No need for you to apologize. The iPod is dying. It is now a niche product. Sure there are still a few people who want an updated iPod but they are the grand minority.
Like I said Apple could make $100 million selling hotdogs at the Apple store but that does not mean they should. The iPod will only make about $100 million in profits this year and probably close to $0 next year.
Your original creative accounting is now a fact? And now you're predicting $0 future profit by using your earlier "calculations" as evidence? Nice one, that's one way to "prove" your position.<ha!!>
Sorry, but I don't buy your figures as anything but boohockey. They don't do anything to these products, not even upgrade them to latest technology and they still sell $1B/year, that's a revenue stream you let sit and contribute minimal effort to keep going, if you can do a bit more effort and increase it significantly, you do that (if you have the resources), but you don't kill it, and that's possibly where Apple is at, assuming this report is accurate.
Personally, I hope they don't kill it, I have a Shuffle that I use for the gym, my iP6+ is nothing I'd ever be so stupid to take into the gym, or go running with, it's too big, but the Shuffle is perfect, and I know others are of a similar mind. These products do have use cases and they do sell, they just don't receive the love from Apple because, well, they'd rather sell you an $800 phone (requiring a SIM) than one of these cheaper devices (as would the telcos).
Apple could really hit a home run here. Upgrade this bad boy to be the ultimate gaming system. It kills any portables out there.
A decent gaming platform might not be a bad idea. That is add controls to make human input more dynamic. However I see the MiFi program and Apples lack of support for common communications protocols as a big detriment to wide adoption of these devices.
The point here is that the MiFi program creates a huge amount of overhead if you want to implement something unique for an iPad / iPod Touch like device. That is external hardware supporting whatever you desire. Given freedom of access to I/O and drivers, these little guys have a lot of potential for driving things that you don't need a full size computer for. An iPod Touch would make a fantastic controller for a 3D printer for example or a data collection device for some odd analog data. However people aren't going to go through the MiFi program to implement these uses. Especially if a use might be a one time project.
It is also great for messaging and social media. As already stated it is a great entry point for kids.
When you look at the device as a great machine for "kids" I really think you are putting it into a niche it doesn't deserve. It is better to think of the device as a full fledged computer that has unlimited potential uses in the same way any other computer has. Apples problem is that they need to see the platform the same way and open up drivers for common serial communications protocols so that the device can be used as such.
It also sets Apple up nice to create a line up of future phone customers. Just need to keep the specs more current.
A person buying the current models would have to be a complete idiot in my mind. They simply are too outdated to be useful.
The storage increase would be welcome as kids take a lot of pics and video. Also movies local on the device is attractive when traveling.
Edit. Any mint condition iPhone 5 quickly goes up past $300 on eBay.
Not only that, a 3 year old phone's battery won't be nearly as good as a brand-new iPod touch's.
I use a touch instead of a phone and would be interested in upgrading soon as its 2.5 years old. Not paying for data has saved me thousands of dollars and has only caused me grief maybe 2 or 3 times in my life. There is a ton of wi-fi in my city though.
It is hard to justify the iPod Touch at over $200 when you can get a really decent smartphone with more features for under $50 at any department store. You don't need to activate the smartphone to use it for all the things you can use an iPod Touch for. The smartphone has additional features such as GPS.
My bet is that they add LTE to the iPod touch. I've never owned one but it can pretty much do most of what an iPhone can aside from traditional calling, right? Data calling is far superior anyway.
Maybe, since the iPod shuffle was so small, they would integrate that entire thing into a set of Beats headphones so that's all you have to wear and no wires. Thoughts?
Dang, a couple days ago this article would probably have kept me from ordering a refurb iPod (still in transit) for my wife.
She got her old 3rd gen Touch too wet to fix, and the plan was for her to use her even older 2nd gen Shuffle again until new iPods came out. In the meantime I'd get my first iPod ever (5th gen Touch) to play around with and when the new ones came out she could have that.
But she whined a little bit the other day about not having an iPod with a clock, I figured since nothing had happened on the new version of iPod front for some time, that it would still be quite a while yet and anniversary being next week, pulled the trigger.
Now may just have to revert to the original plan again, and return the refurb once it gets here. Decisions decisions.
It is hard to justify the iPod Touch at over $200 when you can get a really decent smartphone with more features for under $50 at any department store. You don't need to activate the smartphone to use it for all the things you can use an iPod Touch for. The smartphone has additional features such as GPS.
That $50 smartphone is subsidized by your cell service, otherwise it's $500-700+.
As opposed to Apple losing money due to low sales?
Some of those listed features I would consider to be mandatory on any new device from Apple. Touch must go 64 bit for example and frankly the chips wouldn't cost Apple much more at this point. Frankly a decent camera upgrade wouldn't cost them much at all either. Given that I wouldn't expect an iPod refresh to mimic what is currently produced as that obviously has sales issues.
So what would a refresh lead to? I see suggestions of a gaming oriented machine as one possible avenue. That would mean a Touch with real buttons to better support gaming. The other possibility is a refactoring to support professional music better. Here I'm thinking DJ's, bands and the like that where so attached to the iPod Classic.
With either possible avenue Apple takes they really need to remove many of the restrictions they put on the device that they use to milk the ecosystem through MiFi. Apple really needs a device that hardware hackers can get excited about.
Apple could really hit a home run here. Upgrade this bad boy to be the ultimate gaming system. It kills any portables out there. It is also great for messaging and social media. As already stated it is a great entry point for kids. It also sets Apple up nice to create a line up of future phone customers. Just need to keep the specs more current. The storage increase would be welcome as kids take a lot of pics and video. Also movies local on the device is attractive when traveling.
NO. It does not have buttons. People need to stop this stupid idea.
NO. It does not have buttons. People need to stop this stupid idea.
LOL I personally would never use it as such but for the younger crowd and casual gamers it is perfect. Plus someone will eventually make a worth controller case.
but how much profit does Apple really get from iPod sales? Very little. They are better off focusing on their core products at this point.
An arguement can be made that Apples current situation with the iPod line up is directly due to taking focus off the product and failing to innovate with that product. It is absolutely asinine for Apple to be shipping Touch with such an outdated processor.
The best iPods are 2 year old iPhones.
That is certainly the case today but you should ask why! The why is pretty simple, an outdated iPhone is light years ahead of Touch performance wise. Such an iPhone also supports much of iOS that is new. These issues are all directly related to Touch not being updated in a very long time.
I seriously doubt Apple would use the 32-bit A6 processor on a refreshed iPod touch! They would likely go with the A7 at a minimum because the rest of the iOS product line will complete the transition to 64-bit this year.
Quote:
Originally Posted by GrangerFX
It is hard to justify the iPod Touch at over $200 when you can get a really decent smartphone with more features for under $50 at any department store. You don't need to activate the smartphone to use it for all the things you can use an iPod Touch for. The smartphone has additional features such as GPS.
Do those "really decent" smartphones run iOS or cost "under $50" without a service activation?
There simply is no MP3 player market other than the iPod. The fact that other MP3 players even exist is anathema to many. They certainly don’t sell in any significant enough numbers to be relevant to anything. So anything Apple does to improve or innovate the iPod is good for them.
I'm hoping Apple bumps up the storage in the iPod Touch. I would love to see a 128 GB model. I would be happy with a refresh of an A7 and storage bump.
Of course iPod sales are down. The products haven't changed. If Apple stopped the iPhone at 5 people wouldn't buy a new iPhone 5 each year to replace last years iPhone 5 ( unless they had lost or damaged the old one). I had a couple of iPod classics. They couldn't store all my songs. I was looking forward to s bigger capacity classic as I assume other classic owners were. We weren't going to go out and buy another 160gb but we would buy a 240gb or bigger!
As much as I love the Touch its days are numbered. I guess they could give it a version of the iPhone 6 Plus' big screen and integrate it into the iPad product line as an iPad Micro. That may be attractive to some buyers at the right price. I'm leaning more towards the new iPods focussing more on the very small form factor wearables market. Even the current Touch is too large to strap on to your arm in my opinion. A new nano that incorporates some of the features from the Apple Watch might make sense. You have to be willing to step back a ways from conventional logic around cannibalization when dealing with Apple. They've shown a willingness to bring products to market based solely on the merits of the product, even when it stepped on the toes of other products in their portfolio. Perhaps they'll let the Beats team define the future of the iPod and draw it a little further away from the iPhone family. Only Apple knows what it's going to do with the iPod and we'll just have to wait and see.
No need for you to apologize. The iPod is dying. It is now a niche product. Sure there are still a few people who want an updated iPod but they are the grand minority.
Sure they are in the minority today, but you have to ask yourself why. Part of that in my opinion is a lack of vision on Apples part, you can't really expect that 4 year old design like the Touch (really much older, but the last major update is 4 years now) to sell well to consumers with a decent education.
I see two big problems with the iPod line up. Apples lack of vision and an apparent unwillingness to experiment or innovate with new features. The other big problem is too much control over the device thus limiting its potential uses.
Like I said Apple could make $100 million selling hotdogs at the Apple store but that does not mean they should. The iPod will only make about $100 million in profits this year and probably close to $0 next year.
IPod has huge potential if Apple reimagines the product line. Look at the sales of the various ARM boards focused on the "Maker" communities. Raspberry PI and similar boards sell in the tens of million every year and frankly aren't that much less expensive than a Touch once you add an LCD, power supply and other goodies. Imagine the sales potential if Apple opened up the USB port, maybe making that port USB-C, and added a programming environment. Python would be one good approach but we might see Swift capable of operating on such a device soon. Of course part of attraction with Raspberry PI is hardware I/O, I would not expect Apple to do digital I/O, but offering up a second USB port would make lots of sense. This especially if that port can easily access USB to serial or parallel converters.
The point is a well supported and low cost "computer" is a very attractive device when it has the right feature set. Apple just needs to see the potential. Frankly it wouldn't hurt a bit for them to return to their roots and offer up some devices that the hacker communities would find attractive. One of the big drivers for Apple 2 success and frankly for the success of these little Raspberry PI type boards is the ability to develop useful apps right on the device. Python seems to be the near term solution on most of these nano computers for programming so maybe Apple needs to be encouraged in this direction.
I look at it this way, I love my Mac and frankly my iPAD gets used daily. However neither is cheap enough to use for project type work common in the "lab". Right now Touch is cheap enough, especially discounted, the problem isn't cost it is rather the nature of the device and being locked out of it unless you sign up for MiFi. Of course MiFi has such tall fences to climb that most don't bother. So what I'm saying is rip down the fences that hold the device back and supply it with a default, built in, programming environment. Such an iPod Touch would be of interests to a far wider array of users than it is currently.
My iPod Touch 5 is my best ever digital camera. It is incredibly slim. When I use my wife's iPhone 5 it feels heavy and clunky. by comparison
I pick up eMail, read it whilst on the road, check my contacts, the weather, timetables, message, play games whilst waiting for anything and have even been writing a book in iAWriter. I have a stack of music, lectures, podcasts and audiobooks for when I can't use the screen but just want something to listen to.
I have a separate cheap phone that actually makes decent calls, which is something most smartphones suck at.
I'd happily upgrade if a new iPod Touch had a better camera because I use that so much, otherwise there is nothing wrong with my existing iPod.
I do. I have no need for an iPhone, but the iPod Touch has been great. Beware of assuming your own situation represents everyone, because it never does.
Comments
No need for you to apologize. The iPod is dying. It is now a niche product. Sure there are still a few people who want an updated iPod but they are the grand minority.
Like I said Apple could make $100 million selling hotdogs at the Apple store but that does not mean they should. The iPod will only make about $100 million in profits this year and probably close to $0 next year.
Your original creative accounting is now a fact? And now you're predicting $0 future profit by using your earlier "calculations" as evidence? Nice one, that's one way to "prove" your position.<ha!!>
Sorry, but I don't buy your figures as anything but boohockey. They don't do anything to these products, not even upgrade them to latest technology and they still sell $1B/year, that's a revenue stream you let sit and contribute minimal effort to keep going, if you can do a bit more effort and increase it significantly, you do that (if you have the resources), but you don't kill it, and that's possibly where Apple is at, assuming this report is accurate.
Personally, I hope they don't kill it, I have a Shuffle that I use for the gym, my iP6+ is nothing I'd ever be so stupid to take into the gym, or go running with, it's too big, but the Shuffle is perfect, and I know others are of a similar mind. These products do have use cases and they do sell, they just don't receive the love from Apple because, well, they'd rather sell you an $800 phone (requiring a SIM) than one of these cheaper devices (as would the telcos).
The point here is that the MiFi program creates a huge amount of overhead if you want to implement something unique for an iPad / iPod Touch like device. That is external hardware supporting whatever you desire. Given freedom of access to I/O and drivers, these little guys have a lot of potential for driving things that you don't need a full size computer for. An iPod Touch would make a fantastic controller for a 3D printer for example or a data collection device for some odd analog data. However people aren't going to go through the MiFi program to implement these uses. Especially if a use might be a one time project. When you look at the device as a great machine for "kids" I really think you are putting it into a niche it doesn't deserve. It is better to think of the device as a full fledged computer that has unlimited potential uses in the same way any other computer has. Apples problem is that they need to see the platform the same way and open up drivers for common serial communications protocols so that the device can be used as such. A person buying the current models would have to be a complete idiot in my mind. They simply are too outdated to be useful.
Really? Show me where.
Edit. Any mint condition iPhone 5 quickly goes up past $300 on eBay.
Not only that, a 3 year old phone's battery won't be nearly as good as a brand-new iPod touch's.
I use a touch instead of a phone and would be interested in upgrading soon as its 2.5 years old. Not paying for data has saved me thousands of dollars and has only caused me grief maybe 2 or 3 times in my life. There is a ton of wi-fi in my city though.
Maybe, since the iPod shuffle was so small, they would integrate that entire thing into a set of Beats headphones so that's all you have to wear and no wires. Thoughts?
She got her old 3rd gen Touch too wet to fix, and the plan was for her to use her even older 2nd gen Shuffle again until new iPods came out. In the meantime I'd get my first iPod ever (5th gen Touch) to play around with and when the new ones came out she could have that.
But she whined a little bit the other day about not having an iPod with a clock, I figured since nothing had happened on the new version of iPod front for some time, that it would still be quite a while yet and anniversary being next week, pulled the trigger.
Now may just have to revert to the original plan again, and return the refurb once it gets here. Decisions decisions.
That $50 smartphone is subsidized by your cell service, otherwise it's $500-700+.
As opposed to Apple losing money due to low sales?
Some of those listed features I would consider to be mandatory on any new device from Apple. Touch must go 64 bit for example and frankly the chips wouldn't cost Apple much more at this point. Frankly a decent camera upgrade wouldn't cost them much at all either. Given that I wouldn't expect an iPod refresh to mimic what is currently produced as that obviously has sales issues.
So what would a refresh lead to? I see suggestions of a gaming oriented machine as one possible avenue. That would mean a Touch with real buttons to better support gaming. The other possibility is a refactoring to support professional music better. Here I'm thinking DJ's, bands and the like that where so attached to the iPod Classic.
With either possible avenue Apple takes they really need to remove many of the restrictions they put on the device that they use to milk the ecosystem through MiFi. Apple really needs a device that hardware hackers can get excited about.
NO. It does not have buttons. People need to stop this stupid idea.
NO. It does not have buttons. People need to stop this stupid idea.
LOL I personally would never use it as such but for the younger crowd and casual gamers it is perfect. Plus someone will eventually make a worth controller case.
That is certainly the case today but you should ask why! The why is pretty simple, an outdated iPhone is light years ahead of Touch performance wise. Such an iPhone also supports much of iOS that is new. These issues are all directly related to Touch not being updated in a very long time.
I seriously doubt Apple would use the 32-bit A6 processor on a refreshed iPod touch! They would likely go with the A7 at a minimum because the rest of the iOS product line will complete the transition to 64-bit this year.
It is hard to justify the iPod Touch at over $200 when you can get a really decent smartphone with more features for under $50 at any department store. You don't need to activate the smartphone to use it for all the things you can use an iPod Touch for. The smartphone has additional features such as GPS.
Do those "really decent" smartphones run iOS or cost "under $50" without a service activation?
There simply is no MP3 player market other than the iPod. The fact that other MP3 players even exist is anathema to many. They certainly don’t sell in any significant enough numbers to be relevant to anything. So anything Apple does to improve or innovate the iPod is good for them.
I'm hoping Apple bumps up the storage in the iPod Touch. I would love to see a 128 GB model. I would be happy with a refresh of an A7 and storage bump.
I see two big problems with the iPod line up. Apples lack of vision and an apparent unwillingness to experiment or innovate with new features. The other big problem is too much control over the device thus limiting its potential uses.
IPod has huge potential if Apple reimagines the product line. Look at the sales of the various ARM boards focused on the "Maker" communities. Raspberry PI and similar boards sell in the tens of million every year and frankly aren't that much less expensive than a Touch once you add an LCD, power supply and other goodies. Imagine the sales potential if Apple opened up the USB port, maybe making that port USB-C, and added a programming environment. Python would be one good approach but we might see Swift capable of operating on such a device soon. Of course part of attraction with Raspberry PI is hardware I/O, I would not expect Apple to do digital I/O, but offering up a second USB port would make lots of sense. This especially if that port can easily access USB to serial or parallel converters.
The point is a well supported and low cost "computer" is a very attractive device when it has the right feature set. Apple just needs to see the potential. Frankly it wouldn't hurt a bit for them to return to their roots and offer up some devices that the hacker communities would find attractive. One of the big drivers for Apple 2 success and frankly for the success of these little Raspberry PI type boards is the ability to develop useful apps right on the device. Python seems to be the near term solution on most of these nano computers for programming so maybe Apple needs to be encouraged in this direction.
I look at it this way, I love my Mac and frankly my iPAD gets used daily. However neither is cheap enough to use for project type work common in the "lab". Right now Touch is cheap enough, especially discounted, the problem isn't cost it is rather the nature of the device and being locked out of it unless you sign up for MiFi. Of course MiFi has such tall fences to climb that most don't bother. So what I'm saying is rip down the fences that hold the device back and supply it with a default, built in, programming environment. Such an iPod Touch would be of interests to a far wider array of users than it is currently.
My iPod Touch 5 is my best ever digital camera. It is incredibly slim. When I use my wife's iPhone 5 it feels heavy and clunky. by comparison
I pick up eMail, read it whilst on the road, check my contacts, the weather, timetables, message, play games whilst waiting for anything and have even been writing a book in iAWriter. I have a stack of music, lectures, podcasts and audiobooks for when I can't use the screen but just want something to listen to.
I have a separate cheap phone that actually makes decent calls, which is something most smartphones suck at.
I'd happily upgrade if a new iPod Touch had a better camera because I use that so much, otherwise there is nothing wrong with my existing iPod.
I do. I have no need for an iPhone, but the iPod Touch has been great. Beware of assuming your own situation represents everyone, because it never does.
Par for the course in Huddler communities. Their entire business model is based on serving up ads while people argue back and forth online.