theothergeoff

dewme said:

[....] Apple sellers and buyers are unaccustomed to having the choices that they are now facing with the iPhone 8/8X and iPhone X and it's not certain how this will play out because it's new and different for Apple and its customers. If Apple had called the iPhone X the iPhone Pro instead, then it would be very clear what Apple's intentions were and customers would have some historical leanings to apply. Apple's MacBook, Mac, and soon, iMac product lines follow the same pattern with a "pro" moniker attached to the higher spec'd version in the product line. [....]

Customers pick up on the message about the mix and their perspectives define the reality for how the product mix is dealt with in the sales channels and by customers. Apple's launch of the iPhone X only dealt with the product and was clear as mud about the mix. Apple could have done a better job here to avoid the confusion that's playing out now.

I think the 'Pro' moniker is actually vanity title to get  professionals to bite the bullet and buy preconfigured 'Professional-configured' devices,  instead of homebrew types trying to 'cobble' ('cable') up after market upgrades in disks and componentry.    

I do think the iPhoneX is the 'next' iPhone.  not a pro model.  They want all people to move to the X, but they need to get user adoption and functional telemetry to get it right.  Pushing this out at the high end is getting the early adopters to beat the usability out of this (remember the original iPhone... basically the same situation).  

I posit they need to beta test FaceID/emojicons with millions, given their place in the [stock] market (you can't bet a 200Million unit sales per year shareholder requirement on a 'hope' that FaceID will work with every skin tone, use case, etc etc.).  

Deploying on the same A11Bionic with  8 and 8+  gives them 3 base ASP 'top market' selling points, and they don't have to significantly 'downgrade' (trade-in) anyone who says FaceID doesn't work for them (I know that first iterations iPhoto and iPhone camera  flat out didn't detect faces for most African American's I knew or took pictures of...  but that was a 'free'/'cool' feature, not a bet the business personal security feature).   You don't want people buying iPhone 7's... you minimally want your newest supply chain to pay for itself.   If the only risk is the screen, which is already rate limited, deploy at a lower rate, and see if demand outstrips supply, which is a good thing (my guess the any increase in profit margin is consumed by a risk hedge line item, hence selling any 2017 unit will be the same net profit in their plan).

Philosophically, and this is maybe something we placed on Apple: Apple tended to 'tell' people what the right technology/UI solution was and be all or nothing with that UX.  I don't think they can do that now as blatantly now.  They are economically able to do it (live on their cash if they make a major mistake), but I think strategically, they do have to maintain their base and offer 'transitional' branches, such as the 'X', and we move to AR and a millienial userbase where their avatar will need to become more 'real time' (hence the emojicon tactic) [I'm fearing the day when emojicon's read facebook/twitter posts to me].   Apple needs to experiment,educate, and market 'in real time.'

X+1 will have a better FaceID, 'rightsized' bezels, and iOS 12 will have better interactions for same.   Ipads will come with FaceID, and the same bezel rightsizing, and deliver something you can hold and use effectively in that larger form factor.  the UX will become normalized.

I think their messaging is clear.  Buy what you want/need.

pakitt said:

Who will buy the iPhone8? me!  
And why? because it is faster? maybe.
Because of the design? not really.
Why then? Because:

• I like my privacy to be protected
• I like a company that has updated my 3 years' old iPhone with iOS11 and still works really well, thank you very much
• Apple strives to use 100% renewable resources in anything it does (and I know about it - what are other companies doing? do we know?)
• Apple offers an integrated environment that makes it easy to share my life with whom I decide to (and not to advertisers)
• the 8 has what appears to be from first tests, a fantastic camera that will likely make selling my DSLR a no brainer (and not because it is a replacement of a DSLR, but because for the usage patterns I have, it perfectly fulfills the task and even outperforms) and it is the key reason to upgrade from the 3 years' old 6
  
• and yes... because the X is fantastic, but too expensive for my budget and is a first gen tech and the notch I don't really like.

Looking forward to the X3 in 3 years!  

point 1.  err, the same 'privacy' risks exist on the iPhone8 and the iPhoneX.  FaceID doesn't increase your risk, except for 'normalizing' using an image for an identity (and if that is the issue, well, then, photo IDs were the beginning of your downfall).  6 vs 8 vs X is no trade off in privacy.  If you feel someone will unlock your phone  by forcibly opening your eyes infront  of your phone, you have bigger problems than thinking the 8 "protects" your privacy.  

points 2,3,4,  motherhood and Apple(tm) pie arguments

point 5: from a 6, yes, the 8 is a great camera.  8+ is better, and likely enough for anyone, like you, that the DSLR was only because you wanted 'good' pictures, not because you needed a photo platform for special needs/conditions (I still have a 12 year old 7MP DSLR, because it handles telephoto lenses, and I shoot sports in sketchy light.  I take 90% of my pics with an iPhone, and I think the larger sensor will tip the edge for moving away from my 66-206mm telephoto lens ).

point last: Your last point is actually the right point (and/or it's confirmation bias of my primary concern).  'dotZero' releases from Apple, especially with hardware, need some burn in.  I've always bought 's' releases (3Gs, 4s, 6s, and even a 5SE for my work phone) for that reason.  As for the notch: I'm not holding my breath. my guess it's here for at least 1 more year, and after that, when a new geometry comes to the fore (they support too many now), they'll change the notch.

I'm torn... I want the better camera of the 8+, but even with my big hands, I have small thumbs, so the screen is too big for 1 hand use.

Me: I'm holding out for the 2018 'X' version, unless my cracked 6s screen drives me into buying an 8 before then.  At this point, Apple Watch 3/air pod2s is a more compelling 2017 spend (my first watch).

sumergo said:

boogerman2000 said:

sumergo said:

My problem with FaceID is that it further degrades our individual privacy and makes us more vulnerable to both over-officious government and predatory marketing.

TouchID is my physical finger on this phone.  FaceID is my face on a potentially global database.  Coming from the UK, one of the most surveilled societies in the western world, I find this worrying.

I'm not interested in being reduced to a target for near-field / face-recognition ads or constant surveilance.

An old fart?  For sure - I actually like being an individual.

Privacy and individuality are largely a thing of the past. "Social" media / tech hv brought on a paradigm so shift so quickly and so thoroughly, most people have yet to comprehend that it's happened.  

So true.  Check out:
http://www.npr.org/2017/09/13/548662507/world-without-mind-is-an-urgent-personal-polemic
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/chapman/ct-perspec-iphone-x-unabomber-technology-20170913-story.html

We are the wrong species.  250,000 year old, hunter-gatherer brains, grappling with nuclear technology & always-on, instant communications.  It must be clear that we don't see to be able to handle this complexity ;-(

This isn't some 'new problem.'  Scott McNealey (sun microsystems) said it in 1999... "Consumer privacy issues are a “red herring.  You have zero privacy anyway. Get over it.” 

sumergo:

You're not old, you believe in a fantasy.  

you stopped being an individual once you took on a last name, a voting card, or passport.  You are part of an economic system.  You have hundreds of identities. and your image is not some secret, let alone whether or not FaceID data can be reconstructed to identify 'you'.    FaceID doesn't degrade our individual privacy no more than walking outside, and arguably less so.  
(I posit that your understanding of FaceID is less than complete, and based on the premise you have that Apple's secure enclave isn't secure)

Your iPhone does compromise your identity (not your individuality).
The existence of your AppleID degrades your individual privacy, not FaceID
Your IPaddress (yes, for the most part with IPV6, your carrier locks you down to an identifiable ID for your device) does as well. 

and your carrier does as well.

You should be more worried about your android/dumb/apple phones IPV6... it leaks more  information about you due to how carriers set you up than FaceID leaked the one way hash of your mathematical mappings of your face.   I spoke with ATT, and they are not far getting to the point that they can tell if it's you based on the GPS data they can gather ("...we've got his IPV6 signal... and GPS feedback... It's him, not his wife... he typically carries his phone 1.1 meters off the ground and walks at 3m/second, with a 7cm bounce, all parameters meet his biometric profile").  [yes...  the downside of Gbps LTE is they get telemetry continually, and triangulation is part of the managing performance]

In the US, ATT and NSA are pretty much joined at the [GB optical] hip when it comes to data collection. FaceID ain't gonna improve that.

Best be up in a cabin in the mountains in montana, wearing a hoodie and carving exquisite wooden boxes [preferably without the 'surprise'], if you want 'individual privacy'

Soli said:

macplusplus said:

OS X was X because of UNIX, not because of anything tenth.  X to denominate UNIX was common in the 90s.

Can you back that up? I've always heard Apple say it as '10' and it came after Mac OS 9. In fact, this is the first time I've ever heard anyone say that the 'X' is because they wanted the last letter of the word Unix.

for us oldsters, legend has alluded that Mac OS 10 was written with the  roman numeral X  for 3 reasons

1) The X was the most prominent part of the branding, and was there to represent its unix compatibility.
       At the time, Windows (or Mac OS 9) wasn't considered 'workstation' (a 'mainframe' OS on a desktop) quality, compared to Sun, SGI, Ultrix, HP-UX.
Look at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ko4V3G4NqII
       3 minutes in:  Very Linux Like
and  http://www.osnews.com/story/691/The_Roots_of_MacOSX
       
2) a veiled homage to NeXTstep (avi tevanian liked it, and hated when for marketing purposes, they renamed NeXTSTEP to OPENSTEP when they went cross platform).  The decision to start 'Rhapsody' with Mach/BSD (NeXTSTEP) and kill 'Copeland'.  Apple marketing* was driving to pronounce it  "oh ess ten",  the old NeXT engineering teams called it 'Oh-esS-eks' (or OS-NeXT),  rhyming with POSIX  'paws-eks' (a key standard Apple was driving to for corporate sales)

*At the time of the NeXT purchase, Apple had AU/X.  'Apple Unix with Xwindows'.  A good OS, but a commercial failure (like all Xwindows desktops were a consumer failure).  
The calling of it as Oh-ess-ten is often attributed to making sure Mac faithful knew that their Classic Mac stuff would work (in blue box), and this new OS  wasn't incompatible like AU/X was.  Old Apple Marketing was heels dug in about pronouncing it 'eks', and new Apple Marketing wanted to highlight the Unix underpinning of a 'single, real, modern' operating system (vs Windows 98 and NT and CE, and 2000).   Using X as a symbol and 10 as a name was the marketing compromise, New and totally different, yet, just the next Mac Operating system.

3) A tech marketing tenet from the 60's and 70's was to use X in brand names (Xerox, AMEX, FedEX), as it sounded 'techie' (likely from X-Ray) for the double sublimal message of 'unknown/variable' [cool compared to a constant], and mind seeing the X and mentally alliterating to 'seX' (maybe a guy thing). 

(this was attributed in the urban legend  of Digital Equipment' 32bit computer name an impure Acronym: VAX: 'Virtual Addressing eXtention'  They wanted a 3 letter acronym that reference Virtual addressing and had an X in it )

Ever wonder why they called it Pepsi Max?  

Soli said:

welshdog said:

This theater seems very small compared to the venues used for past product announcements.

Anyone know?

The number of seats for other venues have ranged from 300 to just 1,600 seats.

• Apple Town Hall ≈ 300
• Yerba Buena Center ≈ 760
• Steve Jobs Theater ≈1000
• Bill Graham Center ≈ 1600 (for iPhone events)

You have to assume that with all the space and planning that Apple didn't make a mistake with how many media outlets they'd need to plan for for many years to come. I think what we saw in the past at Bill Graham was a lot of Apple employees getting invites to help fill the seats. This will probably suck for them, but I wouldn't expect that the event will have any less media coverage than in the past, if that's your concern.

and... with it being on campus (in the future), and the big releases requiring demo areas set up, the employees can walk/shuttle over to the demo tent afterward from a satellite viewing location.  It's not like it's several miles away from their work site (yes, I know Apple has lots of work sites, and yes, the building isn't occupied now).

I'll be more interested in 'first show glitches*' for the venue, and how they avoid them (given the history of apple event prepping).   I'm wondering how many employees will be bussed in to sit in the room the day before, listening to a dry run or 3, shuttled in and out to practice crowd control, etc.  And after they leave, the 'real presentations' are rehearsed late into the night.

*This will be  the first time 1000(more likely 1300+ with staff) warm, sound emitting and absorbing, bodies sit in that venue for 3 hours, with the cameras rolling live, Cell phones and WiFi radiating, bathrooms at capacity....