charlesn

iluvcrap2000 said:

Smoke and mirrors. They will "Invest" into a Limited Commitment and Take the Time till He gets out of office.  

Same for all these "investment' announcements. Foxconn in Wisconsin redux. A cough, "promise" of $10 billion and 13,000 new jobs. Big, splashy photo op with Trump shown shoveling dirt at the groundbreaking, when what he was really shoveling was bullsh*t. The whole thing ended up as a nothing burger. 

If there's one thing I love about this Republican administration, it's their small "g" government approach! They're all about getting government and regulations off the backs of businesses, finally! Except, of course, for the use of tariffs as blatant extortion to force businesses to invest where Trump wants them to invest, the actual economics of such investment be damned!

By the way, how is that $10 billion investment from Foxconn in Wisconsin going, the one that Trump 45 announced with much fanfare? Have they filled all 13,000 new jobs yet? /s

Wesley_Hilliard said:

ApplePoor said:

Hopefully this is not just a distraction from or an addition to the disinformation at the iPhone 16 presentation in 2024. Also could be the only "big" new thing next month as we see the usual claims of all new device using last years enclosure, etc. But there will be "new" colors.....

Disinformation? Nope, Apple launched everything it announced, but delayed one product that was operational, but hallucinating more than they like. 

Oh, c'mon, Wesley--you know this statement, while technically "true," is also disingenuous. The revamped Siri with contextual awareness was THE marquee feature, BY FAR, of Apple's announced AI efforts at WWDC 2024. I'm pretty sure no one would have cared if it was Image Playground that had been delayed. And as far as "delayed because it was hallucinating more than they'd like" -- yes, that's the official Apple party line, except that kind of fix doesn't push your delivery date out by as much as 21 months! Because all Apple is promising right now is delivery by end of 2026. That was the tricky part of their announcement in March that they anticipated rolling out the new Siri features "within the coming year." Well, since we're in 2025, "the coming year" would be 2026, so it could be anytime within that year. 

Normally I'd say "slam dunk" for Apple, but I'm not so sure that will be the case here. Sounds to me, at least from the above description, that Apple chose NOT to defend its trademark for the past dozen years that Apple Cinemas has been operating theaters under that name. From what I understand of trademark law, you don't get to selectively defend your trademark sometimes and not defend it others. If you're aware it's being infringed upon and don't vigorously defend it, it seriously weakens your case in the eyes of the court when you do try to defend it at a later date. I mean, geez, Apple was making the Apple Cinema Display up through mid-2011, so you'd think the founding of a company called Apple Cinema in 2010 might have been a cause for concern before now. 

Mike Wuerthele said:

studiomusic said:

1 point out of 10 points of growth doesn't seem to be "panic buying" of iPhones. That seems "tiny".

Tim Cook disagrees with you.

Mike, maybe you can clarify something for me. This report from William Gallagher states the following: "During Apple's previous earnings call in May 2025, Tim Cook said that there had been some iPhone panic buying ahead of Trump's "reciprocal" tariffs, but that it had not been significant." Well, I went back to AppleInsider's coverage of the last earnings call and find no mention of Cook using the phrase, "panic buying." In fact, I can find no quotes anywhere from Tim on either call in which he says "panic buying." For the May call, that phrase seemed to have been part of a question put to him, not his words at all, and you reported it like this:

"...Cook did comment on the question of whether panic buying had set in among consumers, prior to the tariff announcement. "We don't believe that there was a significant pull forward due to tariffs into the March quarter," he said. "There's no obvious evidence of it."

And then there's the headline for this report on current earnings: "Fears Over Tariff Price Rises Prompted Panic Buying of iPhones" Really? You make it sound like trying to buy toilet paper in the midst of the Covid lockdown. Here are Tim's actual words about this: ""On the buying ahead relative to worrying about prices and so forth on tariffs, we did see some evidence of that in the early part of the quarter," Cook told CNBC. "We would estimate it to be about one point of the 10 points of company growth." Sorry, but can you point me to where he says there was "panic buying?" And that one point out of ten in revenue growth that he pegs to consumers buying ahead reflects all of Apple's revenue categories, not just iPhones. And to give this some further context: Apple's 10% YOY revenue growth amounted to $8.2 billion in actual dollars. That means 1 point of that 10 point increase would be $820 million. So out of $90 billion in total revenue for the quarter, $820 million can be attributed to consumers buying products ahead to avoid tariffs. That's less than 1% of total revenue. If there's any "panic buying" in that number, I'm sure not seeing it. Also, on the earnings call, Apple attributed one-sixth of the 13% increase in iPhone sales to tariff-related buying ahead. In other words, the tariff buying bumped iPhone sales by 2.1%. That's not nothing, but again, where's the panic in that number? 

Consumers trying to get ahead of an anticipated price increase in a product by buying now happens all the time. There's no panic in it. It's just about trying to buy smart. But nobody wandered into an Apple Store since April 1 and found empty shelves where there used to be iPhones. This just feels like sensationalism for the sake of it, and then trying to baselessly pin it back on Tim Cook.