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Apple CEO Tim Cook Calls AirPods 'a Runaway Success' (cnbc.com)
It turns out the $159 AirPods Bluetooth earphones are selling well, or so CEO Tim Cook would have us believed. Cook dropped by the New York Stock Exchange on Wednesday while on vacation, and talked about the AirPods sales. From a report on CNBC: In comments to CNBC, Cook declined to talk specifically on Apple's outlook, but he said it has been a "great holiday." He added that the company's new wireless earbuds, AirPods, are "a runaway success." When asked if more would come into stock, he said Apple's "making them just as fast as we can." AirPods debuted at September's splashy event, but saw shipping delays through most of the fall and finally hit shelves just days before the crucial Christmas shopping rush. The limited shipments were sold quickly -- ship dates are now six weeks out on Apple's website.
or so Taco would have us believed.
They literally run away from your ear so you have to buy another pair.
APK quotes people (including myself) without context and should not be trusted. Just thought you should know.
1) iPad Pro: Meh.
2) Apple Watch: Meh.
3) MBP 2016: Meh
4) iPhone 7: Meh
5) Airpods?
I'm going to go with "Meh".
------ The best brain training is now totally free : )
I see Apple and Nintendo both used that gimmick this Xmas. Shoppers react like Pavlov's dogs and camp out at Wal-Mart and Best Buy each morning before the stores open.
Sell a car without a steering wheel (or with an awkward extension bar), then sell the steering wheel later at a premium and claim "our steering wheels are a huge success!"
Table-ized A.I.
...George Lucas calls The Phantom Menace a runaway Success - while the rest of the world calls both products a flaming pile of dogshit. Happy 2017 - the year we get bullshit'ed more than ever...
No offense to anyone here, but I don't think I will ever understand the mindset of the Apple fanboi.
Because for the price of these earbuds one can buy a decent ... smartphone and wired earbuds which won't sound any worse.
Maybe they're popular, maybe they aren't... but what else is the CEO going to say?
#DeleteChrome
Apple took away the headphone jack
Or you could, you know, use the adaptor included WITH EVERY iPHONE...
I can believe that no matter how badly Apple treats it's faithful
Yes, giving people free adaptors is certainly "treating them badly", right up there with setting your pants on fire with a defective phone. Wait, pants on fire, that phrase... it reminds me of you somehow... hmm.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
How many runaways have the money to purchase an apple product?
There is no right to feel safe thru security vaudeville at the expense of everyone's freedom, privacy and tax money.
While Jobs spoke to humanity
The whole airpod roll out drama is a marketing stunt that Apple does all the time: create scarcity for the sake of scarcity in order to manipulate people into believing something is extremely popular.
Apple knows its core market well: people who want to buy things for the sake of the status symbol. And no, this is not a rabid anti apple sentiment, there are many companies that sit in Apple's market position that operate the same say (e.g. various car companies, watch makers, etc.)
And yet people are shilling out that $160 for the upsell.
SOME people are paying that because they like bluetooth headphones.
I don't; I just use the headphones included in the box. You know, the wired ones that plug directly into the phone? I have a set of noise canceling headphones too; I just leave the adaptor on that set, so to me there's no difference as I just grab a set of headphones and plug them into the phone.
What is your damage hating on people who like wireless headsets? They could use anyone else's you know, not just Apple's - as usual the Apple ones are just really well designed and so some people chose to buy them even though they are expensive.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Are they selling well because they're great, or are they selling well because people don't have much of a choice, with no headphone jack? I'm not an Apple guy nor am I an Apple hater, but this seems almost as disingenuous as Microsoft bragging about Windows 10 'adoption rate' when they fooled, lied, tricked, or literally forced their way onto people's computers. False news much?
Seriously, I find Microsoft's whole Surface product line to be promising, yet not quite "there" yet.
The Surface Studio, for example? Very cool concept and one of those designs that inspires a lot of techno-lust when you see it. But on a closer analysis, I just can't see the value? For the huge price tag, you still wind up with a machine with the previous generation GPU technology in it; doubly insulting when you pair it with a huge display of that high a resolution, where you really could use more GPU power to move all those pixels around.
The Surface Book? I haven't spent much time in front of one of those, so I feel less qualified to talk about it, except again - you pay a really big price premium for it over most Windows notebooks, and I don't quite see where the value is? The previous version supposedly had some issues with the hinge design that people didn't like. I think most of that was addressed in the latest revision. The whole thing just doesn't excite me in any way, shape or form though. It's just "another laptop option on the market".
And the Surface Pro 4, I'm very familiar with as I use one every day. This one absolutely stinks, IMO, in its base price configuration with the Core m CPU. If you want to see the point in buying one at all, you have to spend more money for a better configured variation. The "sweet spot" of price vs. performance is probably the Core i5 with 8GB of RAM and 256GB SSD. You can buy that one for around the $1,500 price point with a type-cover keyboard (which should realistically just come with the things ... you DO want one for it). As soon as you decide you'd rather have 16GB of RAM and/or a 512GB SSD though? The price starts shooting way upward. IMO, these machines have kind of a cheap plastic feel to them and I've seen a fairly high incidence of repairs needed on them too. But at the same time? The pencil works great with them, and when attached to your full size keyboard, mouse and display via the dock, you'll forget you're not using a pretty good performing desktop PC.
I think everything "Surface" from MS is starting to finally pose a challenge for Apple in the PC hardware department. And it's coming at just the time when Apple seems to be slacking off on any real focus on updating Macs (in favor of more profitable iOS devices, watches, etc.). But as it stands right now, I still prefer using my Macs. Might just be a preference for OS X over Windows 10 at this point, but that's enough to keep me using my Macs as primary machines for the time being. Still, my NEXT new computer may well NOT be a Mac unless Apple turns things around soon.
iFans probably think the price should be doubled.
If only I had mod points left.
I think what many people aren't aware of (because Apple sure doesn't go to any effort to market it) is that the new Bluetooth EarPods use a proprietary "W2" chip which adds a number of proprietary extensions to the Bluetooth standards.
The iPhone 7 has the W2 chip functionality embedded in it for any devices able to support it, and defaults back to standard Bluetooth support for everything else.
The additional W2 functionality is supposed to address some of the glitches and hassles inherent in regular Bluetooth headsets and provide a better experience.
If you're a customer who prefers using wireless Bluetooth headsets with a cellphone to begin with (and MANY people I know do), the EarPods and iPhone 7 combo promises one of the better usability experiences you can get out that combo today. Yes, it may be at the expense of giving you a traditional headphone jack. But how much that matters to you really does depend on your use case.
Because I don't.
If I ever get off my ass and start a business (i.e. never) remind me that the above AC is not going to be my director of sales. At my business, sales will be viewed as The Most Important Indicator of a product's success. That's because my business would be for-profit. Theoretically, at least.
I have to hand it to Apple for having the perfect approach to judging (and creating) product success: sales. Apple is about the money, and you basically can't do better than that, from a business perspective. (From a user perspective, everything is different, though, and that's why it's so mysterious to me that anybody buys that company's junk. But they do.) It's a refreshing reminder that not necessarily the entire economy has vowed to drive away customers and prevent revenue, the way that Hollywood is always trying to do.
Even when they do horrible, hostile, anti-user things, the users show up and throw money at them, showing that they don't judge Apple or their products' quality. What other business has succeeded at finding these types of customers? Who is better? Not even Scientologists are this good, if you believe some of the rumored numbers.
I bought 3 pair from the apple store and sold 2 pair on Ebay for over $250 each.
The funny part is they are not even hard to get ahold of, many stores are out, but the store.apple.com has them and will get them to you in 2 days.
I'll still enjoy robbing idiots on ebay though....
Proof positive that Apple fanboys will buy literally anything Apple puts up for sale, no matter how inane it is.
Eat the rich.
"It turns out the $159 AirPods Bluetooth earphones are selling well, or so CEO Tim Cook would have us believed."
I didn't believed it then and I don't believed it now.
Editing faux pas aside, the only thing they've been a "success" at is 1) making Apple mo' money and 2) locking users into ever-more-expensive gadgets that cannot be repaired.
iFixit gives the Apple AirPods a '0' out of 10 on the repairability scale, also known as the "worst possible score achievable". In other words, they can't be repaired, period. It appears that even Apple can't repair them, which is kind of amazing when you consider that they're the ones who built the fucking things.
AirPods make iPads look positively consumer-friendly in terms of service, and we all know what a total shit show it is to open an iPad....
Just cruising through this digital world at 33 1/3 rpm...
Now that Apple has invented bluetooth, am I in any danger of losing my 5 year old bluetooth headphones in a patent dispute? :p
A government is a body of people notably ungoverned - AC
Finally Apple got its Steve Ballmer.
I'm sure we need no further proof, since Cook says so. I'm sure Bill Gates nor Steve Balmer said anything positive about Windows ME or Vista shortly after their releases.
I had a sucky sig.
The W2 chip isn't going to help at all with the two biggest flaws in the earpods:
1. Crap battery life
2. Easily lost
The only thing you can do about the battery life is remember to turn them off and carry the charging case around with you. Preventing loss will no doubt create a market for expensive bits of string to tie them together. Might as well just have had a band and stuck a bigger battery in it, solving both problems and costing a fraction as much.
Apple seems to love these anti-features. 0.01mm thinner phone so you can wrap it in a chunky case for protection and it will still bend in your pocket. Take away the headphone jack because ha ha fuck you, chump.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
Of course the adapter is designed to fail, just like the official charging cords, so that you get taxed for not buying a new iphone every year.
Go fuck yourself.
Personally I think the Surface Studio and Surface Book are a major WTF in the pricing department. That said the premium price for the Surface Pro 4 seems to be worth it. And by "premium" I mean you get what you pay for.
I'm typing here at the moment next to my dad's HP Spectre X2. It was a cool $400 less than the SP4 but the top configuration has a far slower processor. It doesn't feel cheap but then the entire thing is thicker, heavier, the pen isn't anywhere near as nice to use, palm detection is so hit and miss that dad doesn't take notes on it, and don't get me started on the stupid arse design decision that went into the SD card slot. Plus as soon as you like to decently spec it out you need to change models to something different which is thicker and heavier again.
I do like the fact that the Spectre has more than 1 USB port though (though the Macbook Pro style approach has resulted in dad going out and having to buy a USB fucking dongle today, because I have a normal USB key, and because transferring data to it from the SP4 via SD card is such an incredibly stupid process (start by finding a paperclip)) and I like the nod to an idea of putting an LTE modem in the device, ... even though it's only available in the USA and only on Verizon.
So far the larger Surface lineup is quite meh in my opinion but I'm a huge fan of the Surface Pro.
Fantastic. What's better than forcing bluetooth on customers? Forcing fragmentation into the market place with a proprietary standard in devices. Who doesn't love this company.
That's fair. The question was about innovation. Lots of innovative things start out as not quite there yet. I don't think there's much question that MS is beating Apple in terms of innovation lately.
They just keep getting in my way, and I can't put my phone farther away than the length of the wire which is often too short. I wanted to switched to Bluetooth but the problem with most BT headset is they are big and heavy and make me feeling uncomfortable with it on my head for too long. As for the BT earphones, most of them if not all have wires and yes, it breaks when you try to fish it out by holding at one of the earpiece. So, yes, I welcome the AirPods and similar earphones as long as they can last at least a day of continuous use.
Surface is really Shitty.
What innovation are you talking about? iMac clone when iMacs aren't even sexy anymore?
The screen looks good (thanks Samsung) but general build quality looks shit and probably is shit.
Coming up with a shitty design no one else wants is not innovation. I can't fault them for trying, but to try this hard and fail this hard is just incredible.
It is legitimising the reduction in choice to the wider community.
WHAT REDUCTION OF CHOICE????
You can use any headphone made with an iPhone seven, right out of the box.
Come on.
who buy bluetooth headphones because the must has iPhone 7 needs them
I don't use Bluetooth headphones with an iPhone 7 because IT DOES NOT NEED THEM.
I want these to be a huge failure for Apple
Who is so retarded that they care if a COMPANY lives or dies? That is sick and you are a sick person for wishing failure on anyone. Do you know what Karma does with haters like yourself?
If all you CAN see is failure, failure is all you WILL see.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
So far the larger Surface lineup is quite meh in my opinion but I'm a huge fan of the Surface Pro.
The problem is the keyboard. It feels weird and there's no insert key. Why would someone choose to have a PgUp key and no insert on a keyboard is beyond me.
lucm, indeed.
Any battery operated device is going to run out of battery.
Any earbuds are easily lost. I lost my Bose QC20s. It's because they are small, not because they are Apple products.
Must be fun to charge your god damn headphones every day. No thanks. In this case I will stick to the wired version.
That's fair. The question was about innovation. Lots of innovative things start out as not quite there yet. I don't think there's much question that MS is beating Apple in terms of innovation lately.
Sorry, no.
...
I use PageUp / PageDown daily and it actually annoys me that it requires me to hold down Fn. I would have preferred it to be separate.
But I only learnt just now that there's no Insert key. I never noticed this before, and the Windows onscreen keyboard also doesn't have an insert key so now I would have no idea how to get insert if I ever needed it. Your use case is probably different from mine, but from what I recall the only time I've ever used the insert key is to unpress it when I accidentally hit it inadvertently.
It's called the "W1" chip; but the rest of your post is spot-on.
Fantastic. What's better than forcing bluetooth on customers? Forcing fragmentation into the market place with a proprietary standard in devices. Who doesn't love this company.
Who's forcing anything?
And W1-equipped devices are 100% backwards-compatible with standard BT stuff. You could use Apple's AirPods as easily with any BT phone, computer, or whatnot. Conversely, you can use the W1-chip equipped iPhone with any standard BT headset.
But don't let facts stand in the way of your idiotic, baseless, hatred of all things Apple (while secretly lusting after their gear)..
I have yet to have these fall out and I have tried hard. Also, the battery life of the case is such I have yet to run out of battery or have to go out of my way to charge in a way that hurts usability.
Unless you're telling me you wear headphones 24/7 through every instance of your routine, and I doubt that you do your argument is invalid, or, its only valid for you, but not for everyone.
If they had a string or band attached they would not have been aesthetically pleasing to me and I would not like them as much.
...or sound
But don't let facts stand in the way of your idiotic, baseless,
I can see english is your second language. Maybe look up fragmentation. By packaging a fragmentation with a common standard it is forcing fragmentation into the market place.
Careful. I heard the reality distortion field causes cancer. Maybe you should get yourself checked, you seem to be quite over exposed to it.
You just shipped a new phone that requires either a proprietary wired headphone of wireless headphones. Also, it's the Christmas shopping season and people are looking for gifts for people who have everything.
My bet is that air bud sales will drop off after the holidays and that future sales will be mediocre, at best.
Face it, the Apple mojo is gone. You've gotten fat and lazy.
But don't let facts stand in the way of your idiotic, baseless,
I can see english is your second language. Maybe look up fragmentation. By packaging a fragmentation with a common standard it is forcing fragmentation into the market place.
Careful. I heard the reality distortion field causes cancer. Maybe you should get yourself checked, you seem to be quite over exposed to it.
Assuming you are a Fandroid, I submit that no Fandroid need lecture anyone on "Fragmentation".
But assuming, arguendo, that the term "Fragmentation" is appropriate in this context (which I frankly find pretty specious), some amount of "fragmentation" (as you call it) is part of any change. Change requires, er, Change.
But, it's all about how you handle that Change. In Apple's case with the iPhone 7, they made the Change as painless as possible by both including a headset (like they have always done), but with a Lightning Connector, rather than a 4 conductor 3.5 mm connector like before, and including a simple Lightning to 4 conductor 3.5 mm jack, for use with any existing analog headphones/earbuds/headsets.
Seriously, what more could they have done, assuming the (obvious) fact that they saw that 3.5 mm jacks were on their way out (and, BTW, you are reminded that Apple wasn't the first to ditch the 3.5 mm jack; so others in the industry obviously agree with them regarding that issue)?
Now I agree there is an argument to be made that they should have gone to USB-C and ditched Lightning at the same time; but I feel that the headphone jack decision was made fairly late in the design process, and so "didn't make the cut" this go-around. But, IMHO, Lightning is on the way-out, in favor of USB-C (probably on the iPhone 8). And then Apple will be aligned with the rest of the mobile device industry (not to mention their own computing products) in standardizing on what is fast becoming the standard.
Assuming you are a Fandroid, I submit that no Fandroid need lecture anyone on "Fragmentation".
What are you 12? You start with an attempted insult and then side step the issue? I assume you wrote something after this sentence but it's probably as waste of time reading given your opening sentence. Learn to behave and then your writing won't be a waste of time in the future.
Goodday.
Assuming you are a Fandroid, I submit that no Fandroid need lecture anyone on "Fragmentation".
What are you 12? You start with an attempted insult and then side step the issue? I assume you wrote something after this sentence but it's probably as waste of time reading given your opening sentence. Learn to behave and then your writing won't be a waste of time in the future.
Goodday.
How long have you been a member? Childish insults are the stock-in-trade on this Forum. When in Rome...
And I most certainly did not "sidestep" the issue. I attempted to explain and amplify (no pun) on the real issues involved, and how Apple had actually tried to address them.
It is you that is "side-stepping", by refusing to address my most salient points, rather than whining because I called someone a name.
I can see english is your second language.
Says the guy who doesn't capitalize "English".