My 3rd generation iPod came with a high quality case with clip, a dock, Firewire cable, mini Firewire adapter that doesn't fit anything I have ever encountered, a soft fiber bag, a power adapter, a very useful wired remote/headphone extender I used for many years in my car with the iPod connected directly to an amp.
It is as much an ecological reason as it is economical:
The best way to avoid waste is to not produce the product. If Apple were to offer the same peripherals with every product, you would end up with a lot of unused products in your drawer.
It is as much an ecological reason as it is economical:
The best way to avoid waste is to not produce the product. If Apple were to offer the same peripherals with every product, you would end up with a lot of unused products in your drawer.
The non-inclusion of adapters and accessories has little to do with ecological reasons. It has a lot to do with profit.
My 15" MBPR was made so an Ethernet socket could not be accommodated. If you want Ethernet you had to buy an expensive thunderbolt adapter, which is gouging given the purchase price of the computer. I agree with you that many users might never make use of an adapter but a perfect compromise would have to been to just include a voucher redeemable in the ?Store for the adapter.
I doubt there would be more than 5 users worldwide who wouldn't make good use of a USB C to USB adapter were one included with the Macbook. Apple could and should have included a USB port on the power adapter. They didn't eschew doing that for ecological considerations.
Apart from adapter for no known port included with my iPod, I have made very good use of all the included accessories.
There are existing Apple products that are thinner than the iPhone that still use the standard headphone jack. Apple may have legitimate reasons for losing the headphone jack I just don't see how thinness is one of them. And are there any iPhone owner saying I wish my iPhone was thinner? I highly doubt it. If anything people want more battery life, but for whatever reason Apple has decided that nine hours is good enough (yes I know the iPhone Plus gets more). I would much rather keep iPhone at the same thickness and get an extra hour or two of battery life.
I am perfectly happy with the current battery life, and thinness is an attribute I value. So I would be totally fine with a move like this. Apple's past success is proof that people with your pov are in the minority.
If you need longer battery life, there are lots of third party options available. So I don't understand what you're (and others here are) complaining about.
It is as much an ecological reason as it is economical:
The best way to avoid waste is to not produce the product. If Apple were to offer the same peripherals with every product, you would end up with a lot of unused products in your drawer.
The non-inclusion of adapters and accessories has little to do with ecological reasons. It has a lot to do with profit.
My 15" MBPR was made so an Ethernet socket could not be accommodated. If you want Ethernet you had to buy an expensive thunderbolt adapter, which is gouging given the purchase price of the computer. I agree with you that many users might never make use of an adapter but a perfect compromise would have to been to just include a voucher redeemable in the ?Store for the adapter.
I doubt there would be more than 5 users worldwide who wouldn't make good use of a USB C to USB adapter were one included with the Macbook. Apple could and should have included a USB port on the power adapter. They didn't eschew doing that for ecological considerations.
Apart from adapter for no known port included with my iPod, I have made very good use of all the included accessories.
C'mon now. A lot of these adapters are available for a few bucks each from a number of third-party providers and outlets like Monoprix.
C'mon now. A lot of these adapters are available for a few bucks each from a number of third-party providers and outlets like Monoprix.
The Thunderbolt - Ethernet adapter is $35. When I have spent north of $2000 for a computer I think charging extra for the adapter is unwarranted. Mine is an original release 2012 15". At the time, which is when I could have most done with the adapter, there were no cheap alternatives on the market.
In a similar vein, I think the Pencil should be included with the iPad Pro.
The Thunderbolt - Ethernet adapter is $35. When I have spent north of $2000 for a computer I think charging extra for the adapter is unwarranted. Mine is an original release 2012 15". At the time, which is when I could have most done with the adapter, there were no cheap alternatives on the market.
In a similar vein, I think the Pencil should be included with the iPad Pro.
Great, then we get all the prices to shoot up even though most people don't need all the stuff you mentioned. Of course, you aren't saying that at all; instead you are saying Apple should lower their profit margin because you feel entitled that if you spend x-amount on something you shouldn't have to spend anymore on options, but do you realize that you're expressing entitlement when you make such claims?
There are existing Apple products that are thinner than the iPhone that still use the standard headphone jack. Apple may have legitimate reasons for losing the headphone jack I just don't see how thinness is one of them. And are there any iPhone owner saying I wish my iPhone was thinner? I highly doubt it. If anything people want more battery life, but for whatever reason Apple has decided that nine hours is good enough (yes I know the iPhone Plus gets more). I would much rather keep iPhone at the same thickness and get an extra hour or two of battery life.
Oh, don't worry about it ... As soon as Apple does this, you'll be the biggest defender of it, especially when Jony Ive makes a video about how he lead the effort to eliminate the headphone jack. And then revise your own history to deny you ever had a problem with it.
I use cheap headphones all day because I abuse them and think of them as a disposable item. If I can't use those, it would make having that device pretty worthless to me. I also charge and listen at the same time. Of course, if they go through with this there will be a $30.00 adapter that we can use but I'd go through those just as fast. Not worth it. I love my iStuff but this would make my daily experience more work than it was worth.
Oh, don't worry about it ... As soon as Apple does this, you'll be the biggest defender of it, especially when Jony Ive makes a video about how he lead the effort to eliminate the headphone jack. And then revise your own history to deny you ever had a problem with it.
How I love being right.
1) How are you right? You stated something as fact and then are claiming it's true.
2) What evidence do you have of her changing her mind simply because Apple does something, regardless of any elucidation that made a previously imperceivable solution clear?
3) She clearly doesn't have good spatial awareness in not understanding how components affect size in 3-dimensions, and she probably doesn't realize that the iPod Nano is thin because the components are fewer, battery smaller, and the headphone jack goes from front-to-back without having the display over it, but that just makes one daft, not a liar.
I'm fairly certain that Lightning does NOT support analogue audio out. It is fully digital.
Any adapter you can buy includes a D/A converter.
Apple will make sure you're wrong on that. If Apple ditch the 3.5mm port, the Lighting port will support Analog signal. Otherwise, how the hell the new headphone will work? I'm sure that Apple won't be dumb enough to add D/A converter to the headphone. It doesn't make sense financially. Instead, they make the Lightning port on new iPhone compatible with analog headphone and sell you a 3.5mm-Lighting converter.
For whiners, you don't need to dump your $1000 headphone. Apple will sell you a connector and it should be small enough for your ridiculous habit ($1000 headphone for an iPhone?).
Wow. A whole lot of hazy assuming going on here about what Apple can or can 't do, or what they aren't "dumb" enough to do.
Great, then we get all the prices to shoot up even though most people don't need all the stuff you mentioned. Of course, you aren't saying that at all; instead you are saying Apple should lower their profit margin because you feel entitled that if you spend x-amount on something you shouldn't have to spend anymore on options, but do you realize that you're expressing entitlement when you make such claims?
It's not a sense of entitlement in the slightest. At the time I bought it I could have opted for a non Retina model which did include an Ethernet port. Such a port is to be expected on a high-end machine just as much as you would expect a screen and a keyboard. The only reason there isn't one inbuilt is space. Did you have your tongue firmly planted in your cheek when you mentioned Apple lowering their profit margin? They have over 200 billion in the bank. They don't even know what to do with it all. That $35 adapter is unlikely to cost $2 to make. Had they include a voucher, as I suggested, their cost to manufacture and supply those adapters wouldn't amount to the interest earned on their hoard in 5 minutes.
If I had said that I wanted my Mavbook to have been platinum plated, that would have been the sense of entitlement you are trying to paint me with.
Wanting that which is normal, expected and standard with products of a class is not a sense of entitlement, just sensible.
Such a port is to be expected on a high-end machine just as much as you would expect a screen and a keyboard.
To have an expectation that they should make anything that suits your needs over their own needs or their customer base is entitlement.
Can we agree that their drive is to turn a profit? Can we agree that they do this buy getting people to buy their products… repeatedly? If we can agree on those two things then you also have to agree that Apple is doing what it thinks is best for the majority of their customers. If you are something needs an RJ-45 jack and you have an aversion to dongles there were the older MBPs available, which includes those that weren't able to function without an internal ODD. If Apple does make a wrong turn, their sales will reflect it because they will lose more customers than they gain. That's how the free market works, and to expect them to do this or that simply isn't a reasonable request.
Personally, I wanted the ODD to go away several years before it did (since on a 13" MBP that's about 25% of the internal capacity); I wanted Apple to make Mac OS X and their Suite apps free with Macs years earlier; I wanted to get rid of the 3.5mm port years ago; Iwanted them to update the 30-pin connector years earlier; I wanted the iPad to get a digitizer, stylus, and APIs many years earlier; I wanted CoverFlow on iOS to go away completely; countless others.I want these things… but I don't expect Apple to do them simply because I want them. Quite often, my wants do eventually become a reality, which I attribute to looking at them from Apple's perspective of a business plan. Right now I
Right now, I want Apple to make Safari on the iPad's with split screen allow for two separate apps windows, each with multiple tabs as I think it's silly that the work around is to install a 3rd-party browser to have this feature; I want a 4K Apple TV with Siri Remote support for Home Shairing, and I want Apple to update Macs with Skylake, TB 3, and at least a 5K Cinema Display, which I hope moves to a 21:9-ish aspect ratio with the same height of the current 27" display height. I would bet against that last one every happening.
If it wasn't for Apple we'd probably still be using SCSI, serial, VGA, and parallel printer cables on your beige box "PCs". I think a century is pretty damn good run for a connector.
If it wasn't for Apple we'd probably still be using SCSI, serial, VGA, and parallel printer cables on your beige box "PCs". I think a century is pretty damn good run for a connector.
Apple was responsible for bringing SCSI to the masses, first with the Mac Plus.
If it wasn't for Apple we'd probably still be using SCSI, serial, VGA, and parallel printer cables on your beige box "PCs".
Originally Posted by Cpsro
Apple was responsible for bringing SCSI to the masses, first with the Mac Plus.
Seeing as the season calls for it, I’ll repost the classic.
It's A Wonderful OS
Jimmy Stewart stars as Steve “Jobs” Bailey, who runs a beleaguered but beloved small-town computer company. For years, big monopolist Bill “Gates” Potter has been wielding his power and money to gain control of the town. And for years, Steve has fought for survival: “This town needs my measly, one-horse computer, if only to have something for people to use instead of Windows!”
But now an angry mob is banging on Apple’s front door, panicking.
“The press says your company is doomed!” yells one man.
“You killed the clones! We're going to Windows!” calls another.
“We want out of our investment!” they shout.
Steve, a master showman, calms them. “Don’t do it! If Potter gets complete control of the desktop, you’ll be forced to buy his bloatware and pay for his cruddy upgrades forever! We can get through this, but we’ve got to have faith and stick together!” The crowd decides to give him one more chance.
But the day before Christmas, something terrible happens: On his way to the bank, the company’s financial man, Uncle Gilly, somehow manages to lose $1.7 billion. With eyes flashing, Steve grabs the befuddled Gilly by the lapels. “Where’s that money, you stupid old fool? Don’t you realize what this means? It means bankruptcy and scandal! Get out of my company–and don't come back!”
Desperate and afraid, Steve heads to Martini’s, a local Internet cafe, and drowns his sorrows in an iced cappuccino. Surfing the Web at one of the cafe’s Macs, all he finds online is second-guessing, sniping by critics, and terrible market-share numbers. As a blizzard rages, Steve drives his car crazily toward the river.
“Oh, what’s the use?!” he exclaims. “We’ve lost the war. Windows rules the world. After everything I’ve worked for, the Mac is going to be obliterated! Think of all the passion and effort these last 15 years–wasted! Think of the billions of dollars, hundreds of companies, millions of people…” He stands on the bridge, staring at the freezing, roiling river below–and finally hurls himself over the railing.
After a moment of floundering in the chilly water, however, he's pulled to safety by a bulbous-nosed oddball.
“Who are you?!” Steve splutters angrily.
“Name’s Clarence–I mean Claris,” says the guy. “I’m your guardian angel. I've been sent down to help you–it’s my last chance to earn my wings.”
“Nobody can help me,” says Steve bitterly. “If I hadn’t created the Mac, everybody’d be a lot happier: Mr. Potter, the media, even our customers. Hell, we’d all be better off if the Mac had never been invented at all!” Music swirls. The wind howls. The tattoo on Steve’s right buttock–Buzz Lightyear from Toy Story–vanishes. Steve pats the empty pocket where he usually carries his Newton. “What gives?”
“You’ve got your wish,” says Claris. “You never invented the Mac. It never existed. You haven’t a care in the world.”
“Look, little fella, go off and haunt somebody else,” Steve mutters.
He heads over to Martini’s Internet Cafe for a good stiff drink. But he's shocked at the difference inside. “My God, look at the people using these computers! Both of them–they look like math professors!”
“They are,” says Claris.
“What is this, a museum? It looks like those computers are running DOS!”
“Good eye!” says Claris. “DOS version 25.01, in fact–the very latest.”
“I don’t get it,” Steve says.
“DOS is a lot better and faster these days, but it hasn’t occurred to anybody to market a computer with icons and menus yet. There’s no such thing as Windows–after all, there never was a Mac interface for Microsoft to copy.”
“But this equipment is ancient!” Steve exclaims. “No sound, no CD-ROM drive, not even 3.5-inch floppies!”
“Those aren’t antiques!” Claris says. “They’re state-of-the-art TRS-80s, complete with the latest 12X, 5-inch-floppy drives. Don’t forget, Steve: The Mac introduced and standardized all that good stuff you named.”
“But that’s nuts!” Steve explodes. “You mean to tell me that the 46 percent of American households with computers are all using DOS?”
“Correction: All 9 percent of American households,” says Claris cheerfully. “Without a graphic interface, computers are still too complicated to be popular.”
“Bartender!” shouts Steve. “You don’t have a copy of Wired here, do you? I’ve got to read up on this crazy reality!” The bartender glares. “I don’t know what you’re wired on, pal, but either stop talking crazy or get outta my shop.”
“No such thing as Wired,” whispers Claris. “Never was. Before you wished the Mac away, most magazines were produced entirely on the Mac. Besides, Wired would be awfully thin without the Web.”
“Without the–now, wait just a minute!”
Horrified, Steve rushes over to one of the PCs and connects to the Internet. “You call this the Net? It looks like a text-only BBS–and there’s practically nobody online! Where’s Navigator? Where’s Internet Explorer? Where’s the Web, for Pete’s sake?”
“Oh, I see,” Claris smiles sympathetically. “You must be referring to all those technologies that spun off from the concept of a graphic interface. Look, Steve. Until the Mac made the mouse standard, there was no such thing as point and click. And without clicking, there could be no Web… and no Web companies. Believe it or not, Marc Andreesen works in a Burger King in Cincinnati.”
Steve scoffs. “Well, look, if you apply that logic, then PageMaker wouldn’t exist either. Photoshop, Illustrator, FreeHand, America Online, digital movies–all that stuff began life on the Mac.”
“You’re getting it,” Claris says. He holds up a copy of Time magazine. “Check out the cover price.”
Steve gasps. “Eight bucks? They’ve got a lot of nerve!”
“Labor costs. They’re still pasting type onto master pages with hotwax.”
“You’re crazy!” screams Steve. “I’m going back to my office at Apple!”
He drives like a madman back to Cupertino–but the sign that greets him there doesn’t say, “Welcome to Apple.” It says, “Welcome to Microsoft South.”
“Sorry, Steve; Apple went out of business in 1985,” says Claris. “You see, you really did have a wonderful machine! See what a mistake it was to wish it away?”
Steve is sobbing, barely listening. “OK, then–I’ll go to my office at Pixar!”
“You don’t have an office at Pixar,” Claris reminds him. “There was no Mac to make you rich enough to buy Pixar!”
Steve has had enough. He rushes desperately back to the icy bridge over the river. “Please, God, bring it back! Bring it back! I don’t care about market share! Please! I want the Mac to live again!”
Music, wind, heavenly voices–and then snow begins softly falling. “Hey, Steve! You all right?” calls out Steve’s friend Larry from a passing helicopter. Steve pats his pocket–the Newton is there again! It’s all back!
Steve runs through the town, delirious with joy. “Merry Christmas, Wired! Merry Christmas, Internet! Merry Christmas, wonderful old Microsoft!” And now his office is filled with smiling people whose lives the Mac has touched. There’s old Mr. Chiat/Day the adman. There’s Yanni the musician. And there’s Mr. Spielberg the moviemaker. As the Apple board starts singing “Auld Lang Syne,” somebody boots up a PowerMac.
Steve smiles at the startup sound. “You know what they say,” he tells the crowd. “Every time you hear a startup chime, an angel just got his wings.”
Otherwise, how the hell the new headphone will work? I'm sure that Apple won't be dumb enough to add D/A converter to the headphone. It doesn't make sense financially.
It makes perfect sense that Apple may in fact desire to make a device with only a lightning port and market a companion set of lightning headphones, so one would either get on board or go home. In fact they're the only candidate for doing so (not that I'm claiming the rumor is true or predicting they will do this). It's not as if they've never said this before. Sell an adapter to make money from those wishing to use other headphone, but a totally digital path to a set of digital port earbuds is more like Apple than not. Putting the converter in headphones makes no more of a manufacturing burden than creating adapters and putting it in them. It's a tiny cylinder of plastic the size of a pinky nail that has to be fabricated and put in either one no matter what they do.
As far as financials for the user, many smartphone buyers are swayed by a $20 difference in cost. And many get the top of the line and literally have no idea how much it costs. Apple doesn't think much about the user for whom being $20 more than without a feature is a dealbreaker.
Of course, any discussion about the advantages of keeping it digital until the last possible connection with earbuds is ridiculous on two levels. One, because it has to be analog at the earbud there's never going to be any advantage sonically strictly based on keeping it digital leaving the device, as far as headphones, and two, there doesn't exist the sonic quality in 95% of the iDevice earwidgets in use to make a difference. And whatever difference can be determined by high end monitoring is well offset by the total % of users for whom it makes no difference.
It's all about doing something notable, being the first. It doesn't even matter if it has little market penetration.
Comments
Before they came up with iOS and iGreed set in.
My 3rd generation iPod came with a high quality case with clip, a dock, Firewire cable, mini Firewire adapter that doesn't fit anything I have ever encountered, a soft fiber bag, a power adapter, a very useful wired remote/headphone extender I used for many years in my car with the iPod connected directly to an amp.
It is as much an ecological reason as it is economical:
The best way to avoid waste is to not produce the product. If Apple were to offer the same peripherals with every product, you would end up with a lot of unused products in your drawer.
It is as much an ecological reason as it is economical:
The best way to avoid waste is to not produce the product. If Apple were to offer the same peripherals with every product, you would end up with a lot of unused products in your drawer.
The non-inclusion of adapters and accessories has little to do with ecological reasons. It has a lot to do with profit.
My 15" MBPR was made so an Ethernet socket could not be accommodated. If you want Ethernet you had to buy an expensive thunderbolt adapter, which is gouging given the purchase price of the computer. I agree with you that many users might never make use of an adapter but a perfect compromise would have to been to just include a voucher redeemable in the ?Store for the adapter.
I doubt there would be more than 5 users worldwide who wouldn't make good use of a USB C to USB adapter were one included with the Macbook. Apple could and should have included a USB port on the power adapter. They didn't eschew doing that for ecological considerations.
Apart from adapter for no known port included with my iPod, I have made very good use of all the included accessories.
I am perfectly happy with the current battery life, and thinness is an attribute I value. So I would be totally fine with a move like this. Apple's past success is proof that people with your pov are in the minority.
If you need longer battery life, there are lots of third party options available. So I don't understand what you're (and others here are) complaining about.
C'mon now. A lot of these adapters are available for a few bucks each from a number of third-party providers and outlets like Monoprix.
C'mon now. A lot of these adapters are available for a few bucks each from a number of third-party providers and outlets like Monoprix.
The Thunderbolt - Ethernet adapter is $35. When I have spent north of $2000 for a computer I think charging extra for the adapter is unwarranted. Mine is an original release 2012 15". At the time, which is when I could have most done with the adapter, there were no cheap alternatives on the market.
In a similar vein, I think the Pencil should be included with the iPad Pro.
[IMG]http://www.ixbt.com/short/images/AK-DL1_3.jpg[/IMG]
Great, then we get all the prices to shoot up even though most people don't need all the stuff you mentioned. Of course, you aren't saying that at all; instead you are saying Apple should lower their profit margin because you feel entitled that if you spend x-amount on something you shouldn't have to spend anymore on options, but do you realize that you're expressing entitlement when you make such claims?
Oh, don't worry about it ... As soon as Apple does this, you'll be the biggest defender of it, especially when Jony Ive makes a video about how he lead the effort to eliminate the headphone jack. And then revise your own history to deny you ever had a problem with it.
How I love being right.
1) How are you right? You stated something as fact and then are claiming it's true.
2) What evidence do you have of her changing her mind simply because Apple does something, regardless of any elucidation that made a previously imperceivable solution clear?
3) She clearly doesn't have good spatial awareness in not understanding how components affect size in 3-dimensions, and she probably doesn't realize that the iPod Nano is thin because the components are fewer, battery smaller, and the headphone jack goes from front-to-back without having the display over it, but that just makes one daft, not a liar.
Wow. A whole lot of hazy assuming going on here about what Apple can or can 't do, or what they aren't "dumb" enough to do.
Looks like the iPhone 7 will be "waterproof".
Great, then we get all the prices to shoot up even though most people don't need all the stuff you mentioned. Of course, you aren't saying that at all; instead you are saying Apple should lower their profit margin because you feel entitled that if you spend x-amount on something you shouldn't have to spend anymore on options, but do you realize that you're expressing entitlement when you make such claims?
It's not a sense of entitlement in the slightest. At the time I bought it I could have opted for a non Retina model which did include an Ethernet port. Such a port is to be expected on a high-end machine just as much as you would expect a screen and a keyboard. The only reason there isn't one inbuilt is space. Did you have your tongue firmly planted in your cheek when you mentioned Apple lowering their profit margin? They have over 200 billion in the bank. They don't even know what to do with it all. That $35 adapter is unlikely to cost $2 to make. Had they include a voucher, as I suggested, their cost to manufacture and supply those adapters wouldn't amount to the interest earned on their hoard in 5 minutes.
If I had said that I wanted my Mavbook to have been platinum plated, that would have been the sense of entitlement you are trying to paint me with.
Wanting that which is normal, expected and standard with products of a class is not a sense of entitlement, just sensible.
To have an expectation that they should make anything that suits your needs over their own needs or their customer base is entitlement.
Can we agree that their drive is to turn a profit? Can we agree that they do this buy getting people to buy their products… repeatedly? If we can agree on those two things then you also have to agree that Apple is doing what it thinks is best for the majority of their customers. If you are something needs an RJ-45 jack and you have an aversion to dongles there were the older MBPs available, which includes those that weren't able to function without an internal ODD. If Apple does make a wrong turn, their sales will reflect it because they will lose more customers than they gain. That's how the free market works, and to expect them to do this or that simply isn't a reasonable request.
Personally, I wanted the ODD to go away several years before it did (since on a 13" MBP that's about 25% of the internal capacity); I wanted Apple to make Mac OS X and their Suite apps free with Macs years earlier; I wanted to get rid of the 3.5mm port years ago; Iwanted them to update the 30-pin connector years earlier; I wanted the iPad to get a digitizer, stylus, and APIs many years earlier; I wanted CoverFlow on iOS to go away completely; countless others.I want these things… but I don't expect Apple to do them simply because I want them. Quite often, my wants do eventually become a reality, which I attribute to looking at them from Apple's perspective of a business plan. Right now I
Right now, I want Apple to make Safari on the iPad's with split screen allow for two separate apps windows, each with multiple tabs as I think it's silly that the work around is to install a 3rd-party browser to have this feature; I want a 4K Apple TV with Siri Remote support for Home Shairing, and I want Apple to update Macs with Skylake, TB 3, and at least a 5K Cinema Display, which I hope moves to a 21:9-ish aspect ratio with the same height of the current 27" display height. I would bet against that last one every happening.
If it wasn't for Apple we'd probably still be using SCSI, serial, VGA, and parallel printer cables on your beige box "PCs". I think a century is pretty damn good run for a connector.
Apple was responsible for bringing SCSI to the masses, first with the Mac Plus.
Seeing as the season calls for it, I’ll repost the classic.
It's A Wonderful OS
Jimmy Stewart stars as Steve “Jobs” Bailey, who runs a beleaguered but beloved small-town computer company. For years, big monopolist Bill “Gates” Potter has been wielding his power and money to gain control of the town. And for years, Steve has fought for survival: “This town needs my measly, one-horse computer, if only to have something for people to use instead of Windows!”
But now an angry mob is banging on Apple’s front door, panicking.
“The press says your company is doomed!” yells one man.
“You killed the clones! We're going to Windows!” calls another.
“We want out of our investment!” they shout.
Steve, a master showman, calms them. “Don’t do it! If Potter gets complete control of the desktop, you’ll be forced to buy his bloatware and pay for his cruddy upgrades forever! We can get through this, but we’ve got to have faith and stick together!” The crowd decides to give him one more chance.
But the day before Christmas, something terrible happens: On his way to the bank, the company’s financial man, Uncle Gilly, somehow manages to lose $1.7 billion. With eyes flashing, Steve grabs the befuddled Gilly by the lapels. “Where’s that money, you stupid old fool? Don’t you realize what this means? It means bankruptcy and scandal! Get out of my company–and don't come back!”
Desperate and afraid, Steve heads to Martini’s, a local Internet cafe, and drowns his sorrows in an iced cappuccino. Surfing the Web at one of the cafe’s Macs, all he finds online is second-guessing, sniping by critics, and terrible market-share numbers. As a blizzard rages, Steve drives his car crazily toward the river.
“Oh, what’s the use?!” he exclaims. “We’ve lost the war. Windows rules the world. After everything I’ve worked for, the Mac is going to be obliterated! Think of all the passion and effort these last 15 years–wasted! Think of the billions of dollars, hundreds of companies, millions of people…” He stands on the bridge, staring at the freezing, roiling river below–and finally hurls himself over the railing.
After a moment of floundering in the chilly water, however, he's pulled to safety by a bulbous-nosed oddball.
“Who are you?!” Steve splutters angrily.
“Name’s Clarence–I mean Claris,” says the guy. “I’m your guardian angel. I've been sent down to help you–it’s my last chance to earn my wings.”
“Nobody can help me,” says Steve bitterly. “If I hadn’t created the Mac, everybody’d be a lot happier: Mr. Potter, the media, even our customers. Hell, we’d all be better off if the Mac had never been invented at all!” Music swirls. The wind howls. The tattoo on Steve’s right buttock–Buzz Lightyear from Toy Story–vanishes. Steve pats the empty pocket where he usually carries his Newton. “What gives?”
“You’ve got your wish,” says Claris. “You never invented the Mac. It never existed. You haven’t a care in the world.”
“Look, little fella, go off and haunt somebody else,” Steve mutters.
He heads over to Martini’s Internet Cafe for a good stiff drink. But he's shocked at the difference inside. “My God, look at the people using these computers! Both of them–they look like math professors!”
“They are,” says Claris.
“What is this, a museum? It looks like those computers are running DOS!”
“Good eye!” says Claris. “DOS version 25.01, in fact–the very latest.”
“I don’t get it,” Steve says.
“DOS is a lot better and faster these days, but it hasn’t occurred to anybody to market a computer with icons and menus yet. There’s no such thing as Windows–after all, there never was a Mac interface for Microsoft to copy.”
“But this equipment is ancient!” Steve exclaims. “No sound, no CD-ROM drive, not even 3.5-inch floppies!”
“Those aren’t antiques!” Claris says. “They’re state-of-the-art TRS-80s, complete with the latest 12X, 5-inch-floppy drives. Don’t forget, Steve: The Mac introduced and standardized all that good stuff you named.”
“But that’s nuts!” Steve explodes. “You mean to tell me that the 46 percent of American households with computers are all using DOS?”
“Correction: All 9 percent of American households,” says Claris cheerfully. “Without a graphic interface, computers are still too complicated to be popular.”
“Bartender!” shouts Steve. “You don’t have a copy of Wired here, do you? I’ve got to read up on this crazy reality!” The bartender glares. “I don’t know what you’re wired on, pal, but either stop talking crazy or get outta my shop.”
“No such thing as Wired,” whispers Claris. “Never was. Before you wished the Mac away, most magazines were produced entirely on the Mac. Besides, Wired would be awfully thin without the Web.”
“Without the–now, wait just a minute!”
Horrified, Steve rushes over to one of the PCs and connects to the Internet. “You call this the Net? It looks like a text-only BBS–and there’s practically nobody online! Where’s Navigator? Where’s Internet Explorer? Where’s the Web, for Pete’s sake?”
“Oh, I see,” Claris smiles sympathetically. “You must be referring to all those technologies that spun off from the concept of a graphic interface. Look, Steve. Until the Mac made the mouse standard, there was no such thing as point and click. And without clicking, there could be no Web… and no Web companies. Believe it or not, Marc Andreesen works in a Burger King in Cincinnati.”
Steve scoffs. “Well, look, if you apply that logic, then PageMaker wouldn’t exist either. Photoshop, Illustrator, FreeHand, America Online, digital movies–all that stuff began life on the Mac.”
“You’re getting it,” Claris says. He holds up a copy of Time magazine. “Check out the cover price.”
Steve gasps. “Eight bucks? They’ve got a lot of nerve!”
“Labor costs. They’re still pasting type onto master pages with hotwax.”
“You’re crazy!” screams Steve. “I’m going back to my office at Apple!”
He drives like a madman back to Cupertino–but the sign that greets him there doesn’t say, “Welcome to Apple.” It says, “Welcome to Microsoft South.”
“Sorry, Steve; Apple went out of business in 1985,” says Claris. “You see, you really did have a wonderful machine! See what a mistake it was to wish it away?”
Steve is sobbing, barely listening. “OK, then–I’ll go to my office at Pixar!”
“You don’t have an office at Pixar,” Claris reminds him. “There was no Mac to make you rich enough to buy Pixar!”
Steve has had enough. He rushes desperately back to the icy bridge over the river. “Please, God, bring it back! Bring it back! I don’t care about market share! Please! I want the Mac to live again!”
Music, wind, heavenly voices–and then snow begins softly falling. “Hey, Steve! You all right?” calls out Steve’s friend Larry from a passing helicopter. Steve pats his pocket–the Newton is there again! It’s all back!
Steve runs through the town, delirious with joy. “Merry Christmas, Wired! Merry Christmas, Internet! Merry Christmas, wonderful old Microsoft!” And now his office is filled with smiling people whose lives the Mac has touched. There’s old Mr. Chiat/Day the adman. There’s Yanni the musician. And there’s Mr. Spielberg the moviemaker. As the Apple board starts singing “Auld Lang Syne,” somebody boots up a PowerMac.
Steve smiles at the startup sound. “You know what they say,” he tells the crowd. “Every time you hear a startup chime, an angel just got his wings.”
My response had zero to do with my experience vs your experience.
That's not a given.
It makes perfect sense that Apple may in fact desire to make a device with only a lightning port and market a companion set of lightning headphones, so one would either get on board or go home. In fact they're the only candidate for doing so (not that I'm claiming the rumor is true or predicting they will do this). It's not as if they've never said this before. Sell an adapter to make money from those wishing to use other headphone, but a totally digital path to a set of digital port earbuds is more like Apple than not. Putting the converter in headphones makes no more of a manufacturing burden than creating adapters and putting it in them. It's a tiny cylinder of plastic the size of a pinky nail that has to be fabricated and put in either one no matter what they do.
As far as financials for the user, many smartphone buyers are swayed by a $20 difference in cost. And many get the top of the line and literally have no idea how much it costs. Apple doesn't think much about the user for whom being $20 more than without a feature is a dealbreaker.
Of course, any discussion about the advantages of keeping it digital until the last possible connection with earbuds is ridiculous on two levels. One, because it has to be analog at the earbud there's never going to be any advantage sonically strictly based on keeping it digital leaving the device, as far as headphones, and two, there doesn't exist the sonic quality in 95% of the iDevice earwidgets in use to make a difference. And whatever difference can be determined by high end monitoring is well offset by the total % of users for whom it makes no difference.
It's all about doing something notable, being the first. It doesn't even matter if it has little market penetration.