
How dumb can they be, honestly, to pick a fight with Apple. Money is power.
Yeah, then the whole world can all use PulseAudio which is clearly NOT crap! Open source innovation will triumph at last!
Apple bought Beats; why would they feature a competitor's product in their stores? The settlement of the lawsuit does not give rise to an expectation that the products would continue to be sold. Apple was likely going to do that anyway.
Okay, okay, it's only the top two stories plus one more on the first page, which I guess makes for... 20% SlashDot market share?
Simple really, Apple now owns their main competitor (at least in headphones and small bluetooth speakers). Just business, move along, nothing to see here.
Sounds like a petulant little child to me. You dared challenged the great Apple in court, so now we are not going to sell your products anymore! Na na na NA na na.
No, Bose have Quiet Comfort headphones which has by far the best noise cancelling technology in it. They in turn license that to many companies.
"Beats" is just a brand play.
AKG's I can't speak for, but having used noise cancelling headphones I won't settle for ordinary ones. It doesn't matter how good the speaker in the earpiece is, if its competing with noise from outside, its not a clean sound.
It's plain and simple: now that Apple owns Beats, it makes no sense to sell their competitors products. It just isn't done.
So 3 companies, all of whom make electronics that consist of about 99% hype and about 1% tech, sue each other?
What's funny is Bose has been at this a very long time. Don't buy Bose people! It's a scam, it's always been a scam. There are plenty of good stereos and speakers out there, Bose doesn't make any of them. And beats? That's literally the cheapest Chinese headphones they could find this month and they slap a Dr Dre sticker on it.
Buck Feta.
Buck Feta. You know what to do.
Win, lose, or something in between. Once Bose sued Apple they were going to be out.
Apple has it's nice walled garden. Only good little boys and girls are allowed to play.
By suing, Bose became a bad boy. They would be ejected from Apple's garden.
At this point Apple can't stop Bose from selling Apple compatible products. They just won't sell them in their store.
Bose has been around longer than Apple. This wasn't their first patent fight. I suspect there was no surprise in Bose' boardroom when this was announced. I have a feeling that Bose' CFO is not happy but not unhappy. It's business.
And Bono.
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Noise isolation? I don't know the term, if its just a marketing term for "well padded", then you should really go try the noise cancelling ones.
You don't really lose the sounds when you put on padded headphones, it just becomes a sort of 'underwater' muffled bass. Its like 50hz hum, you hear it all the time but your brain tells you to ignore it. Then you go somewhere quiet and you then notice everywhere else has 50hz hum!
It's the same thing, you think you hear quiet till you turn on the noise cancelling, then you know what quiet actually is.
Then you don't waste time with all those crappy studio headphone brands.
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I've heard that 3D printing is the game-changing technology to end all technologies. Why I've been assured that people 3D print cars and houses (presumably with a car already parked in the garage)!!!
Surely headphones, which are just a loop of wire and a stupid plastic sheet that moves back and forth near a magnet, are trivial to 3D print at this stage?
To think otherwise is to be a Luddite, right?
And here I am with cheaper Sennheisers that are superior quality. I guess I'm just too darn smart to fall for marketing plugs, celebrity endorsements, and companies slapping their brand name on inferior products in exchange for basically bribes.
For what Apple paid they could probably bought 2 or 3 truly outstanding headphone companies and a few music library's. Bad move lifetime audio tweak. Kirb Marriott
Uh... what?
Il n'y a pas de Planet B.
All monitor have color correction and use different technology, then people perceive color sometimes differentely. The same for music. No matter the quality of your head phone or louspeaker, in the very end your tympanon your brain and the air and configuration of the room or headphone will change it. Frankly that's why so amny A/B test shows audiophile to be audiofool : they are fooling themselves into thinking a super expensive equipment with whatever response frequency will be better quality. The reality is that the crushing majority of the population is not able to tell quality difference in A/B test.
C. Sagan : A demon haunted world:
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visit randi.org
Do they sell any quality headphones? Better than Sennheiser's including the types that require specialized amp? Or only garbage like Sony's?
One less inhabitant in Apple's walled garden.
Seriously, why the hell would a company sell their competitor's stuff in their own store when they had just been sued by them? Even if they weren't sued, apple have their own line of audio gear now. It's just stupid to promote your competitor's product in your own store.
I run: Windows, OS X, Linux, FreeBSD. Just because you have a hammer, doesn't mean everything is a nail.
As long as the guest is OK booting under either hardware (physical and virtual) dynamically, it should work fine. It's been a long time since mainstream OSs couldn't do that.
Does a Windows guest still require the user to telephone someone in India when switching between physical and virtual machines after having used up all Internet reactivations?
And then, systemd can take over the world!
The primary focus should be on driving people to your stores and selling products with are your core competency. It's understandable that an Apple store will not sell Windows laptops or Android phones. But they should absolutely have a decent choice of keyboard, mice and headphones. If not, people who simply want a Mac with different keyboard will go to shop in Best Buy rather than Apple Store. But there, core Apple products will be presented side by side with with competition and without regard for complete experience that Apple wants to create for customers. While I am there should I pick up an $99 Android tablet for kids to watch Netflix rather than spending $399 on an iPad mini? Hmm...
I remember back years ago where Bose was pretty much defacto standard on great audio. Today, they're not bad, but the quality (IMHO) has declined while their prices have gone up -- I believe they are significantly overpriced for what they deliver today.
Now if only I could afford Bang & Olufsen high-end equipment :-)
Apple is having a temper tantrum, they'll get over it. But it seems like a political move to pay Bose back for starting trouble -- I could be mistaken.
Those guys are so bad at selling things, that's why they barely even have a market cap of $600B.
That Apple would not carry Bose products in their stores anymore.
Even the Beats knock-off STREET ANC cans from SMS have the noise cancelation that is reviewed as being as good as the QC line, while being cheaper, and having a different mix of connectivity options and styling choices.
Bose has got to start differentiating themselves or innovate instead of leaning on brand inertia.
Black holes are where the Matrix raised SIGFPE
I'm not sure what any of this has to do with Microsoft--Apple sells Microsoft software in its stores right now. Apple has by no means broken ties with every non-Apple company. They have to make nuanced decisions about how to deal with partners and competitors and they just might have more information on which to base those decisions than you do.
I just always find it hilarious when some random internet dude living in his Mom's basement is certain that Apple is doomed. I found it hilarious when Apple was at a $10B market cap, and again at $50B, and then again at $100B, and then again at $200B, and then $300B, $400B, $500B and now $600B.
I think we need to resort to specifying listening volumes in dB(A) levels, since I can't imagine driving even a bad headphone to distortion levels at what I call 'normal listening volume'. For me, that's probably around 70 dBA, "normal speech at 3 ft".
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