I feel the worst for the average customers who don't read tech-blogs, wanted these and didn't even get a shot at it, because Apple didn't issue any kind of press release to give people a chance to line up to play the on-line order lottery. On the other hand, when the average customer realizes they won't be available for a few more months still, nothing will change from their reality yesterday, which is they had no idea when they would be released if ever, and had to move on. Of course now they have a date, so that's just another month or two of managing whatever work-around they've been dealing with since Apple removed the headphone jack.
Whatever work-around?! You mean using the same headphones they've always used with the Apple-provided adapter.
What's the point of releasing these a week and a half before Christmas if an hour after they go on sale their back ordered 4 weeks? And what if all those interested see the 4 weeks and say screw it and buy something else?
It's launched across many countries concurrently so stock has to be rather limited to meet all the demands.
So far, Singapore still delivers on 20th, Japan still delivers on 19th. Hong Kong is 4 weeks out, China is 2 weeks out. Kinda show where the demands are.
rogifan_new said: What's the point of releasing these a week and a half before Christmas if an hour after they go on sale their back ordered 4 weeks? And what if all those interested see the 4 weeks and say screw it and buy something else?
You're not seriously suggesting that Apple should have simply sat on their existing stock?
What's the point of releasing these a week and a half before Christmas if an hour after they go on sale their back ordered 4 weeks? And what if all those interested see the 4 weeks and say screw it and buy something else?
Given that the original plan by Apple was to have these available "late October", I am pretty sure they got them for sale as quickly as possible, and with as many units as possible. Sometimes engineering something very cutting edge doesn't happen to perfect time scale. They clearly encountered an issue and it took more time to resolve it.
What would you have preferred - that Apple ship them with a possible flaw and try and deal with it later? Not sell any until they had 20 million units already built? Did Samsung get it right with the Note 7?
Am I an "Apple sycophant" because I point this out?
Finally, for the customers that wanted AirPods (super easy setup & automatically synced across all Apple devices, charging case with 24h charge, completely separate ear pieces, beam forming mic, etc), which other vendor's product do you think they will buy?
What's the point of releasing these a week and a half before Christmas if an hour after they go on sale their back ordered 4 weeks? And what if all those interested see the 4 weeks and say screw it and buy something else?
What part of "Yes a mistake was made producing a brand new cutting-edge piece of hardware what do you want Apple to do about it other than invent a time machine and go back in time to correct it" are you struggling with? It's like all the trolls and concern trolls are proudly thumping their chests with a "SEE! APPLE SCREWED UP! NYAAAAH!" and then attaching all sorts of nonsense to it (like claiming the 7 is non-functional w/o AirPods, which is utter rubbish). When we point out the rubbish and absurd sense of entitlement, you get mad.
I must ask -- what is your objective here? I'm struggling to understand it. To establish that this is sub-optimal? Who doesn't already believe that?
I ordered two within minutes of my daily early morning check of AI. So easy with Apple Pay and Touch ID. One for me and one for gift, unless I see off-the-charts Ebay prices. In that case I'll be more than happy to let them go-offering overnight shipping for Christmas buyers. I only regret not buying more. I see they're already backordered.
Did anyone else notice the BeatsX headphones now say "Coming February" ?
I did. This means that the previous rumour about it being about syncing each earpiece is BS or BeatsX has its own separate issue. It's looking like an issue with the new W1 chip, but we may never know.
Agreed it very well might be a W1 yield issue. AirPods were known to be an off the chart success. Maybe they had to stock up and cut out Beats X.
What's the point of releasing these a week and a half before Christmas if an hour after they go on sale their back ordered 4 weeks? And what if all those interested see the 4 weeks and say screw it and buy something else?
I think it would be much worse for Apple to sit on their inventory knowing they could have sales before Christmas. That would not sit well with anyone and you'd be bitching up a storm for this too.
As far as whether or not someone goes and gets something else...
Then they simply go buy something else. There's obviously enough interest anyways. What did you really want Apple to do, sit on its inventory? Apple can't help that there was a delay in their product. They obviously wanted to ship these much sooner. The same thing happens every year with iPhones. People order, get sick of waiting and go get something else yet Apple still has tens of millions of sales. Its nothing new...
If you have an account and are logged in, your can sort the search based on completed auctions. Sad that already people are paying double or more for them. Guess if you have a few on order, it is called a Christmas bonus.
I feel the worst for the average customers who don't read tech-blogs, wanted these and didn't even get a shot at it, because Apple didn't issue any kind of press release to give people a chance to line up to play the on-line order lottery. On the other hand, when the average customer realizes they won't be available for a few more months still, nothing will change from their reality yesterday, which is they had no idea when they would be released if ever, and had to move on. Of course now they have a date, so that's just another month or two of managing whatever work-around they've been dealing with since Apple removed the headphone jack.
Whatever work-around?! You mean using the same headphones they've always used with the Apple-provided adapter.
It's a little more than that.
Someone who used their headphone jack regularly and bought the iPhone 7 in September thinking a major selling point -- the AirPods would be available in a little over a month. Then they had to wait another month, and then another, and another. If they didn't hear about the release this morning within the first hour of sale, they now have to wait until January, and as the day goes on, maybe even later. BeatsX has already been delayed until February.
So what it means is that yes, they now have to use an adapter, and deal with possibly losing it, or leaving it behind when using their headphones on something else. But that's not all they have to use -- if they charge their phones and listen at the same time, they also have to buy a $40 Belkin splitter, and keep up with that too. And they have to worry about what battery case they use since Mophie does not have a passthrough Lightning connector, so they can't even use the headphone adapter with that. None of that would be a problem with BT headphones.
The point is, rather than being able to embrace Apple's wireless vision shortly after buying the iPhone 7, instead they are putting a band-aid on their headphone use, putting up with a less than optimal user experience, which has been made more cumbersome because of Apple's delay. The promise of the W1 chip makes the prospect of investing in regular BT headphones unthinkable now. The Studio 3, which have been available the longest, are twice as expensive and considerably bigger and heavier; and the PowerBeats 3 only just became available this month, more expensive still, and are nowhere near as cool. And that's it. But it likely got people who might have been sitting on the fence about the iPhone 7, because of the lack of a headphone jack, to open their wallet and buy at on day one, thus driving up the sales -- only to be let down by the AirPods ship date slipping every month, while their headphone use became more cumbersome.
No. Not a call. Just a simple notification. A perfectly reasonable request seeing that many tech companies offer alert notifications for newly announced products that are unavailable for pre order.
Perhaps the best option would have been to open up a pre-order system from the day of the keynote.
Seeing how ship times slipped so quickly, it's clear that this was basically an operation to save face and get some units shipping and into Christmas stockings. It makes sense. They ship before Christmas and at least some folks get them as presents.
However, that doesn't change the fact that the launch has been a failure on many levels and just one of them was communication. Remember, that's the easy bit that no one should screw up on.
More troubling was the amount of planning that went into this for a full on Christmas rush, only to see them available for order on 13th December and the delivery date slip past Christmas Day in a matter of minutes. Inevitably many people will now put the cash earmarked for AirPods as Christmas presents into something else. That is a lost sale.
Shit happens but that doesn't change the essential facts: they screwed up.
If you have an account and are logged in, your can sort the search based on completed auctions. Sad that already people are paying double or more for them. Guess if you have a few on order, it is called a Christmas bonus.
Mmm... We live in the SF East Bay. Tickets for the Hamilton Stage Play went on sale yesterday at 9:00 AM PST. My daughter was online for ~6 hours (started with 20,000 people ahead of her) and finally bought the family 6 orchestra tickets for $200 each.
She checked an hour later and the season (Mar-Aug) was sold out. eBay has worse seats for $1,000-$2,000 each.
If you have an account and are logged in, your can sort the search based on completed auctions. Sad that already people are paying double or more for them. Guess if you have a few on order, it is called a Christmas bonus.
Mmm... We live in the SF East Bay. Tickets for the Hamilton Stage Play went on sale yesterday at 9:00 AM PST. My daughter was online for ~6 hours (started with 20,000 people ahead of her) and finally bought the family 6 orchestra tickets for $200 each.
She checked an hour later and the season (Mar-Aug) was sold out. eBay has worse seats for $1,000-$2,000 each.
Do dah word scalper strike a familiar note?
I had no idea Hamilton was coming to the Bay Area. Would have loved to have bought tickets.
If you have an account and are logged in, your can sort the search based on completed auctions. Sad that already people are paying double or more for them. Guess if you have a few on order, it is called a Christmas bonus.
Mmm... We live in the SF East Bay. Tickets for the Hamilton Stage Play went on sale yesterday at 9:00 AM PST. My daughter was online for ~6 hours (started with 20,000 people ahead of her) and finally bought the family 6 orchestra tickets for $200 each.
She checked an hour later and the season (Mar-Aug) was sold out. eBay has worse seats for $1,000-$2,000 each.
I feel the worst for the average customers who don't read tech-blogs, wanted these and didn't even get a shot at it, because Apple didn't issue any kind of press release to give people a chance to line up to play the on-line order lottery. On the other hand, when the average customer realizes they won't be available for a few more months still, nothing will change from their reality yesterday, which is they had no idea when they would be released if ever, and had to move on. Of course now they have a date, so that's just another month or two of managing whatever work-around they've been dealing with since Apple removed the headphone jack.
Whatever work-around?! You mean using the same headphones they've always used with the Apple-provided adapter.
It's a little more than that.
Someone who used their headphone jack regularly and bought the iPhone 7 in September thinking a major selling point -- the AirPods would be available in a little over a month. Then they had to wait another month, and then another, and another. If they didn't hear about the release this morning within the first hour of sale, they now have to wait until January, and as the day goes on, maybe even later. BeatsX has already been delayed until February.
So what it means is that yes, they now have to use an adapter, and deal with possibly losing it, or leaving it behind when using their headphones on something else. But that's not all they have to use -- if they charge their phones and listen at the same time, they also have to buy a $40 Belkin splitter, and keep up with that too. And they have to worry about what battery case they use since Mophie does not have a passthrough Lightning connector, so they can't even use the headphone adapter with that. None of that would be a problem with BT headphones.
The point is, rather than being able to embrace Apple's wireless vision shortly after buying the iPhone 7, instead they are putting a band-aid on their headphone use, putting up with a less than optimal user experience, which has been made more cumbersome because of Apple's delay. The promise of the W1 chip makes the prospect of investing in regular BT headphones unthinkable now. The Studio 3, which have been available the longest, are twice as expensive and considerably bigger and heavier; and the PowerBeats 3 only just became available this month, more expensive still, and are nowhere near as cool. And that's it. But it likely got people who might have been sitting on the fence about the iPhone 7, because of the lack of a headphone jack, to open their wallet and buy at on day one, thus driving up the sales -- only to be let down by the AirPods ship date slipping every month, while their headphone use became more cumbersome.
That's a lot of hypothetical concern for a lot of hypothetical users with those constraints.
Meanwhile, here in the actual world I haven't met anyone having these problems -- they're just using their wired or wireless headphones as they always have. I'm an office jockey with a 7 and even I haven't run into problems charging while talking (likely because I charge while sleeping or don't spend 10 hours straight with no breaks on the phone). What am I doing wrong?
Joking aside, I don't think I'm doing anything wrong and am not convinced these are legitimate concerns.
Comments
So far, Singapore still delivers on 20th, Japan still delivers on 19th. Hong Kong is 4 weeks out, China is 2 weeks out. Kinda show where the demands are.
What would you have preferred - that Apple ship them with a possible flaw and try and deal with it later? Not sell any until they had 20 million units already built? Did Samsung get it right with the Note 7?
Am I an "Apple sycophant" because I point this out?
Finally, for the customers that wanted AirPods (super easy setup & automatically synced across all Apple devices, charging case with 24h charge, completely separate ear pieces, beam forming mic, etc), which other vendor's product do you think they will buy?
I must ask -- what is your objective here? I'm struggling to understand it. To establish that this is sub-optimal? Who doesn't already believe that?
As far as whether or not someone goes and gets something else...
Then they simply go buy something else. There's obviously enough interest anyways. What did you really want Apple to do, sit on its inventory? Apple can't help that there was a delay in their product. They obviously wanted to ship these much sooner. The same thing happens every year with iPhones. People order, get sick of waiting and go get something else yet Apple still has tens of millions of sales. Its nothing new...
http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_odkw=earpods+wireless&_osacat=0&_from=R40&_trksid=p2045573.m570.l1313.TR11.TRC2.A0.H0.Xairpods.TRS0&_nkw=airpods&_sacat=0
$300-$1600 delivered before Christmas.
If you have an account and are logged in, your can sort the search based on completed auctions. Sad that already people are paying double or more for them. Guess if you have a few on order, it is called a Christmas bonus.
It's a little more than that.
Someone who used their headphone jack regularly and bought the iPhone 7 in September thinking a major selling point -- the AirPods would be available in a little over a month. Then they had to wait another month, and then another, and another. If they didn't hear about the release this morning within the first hour of sale, they now have to wait until January, and as the day goes on, maybe even later. BeatsX has already been delayed until February.
So what it means is that yes, they now have to use an adapter, and deal with possibly losing it, or leaving it behind when using their headphones on something else. But that's not all they have to use -- if they charge their phones and listen at the same time, they also have to buy a $40 Belkin splitter, and keep up with that too. And they have to worry about what battery case they use since Mophie does not have a passthrough Lightning connector, so they can't even use the headphone adapter with that. None of that would be a problem with BT headphones.
The point is, rather than being able to embrace Apple's wireless vision shortly after buying the iPhone 7, instead they are putting a band-aid on their headphone use, putting up with a less than optimal user experience, which has been made more cumbersome because of Apple's delay. The promise of the W1 chip makes the prospect of investing in regular BT headphones unthinkable now. The Studio 3, which have been available the longest, are twice as expensive and considerably bigger and heavier; and the PowerBeats 3 only just became available this month, more expensive still, and are nowhere near as cool. And that's it. But it likely got people who might have been sitting on the fence about the iPhone 7, because of the lack of a headphone jack, to open their wallet and buy at on day one, thus driving up the sales -- only to be let down by the AirPods ship date slipping every month, while their headphone use became more cumbersome.
Perhaps the best option would have been to open up a pre-order system from the day of the keynote.
Seeing how ship times slipped so quickly, it's clear that this was basically an operation to save face and get some units shipping and into Christmas stockings. It makes sense. They ship before Christmas and at least some folks get them as presents.
However, that doesn't change the fact that the launch has been a failure on many levels and just one of them was communication. Remember, that's the easy bit that no one should screw up on.
More troubling was the amount of planning that went into this for a full on Christmas rush, only to see them available for order on 13th December and the delivery date slip past Christmas Day in a matter of minutes. Inevitably many people will now put the cash earmarked for AirPods as Christmas presents into something else. That is a lost sale.
Shit happens but that doesn't change the essential facts: they screwed up.
Mmm... We live in the SF East Bay. Tickets for the Hamilton Stage Play went on sale yesterday at 9:00 AM PST. My daughter was online for ~6 hours (started with 20,000 people ahead of her) and finally bought the family 6 orchestra tickets for $200 each.
She checked an hour later and the season (Mar-Aug) was sold out. eBay has worse seats for $1,000-$2,000 each.
Do dah word scalper strike a familiar note?
Meanwhile, here in the actual world I haven't met anyone having these problems -- they're just using their wired or wireless headphones as they always have. I'm an office jockey with a 7 and even I haven't run into problems charging while talking (likely because I charge while sleeping or don't spend 10 hours straight with no breaks on the phone). What am I doing wrong?
Joking aside, I don't think I'm doing anything wrong and am not convinced these are legitimate concerns.
I know iPhones get that treatment in some markets, but I don't recall seeing too much of that here.
Perhaps the people who are now waiting can order Piano black in January, and Product(RED) for Valentine's Day, and be the REAL "cool people."
Good luck all.
E.