barthrh

How does your comment relate to calculating surcharges? To modify... it is a 43% surcharge on app prices / a 30% tax on developers.

What do you think retailers charge as a markup on hard goods on the store shelf? In the "old days" of buying software on disk, the retailers were taking 50% or more markup on wholesale. Retail is commonly a 100% markup on wholesale. Before anyone says "well you don't need to buy from that retailer", nor is that retailer obliged to put the URL of each product / competitors' stores on the shelf tags.

You don't see developers complaining as vocally about the *same* 30% cuts happening on the Sony PS / MS XBox stores because they know the alternative -- distribution, packaging, marketing, collecting from the stores, lower wholesale vs. the 30% (or 43%) "tax" -- is way worse.

twolf2919 said:

Literally everything you wrote in support of Fisker also holds for Rivian.  Although I think it very unlikely that Apple will buy any car company, Rivian would be a better fit for Apple for one simple reason: they have indicated, many times, they like to control/make all the critical components of of their products.  Fisker doesn't even make their own cars - they're produced by Magna-Steyr in Austria!  Rivian makes its own cars and has developed its own related technologies (e.g. the  motors that now drive  most of their newer vehicles).

But Munster is not the smartest tool in the shed.  He just throws stuff onto a wall and hopes something sticks.  He previously forecast Apple will produce a TV for christ sake.

If anything, Apple pairing up with a platform like Magna through an investment or partnership is the best play. I believe that EVs will become a very fractured market, much more so than ICE cars, because you can just build an experience atop a platform. Buy the battery, drivetrain, framework from a Magna, then you add the experience. We are already seeing tech companies announcing cars. The platform builders would offer a flexible array of options so that you can build a sports car, laid-back SUV, or small urban putter. It'll make for way more reliable cars, unlike so many of today's cars where they look great, but you need to be ready to for lots of garage time (most British and Italian cars?). Just look at the Supra vs. the Z4. Built on the same platform, share most of their DNA, but each manufacturer made it into something unique with design and execution tweaks.

Apple needs to get in on the platform business to get CarPlay and core electronics into these cars.

schlack said:

$24 per YEAR. SMH. Uh, no.

It doesn't stop working after a year, you just don't get updates and bug fixes. Can't imagine how they could afford to do that ongoing for $24 (or $100) one-time given the nature of what they do (support new APIs and games).

darelrex said:

I can't imagine how I would justify such an opinion.. unless I had a severe, ulterior dislike of Apple and its customers, and on that basis I hungered for any rationale for Apple to be screwed with in any way possible.

I think that these justifications come from people who don't understand business, competition and profit. Should HBO be required to license GOT and Succession? Because if you haven't watched those, you may as well use green bubbles. Should I be able to make a bike that pretends to be a fully subscribed Peloton so I can use their services and not expect to be shut down? We keep pretending that people have no choice but they do. If you don't like Apple, don't buy it. If you like the software on Apple's platform, then fucking buy it. Get an iPhone SE for cheap and have at it. "But I don't want an Apple, I just want Messages. And Daddy, I want a trained squirrel, but not any trained squirrel, I want *that* trained squirrel". 

charlesn said:

Maybe I misunderstand the market for Apple Pencil, but this has always seemed like a fairly specialized accessory for a certain segment of iPad users, but not something that the mass market wants or needs... which makes it bewildering that we now have THREE Pencil models in the lineup. Was there really a target group of potential buyers holding out for a stripped down model at the $79 price point that loses a couple of the Pencil's most desirable features?! And $79 still ain't cheap for an accessory! SMH. 

It's a real "nice to have" with an iPad that supports it. I have an original Pro 12.9 and the pencil is great for doing scratch calculations, a "back of the envelope" diagram, or even doing some degree of PDF markup (I assume it's way better w/ iOS 17 PDF editing, though I have not tried. Not essential, but I wouldn't be without one now that I've had one.