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The example and analogy here isn't quite right.

Apple is the landlord and property owner of the shopping mall. Instead of charging of monthly rent, they change a 30% of your revenue. Which they help you to process the payment, attracting traffic ( downloads ), transfers and advertise. Part of the job and profit within the money is to attract more people into the shopping mall. Since all rent are based on visitors, the more visitors the better. Now whether those visitors decide to shop and buy is not guaranteed.

This is all perfectly fine. It is model just like any real world property.

The problem is Apple decided to open its own shop within its property, selling stuff that directly competes with some of the tenants.

In an American view this is probably fine, since Apple owns the property they can do whatever they want with it. However in certain countries, this is consider Anti competitive. The shop would have to be a separate business with different financial account, so the rent is properly paid and subtracted within the cost of operation ensuring there is no product dumping below cost, which is illegal in EU.

I do think they had a case in EU when it was 30%. But when it is at 15%, it will be a tough call. It also depends on how Apple and the EU's case or Irish tax ends, as it may alter the results of how EU view Apple.

GeorgeBMac said:

I've never understood Apple leaving the router market.
I get it that today's routers are probably a difficult market in which to make money.   They're a commodity. 
But, WiFi and related protocols are also critical to IoT and Apple's interconnectedness -- even the Apple Watch partially relies on it to talk to the iPhone.  And, potential seems to be growing rather than shrinking.

To me, from a strategic standpoint, it does not sound like a smart move.  Apple doesn't do too many dumb things so I have to believe that there is something to this story that I'm missing.  But, right now, it sounds like it is, at best, not a smart move.

Every Single market Apple is in right now is a commodity. PC / Mobile Phones / Tablet, so I dont think commodity was ever a reason Apple leave a market.

I dont think they left, since they are folded into Apple TV team, may be Apple TV will offer Router function. 

randominternetperson said:

Anyone know the price breakdown for the major components of this?  $5K is huge money, and critics will be all about the "Apple tax."  It would help to know that the processor costs $x, the video card costs $x, the 1TB SSD costs $x, etc.  Presumably Apple is earning a margin of near 30%, so I expect these components are surprisingly expensive (adding up to well over $3000).

It is actually not in the case of iMac, because no one can price the Display. If you are just using any TN / E-IPS or even IPS Display price then it wouldn't be fair comparison.

The only 5K monitor you will find is actually the one LG partner with Apple. Dell said they would ship one long ago but nothing has happen. Many guess it was simply a problem of price and market fit. 

And when you factor in the all in one, metal casing, and Keyboard and mouse, it is actually fairly attractively priced.

The problem is, do you value the screen and Display? Do you value the high machines Aluminium casing? The speakers, the keyboard, etc.

The problem with iMac is not many wanted to pay the premium for the screen. That is llke not everyone are willing to spend 2K+ on a OLED TV.

I for one wanted the same two side cooling system for an high end CPU and GPU without going into server and workstation parts, and 2K 21" Screen will do me fine.

Unfortunately, Apple doesn't offer much choice for Desktop.

VRing said:

I don't know why this has to be so complicated. I mean, look what HP put together a year ago with the Z2 Mini G3.


Simple, small and relatively powerful.

Apple's next Mac mini doesn't need any gimmicks or fancy design. Just make it small, competitively priced and useful.

Margins and Price.

I dont think Apple has ever shipped a loss leader or low margin products. Their Margin, or Margin over time when included R&D are fairly consistent. And apart from the Windows OEM Price of about $50 Apple earned more compared to other vendor, it will be hard to make Apple's standard profits and this low cost segment.

 

iOS 11 and 11.1 were definitely slower on my iPhone 6s.  11.1 improved slightly, but was still slower then iOS 10.x

11.2, however no longer lags. It feel smooth again, whether it is faster or the same as iOS 10.x, i cant remember. But at least i am satisfy with the performance now.

As a matter of fact, ALL apps, not just iOS, feels snappier or back to what it was in iOS 10.x.

As with most iOS release Apple has decided to disable some optimization for older iDevices until later release, a practice i cant quite understand.