launfall

Solar would not have been the best option in Ireland...sunny days are rare and short-lived.

The article is correct about Tim not being Steve.  Jobs was a megalomaniacal genius who was wrong as often as he was right.  He misread the market so many times, but that is forgiven by the number of times he read it correctly. But he was a leader.
I am one of the Apple-watchers-buyers-stockholders who believe that the one thing Tim lacks is control over a company that is expected to be a market leader and frankly no longer is. Is it profitable? You bet it is! But it is profitable in spite of some of the stupidest blunders imaginable. Most recently: the battery throttling is the result of a continued hubris left over from Steve that Tim should long ago have extricated. Divulging new products months before they are ready to launch has repeatedly allowed competitors who are already in the market, to get a jump on Apple. And then to miss the target date is a mistake that lays directly at Tim's feet. Apple is big enough and has a diverse enough customer base to stay at the top of the tech market and any area, but instead appears to only be able to work on one product at a time. So many of Apple's products languish for years without an update that it is embarrassing. Mac Pro, Mini, AppleTV, all sit around gathering dust without updates for so long that they descend into technological mediocrity and infuriate customers who would be happy to spend the money for a quality refresh. Apple frequently releases products that are way behind the curve of what is currently available, then over prices them, then ignores them for years.

Apple's current stock price should be 50% higher than it is, and would be if Tim Cook got his act together and either actually led the company, or stepped aside to let someone else do the job. Lead, follow, or step aside. There is money to be made in gaming desktops and laptops (they are not dissimilar to pro machines), but Apple is so far behind that curve no serious gamer even looks at Apple. Apple's half-assed response to the connected-home industry, AI, professional software and hardware are ample testimony to a lack of leadership under Tim. Others are setting the bar higher than Apple seems capable of reaching, and by the time it gets close, the bar's already moved higher. Perception is often the key to profitability, and the market's belief that Apple is the technology star is no longer embedded in either the consumer's or market analyst's mind. And that's going to be Tim's legacy.

And one final point: get Jony Ive out of the business.  He has long since forgotten that form FOLLOWS function. A Mac Pro that looks like an air purifier? No one asked for that, Jony. It is NOT what the pro market wanted or needed. And the sales sucked as a result. And five years later the response is an iMac?

They are more a competitor of Android users.  It seems like the only headline that gets any attention is if it affects Apple. As this is an Applecentric site, Appleinsider should know better than to write a headline like this, as it's little more than unnecessary clickbait. If anyone should be afraid it should be Samsung, as that is Xiaomi's target. They will make no dent in Apple's bottom line.

StrangeDays said:

launfall said:

I don't for a minute think that Apple was trying to make obsolete their older iPhones. What I do believe is that Apple still suffers from the same hubris that has plagued the company since it's creation. You don't deliberately create a problem for a customer's phone because you think it's good for them.  You spell out what the update does in highly visible plain English and provide them with the means to disable the modification. Over the years I have spent well over $100,000 on Apple products, starting with the 2GS, and it has infuriated me that Apple, seemingly on a whim, will remove a product feature, only to restore it when the shit hits the fan. This "we know what's best for you" hubris is in the DNA of Apple, put there by Jobs and perpetuated by Cook.  Hopefully this slap in the face, and shareholder wrath, will wake Cook up and Apple will be a better company for it.  They deserve the opprobrium they are currently receiving and you can lay that squarely at Cook's doorstep. A CEO's job is to NOT devalue the company, and he has done just that.

Yeah no. All of your description is misunderstanding what design is — compromise. Apple makes the most popular mass market CE products on the planet, and has to make design decisions and compromises just like any place else. They don’t make the products just for you. They make them for the market and yes, must decide what’s best for that market. They get it right much more than they get it wrong — as proof just look at their numbers, people vote with their wallets. Over and over. 

Your opinions on Cook devaluing the company are peculiar considering its revenue and cash horde. I think Thursday’s earnings call will make this claim look absurd. 

You missed the point of my comment. Regardless of Apple’s intent, the effect was to force an undisclosed update on a user without describing the very real consequences or offering an alternative. That’s not just bad PR, that’s bad business decisions. The unintentional consequences are that the effect on the user can be construed as deliberate sabotage of the phone in order to sell new phones. That Apple did not foresee that there could be real and very negative reactions to this is why I believe management has failed. Implying nefarious motives to a company’s actions is universal and we have all felt that way about a company at some time. It’s not at all surprising that governments react as they do when people who use a product feel betrayed. None of this would have happened had Apple not sustained the culture that they know best. This is ample proof that they didn’t. 

I don't for a minute think that Apple was trying to make obsolete their older iPhones. What I do believe is that Apple still suffers from the same hubris that has plagued the company since it's creation. You don't deliberately create a problem for a customer's phone because you think it's good for them.  You spell out what the update does in highly visible plain English and provide them with the means to disable the modification. Over the years I have spent well over $100,000 on Apple products, starting with the 2GS, and it has infuriated me that Apple, seemingly on a whim, will remove a product feature, only to restore it when the shit hits the fan. This "we know what's best for you" hubris is in the DNA of Apple, put there by Jobs and perpetuated by Cook.  Hopefully this slap in the face, and shareholder wrath, will wake Cook up and Apple will be a better company for it.  They deserve the opprobrium they are currently receiving and you can lay that squarely at Cook's doorstep. A CEO's job is to NOT devalue the company, and he has done just that.