dysamoria

What the hell? I've never been informed by Apple of recalls or replacements for these things! I haven't even seen it mentioned here before today. After the first three MONTHS, my a s and d key labels were wearing off from casual typing. They're almost completely gone today.

When I posted my review of the Smart Keyboard on Apple's online store my review was hidden and they will not tell me why! I was fair, well-worded, and not at all abusive. If I try to write a new one, the site just indicates something like "you already wrote a review for this item"; but it won't show said existing review and won't let me edit it. It's just NOT THERE! Apple hasn't replied to my inquiry about this either. They've deleted reviews of mine on the App Store as well, also with zero indication of why (though there I've been able to post new ones, and forget me being as detailed as the original one; what a waste of time). I've never been abusive in my App Store reviews, yet I see them deleted while other people's clearly abusive or scammy/fake reviews persist!

As for functionality, the keyboard does have moments where it won't respond. It seems entirely caused by the bug-ridden iOS, though, because it behaves as through, for example, the Safari tab/app doesn't have the focus (focus issues being something that iOS shouldn't have, but clearly does, once you have a keyboard to reveal this issue). There are also a number of clearly incomplete implementations of Smart Keyboard support throughout the OS and API.

I've not had problems with the connector or the keyboard hardware itself, aside from the letter labeling. If people have keyboards that stop working entirely, well that sucks even harder.

I have reported every bug and bad behavior to Apple via their iPad feedback page. Not that my reports there ever seem to go heeded (at this point, I feel like an unpaid intern, reporting details about their products that they don't seem to care about, most of which started in 2013).

adm1 said:

If they're on the hook for anything financial, it would be the standard licensing fee that they avoided paying initially. I can't see the 9B profit argument holding up in court.

Making money on the thing while having not paid the license is WHY damages are sought. It's punishment.

airnerd said:

Google/Android lacks corporate direction, they lack leadership.  This article sums it up perfectly.  They are always looking to play catch up, to try to find something that can fill the gap between them and a competitor, and they are quick to sell something and then drop it.  I posted a few weeks ago about firing up my iPhone 4S for the first time in years.  After updating to iOS9 it flies around apps on wifi pretty quickly, I was amazed.  Gave it to my 6 year old to play on.  he also has my old original iPad Mini that he still plays games like Madden 17 and streams youtube Kids on without a problem.  I didn't expect the ipad to last this long and didn't figure my phone would be able to run any apps.  But they are both there and I can get around it just as simply as I can my newer everyday phone.  

tl;dr...Apple shows that you can invest your money in them and they will build on what you bought.  You won't lose support or focus in 2 years and have to toss it.  

While this is true, it's becoming a shorter length of time for each device and the software is really being used to push hardware purchases.

Logic 10.4 abandoned Mac OS El Capitan, Sierra abandoned Macs that can actually run it fine, and most, if not all, Apple iOS apps require iOS 11.x. It's fine if you don't want to maintain a fully-functional iCloud-enabled ecosystem of Apple products, because that requires staying within a 1 to 2 year range of OS versions across all devices, until Apple abandon the device by withholding the most recent OS release from it, which withholds ecosystem functionality and app support.

My iPhone 4 is no longer a cell phone in usage. I was forced, by Safari, to move to a new device (with iOS 9 at the time). It doesn't have iOS 7 on it. I refuse to install that (and wow is iOS 6 pretty and fast, in comparison to iOS 7+, just like how Snow Leopard looks better and runs far faster than any newer Mac OS). The device works well as an iPod, so it's not useless to me, but it's still very frustrating to use for Internet (on rare occasions I try to do so) and the Apple iCloud stuff is partially incapacitated due to iCloud changes (mostly in the changes Notes format). None of the apps I use on it are up-to-date and none can be updated.

It's quite limited but certainly not useless. It's almost like the PowerMac G4 I still have serving as an iTunes library and a retro software machine... there's already a bunch of abandoned apps only usable on older iOS versions. Of course, unlike the old Mac, it's impossible to reinstall anything (including the OS), so good luck if the device needs to be restored...

So yeah, "playing around" isn't a problem on older Apple devices. Having a fully functional "ecosystem", however, definitely is an issue beyond a couple of years. The ecosystem is one of the main draws for Apple product, so this isn't inconsequential. The more Apple products a person has (when they weren't all bought at the same time), the more difficult it is to keep them all synchronized with supported software and functionality; especially when you want to avoid slowing devices with OS upgrades and have no money to replace them all at the same time (have to do it piecemeal).

It's kind of maddening that Apple has dropped support for El Capitan with Logic 10.4 (it's only been about three years), and it's annoying that they can't get their own requirements information correct. On the App Store it says 10.12 is the minimum, but on the Logic X product page on their website, it says 10.11.

What about bug fixes and performance improvements?

Do people actually care about animoji?

I'm glad the CPU throttling/battery thing is being handled. This is how it should've been done on day one of that "feature" (which was, of course, just a way for Apple to avoid replacing batteries under warranty). Seems the only way to get Apple to do what's best for their customers is to shame Apple into doing it via media circuses. Typical corporate arrogance.