charlesn

Superb analysis, William! Having spent my career producing television I'd say you hit all the key points. Of course, some people will never get it, but it has always been that way with Apple. 

if these mockups really are what's coming, then Apple should rename the Pro models "Frankenphone." The Pros, especially, are THE fugliest, most god-awful design I've ever seen from Apple, bar none, like a flashing, tawdry-colored neon sign that says, "F-ck Jony Ive!" (Yes, like all tawdry neon signs, one letter isn't working.) The whole Frankenphone aesthetic of the Pros is an utter rejection of all that is iconically clean and simple about Apple industrial design and not for the better. Even the iPhone Slim appears it will be birthed with a hunchback that will undermine the whole "thin" aesthetic that is its main selling point--wtf? And clearly unnecessary since its dupe, the Galaxy Edge, will have two camera lenses instead of one, no hunchback required. Ironically, the 16e will end up being the most attractively designed iPhone. 

avon b7 said:

rob53 said:

Anti-competition... The iPhone market is still less than the android market. Does Germany even try and make and sell mobile devices? I believe they do but the market simply doesn't want them in any quantity. Germany suing Apple doesn't help Germany make their own devices, it simply makes them money off the back of other companies. The EU cartel is the same thing. If you can't make something people want you sue the company that people like. This isn't an antitrust lawsuit, it's simply a money grab because Germany no longer makes products people want to buy and use. --Look at what's happening with its automobile market, it's tanking. Will Germany sue other car companies because they no longer can keep up with technology and the desires of consumers? 

The Germans aren't making the laws up as they go. 

Actually, they ARE making them up as they go! From the report above: "The lawsuit was instigated by the Bundeskartellamt in April 2023, with the regulator believing that Apple was subject to a 2021 amendment to the German Competition Act." Convenient law-making, don't you think? If you want to go after a company but have no law to do so, just make up a new one and then prosecute. This will never happen, but I really, really wish Apple would tell the EU to shove it and just pull up stakes and let the EU legislate itself into nothing but crappy EU-made phones, and then they can legislate those back to two cans and a string. 

nubus said:

The current market share for iPhone matches the one from 2012 - the last year of products we know Jobs were involved in. The Mac market share stopped growing 5 years ago in March 2020 (https://gs.statcounter.com/os-market-share/desktop/worldwide/#monthly-201204-202502).

Oh, my! He posted a link so it must be true, right? Did you bother to look at the methodology used to arrive at these so-called "statisitcs?" Of course not! It's on the internet so it must be true! So here, let me help you with that, as explained by Global Stats:

"In other words we calculate our Global Stats on the basis of more than 5 billion page views per month, by people from all over the world onto our 1.5 million+ member sites."

Oh, this sounds like a very reliable way of calculating market share! Page views to "member sites" with zero knowledge of how/why they were chosen or how representative they are or not of the overall PC/mobile phone market. Excellent source! Maybe pull stats out of a hat next time and post those--I'm sure they'd be equally reliable. 

apple4thewin said:

So in terms ranking based on price we got 5 iPhone 17 products to list:

1: iPhone 17e (Spring 2026) $599
2: iPhone 17 (Fall 2025) $799
3: iPhone 17 Air? (Fall 2025) $999 -slimness will increase price from plus size
4: iPhone 17 Pro (Fall 2025) $1099 -increase base storage size plus increased RAM and redesign.
5: iPhone 17 Ultra (Fall 2025) $1299 -Name change tax plus increased RAM, redesign, and better battery and cooling mentioned in article. 

This is just my opinion. I could be wrong, but it is reasonable. If switching from se 4 to just e means a big price jump, then we can do the same to Pro Max to Ultra.

I believe iPhone 16 will replace iPhone 15 as the phone between the "e" model and the regular iPhone 17 with the same $699 price. 

I have to say the logic for an iPhone Air continues to escape me. The iPhone Plus didn't sell, so we're going to replace it with essentially the same size phone that has a reduced feature set vs the Plus--and maybe, critically, shorter battery life--but sells for an even higher price and people who didn't want to buy the Plus are going to want this because it's maybe 2 millimeters thinner? REALLY? Because I must have missed the "We need a thinner iPhone above all else!" outcry from the mass market. And if they stick a hunchback camera bar on the back of the phone, they will have compromised its one and only advantage, which is the slick appearance of a thinner slab phone. I continue to hope that this phone will turn out to be more interesting than trimming the feature set and a couple of millimeters from a regular iPhone.

I really hope Apple doesn't split its Pro models into Ultra and Pro. I hate the Max form factor, tried it one year but never again, and it would suck if Apple's best phone features became exclusive to the biggest phone.