rhinotuff

sog35 said:

bobschlob said:

I don't see your number for iPhone sales losses in there (you know... "hardware"; where Apple actually makes it's money?)

Apple will lose very few iPhone sales. Maybe a few million here or there. Most of the current iPhone users will not buy a $100-$300 Sony phone with iOS light loaded on it. But even if they do lose a few million iPhone sales Apple will make much more profit from the 600 million additional iOS users they gain plus $18 billion in licensing fees.

The key is not to license iOS light to phones that are high end. Only $100-$300 phones. Many who buy those cheaper phones have no possible way to buy $600-$900 iPhones anyway. I think its a win win for Apple. The only one that losses is Android and Google.

The way I see it is two options:

Apple does not license iOS:
Sell 250 million iPhones
$40 billion in iPhone profit

Apple license iOS light:
Get $30 royalties on 600 million phones
Sell 230 million iPhones
$36 billion in iPhone profits
$18 billion on royalties profits 
$3 billion on additional services revenue from additional users
Total $57 billion in profit

Apple is losing out on profiting on the $100-$300 price point which makes up over a billion units a year.

If only they would have made clones running their computer OS...  Oh that's right, that went well for them.  I like the idea of getting iOS out there, but the reason Apple products work so well is because they control the hardware and the software.  This eliminates compatibility issues and the need for patches and extensions.  If you think there's too many incremental iOS updates now, imagine if there was a new iOS compatible product being launched every couple of weeks...

A race to the top, who can gouge their customers the most!

bdkennedy said:

Requiring a subscription fee for access kind of defeats the purpose of cutting the cord. If I'm purchasing internet access from AT&T, that's all that should be needed for me to watch TV.

I don't think simply having an internet connection entitles you to free HBO for life...

kent909 said:

I want to know if the presidential candidates will be discussing this horrible travesty on mankind in the next debates? /s

Well of course they will.  Trump will talk about how they need to be using American-made phones, like his Samsung...

singularity said:

bobschlob said:

Ah. so it's just "style" you have a problem with. Not the content.

DED's style is to hide good salient points within emotional vitriol and in the majority of cases cite himself to back up his opinion. Then add in an extra thousand words just for good measure.
I think its a shame as there is a great journalist in there if he could hold back a bit.

I think there's a lot of passion for Apple in there, but he tends to write articles that cause me to envision him wearing a tinfoil hat while doing so.  If the article was written with a different title and shortened to a reasonable length it wouldn't have been a bad article.  The fact that he's claiming this IS the reason people are switching is just B.S. without facts.  The average person doesn't care to look into these things.  There are millions of people out there that buy their phone purely based on looks or what's trendy, that's how the vast majority evaluates products.  Most of us on this site do not fall into that category.  I'm a lifelong Apple fan, but DED is an Apple Fanboi, there's a huge difference between the two.  I often see him as the overly religious person shouting that everyone is going to hell unless they buy Apple.  I don't force my preferences on my friends and family, but I do laugh when their Android devices malfunction, or curse at them as I try to replace a screen on their Nexus 6 (major pain in the @$$ by the way).