Apple is now an antifragile company(tidbits.com)
tidbits.com
Apple is now an antifragile company
https://tidbits.com/2021/07/30/apple-is-now-an-antifragile-company/
329 comments
Maybe it's just me, but the integration of my Apple ecosystem makes each device feel generations ahead of my Windows/Linux devices. The whole UX flow is just so damn smooth and convenient, from AirPlay to controlling my smart home. I can't imagine doing this with non-Apple devices.
Apple does not even have to be the best at everything, or even particularly great at everything. What they need to do is be good at integrating everything, which they are.
Apple does not even have to be the best at everything, or even particularly great at everything. What they need to do is be good at integrating everything, which they are.
I used to think like you.. Then Apple took away my ability to fully control network traffic on my computer. Before that they took away my ability to upgrade storage and RAM. And even before that, there were always sacrifices to be made to get the Apple experience.
So yes the UX is great (I would not say amazing) and when the integration exists, the experience is almost always fantastic..
But I've always felt like it has come with trade-offs, and in recent years Apple has moved the balance enough that I no longer believe the trade-offs are worth it for me, at least when it comes to my daily driver computer.
I moved back to Windows (+Linux thanks to WSL2) in 2020 - after being a Mac-first user for almost 15 years - and am very happy with my choice.
So yes the UX is great (I would not say amazing) and when the integration exists, the experience is almost always fantastic..
But I've always felt like it has come with trade-offs, and in recent years Apple has moved the balance enough that I no longer believe the trade-offs are worth it for me, at least when it comes to my daily driver computer.
I moved back to Windows (+Linux thanks to WSL2) in 2020 - after being a Mac-first user for almost 15 years - and am very happy with my choice.
You can imagine that controlling network traffic or upgrading RAM are not abilities that the vast majority of people are concerned about, even in tech.
Thats the thing, most people don't need those particular things. But a lot of people need something very particular that very few others need. The problem is not that apple doesn't support a particular use case, but that they cant support all niche cases.
Microsoft / Linux doesn't do everything, but if you need something specific you can bet that there is someone out there that provides that functionality for those platforms.
Microsoft / Linux doesn't do everything, but if you need something specific you can bet that there is someone out there that provides that functionality for those platforms.
Of course it's not a concern for all users, definitely the network one, but I think you're underestimating how commonplace RAM upgrades are.
In my own circles (so anecdotally) I've had plenty of conversations over the last 20+ years about helping tech and non-tech people upgrade RAM on their computers, including laptops.. And in the last 5 years I've heard plenty of people be surprised (and bummed) that they can't upgrade the RAM on their Macs post-purchase anymore.
And of course maxing out the RAM at purchase time is a complete rip-off compared to market prices.
Every Mac I've owned (5 machines across desktops/laptops from 2006 through to 2016 I think), I eventually upgraded the RAM myself via aftermarket parts at reasonable market rates and it greatly extended the life of the computer.
Given the premium cost you already pay for a Mac, not being able to do this anymore is a deal breaker, for me at least.
In my own circles (so anecdotally) I've had plenty of conversations over the last 20+ years about helping tech and non-tech people upgrade RAM on their computers, including laptops.. And in the last 5 years I've heard plenty of people be surprised (and bummed) that they can't upgrade the RAM on their Macs post-purchase anymore.
And of course maxing out the RAM at purchase time is a complete rip-off compared to market prices.
Every Mac I've owned (5 machines across desktops/laptops from 2006 through to 2016 I think), I eventually upgraded the RAM myself via aftermarket parts at reasonable market rates and it greatly extended the life of the computer.
Given the premium cost you already pay for a Mac, not being able to do this anymore is a deal breaker, for me at least.
They're concerned about it, but non-technical people get hooked on the familiar. They often don't want to learn a new UI when they know one already.
I have a friend who has a 2015-ish Macbook with 4GB RAM - and she is getting into Photoshop.
So her computer works well for her. The monitor is good enough, the CPU is good, and so on. 4GB just won't cut it.
Since she can't upgrade her RAM for $150 like she should, she has to get a new computer. But she likes the trackpad and the Apple UI so much, she is going to get an iMac with 16GB RAM and 256GB SSD for $1600, instead of a Windows PC with a top-line processor, 32GB RAM, 27" screen and 1TB+ of SSD.
I have a friend who has a 2015-ish Macbook with 4GB RAM - and she is getting into Photoshop.
So her computer works well for her. The monitor is good enough, the CPU is good, and so on. 4GB just won't cut it.
Since she can't upgrade her RAM for $150 like she should, she has to get a new computer. But she likes the trackpad and the Apple UI so much, she is going to get an iMac with 16GB RAM and 256GB SSD for $1600, instead of a Windows PC with a top-line processor, 32GB RAM, 27" screen and 1TB+ of SSD.
The retina screen alone would cost $400+ for a windows. And the Mac is much more of a pro tool when doing creative work. My windows machines always crash on me.
I haven't had windows crash on me when I wasn't doing driver stuff in literally years. Something is wrong with your hardware, unless you're talking about the software that you are using on windows. If those crash it's not windows fault it's just bad programming.
If that’s the case you are the lucky one. It’s surely not a coincidence that Windows software suffers from “bad programming” 50x more often.
There is simply no contest in reliability, you’re always expecting a new problem with windows - just yesterday, in fact, an OS update disabled my network card and I had to reinstall everything to “fix” it. You can use a Mac for years without even knowing what a driver is.
There is simply no contest in reliability, you’re always expecting a new problem with windows - just yesterday, in fact, an OS update disabled my network card and I had to reinstall everything to “fix” it. You can use a Mac for years without even knowing what a driver is.
Working in a company where I deal with equal amount of Macs an Windows, we spend a lot more time dealing with Mac issues that simply cannot be solved due to either hardware or software limitations Apple have put in place.
Windows is very solid and we rarely see issues with it on decent hardware which still costs 1/2 of what a lower spec Mac equivalent.
Windows is very solid and we rarely see issues with it on decent hardware which still costs 1/2 of what a lower spec Mac equivalent.
I use both macOS and Windows daily, and I think I saw like one BSOD in the last year, and quite a lot more kernel panics on macOS.
Regarding the software I use, I wouldn't say that it's any more stable on macOS than on Windows.
Regarding the software I use, I wouldn't say that it's any more stable on macOS than on Windows.
If you want to do mouse-intensive work on a laptop the mac trackpad is the only way to go.
I spent several minutes trying to get my AirPods to connect to my phone today instead of my iPad. Ended up being late for a call because of it. Happens a few times a week. More than irritating. First world problem, to be sure. But still the whole “it just works” line irks me no end.
Sounds like a problem with your AirPods or your iPad's saved Bluetooth device settings.
I've literally never had a problem for years. Switching is seamless. I don't even have to manually switch, it happens automagically. Same for everyone I know with AirPods.
I've literally never had a problem for years. Switching is seamless. I don't even have to manually switch, it happens automagically. Same for everyone I know with AirPods.
This is exactly how I feel too...
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That's the very reason I stay on the fringes of the Apple ecosystem. The approach of an Apple branded version of everything means that if you don't want exactly what they give you then you have a terrible time. You're either all in or all out.
I don't consider myself overly dogmatic about controlling my devices or data but the thought of going all in on one tech company for my gadgets for the next decade or so is both gross and, to be honest, really boring. I don't see how I could get excited about tech when the only choice I get is what colour it is (or the storage space).
I don't consider myself overly dogmatic about controlling my devices or data but the thought of going all in on one tech company for my gadgets for the next decade or so is both gross and, to be honest, really boring. I don't see how I could get excited about tech when the only choice I get is what colour it is (or the storage space).
Really boring is how I want my phone to behave: secure and boring. The fact they have a watch that works seamlessly also helps.
I don’t think of these things as gadgets anymore. In the past I’ve built a Linux DVR - so I know how to tinker and find it fun for certain things but not things I depend on and want to behave like appliances. I don’t tinker with my refrigerator or my automobile either.
I don’t think of these things as gadgets anymore. In the past I’ve built a Linux DVR - so I know how to tinker and find it fun for certain things but not things I depend on and want to behave like appliances. I don’t tinker with my refrigerator or my automobile either.
I would describe modern Android as boring and not require tinkering either. Secure is tougher and up to the OEM to keep up with patches.
Certain things with iOS are just overly difficult like getting files on or off or trying to add new music to the music app without a PC.
Certain things with iOS are just overly difficult like getting files on or off or trying to add new music to the music app without a PC.
Android is extremely secure if you don't put a bunch of relatively unknown apps on it and don't root it. I would say on par with iphone easily. I only pick iphone because they do a much better job of keeping apps and such from spying on you. Also android is constantly updating the google mothership on your location and habits.
You don’t think Apple does any surveillance and sell to companies? They don’t reject apps that spy, just the ones that do without a benefit to them.
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You are right. If you do mainstream things and stay within their products it works great. The thing is that what is bleeding edge today is mainstream tomorrow. The worlds brain trust is moving away from Apple, and if Apple wants to keep up they cant rely on anyone else to help them.
> The worlds brain trust is moving away from Apple
Not really, the M1 is a smashing success with most techies. People seem to like the phones too. The watches are doing really well too. Oh, and the tablets are really popular also. Even with techies.
There seems to be a group of people sworn never to be corrupted by the evil Apple and their evil ways. I first saw it on /., and the same group has been ringing out death knells for Apple ever since.
Not really, the M1 is a smashing success with most techies. People seem to like the phones too. The watches are doing really well too. Oh, and the tablets are really popular also. Even with techies.
There seems to be a group of people sworn never to be corrupted by the evil Apple and their evil ways. I first saw it on /., and the same group has been ringing out death knells for Apple ever since.
I don't think people are leaving Apple hardware, but I would say they are leaving/no longer entering Apple's software stack. Native Mac dev is plummiting, native iOS dev has probably peaked by now. I see less enthusiasm jumping on new Apple features and protocols that come out every year than I used to.
It feels similar to the end of MS's domiance. They were always profitable and had huge marketshare, but just because everybody was running Windows, that didn't mean they were really embracing the full MS ecosystem. Apple feels that way today.
It feels similar to the end of MS's domiance. They were always profitable and had huge marketshare, but just because everybody was running Windows, that didn't mean they were really embracing the full MS ecosystem. Apple feels that way today.
people have been predicting the end of Apple for 25 years. I've been there the whole time and have heard it all before.
I'm not saying its the end of Apple. There was no end of IBM or MS either, in fact while both companies were losing developer mindshare they were making record profits.
I'm talking about a much more nebulous concept of a company as a thought leader, one that people follow. There was a time when the rumor of MS entering a market would cause competition to shut down. Now nobody blinks an eye when MS ships an actual product that competes with them.
And in that regard, I think we're seeing the end of Apple's role as a technologically interesting company (at least wrt software). For example it used to be pretty much only Apple and a few exclusive MacOS developers who actually cared about design. Now designing thinking has gone mainstream all while Apple seems to be busy ignoring everything from their classic HIG.
I'm talking about a much more nebulous concept of a company as a thought leader, one that people follow. There was a time when the rumor of MS entering a market would cause competition to shut down. Now nobody blinks an eye when MS ships an actual product that competes with them.
And in that regard, I think we're seeing the end of Apple's role as a technologically interesting company (at least wrt software). For example it used to be pretty much only Apple and a few exclusive MacOS developers who actually cared about design. Now designing thinking has gone mainstream all while Apple seems to be busy ignoring everything from their classic HIG.
I don't know if I live in another world but I rarely see an Apple Watch or an iPad (not anymore). I've seen maybe 5 Apple watches in my life between Europe and Asia.
I live in Europe and it's been the exact opposite. Apple watches used to seem like a novelty, but now like half the people in my social circle have one.
This is also true in developing Asia. I'm in Thailand and although you won't see many Thai people wearing them they all know what they are and almost all of them would like to own one if they weren't considered such an extravagant expense. Apple watch is basically a luxury item and so that means that as these other countries start to become more wealthy it's just more growth for Apple as more people start being able to afford it.
I am not saying they don't want it but I don't see it often. It is of course a luxury item, but while I see that people buy an iPhone for their social status, they probably can't afford both. And it probably comes lower in the list of social status/usage ratio as a golden watch could replace an Apple watch, but not an iPhone.
I live in Sweden, it feels like every third person I see wearing a watch is wearing an Apple watch. It is by far the single most common watch brand I see.
Same with iPads. By far the most common brand of large screen device I see. Outside of office environments I see more iPads than laptops, and even in office environments I'm seeing more iPads today than even just 3 years ago.
Same with iPads. By far the most common brand of large screen device I see. Outside of office environments I see more iPads than laptops, and even in office environments I'm seeing more iPads today than even just 3 years ago.
Maybe smart watches are not super common in general. Actually, even wristwatches are rare to see. But, among those that do wear smart watches, it's often the Apple products IME.
iPads are doing exceptionally well, I'm surprised you are unaware. They're replacing laptops for a lot of users, especially those that did not grow up around PCs. It's just that you won't often see them in public.
iPads are doing exceptionally well, I'm surprised you are unaware. They're replacing laptops for a lot of users, especially those that did not grow up around PCs. It's just that you won't often see them in public.
Apple is small potatoes outside of the USA. There is a world beyond the Valley and it's orders of magnitude larger.
I wish I had such "small potatoes" growing in my backyard ...
Apple has a significant presence in Central Europe. Not overwhelming one, American market is obviously a stronger one. It might have something to do with purchasing power parity, which is still not that good behind the former Iron Curtain. But it is a big player here, especially in the richer demographics.
I have never used any Apple products, but I am tempted. People will sing paeans about how their gadgets just work and interact together. I am more of a tinkering-hacking type, so I do not really mind delving deep into my Windows or Linux installation, but Android messes with me sometimes.
Apple has a significant presence in Central Europe. Not overwhelming one, American market is obviously a stronger one. It might have something to do with purchasing power parity, which is still not that good behind the former Iron Curtain. But it is a big player here, especially in the richer demographics.
I have never used any Apple products, but I am tempted. People will sing paeans about how their gadgets just work and interact together. I am more of a tinkering-hacking type, so I do not really mind delving deep into my Windows or Linux installation, but Android messes with me sometimes.
One thing about those small potatoes though: They buy software. You can actually get paid for apps on iOS way easier than Android, and it shows.
The Apple watch is the number one selling watch (not even just smart watch).
There's definitely a huge market of people buying it.
Whenever I go out in major cities in the US, Canada or the UK, I'll always see someone with it
There's definitely a huge market of people buying it.
Whenever I go out in major cities in the US, Canada or the UK, I'll always see someone with it
I have quite a few apple products but none of them new. My problem with Apple is the price. My opinion is that there is always a less expensive & just as capable alternative to anything Apple has to offer, so for my use case it doesn't make sense to pay more.
The Apple products I do have were either broken and given or sold to me to repair or found at thrift shops and pawn shops for deep discounts, and they are all going up for sale soon to recoup my expenses.
The Apple products I do have were either broken and given or sold to me to repair or found at thrift shops and pawn shops for deep discounts, and they are all going up for sale soon to recoup my expenses.
That's the Nintendo problem: how do you create a platform, when your first party solutions are incredibly well-executed?
You need third parties (sort of) for scaling and long tail reasons, but it's always an uneasy relationship.
If you don't expand enough, or the market doesn't generate a solution, your platform has a gap. If you expand too much, third party developers feel burned and desert your platform.
Microsoft solved this by clearly staking its monetized territory ("the office suite"), and not really expanding in other directions (after those weird 90s attempts).
You need third parties (sort of) for scaling and long tail reasons, but it's always an uneasy relationship.
If you don't expand enough, or the market doesn't generate a solution, your platform has a gap. If you expand too much, third party developers feel burned and desert your platform.
Microsoft solved this by clearly staking its monetized territory ("the office suite"), and not really expanding in other directions (after those weird 90s attempts).
Thats a great example. I love Nintendo. Mario and Zelda is always great, but historically Nintendo has not been a good platform for 3rd party developers (I read somewhere that 30% of wii owners didn't know you could take out wii sports and replace it with another game...). The bets that Nintendo has made that hasn't been smash hits, have been terrible failures, because no one else is there to pick up the slack.
If you buy an X-Box, and the next Halo turns out to suck, you are still going to get your moneys worth of 3rd party titles.
If you buy an X-Box, and the next Halo turns out to suck, you are still going to get your moneys worth of 3rd party titles.
There's a big difference between the two in business model: Sony and MS had to care about attach rates and third party software sales, because they (at least initially) took a loss with each console sold: The only way they could make money was if people bought a bunch of software so they'd get licensing revenues.
The Wii was designed with different assumptions in mind, which led to a lean machine they could sell at a profit. Someone buying and Xbox and Gears of War was a huge problem for Microsoft, if someone bought a Wii and Mario Kart, it was just fine for Nintendo as long as the customer was happy: Every sale was profit, plain and simple.
I don't know about the Wii not being good for 3rd parties either, it's more that the Wii didn't do what the 3rd parties wanted to do (high tech edgelord games). So we got completely moronic things like a Castlevania fighting game, a Soul Calibur that wasn't a fighting game. How about Dead Space, a slow, ponderous horror title? Yeah, the devs turned it into a rail shooter, just about the most anti-horror genre choice imaginable.
In simple terms, they thought the Wii userbase were morons who would lap up anything - after all, they'd bought a motion control toaster to play technically really simplistic titles, and in the devs' world, technically simplistic = bad. So they gave people disrespectful shovelware, which, surprise surprise, bombed.
They had the opportunity to make solid titles - the Wii may have been a toaster, but it was still beefier than the PS2 or Gamecube which had a lot of really good titles and anyone who's played Metroid Prime knows those controls are crack.
I think the big miss with the Wii wasn't how good/bad it was, but communication. What was the philosophy behind the machine, Nintendo communicating that, the devs really trying to understand that.
The Wii was designed with different assumptions in mind, which led to a lean machine they could sell at a profit. Someone buying and Xbox and Gears of War was a huge problem for Microsoft, if someone bought a Wii and Mario Kart, it was just fine for Nintendo as long as the customer was happy: Every sale was profit, plain and simple.
I don't know about the Wii not being good for 3rd parties either, it's more that the Wii didn't do what the 3rd parties wanted to do (high tech edgelord games). So we got completely moronic things like a Castlevania fighting game, a Soul Calibur that wasn't a fighting game. How about Dead Space, a slow, ponderous horror title? Yeah, the devs turned it into a rail shooter, just about the most anti-horror genre choice imaginable.
In simple terms, they thought the Wii userbase were morons who would lap up anything - after all, they'd bought a motion control toaster to play technically really simplistic titles, and in the devs' world, technically simplistic = bad. So they gave people disrespectful shovelware, which, surprise surprise, bombed.
They had the opportunity to make solid titles - the Wii may have been a toaster, but it was still beefier than the PS2 or Gamecube which had a lot of really good titles and anyone who's played Metroid Prime knows those controls are crack.
I think the big miss with the Wii wasn't how good/bad it was, but communication. What was the philosophy behind the machine, Nintendo communicating that, the devs really trying to understand that.
The Nintendo comparison is missing some nuance as well. Nintendo was a gaming company that got caught in a war between the two giants Sony and MS for total control of the living room. For Sony and MS, gaming was just a single division that they were willing to take losses on or invest heavily then wait years for payback due to the consoles filling multiple strategic objectives. MS and Sony dumped tons of cash into developing their 3rd party game libraries where Nintendo relied on their in-house development to seed their consoles with games and make most of their money.
Plus, show me another (mobile) device maker that still provides major OS updates after 5+ years.
Seriously. iOS 15 supports the 6s, released in 2015, and it’ll work fine assuming you put new batteries in it as the battery degrades.
That’s why I finally switched to iOS for my phone, and iPhones are quite affordable if you buy used a few generations old. Nevertheless, I couldn’t go back to OSX after years of using primarily Linux.
I agree this is important for security updates. However, Android is not monolothic. Browser, carrier services, even the phone app are updated independently of the operating system image for well into the future.
https://fairphone.com
Also GNU/Linux phones running mainline Linux kernel (but they don't exist for 5 years yet).
Also GNU/Linux phones running mainline Linux kernel (but they don't exist for 5 years yet).
This is ultimately why I switched from android to ios. The new SE at < $200 was also a factor.
The SE is $400 for 64GB, $450 for 128GB, and $550 for 256GB.
https://www.apple.com/shop/buy-iphone/iphone-se
https://www.apple.com/shop/buy-iphone/iphone-se
Theres actually a deal with walmart for verizon/AT&T customers that you can get it for... $175ish I believe now? It was $200 when I did it.
EDIT: its $149 currently https://www.walmart.com/ip/Verizon-Apple-iPhone-SE-2020-64GB...
EDIT: its $149 currently https://www.walmart.com/ip/Verizon-Apple-iPhone-SE-2020-64GB...
Yes, but you can easily find it for less than that. Here is one for $282 on Amazon: https://smile.amazon.com/dp/B088NQXD8T
I'm sure you could find even better deals on eBay.
I'm sure you could find even better deals on eBay.
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It ain't. It's also far easier to integrate everything when you control everything. My current Samsung tablet and phone have the same levels of integration as my iPad/iPhone did. They can share calls, texts, pass files etc. Windows does a good job integrating with my phone too.
Smarthome is one place Apple fell down. I tried to add my hue lights and instead of just automatically finding the hub like Amazon and Google I was supposed to take a picture of a sticker? Could never get it to work. They also took far too long getting an affordable voice speaker for the home out. I'm not digging my phone out every time either.
Smarthome is one place Apple fell down. I tried to add my hue lights and instead of just automatically finding the hub like Amazon and Google I was supposed to take a picture of a sticker? Could never get it to work. They also took far too long getting an affordable voice speaker for the home out. I'm not digging my phone out every time either.
> from AirPlay to controlling my smart home. I can't imagine doing this with non-Apple devices
That's because many smart home devices are only supporting the duopoly OOB due to their market prominence, indeed both Apple & Google are doing something good enough to retain their *poly position.
If the smart home devices have open API, then there's no reason for it to work great with anything else. A case in point, put KDEConnect on Android, Linux Phone or Sailfish and you can even play the audio from your desktop browser on your phone speaker.
That's because many smart home devices are only supporting the duopoly OOB due to their market prominence, indeed both Apple & Google are doing something good enough to retain their *poly position.
If the smart home devices have open API, then there's no reason for it to work great with anything else. A case in point, put KDEConnect on Android, Linux Phone or Sailfish and you can even play the audio from your desktop browser on your phone speaker.
>then there's no reason for it to *not work great with anything else
> from AirPlay
It’s funny that you take AirPlay as an example. I would have agreed with most other things, but AirPlay is light years behind stuff like Google Cast or Spotify Connect.
It’s funny that you take AirPlay as an example. I would have agreed with most other things, but AirPlay is light years behind stuff like Google Cast or Spotify Connect.
It all works beautifully until it doesn't then it all becomes close to worthless.
Take getting videos off an iPhone for instance, something I have to do many times a week in my job.
If you have AirDrop it's effortless. But my MBP has a faulty bluetooth chip so bluetooth generally stops working after the machine has been running a few hours so I need to reboot every time I move videos from my phone to my machine.
Are there alternatives? Nope not really, moving iPhone videos to a PC, Which most video editing workstations are now because Apple neglected or fumbled the high end for close to a decade. You can't AirDrop so what do you do?
- WhatsApp? Nope has a 60 meg limit - Slack? Nope, for some reason trying to send video files 90% of the time stalls or just takes close to 20 minutes. I think they have some built in throttling to prevent my using their service as a AirDrop-drop in because airdropping then sending the same video from desktop is fast - Email? Nope, files are too big
Only real solutions are AirDropping to a Mac then sending on slack or over network or trying to figure out how to do it over the network via the Files app which is also slow and weird.
All that beautiful interoperability goes from being a benefit to actually making the product look bad the second it can't just interoperate with things you need to get your work done.
End of the day they can't do everything and are unwilling to create machines that are competitive in these niche areas but once you're in this niche the whole Apple philosophy starts to look like a bad one.
All it would take would be for them to release an AirDrop for Windows app which would make their platform look better, I'm still your customer even when I have to send a file to a Windows machine Apple... not providing that feature isn't making Windows look bad because the reason I'm there in the first place is because it outperforms even a $20K Mac Pro.
Take getting videos off an iPhone for instance, something I have to do many times a week in my job.
If you have AirDrop it's effortless. But my MBP has a faulty bluetooth chip so bluetooth generally stops working after the machine has been running a few hours so I need to reboot every time I move videos from my phone to my machine.
Are there alternatives? Nope not really, moving iPhone videos to a PC, Which most video editing workstations are now because Apple neglected or fumbled the high end for close to a decade. You can't AirDrop so what do you do?
- WhatsApp? Nope has a 60 meg limit - Slack? Nope, for some reason trying to send video files 90% of the time stalls or just takes close to 20 minutes. I think they have some built in throttling to prevent my using their service as a AirDrop-drop in because airdropping then sending the same video from desktop is fast - Email? Nope, files are too big
Only real solutions are AirDropping to a Mac then sending on slack or over network or trying to figure out how to do it over the network via the Files app which is also slow and weird.
All that beautiful interoperability goes from being a benefit to actually making the product look bad the second it can't just interoperate with things you need to get your work done.
End of the day they can't do everything and are unwilling to create machines that are competitive in these niche areas but once you're in this niche the whole Apple philosophy starts to look like a bad one.
All it would take would be for them to release an AirDrop for Windows app which would make their platform look better, I'm still your customer even when I have to send a file to a Windows machine Apple... not providing that feature isn't making Windows look bad because the reason I'm there in the first place is because it outperforms even a $20K Mac Pro.
These came to mind right away and work for both macOS and Windows:
- Upload to a cloud storage service of your choice and download on the other end—Google Drive is very fast
- Use iCloud Photos (there’s client software for Windows too)
- Plug a cable in and drag and drop like it’s any other digital camera
- Create a Windows SMB network share (or Samba on other platforms), connect to it from Files, and use the share menu from Photos to put it in the network share
- Upload to a cloud storage service of your choice and download on the other end—Google Drive is very fast
- Use iCloud Photos (there’s client software for Windows too)
- Plug a cable in and drag and drop like it’s any other digital camera
- Create a Windows SMB network share (or Samba on other platforms), connect to it from Files, and use the share menu from Photos to put it in the network share
> Plug a cable in and drag and drop like it’s any other digital camera
Yeah, this rarely works. It takes a long time to acknowledge there's any files, and then it tries to copy them, and then crashes instead. Over and over. Turning off the mechanism that autoconverts image files from HEIC to JPG helps (I never tried JUST video files, but those are unreliable either way in my experience). Obnoxious, overall.
Yeah, this rarely works. It takes a long time to acknowledge there's any files, and then it tries to copy them, and then crashes instead. Over and over. Turning off the mechanism that autoconverts image files from HEIC to JPG helps (I never tried JUST video files, but those are unreliable either way in my experience). Obnoxious, overall.
What about copying to a USB memory?
Straight from the phone? How do you do that?
Hmm I was thinking about a USB cable to the laptop (I do with my Android), but wrote USB memory instead.
Now I see in the comment above that cables often don't work.
I wonder if there're apps for saving files to USB memories
Now I see in the comment above that cables often don't work.
I wonder if there're apps for saving files to USB memories
Couldn’t you just use Dropbox or iCloud Photo Library? Yes you would have to pay.
I think you can transfer photos and videos for free using a usb cable as well. https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/import-photos-an...
I think you can transfer photos and videos for free using a usb cable as well. https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/import-photos-an...
In my experience - AirDrop works as expected about 30% of the time. Enough to make it absolutely by far the worst option for file sharing.
I don’t even consider it an ‘option’ anymore while transferring files. I’ll just upload it to my server, since I know - by default - even on the same wifi network, AirDrop is as useful as picking a number in your head and having a friend guess it.
I can’t honestly think of a regular ‘service’ on iOS and MacOS that is as fundamentally broken as AirDrop. I’m not sure what’s so complicated about writing a device to device file sharing service, but - for instance - I just tried to share a file from my Mac to my iPhone. Didn’t work; don’t see my iPhone. Same wifi network - no firewall; no filters. This is a majority of the time.
I don’t even consider it an ‘option’ anymore while transferring files. I’ll just upload it to my server, since I know - by default - even on the same wifi network, AirDrop is as useful as picking a number in your head and having a friend guess it.
I can’t honestly think of a regular ‘service’ on iOS and MacOS that is as fundamentally broken as AirDrop. I’m not sure what’s so complicated about writing a device to device file sharing service, but - for instance - I just tried to share a file from my Mac to my iPhone. Didn’t work; don’t see my iPhone. Same wifi network - no firewall; no filters. This is a majority of the time.
Yeah, AirDrop is great when it works. However, when it doesn't work (happens sometimes to me), it cannot be easily fixed.
Tip: You can connect your phone to you macbook and use build-in preview.app "File -> "import from YOUR_IPHONE_NAME" (however since the last few macos releases preview.app crashes like 50% of time when I'm importing). This only works for movies/photos though and only when using macos.
Although I agree with general sentiment. I used to have android phone and I really enjoyed that you could just connect your phone with cable and browser data with any file manager.
I always have a bad mood when I have to download/upload/sync something via itunes, e.g. voice recordings / pdf / documents / ebooks
Although I agree with general sentiment. I used to have android phone and I really enjoyed that you could just connect your phone with cable and browser data with any file manager.
I always have a bad mood when I have to download/upload/sync something via itunes, e.g. voice recordings / pdf / documents / ebooks
You can use "image capture" app on mac. Also if you want you can use the ifuse method. https://github.com/libimobiledevice/ifuse
But yes, Apple should have made it easier.
But yes, Apple should have made it easier.
Sounds like you need a new MBP?
I'm sorry, but this is a really bad take. The premise of the argument, namely that Apple does (or attempts to do) everything, and does not leverage the industry to its advantage, does not stand up to scrutiny.
Apple relies heavily on a modularised supply chain. It designs its own chips, true, but relies on TSMC and Samsung to fab them. It designs its own camera system, yes, but buys the crucial components (the sensors) from Sony. It designs its own screens, but uses Samsung technology and production capability to do so. It runs its cloud services on top of AWS and MS Azure. And famously of course, they outsource production of almost all their devices to Foxconn.
Apple relies heavily on a modularised supply chain. It designs its own chips, true, but relies on TSMC and Samsung to fab them. It designs its own camera system, yes, but buys the crucial components (the sensors) from Sony. It designs its own screens, but uses Samsung technology and production capability to do so. It runs its cloud services on top of AWS and MS Azure. And famously of course, they outsource production of almost all their devices to Foxconn.
This.
Plus, their dependence on Chinas goodwill makes them vulnerable.
China commands significant power over Apples manufacturing capabilities. Just take a look at Apples supplier list ^1 This is the opposite of antifragile.
Tencent, Pinduoduo, Alibaba are prime examples of how much influence the Chinese government is willing to exercise over companies in case it finds them to not be aligned with it's own interests.
The Chinese government effectively has access to the private iCloud keys for Apples Chinese users.
From an investors perspective I'm a bit bearish on AAPL.
^1: https://www.apple.com/supplier-responsibility/pdf/Apple-Supp...
China commands significant power over Apples manufacturing capabilities. Just take a look at Apples supplier list ^1 This is the opposite of antifragile.
Tencent, Pinduoduo, Alibaba are prime examples of how much influence the Chinese government is willing to exercise over companies in case it finds them to not be aligned with it's own interests.
The Chinese government effectively has access to the private iCloud keys for Apples Chinese users.
From an investors perspective I'm a bit bearish on AAPL.
^1: https://www.apple.com/supplier-responsibility/pdf/Apple-Supp...
Apple carefully selects all of this and makes it work; the "take", as it were, wasn't precisely that Apple does everything (and so I feel like you critically misunderstood it), but that Apple controls everything: any extension of the ecosystem doesn't just block on Apple... it nigh unto must be initiated by Apple.
TSMC isn't going anywhere and semiconductor production for 3rd parties at Samsung isn't going anywhere either, they do tons of it. I know lots of people that work there. EVERYONE (almost) outsources semiconductor fabrication. Are they all fragile? Not many companies own their own plastic or metal factories either. I really am not sure what you're trying to get at here.
>If you want to develop on Mac, you have to use Xcode, you cant use any other tools. So Apple is at a disadvantage.
I don't think that's true even if you consider IDEs that target the OS X frameworks only. Intellij has a product, Flutter targets iOS, I am not an OS X developer but those two jump out straight away.
As for developing on Mac - it's a Unix & so a very capable development tool to target a range of platforms.
I don't think that's true even if you consider IDEs that target the OS X frameworks only. Intellij has a product, Flutter targets iOS, I am not an OS X developer but those two jump out straight away.
As for developing on Mac - it's a Unix & so a very capable development tool to target a range of platforms.
Even though you can develop in Flutter, you still need xcode tools to build the apps, even if you can mostly skip the IDE.
We should differentiate between Xcode the ide and Xcode tools, which are just git, clang, etc. The tools aren’t apple’s product.
In Linux they would have been separate packages, but I don’t think the App Store has dependencies so how else are they going to get the required packages installed for their ide.
In Linux they would have been separate packages, but I don’t think the App Store has dependencies so how else are they going to get the required packages installed for their ide.
In this case the argument is focused on Apple forcing you into their ecosystem. Even though some packages might be generic, Xcode tools & codesign wont run and build on another OS then MacOS.
This is just like saying clang compiled for Linux won’t run on Windows [1].
[1]: Yes, I know about WSL. No, that doesn’t count.
[1]: Yes, I know about WSL. No, that doesn’t count.
It's not: for any other OS, you can develop and compile on whichever other OS you want. Sure, MSVC won't run on Linux, but you can just compile it with clang or GCC on Linux and target Windows. There is no way to do that for iOS.
And this is not because no one wants to write a backend to target iOS, it's because Apple won't allow it. If you want to run native code on iOS, it must be built and signed with XCode on a Mac.
And this is not because no one wants to write a backend to target iOS, it's because Apple won't allow it. If you want to run native code on iOS, it must be built and signed with XCode on a Mac.
Try to create a UWP application or Windows service, or do any kind of debugging or ETW monitoring, like that.
Fair enough with UWP. Might be one of the many reasons no one uses it...
I will still note that debugging and monitoring are usually not going to work cross-platform - try to log to journalfs from a Windows system (wihtout using MinGW or similar).
I will still note that debugging and monitoring are usually not going to work cross-platform - try to log to journalfs from a Windows system (wihtout using MinGW or similar).
Plenty of people use it, they don't need help from Linux devs trying to cross compile applications without any tooling for UI/UX.
You only need clang and codesign to build an app.
If it were actually this simple in practice I wouldn't be jumping between AppCode and Xcode all the time
Could you provide a few examples from your workflow that requires you to open Xcode?
If you want to do real-world things, like change your project settings across different compilation targets (AppCode has a buggy/incomplete settings interface that can't be trusted), use the interface builder (inc. previewing your UI, inc. creating/editing the UI if you're not using SwiftUI), debugging the UI hierarchy, performance profiling, etc., you'll be switching over to Xcode. Once again, in theory you could just have everything running off whatever `make` toolchain you prefer, but if you're making apps for a company, and sharing code with other team members, chances are your exotic setup isn't going to cut it.
i think people might be conflating needing to install xcode vs launching xcode
if you want to build ios apps installing xcode is a requirement (to get the proprietary cli tools) but launching xcode is not required
to build native mac apps, neither installing nor running xcode is necessary, as you can build with the smaller cli-only tools which include only mac os headers/libs
if you want to build ios apps installing xcode is a requirement (to get the proprietary cli tools) but launching xcode is not required
to build native mac apps, neither installing nor running xcode is necessary, as you can build with the smaller cli-only tools which include only mac os headers/libs
As was mentioned here, xcode is not a requirement. I manage my development tools on Big Sur with NetBSD's pkgsrc via pkgin.
Not strictly required, but practically implied.
Developing good software for Apple's platforms without Xcode remains an unsolved problem.
Anyone that has written portable UNIX software knows why stuff like autoconf even exists, targeting POSIX is just like trying to make HTML/CSS/JS, it works as long as everyone uses Chrome, sorry GNU/Linux.
As for those IDEs, they are a subpar experience of what the whole AppFrameworks are capable of, just like Borland of yore always playing catch up with Windows SDKs.
As for those IDEs, they are a subpar experience of what the whole AppFrameworks are capable of, just like Borland of yore always playing catch up with Windows SDKs.
> Targeting POSIX is just like trying to make HTML/CSS/JS, it works as long as everyone uses Chrome, sorry GNU/Linux.
That's a bad analogy IMO. GNU/Linux is mostly POSIX compliant. There are some edge cases one runs into with C programming, but if talking about shell scripting, sticking to POSIX is definitely more portable. Bash would be a chrome equivalent, otherwise it's like targeting a subset of what every browser can do. Testing against Busybox/musl (Alpine) is a good way to assess portability.
That's a bad analogy IMO. GNU/Linux is mostly POSIX compliant. There are some edge cases one runs into with C programming, but if talking about shell scripting, sticking to POSIX is definitely more portable. Bash would be a chrome equivalent, otherwise it's like targeting a subset of what every browser can do. Testing against Busybox/musl (Alpine) is a good way to assess portability.
As a FreeBSD user, I don't think I ever had a C program that didn't advertise being tested on FreeBSD work first time. There's no test suite to verify that you've used only the POSIX subset of what Linux provides, and it's not something you're going to get right solely by trying, no matter how careful a programmer you are.
Try to fork in a POSIX compliant way an application using signals and threads, across several UNIX implementations.
Or asynchronous network programming with certificates, while using only POSIX APIs.
Dealing with filesystem capabilities, file locations, daemon configurations, port management utilities,...
Ah, and anything GUI related is not even part of POSIX.
Or asynchronous network programming with certificates, while using only POSIX APIs.
Dealing with filesystem capabilities, file locations, daemon configurations, port management utilities,...
Ah, and anything GUI related is not even part of POSIX.
Most of this are factually untrue. Do you use mac? Like you can play music with VLC and use VS Code or soma JetBrains IDE. Most developers who use mac never launched Xcode, because, you know, it is mainly to make iOS/macOS apps, and it by far the best tool I seen to make mobile apps.
Do you often run ML jobs on workstations? Why? Yes, macs are not great for gaming, oh well.
Do you often run ML jobs on workstations? Why? Yes, macs are not great for gaming, oh well.
> it is mainly to make iOS/macOS apps
You are talking about developers using a Mac, who also develop for the Mac, as if its this tiny corner case that isn't important. Maybe thats true. But it should be really important for Apple that those developers target the Mac, thats how Apple gets 3rd party software.
You are talking about developers using a Mac, who also develop for the Mac, as if its this tiny corner case that isn't important. Maybe thats true. But it should be really important for Apple that those developers target the Mac, thats how Apple gets 3rd party software.
My intel MacBook Pro runs AAA games just fine on it’s Windows Bootcamp partition.
> Try connecting a VR headset to a Mac
Well, try connecting a VR headset to anything that isn't a Windows PC.
> Try playing the latest hot AAA game everyone is talking about.
Again, this is mainly because of the dominance of Windows, and also to some extent DirectX.
My personal take is that, when left to their own devices, developers and the industry will focus on the dominant platform first (Windows) and other vendors (Mac) will tend to be an afterthought. This was more true 10-20 years ago, when Mac wasn't as dominant.
Because of that, in order for Apple to be successful, Apple couldn't rely on the industry to make their platform great, so they had to build their own 'exclusives'.
Taken another way - in a parallel universe where Apple hadn't heavily invested in building a lot of this stuff themselves and relied on leveraging the industry, I'm not convinced that they would be alive today.
Well, try connecting a VR headset to anything that isn't a Windows PC.
> Try playing the latest hot AAA game everyone is talking about.
Again, this is mainly because of the dominance of Windows, and also to some extent DirectX.
My personal take is that, when left to their own devices, developers and the industry will focus on the dominant platform first (Windows) and other vendors (Mac) will tend to be an afterthought. This was more true 10-20 years ago, when Mac wasn't as dominant.
Because of that, in order for Apple to be successful, Apple couldn't rely on the industry to make their platform great, so they had to build their own 'exclusives'.
Taken another way - in a parallel universe where Apple hadn't heavily invested in building a lot of this stuff themselves and relied on leveraging the industry, I'm not convinced that they would be alive today.
> Well, try connecting a VR headset to anything that isn't a Windows PC.
I have never tried a VR headset under anything that wasn't Linux, so our experiences differ on that point.
I have never tried a VR headset under anything that wasn't Linux, so our experiences differ on that point.
I'll concede the point that SteamVR on Linux is possible because of Valve after some research, but I still think it's an example of were Mac can't rely on outside industry because they will only support the dominant platforms or their own platforms (for instance, Valve supports linux primarily because of steamboxes).
And Valve not supporting Mac again shows that relying on outside industry is not a viable strategy if you are not the dominant platform. Mac wasn't a big platform for them to sell VR titles as it's not used by many consumers to play VR titles, so they drop support.
As another example, the Oculus client only supports Windows (outside of the Quest etc). There are mac's out there with powerful graphics cards and lots of RAM, however they are few and far between compared to Windows boxes, so Oculus chooses Windows as the dominant platform - If you are going to support one, it will be Windows, and if you are going to support Mac, well it's not going to be the first-class citizen. If Apple wants VR support they are going to have to go out there and graft for it.
The overall point is just - Apple is successful because they decided they wouldn't wait for industry to support their platforms, and that they would just build it themselves if the industry didn't come. For instance, iWork is a direct result of Microsoft not bringing Office to Mac originally - The lack of good presentation software was going to be something that prevented professionals using Mac, so they went out and built Keynote themselves. On the flip side, Photoshop was a great app with best support on the Mac, so they never needed to build a good photo editor. The investments are all to fill in gaps where other people in the industry weren't bringing stuff to the party.
And Valve not supporting Mac again shows that relying on outside industry is not a viable strategy if you are not the dominant platform. Mac wasn't a big platform for them to sell VR titles as it's not used by many consumers to play VR titles, so they drop support.
As another example, the Oculus client only supports Windows (outside of the Quest etc). There are mac's out there with powerful graphics cards and lots of RAM, however they are few and far between compared to Windows boxes, so Oculus chooses Windows as the dominant platform - If you are going to support one, it will be Windows, and if you are going to support Mac, well it's not going to be the first-class citizen. If Apple wants VR support they are going to have to go out there and graft for it.
The overall point is just - Apple is successful because they decided they wouldn't wait for industry to support their platforms, and that they would just build it themselves if the industry didn't come. For instance, iWork is a direct result of Microsoft not bringing Office to Mac originally - The lack of good presentation software was going to be something that prevented professionals using Mac, so they went out and built Keynote themselves. On the flip side, Photoshop was a great app with best support on the Mac, so they never needed to build a good photo editor. The investments are all to fill in gaps where other people in the industry weren't bringing stuff to the party.
> And Valve not supporting Mac again shows that relying on outside industry is not a viable strategy if you are not the dominant platform. Mac wasn't a big platform for them to sell VR titles as it's not used by many consumers to play VR titles, so they drop support.
Yes and no - I think part of that was also that Apple is openly hostile to other app stores on the Mac. It's true that third parties are lukewarm in their support for Mac, but it's very hard to disentangle to what extent that's the effect of Apple's lukewarm support for third parties rather than the cause of it.
Yes and no - I think part of that was also that Apple is openly hostile to other app stores on the Mac. It's true that third parties are lukewarm in their support for Mac, but it's very hard to disentangle to what extent that's the effect of Apple's lukewarm support for third parties rather than the cause of it.
The reason VR headsets don't work on Mac isn't because Valve decided to not support them... VR headsets typically plug into the HDMI port of "the latest greatest graphics card", which isn't really "a thing" on Apple computers (until maybe extremely recently--like less than two years ago--on the Mac Pro, and I am not even sure about that), and before you say it is because nVIDIA is simply not bothering to support Mac, I'm pretty sure it is because Apple doesn't really provide sufficient hardware ports or driver extension points for them (and then probably will get pissy about how they have lost control over color balance or something as their software probably only works "perfectly" with their hardware, etc.)
Apple deciding to drop support for industry-standard cross-manufacturer APIs sure didn't help.
Unless you specifically need to target Apple, you don't come across their ecosystem of APIs, which makes it harder to maintain cross-platform compatibility.
Reportedly, Apple is "all-in" on xR, so wait and see I guess. But they're not on the public supporter list of OpenXR for now, as a datapoint: https://www.khronos.org/OpenXR/
Unless you specifically need to target Apple, you don't come across their ecosystem of APIs, which makes it harder to maintain cross-platform compatibility.
Reportedly, Apple is "all-in" on xR, so wait and see I guess. But they're not on the public supporter list of OpenXR for now, as a datapoint: https://www.khronos.org/OpenXR/
Also, Apple may have a vendetta against nVidia. It's been ages since any nvidia product worked on macos.
>For instance, iWork is a direct result of Microsoft not bringing Office to Mac originally
When was that? MS Word has been available on the Mac since 1984, Excel since 1985 and PowerPoint since 1987.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Office#Mac_versions
When was that? MS Word has been available on the Mac since 1984, Excel since 1985 and PowerPoint since 1987.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Office#Mac_versions
Microsoft released Office for Mac before there was even a Windows version. Over 10 years before Keynote even launched. Office v. X released the same year as OS X, two years before Keynote and 4 years before Pages.
Keynote was made because Steve Jobs wanted better presentation software than what others provided that was more like Concurrence on NeXTSTEP.
Keynote was made because Steve Jobs wanted better presentation software than what others provided that was more like Concurrence on NeXTSTEP.
Tech has this perversive notion that you have to be either the objectively best possible option or you’ll die. And this opinion seems to be held by the same people who have been proclaiming that Apple are going out of business because they can’t compete with Linux or Lenovo on pricing and that their mobile phone would fail for lack of physical keyboard or that they where a joke as a mobile company because “they only sell one model of phones”.
You don’t have to be the best, you just have to be your customer bases favorite choice. And Apple is great at delivering to and making money off their customer segment. No need to have a monopoly, no need to “slay the competition” they are just doing their thing making tons of money on a smaller segment of the total market. Imagine if people assumed the same about car brands, that there was only room in the world for a single car company. Sounds absolutely absurd doesn’t it?
Perhaps we can entertain the thought that Apple might not be going away even though they’ve been going out of business since 1976 according to public opinion.
You don’t have to be the best, you just have to be your customer bases favorite choice. And Apple is great at delivering to and making money off their customer segment. No need to have a monopoly, no need to “slay the competition” they are just doing their thing making tons of money on a smaller segment of the total market. Imagine if people assumed the same about car brands, that there was only room in the world for a single car company. Sounds absolutely absurd doesn’t it?
Perhaps we can entertain the thought that Apple might not be going away even though they’ve been going out of business since 1976 according to public opinion.
It may be worth watching D5 again, but here is the bit [1]
>We wont so good at partnering with people, where as Bill and Microsoft were really good at it. They learn how to partner with people really well. And I think if Apple had a little more of that in its DNA, it would have become more successful. And I dont think Apple learned that until few decades later. - Steve Jobs.
I think Steve Jobs was way way better with partnering in his return from NeXT. From iPhone with Cingular to patent signing with Qualcomm partnership. He really knew which battle to fight and which to work with. Tim Cook seems to have a very bean counting view on almost everything. To the point of not valuing much partnership. Which may be a good thing in Supply Chain but not so good with other businesses.
[1] https://youtu.be/wvhW8cp15tk?t=5012
>We wont so good at partnering with people, where as Bill and Microsoft were really good at it. They learn how to partner with people really well. And I think if Apple had a little more of that in its DNA, it would have become more successful. And I dont think Apple learned that until few decades later. - Steve Jobs.
I think Steve Jobs was way way better with partnering in his return from NeXT. From iPhone with Cingular to patent signing with Qualcomm partnership. He really knew which battle to fight and which to work with. Tim Cook seems to have a very bean counting view on almost everything. To the point of not valuing much partnership. Which may be a good thing in Supply Chain but not so good with other businesses.
[1] https://youtu.be/wvhW8cp15tk?t=5012
Nvidia wants you to use CUDA instead of OpenCL..
Thankfully, otherwise we would be stuck with compiling C on the fly without any kind of debugging experience other than GPU printfs.
Your argument is basically what everyone said in the introduction of the article and in fact what was generally said even before the iPhone came out. It's not even a new situation for Apple to be in. 20 years ago it was companies willfully not wanting to support apple for their game or software or whatever. I think companies have come a long way on that.
So they are not commoditizing their complement [1] in general (app store excepted!)?
[1] https://www.gwern.net/Complement
[1] https://www.gwern.net/Complement
What are you talking about? The literally outsource all their manufacturing.
They didn’t even write their own OS or browser or compiler. Microsoft at least does that.
They didn’t even write their own OS or browser or compiler. Microsoft at least does that.
> The problem now is that they do everything so, now they have to be best at everything.
They certainly have the cash on hand to actually do so.
> If you want to develop on Mac, you have to use Xcode, you cant use any other tools.
Unlike Windows you can do everything you want in free Xcode, only when you want to distribute your applications to others you need the 99$/year codesign certificate. Also, you don't even need full Xcode to compile programs, see e.g. Homebrew or MacPorts.
> Try connecting a variable refresh rate screen to a mac, or a VR headset, or Thundebolt device, or just a USB device in to one of their mobile devices. Try playing the latest hot AAA game everyone is talking about.
Most of what you mentioned is gaming, that has never been any market of Apple's - and besides, you can always dual-boot into Windows on the Intel side (and probably, soon enough into Linux on the M1 side). The other stuff (TB, USB on mobile) isn't well supported on the competitions' side too - all I can plug in into my Android phone and tablet is a mouse, keyboard and USB soundcard.
> Try installing a better voice assistant, store, browser or music player and you will find that Apple has made it hard or impossible.
Agreed on the voice assistant. The rest? I can download and install apps like I want, I am not depending on the App Store for anything. Browser? Chrome or Firefox (although I admit, I would be happier if Apple opened up and documented the ways that Safari can use to save battery life) can be downloaded and installed in minutes. Music player? Spotify and VLC have all you want, Amazon Music has an OS X app, and for the iOS side foobar2000 also exists.
> Apple is fine now, because its great at a few things and good enough at the rest of the things it needs to find a large market. How long can a company not fail at one of so many things?
Apple has enough cash on hand and cash flow from their current product line to wait out any "failure" - and they have the cash to buy so much advertising to make a literal pile of poo a bestseller anyway. They are so huge they literally cannot fail.
They certainly have the cash on hand to actually do so.
> If you want to develop on Mac, you have to use Xcode, you cant use any other tools.
Unlike Windows you can do everything you want in free Xcode, only when you want to distribute your applications to others you need the 99$/year codesign certificate. Also, you don't even need full Xcode to compile programs, see e.g. Homebrew or MacPorts.
> Try connecting a variable refresh rate screen to a mac, or a VR headset, or Thundebolt device, or just a USB device in to one of their mobile devices. Try playing the latest hot AAA game everyone is talking about.
Most of what you mentioned is gaming, that has never been any market of Apple's - and besides, you can always dual-boot into Windows on the Intel side (and probably, soon enough into Linux on the M1 side). The other stuff (TB, USB on mobile) isn't well supported on the competitions' side too - all I can plug in into my Android phone and tablet is a mouse, keyboard and USB soundcard.
> Try installing a better voice assistant, store, browser or music player and you will find that Apple has made it hard or impossible.
Agreed on the voice assistant. The rest? I can download and install apps like I want, I am not depending on the App Store for anything. Browser? Chrome or Firefox (although I admit, I would be happier if Apple opened up and documented the ways that Safari can use to save battery life) can be downloaded and installed in minutes. Music player? Spotify and VLC have all you want, Amazon Music has an OS X app, and for the iOS side foobar2000 also exists.
> Apple is fine now, because its great at a few things and good enough at the rest of the things it needs to find a large market. How long can a company not fail at one of so many things?
Apple has enough cash on hand and cash flow from their current product line to wait out any "failure" - and they have the cash to buy so much advertising to make a literal pile of poo a bestseller anyway. They are so huge they literally cannot fail.
> Unlike Windows you can do everything you want in free Xcode, only when you want to distribute your applications to others you need the 99$/year codesign certificate
Are you comparing this to e.g Visual Studio now? Because most SDKs are free (.NET, even the C++ compiler can be used freely now afaik), as is vscode and there are of course several other free IDEs.
Are you comparing this to e.g Visual Studio now? Because most SDKs are free (.NET, even the C++ compiler can be used freely now afaik), as is vscode and there are of course several other free IDEs.
I was referring to professional usage of said IDEs, comparing the vendor-provided solutions. Unlike Xcode, as a business above six users you will need one of the commercial licenses for VS.
vscode is vendor provided, free (also for enterprises), and can be used to build all kinds of apps including C# and C++ (using msvc, clang, mingw etc) It’s true that VS is not free for commercial use yet.
Not quite true, there are some subtleties on your argument.
VS Code supports a subset of Windows development workloads, try to develop C++/WinRT applications or a WPF GUI in VS Code, for example.
VS Community is only free for open source, students or companies up to 5 employees with a specific yearly revenue limit.
VS Code supports a subset of Windows development workloads, try to develop C++/WinRT applications or a WPF GUI in VS Code, for example.
VS Community is only free for open source, students or companies up to 5 employees with a specific yearly revenue limit.
FWIW, I have been doing Windows development on and off since the 90s, and not only have their free tools have always been extremely capable, you can get third party and open sources tooling for literally everything... with Chrome having finally ditched msvc a few years ago for clang, I feel like there is really no excuse anymore for feeling stuck with Microsoft's tooling.
The issue with macOS development is that there are simple things you pretty much have to do for even the most basic app to work correctly--such as build the menu bar from a nib or bundle icons--that require you to use closed source software like altool and ibtool that come with Xcode (and then, despite being command line tools, for some incompetent reason tend to be tied very tightly to the current version of the operating system, which makes stuff like CI extremely annoying).
The issue with macOS development is that there are simple things you pretty much have to do for even the most basic app to work correctly--such as build the menu bar from a nib or bundle icons--that require you to use closed source software like altool and ibtool that come with Xcode (and then, despite being command line tools, for some incompetent reason tend to be tied very tightly to the current version of the operating system, which makes stuff like CI extremely annoying).
Yeah, when one likes to only do low level C and C++ Win32 code, with crutches for everything else.
I mean, I feel like you are treating something I consider "amateur hour development" as "the only reasonable way to do things"; but, even so: you seem to be missing that on macOS it is nigh into impossible to opt out of sitting on a Mac using sad software that comes with Xcode, whereas even C++/WinRT (which you mention, but which I would still mostly consider "low level") is something I can easily use with an alternative IDE from a different operating system. The only place where I feel like you will be sad with Windows development sitting on a drastically different stack is dealing with the more cutting edge .NET functionality. On macOS, it is like pulling teeth to get even a hello world app working without Xcode. Alternative stack tooling like Flutter from giant companies like Google still is forced through Xcode workflows.
I would like to see you use Visual Studio plugins (C++/WinRT is one), or do ETW monitoring, or Event Viewer plugins from Linux.
So many examples that are beyond bare bones Win32 C calls.
So many examples that are beyond bare bones Win32 C calls.
There are certainly features in VS that are not in VS code (otherwise the install size of what 20x? would be pretty crazy). Tools like profilers for example. Visual designers are also among them but are not a requirement. I develop both WPF and WinForms and don’t use designers even though I have had VS enterprise for the last 20 years.. so the question is “can you do it” and “do they have the same feature set” which are obviously two separate questions. There are features available in vscode that aren’t available in VS too.
Which is reasonable. If you can afford 5 fulltime employees you can afford visual studio or take the plunge and move fully to vscode.
> Apple isn't leveraging the industry to its advantage.
Apple is the industry. When you're the industry, you don't leverage it, everybody else attempts to leverage you.
If for some reason they find themselves needing to eg switch back to CPUs supplied by someone else because they can no longer be great at that - given their scale, Intel or AMD (or whomever) will get on their knees and crawl begging for the business.
None of what you're claiming are disadvantages are actual disadvantages unless they lose the iPhone's position. Unless that happens, they are the industry, they are the (increasingly) dominant ecosystem, the advantage is theirs to press. They're winning.
Apple is the industry. When you're the industry, you don't leverage it, everybody else attempts to leverage you.
If for some reason they find themselves needing to eg switch back to CPUs supplied by someone else because they can no longer be great at that - given their scale, Intel or AMD (or whomever) will get on their knees and crawl begging for the business.
None of what you're claiming are disadvantages are actual disadvantages unless they lose the iPhone's position. Unless that happens, they are the industry, they are the (increasingly) dominant ecosystem, the advantage is theirs to press. They're winning.
The article argues that Apple is "antifragile"
> thanks to a diverse mix of strong products.
That is not quite correct. That is robustness: it means the company can endure stressors in a variety of ways. (Other commenters have pointed this out, and I agree with them.)
But the article does hint at a real argument for antifragility: cash.
Apple's cash position, plus their diverse mix of revenue categories, means that in bad times they will be relatively advantaged over competitors. For example, the company spends $40 billion per quarter or so on advance purchases from chip suppliers---meaning that, when supply shocks happen, they will be better off, because they will continue to have what they need but competitors suddenly will not. What allows them to do that? Money. A giant pile of money. That money contributes to robustness, yes, but when sector- or global-scale stressors occur, it will mean that they can actually improve their competitive position.
I can think of counterarguments, but I think that's the strongest case.
> thanks to a diverse mix of strong products.
That is not quite correct. That is robustness: it means the company can endure stressors in a variety of ways. (Other commenters have pointed this out, and I agree with them.)
But the article does hint at a real argument for antifragility: cash.
Apple's cash position, plus their diverse mix of revenue categories, means that in bad times they will be relatively advantaged over competitors. For example, the company spends $40 billion per quarter or so on advance purchases from chip suppliers---meaning that, when supply shocks happen, they will be better off, because they will continue to have what they need but competitors suddenly will not. What allows them to do that? Money. A giant pile of money. That money contributes to robustness, yes, but when sector- or global-scale stressors occur, it will mean that they can actually improve their competitive position.
I can think of counterarguments, but I think that's the strongest case.
For the sake of argument, let's just say that tomorrow Taiwan is suddenly taken over by another country and TSMC is no longer an option. Everything flowing from Taiwan just stops, despite agreements or money spent. That becomes null and void. I'm not sure what good cash on hand will do them within x years of that event happening, should it. It seems Apple is putting more and more of their eggs in TSMC's basket and it seems TSMC is the only company who can get Apple where it wants/needs to be. At least currently. From what I can tell Apple is totally coupled and reliant on TSMC at this point. Only a few of the upper end product lines are still using Intel processors and you know they'll soon be gone, but they are a very small part of Apples total market share by revenue at this point anyway.
> despite agreements or money spent. That becomes null and void.
the only way to prevent this from affecting you as a corporation is to have enough military power to prevent the scenario from happening...oh wait, that's what the US military is for.
the only way to prevent this from affecting you as a corporation is to have enough military power to prevent the scenario from happening...oh wait, that's what the US military is for.
That is true. It's really hard to find news in MSM about this stuff though. I had to get to page 3 on google (tried ddg first!) results to bypass defense news type sites as most people would just poo-poo those. Things haven't been looking so good. https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/national-security/china-s-g...
Japan takes a stance: https://www.npr.org/2021/07/26/1020866539/japans-position-on...
Issues in Philippines: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-56474847
Things have been heating up in the region, for the last few years especially, and generally not trending in a direction I think most of the world wants to see. I don't think the scenario I proposed is that far fetched, and the probability is continually trending is a bad direction. China is a rising super power and by most accounts will rival/surpass the US in many ways, very soon. Within a decade.
One way to accelerate that is to throw a monkey wrench in the world economy while you are largely insulated from the results. At least more insulated than your competitors are. I wouldn't even say that hitting a few Samsung fabs in the process was out of the question. It's not like the response will be much worse than if they didn't touch Samsung and only took Taiwan. Might as well?
I hate thinking this way and I could very well be wrong in any or all of my arm-chair analysis. I absolutely hope so. China's stance on reuniting Taiwan back with the mainland has been growing as Taiwan's power has been growing.
> BEIJING/TAIPEI (Reuters) -Chinese President Xi Jinping pledged on Thursday to complete "reunification" with self-ruled Taiwan and vowed to "smash" any attempts at formal independence, drawing a stern rebuke from Taipei, which lambasted the Communist Party as a dictatorship.
> China, which considers democratically-ruled Taiwan its own territory, has stepped up efforts under Xi to assert its sovereignty claims, including regular flights by fighter jets and bombers close to the island.
> "Solving the Taiwan question and realising the complete reunification of the motherland are the unswerving historical tasks of the Chinese Communist Party and the common aspiration of all Chinese people," Xi said in a speech on the 100th birthday of the ruling Communist Party.
> "All sons and daughters of China, including compatriots on both sides of the Taiwan Strait, must work together and move forward in solidarity, resolutely smashing any 'Taiwan independence' plots."
https://news.yahoo.com/chinas-xi-pledges-reunification-taiwa...
Japan takes a stance: https://www.npr.org/2021/07/26/1020866539/japans-position-on...
Issues in Philippines: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-56474847
Things have been heating up in the region, for the last few years especially, and generally not trending in a direction I think most of the world wants to see. I don't think the scenario I proposed is that far fetched, and the probability is continually trending is a bad direction. China is a rising super power and by most accounts will rival/surpass the US in many ways, very soon. Within a decade.
One way to accelerate that is to throw a monkey wrench in the world economy while you are largely insulated from the results. At least more insulated than your competitors are. I wouldn't even say that hitting a few Samsung fabs in the process was out of the question. It's not like the response will be much worse than if they didn't touch Samsung and only took Taiwan. Might as well?
I hate thinking this way and I could very well be wrong in any or all of my arm-chair analysis. I absolutely hope so. China's stance on reuniting Taiwan back with the mainland has been growing as Taiwan's power has been growing.
> BEIJING/TAIPEI (Reuters) -Chinese President Xi Jinping pledged on Thursday to complete "reunification" with self-ruled Taiwan and vowed to "smash" any attempts at formal independence, drawing a stern rebuke from Taipei, which lambasted the Communist Party as a dictatorship.
> China, which considers democratically-ruled Taiwan its own territory, has stepped up efforts under Xi to assert its sovereignty claims, including regular flights by fighter jets and bombers close to the island.
> "Solving the Taiwan question and realising the complete reunification of the motherland are the unswerving historical tasks of the Chinese Communist Party and the common aspiration of all Chinese people," Xi said in a speech on the 100th birthday of the ruling Communist Party.
> "All sons and daughters of China, including compatriots on both sides of the Taiwan Strait, must work together and move forward in solidarity, resolutely smashing any 'Taiwan independence' plots."
https://news.yahoo.com/chinas-xi-pledges-reunification-taiwa...
> I'm not sure what good cash on hand will do them within x years of that event happening
Extradite key people from Taiwan? Buy up ASML's inventory and next N months' production at an exorbitant premium?
Or, just weather the storm. Apple would be hit. But so would everyone else. I'd wager that hit could take out some of their competition.
Extradite key people from Taiwan? Buy up ASML's inventory and next N months' production at an exorbitant premium?
Or, just weather the storm. Apple would be hit. But so would everyone else. I'd wager that hit could take out some of their competition.
The competition largely either has its own supply like Samsung or is owned by/from that other country (Xiaomi, Huawei, Oppo, Vivo, Realme, Motorola).
I guess Samsung would benefit greatly.
I guess Samsung would benefit greatly.
It’s hard to imagine a situation that both removes Taiwan from play and preserves peace in Korea. It’s unfortunate the world’s chip supply is so geopolitically concentrated.
PRC invades ROC/Taiwan. Besides some saber rattling, US, Japan, Korea don't get involved. The end.
Is that unthinkable?
Is that unthinkable?
Just dropping some interesting posts I found when researching this general area earlier today:
https://unherd.com/2021/07/will-china-invade-taiwan/
Will China invade Taiwan? A panel of superforecasters considers the likelihood of an imminent global conflict
https://www.jonstokes.com/p/why-a-chinese-invasion-of-taiwan (Jon Stokes, the Ars Technica founder)
Why a Chinese invasion of Taiwan would be a catastrophe for China and the world. If they do it, it won't be for the microchips
https://unherd.com/2021/07/will-china-invade-taiwan/
Will China invade Taiwan? A panel of superforecasters considers the likelihood of an imminent global conflict
https://www.jonstokes.com/p/why-a-chinese-invasion-of-taiwan (Jon Stokes, the Ars Technica founder)
Why a Chinese invasion of Taiwan would be a catastrophe for China and the world. If they do it, it won't be for the microchips
It's not unthinkable, but continuing this line of thought, is it unthinkable that China makes a point of upholding all contractual obligations leaving TSMC's customers unaffected?
I believe that PRC doctrine for an invasion of Taiwan is to launch preemptive strikes against US bases in the region. So unless they change their strategy before they invade, the US will definitely get involved.
Who would have an interest in drawing South Korea into it?
The US would be primarily responsible for forcing Korea into the war. The border of North and South Korea is only about a day drive from Beijing, allowing the US to threaten the Chinese government from the very beginning of any conflict. The situation on the Korean Peninsula is commonly thought of as a failing for US diplomacy, but the conflict actually provides perfect cover to keep a huge military detachment almost on the border of our chief geopolitical rival. It’s highly advantageous to the US for Korea to remain fractured.
[deleted]
> Buy up ASML's inventory and next N months' production at an exorbitant premium?
Which inventory? As far as I know ASML is already churning out as many EUV machines as they can and yet they are still fully booked for the next few years. They're currently limited by personnel, factory space and their own supply chain.
Which inventory? As far as I know ASML is already churning out as many EUV machines as they can and yet they are still fully booked for the next few years. They're currently limited by personnel, factory space and their own supply chain.
Apple would take a hit in that case, but so would everybody else who use TSMC. Intel wouldn't be hit, but they also don't make ARM chips.
Apple makes a premium product, which means that they can outcompete others, especially Android, for the remaining chips.
Even in the event that there is no new iPhone for the year they will still make money on their services, and a lack of iPhone will not make it less desirable. Other smartphone makers won't be able to stay in business.
Apple makes a premium product, which means that they can outcompete others, especially Android, for the remaining chips.
Even in the event that there is no new iPhone for the year they will still make money on their services, and a lack of iPhone will not make it less desirable. Other smartphone makers won't be able to stay in business.
Android phone makers won't be as affected since midrange/lowend devices can use older manufacturing processes which are (relatively speaking) widely available.
Apple needs the best to keep its edge and justify the premium.
Apple needs the best to keep its edge and justify the premium.
Well, most of (a while back it was "almost all of"... it might still be) the profit in Android is made by Samsung, which makes high-end devices that compete with the iPhone.
That is a good point, but I wonder: how many second-rate chips are available and how bad are they? Because if the top end is 3 nm and they need 10 nm, then I don't know if there are enough other places to get them.
I think Android phones aren't really CPU/GPU constrained anymore. I bought a cheap Realme phone (130 EUR) for a relative and the thing runs everything you throw at it fluidly, even pretty demanding games. (SOC is MediaTek G95 on 12nm).
TSMC is building a new fab in Arizona as a hedge for this scenario.
That fab will do 5nm in 2024, I think Taiwan TSMC will be on < 3nm by then!
https://www.datacenterdynamics.com/en/news/tsmc-starts-work-...
And is thinking about building another one in Europe.
Antifragility is not absolute. Stress your muscles, you'll grow strong. Overload them by trying to catch a falling elephant, you'll die. Taleb says as much in his book.
The unique property is that the system can get objectively better from being stressed, not that it is a superhydra.
The unique property is that the system can get objectively better from being stressed, not that it is a superhydra.
Well I use my iphones for about 5 years so they could continue funding salaries from cash while getting new supply online.
> For the sake of argument, let's just say that tomorrow Taiwan is suddenly taken over by another country
How about let's not? There are infinite possibilities you can imagine of things going wrong. Pulling one example out of an infinite list does nothing to address the argument itself, it's just fictional role play. And every time one plays a scenario out, they could always just go one more step towards a more catastrophic scenario, until we'd arrive at "A-ha, but as we see, Apple's strategy fails to address heat death of the universe! Got 'em!" Of course your suggested scenario isn't as absurd, and the global supply chains reliance on a few privately held companies is indeed problematic. But the discussion was about Apples strategy and how they prepare with more foresight than their competitors, succeeding better under pressure. Not that they are omnipotent gods that can control and prepare for everything.
How about let's not? There are infinite possibilities you can imagine of things going wrong. Pulling one example out of an infinite list does nothing to address the argument itself, it's just fictional role play. And every time one plays a scenario out, they could always just go one more step towards a more catastrophic scenario, until we'd arrive at "A-ha, but as we see, Apple's strategy fails to address heat death of the universe! Got 'em!" Of course your suggested scenario isn't as absurd, and the global supply chains reliance on a few privately held companies is indeed problematic. But the discussion was about Apples strategy and how they prepare with more foresight than their competitors, succeeding better under pressure. Not that they are omnipotent gods that can control and prepare for everything.
> There are infinite possibilities you can imagine of things going wrong. Pulling one example out of an infinite list does nothing to address the argument itself
You are wrong. This kind of example addresses the argument at its core.
Being "antifragile" is all about how you respond to low probability tail events such as this one.
If you become weaker as a result of such an event, you are not antifragile. You are fragile.
If you can withstand said event, you are not antifragile, you are just robust.
If you become stronger as a result of such an event, only then can you claim to be antifragile.
You are wrong. This kind of example addresses the argument at its core.
Being "antifragile" is all about how you respond to low probability tail events such as this one.
If you become weaker as a result of such an event, you are not antifragile. You are fragile.
If you can withstand said event, you are not antifragile, you are just robust.
If you become stronger as a result of such an event, only then can you claim to be antifragile.
Haven't read "the antifragility book", but I'm still pretty sure antifragile does not mean immortal. The example in the article - muscles - grow when they are stressed, but they definitely can be destroyed also when enough stress is applied.
Or, if I am wrong, and indeed antifragile means immortal then I don't know why we are talking about antifragility rather than whether Apple is a company that cannot be affected negatively no matter what happens in the world. I'd also like to know why is there a need for a new synonym for immortality.
Or, if I am wrong, and indeed antifragile means immortal then I don't know why we are talking about antifragility rather than whether Apple is a company that cannot be affected negatively no matter what happens in the world. I'd also like to know why is there a need for a new synonym for immortality.
The book was written by Nassim Taleb and things like a global pandemic or supply chain collapse are exactly the kinds of things he talks about when he formulates idea such as antifragility.
Now, you are right: there's a limit to antifragility. I don't think the book clarifies this point.
But anyway, Taiwan being consumed by China is exactly the kind of thing that Black Swan and Antifragile deal with.
I mean, that's the whole point of the book.
Now, you are right: there's a limit to antifragility. I don't think the book clarifies this point.
But anyway, Taiwan being consumed by China is exactly the kind of thing that Black Swan and Antifragile deal with.
I mean, that's the whole point of the book.
Yes, but then you are talking about the fragility of the global supply chain system and capitalism. I agree, it is fragile, as is apparent with boom-bust cycles and things like covid or one ship getting stuck in a canal causing major disruptions. Not to mention how badly poor countries get shafted in the process. The global capitalist system is fragile, as history and current events show us.
But these problems are way, way larger than one single company. Are we really expecting Apple as a company within the global capitalist system to just isolate itself from the network and do everything themselves without relying on anyone anywhere? At that point no company in the world is antifragile, and never can be if it works within the capitalist system or relies on any sort of co-operation between people.
But these problems are way, way larger than one single company. Are we really expecting Apple as a company within the global capitalist system to just isolate itself from the network and do everything themselves without relying on anyone anywhere? At that point no company in the world is antifragile, and never can be if it works within the capitalist system or relies on any sort of co-operation between people.
> Are we really expecting Apple as a company within the global capitalist system to just isolate itself from the network and do everything themselves without relying on anyone anywhere?
That's not really what it's about.
I would say an antifragile system is one that adapt to changes (even unexpected one).
A good example are businesses that were able to adapt to covid and earn more revenue by doing things like providing delivery services among other things.
I don't think antifragility is achievable by some kind of process. You probably need live players[0] at the helm to take the lead and figure out ways to adapt to new circumstances.
[0]: https://samoburja.com/live-versus-dead-players/
That's not really what it's about.
I would say an antifragile system is one that adapt to changes (even unexpected one).
A good example are businesses that were able to adapt to covid and earn more revenue by doing things like providing delivery services among other things.
I don't think antifragility is achievable by some kind of process. You probably need live players[0] at the helm to take the lead and figure out ways to adapt to new circumstances.
[0]: https://samoburja.com/live-versus-dead-players/
> Pulling one example out of an infinite list does nothing to address the argument itself, it's just fictional role play.
That’s true, but as a Taiwanese I can tell you Taiwan being taken over by another country is definitely in the shortlist of plausible scenarios. Not particularly likely, but definitely not fictional at all, maybe somewhere around Pearl Harbor possibility.
That’s true, but as a Taiwanese I can tell you Taiwan being taken over by another country is definitely in the shortlist of plausible scenarios. Not particularly likely, but definitely not fictional at all, maybe somewhere around Pearl Harbor possibility.
I suggest reading the whole comment. I address this concern directly in it.
Yes, there is a global supply chain fragility when it comes to a few companies controlling the supply of microchips. Nobody is suggesting that Apple somehow can do everything from scratch. Even if they had factories making the chips themselves, what if their raw material suppliers collapsed? What if a critical delivery route gets compromised, as happened with Ever Given? What if a war breaks out? What if, what if, what if... You can entertain any number of ideas. Everyone knows that the global supply chains have dependencies, and if something bad happens in the world, the economy and supply chains of the world suffer. This has nothing to do with Apple specifically.
Yes, there is a global supply chain fragility when it comes to a few companies controlling the supply of microchips. Nobody is suggesting that Apple somehow can do everything from scratch. Even if they had factories making the chips themselves, what if their raw material suppliers collapsed? What if a critical delivery route gets compromised, as happened with Ever Given? What if a war breaks out? What if, what if, what if... You can entertain any number of ideas. Everyone knows that the global supply chains have dependencies, and if something bad happens in the world, the economy and supply chains of the world suffer. This has nothing to do with Apple specifically.
I know you did, but it does not make the accusation less, uh, irritating to a Taiwanese, lacking a better expression (I don’t feel that strong, but do feel uncomfortable). The point is not how the threat can be addressed in what way, but you are greatly underestimating the possibility. Which is quite reasonable tbh, I don’t feel anything about wars in Africa and the Middle East and would likely underestimate how unstable things are when depending on entities in those areas, but it does not make the actual threat less worth considering.
Oh I see. I did not mean this as a political comment or an evaluation of the likelihood of the scenario playing out. Just pointing out that a single company cannot do much, if/when such things happen.
> Have you tried to buy a PlayStation 5 or an Xbox Series X? Good luck, they’re still hard to get. No one can produce enough chips. The same goes for automobiles. Automakers have had to choose between producing cars with fewer features or not making them at all.
> Apple hasn’t had this problem. You can walk into an Apple store right now and pick up an iPhone 12 or an M1-based Mac.
I feel like this is only true right now because Apple already had this problem last year. I recall trying every store around me to get an iPad Pro, they were always out of stock with no indicator when they will get them. It was only possible to get one a month before the new one came out.
> Apple hasn’t had this problem. You can walk into an Apple store right now and pick up an iPhone 12 or an M1-based Mac.
I feel like this is only true right now because Apple already had this problem last year. I recall trying every store around me to get an iPad Pro, they were always out of stock with no indicator when they will get them. It was only possible to get one a month before the new one came out.
A week ago Tim Cook said that the chip shortage will start affecting iPhone sales. So, Apple will have exactly the same problem as others.
https://www.businessinsider.com/apple-iphone-chip-shortage-s...
https://www.businessinsider.com/apple-iphone-chip-shortage-s...
Apple currently seems to be bottlenecked on staff; you can't simply walk in to a store and immediately buy an iPhone right now either, you have to make an appointment in advance. (I tried twice in the last 30 days and failed both times.)
If you're shopping for an iPhone, why not simply buy one online instead of going into a store where you know an appointment is required?
You can't buy online with cash, or with any method not linked to strong identity in the USA thanks to BSA and PATRIOT.
Any method other than cash (with a mask - Apple stores use face recognition cameras) links your phone serial number to the payment card forever.
Any method other than cash (with a mask - Apple stores use face recognition cameras) links your phone serial number to the payment card forever.
Why would you care about buying an iPhone anonymously when you're more than likely to use face recognition to unlock the device and sign in with your Apple ID, linking your phone's serial number to your address, payment info etc anyway?
I see you haven't taken the time to read Apple's privacy policy, as well as their law enforcement documentation outlining what they are able to provide even with a court order.
I just read the Apple earnings and they reported a 50% year-over-year jump in iPhone sales. That’s absolutely bonkers.
I like Apple and their products. I own an iPad, MacBook, iPhone and AirPods but I don’t understand why so many regular people who aren’t this deep in the Apple ecosystem buy iPhones in such large quantities in 2021.
Go to a carrier store and these are so many modern looking Android devices that rival the iPhone 12. How are Apple still selling so many iPhones when the competition has caught up dramatically?
I like Apple and their products. I own an iPad, MacBook, iPhone and AirPods but I don’t understand why so many regular people who aren’t this deep in the Apple ecosystem buy iPhones in such large quantities in 2021.
Go to a carrier store and these are so many modern looking Android devices that rival the iPhone 12. How are Apple still selling so many iPhones when the competition has caught up dramatically?
>How are Apple still selling so many iPhones when the competition has caught up dramatically?
I'm not a tech person like folks around here. I'm good with tech such that dozens of friends and family use me for tech support, but my skills can't touch what HN users can do. I don’t even work in tech. Never have. I'm also someone who has been an Apple user since before there was a Mac.
The idea that the competition "has caught up" sounds like a specs kind-of comparison. I wouldn't know, but I assume it's true (especially ignoring Apple chips). All in all, I assume any major capabilities are widespread. Here are the things I see among average US users I know who are using iPhones and glad they do. Of course, they can afford any iPhone cost premium, but none of what I see is from people who are big spenders, the type who regularly get a newer model. For example, one friend is still happy with his iPhone 7 and a relative recently asked for iPhone recommendations when the screen got shattered on a 5S.
But here are the things I’ve noticed among the people I know, in no particular order:
1. Overall, they actively like the Apple UI and UX. It’s not that it works and that they can do whatever they want, it brings them a measure of pleasure. For all I know it’s as simple as the colors used, but there are experiences there (unknown to me) that delight them. Delight is powerful. Remember in the original iPhone intro when Jobs discussed showing the prototype to a friend and that person said something like, “You had me at rubber band scrolling”? That’s delight.
2. Apple Stores. Average users like knowing where to go in advance should they need full-on help. When making a platform switch, that’s reassuring and apt to come to mind. I think there’s a dual-action thought process—they’re comforted that they just know where there’s an Apple Store (not too far away for most Americans) and they’re at best ambivalent about the carrier store experience for a non-iPhone.
3. Accessories galore. The Android ecosystem may be just as bountiful, but most people believe the Apple ecosystem is bountiful. Other than a case they probably don’t know if there are even accessories they want, but they like the comfort of knowing there’s anything they can imagine if they get a need.
4. The iPad. If you're a tablet user (ignoring e-readers here), being all-in on one style of UI/UX, along with any Apple integrations—the notes just sync!—has value and allure. Since the iPad is the tablet, Apple has kind of cornered that multi-purchase market.
5A. Network effects. These remarkable, ongoing iPhone sales numbers, combined with ideas like I’ve described above, are going to have network effects. Whether it’s blue-bubble peer pressure, nearly 15 years of iPhone TV commercials seeping into minds, whatever… hundreds of millions of satisfied users are going to have network effects.
5B. The other network effect is all-time iPhone sales. What is it, around a billion now? Over nearly 15 years. That's a lot of phones getting replaced even by people who aren't the type to always have a sufficiently new model.
When a product reaches this many sales, it’s never about specific features. Nearly all buyers don’t know the strengths or weaknesses of the iPhone privacy features. Encryption? Most people’s first thought is a fear of getting locked out. Privacy? There’s a good chance they’ll install a Facebook, Instagram, or Google-made app anyway, all without a thought about privacy. The camera? They can see it's good. Apps? There are loads.
That’s why Apple keeps tacking on more small features or services. Keep the users happy. Users likely don’t care about the free Apple Arcade trial or home screen widgets or a new accessibility capability. But there’s something there for pretty much everyone. Maybe it’s the free season of Apple TV because they saw Ted Lasso. Or easily pinpointing a kid’s whereabouts. Or FaceTime because grandma has an iPad and she’ll know how to answer a FaceTime call the first time she gets one.
The product becomes something else at some point. And if Apple keeps them sufficiently satisfied, they’re unlikely to leave, especially since a smartphone borders on necessity in today’s world.
I'm not a tech person like folks around here. I'm good with tech such that dozens of friends and family use me for tech support, but my skills can't touch what HN users can do. I don’t even work in tech. Never have. I'm also someone who has been an Apple user since before there was a Mac.
The idea that the competition "has caught up" sounds like a specs kind-of comparison. I wouldn't know, but I assume it's true (especially ignoring Apple chips). All in all, I assume any major capabilities are widespread. Here are the things I see among average US users I know who are using iPhones and glad they do. Of course, they can afford any iPhone cost premium, but none of what I see is from people who are big spenders, the type who regularly get a newer model. For example, one friend is still happy with his iPhone 7 and a relative recently asked for iPhone recommendations when the screen got shattered on a 5S.
But here are the things I’ve noticed among the people I know, in no particular order:
1. Overall, they actively like the Apple UI and UX. It’s not that it works and that they can do whatever they want, it brings them a measure of pleasure. For all I know it’s as simple as the colors used, but there are experiences there (unknown to me) that delight them. Delight is powerful. Remember in the original iPhone intro when Jobs discussed showing the prototype to a friend and that person said something like, “You had me at rubber band scrolling”? That’s delight.
2. Apple Stores. Average users like knowing where to go in advance should they need full-on help. When making a platform switch, that’s reassuring and apt to come to mind. I think there’s a dual-action thought process—they’re comforted that they just know where there’s an Apple Store (not too far away for most Americans) and they’re at best ambivalent about the carrier store experience for a non-iPhone.
3. Accessories galore. The Android ecosystem may be just as bountiful, but most people believe the Apple ecosystem is bountiful. Other than a case they probably don’t know if there are even accessories they want, but they like the comfort of knowing there’s anything they can imagine if they get a need.
4. The iPad. If you're a tablet user (ignoring e-readers here), being all-in on one style of UI/UX, along with any Apple integrations—the notes just sync!—has value and allure. Since the iPad is the tablet, Apple has kind of cornered that multi-purchase market.
5A. Network effects. These remarkable, ongoing iPhone sales numbers, combined with ideas like I’ve described above, are going to have network effects. Whether it’s blue-bubble peer pressure, nearly 15 years of iPhone TV commercials seeping into minds, whatever… hundreds of millions of satisfied users are going to have network effects.
5B. The other network effect is all-time iPhone sales. What is it, around a billion now? Over nearly 15 years. That's a lot of phones getting replaced even by people who aren't the type to always have a sufficiently new model.
When a product reaches this many sales, it’s never about specific features. Nearly all buyers don’t know the strengths or weaknesses of the iPhone privacy features. Encryption? Most people’s first thought is a fear of getting locked out. Privacy? There’s a good chance they’ll install a Facebook, Instagram, or Google-made app anyway, all without a thought about privacy. The camera? They can see it's good. Apps? There are loads.
That’s why Apple keeps tacking on more small features or services. Keep the users happy. Users likely don’t care about the free Apple Arcade trial or home screen widgets or a new accessibility capability. But there’s something there for pretty much everyone. Maybe it’s the free season of Apple TV because they saw Ted Lasso. Or easily pinpointing a kid’s whereabouts. Or FaceTime because grandma has an iPad and she’ll know how to answer a FaceTime call the first time she gets one.
The product becomes something else at some point. And if Apple keeps them sufficiently satisfied, they’re unlikely to leave, especially since a smartphone borders on necessity in today’s world.
It’s super cool to have readers and contributors on HN such as yourself, thanks.
I have to assume there’s some appeal, too, to not having to research a half dozen manufacturers with several offerings each to pick a phone.
For me, every 2 years, I look for the best camera on an iPhone and my shopping is done.
For me, every 2 years, I look for the best camera on an iPhone and my shopping is done.
I’m a techie so I’m not sure if the rest of the population thinks about this the same way, but I assume Android phones are spying on me much more than iPhones. Otherwise I’d be down with supporting an “open” phone, though I’m old enough to remember walking tons of people through installing Spybot Search & Destroy due to the, uh, openness of Windows. Also, I spend tons of time fiddling around on the command line and don’t feel the need to get my tinkerer fix from a phone. Maybe other people don’t want to move away from what’s familiar, or they just want to see the blue color for a fellow iMessage user to feel they’re using the same thing as the other iPhone folks. I’m also expecting to rely on various iOS permissions settings as my kids grow up, and Find My iPhone is very handy with my family’s devices.
I think it's true that both Android and iOS have privacy issues (at a software and design level).
And yep, from the branding of those devices (which Apple can control much more closely since they provide both hardware and software), the perception is much more likely to be that the svelte, sleek white object protects your privacy.
Over a long timeline though, I don't know whether a closed source ecosystem can prove (or achieve) that.
Maybe the code inside all those components is equally pristine and it all respects your privacy as much as the corresponding advertising claims would suggest. Perhaps time will tell.
And yep, from the branding of those devices (which Apple can control much more closely since they provide both hardware and software), the perception is much more likely to be that the svelte, sleek white object protects your privacy.
Over a long timeline though, I don't know whether a closed source ecosystem can prove (or achieve) that.
Maybe the code inside all those components is equally pristine and it all respects your privacy as much as the corresponding advertising claims would suggest. Perhaps time will tell.
Spybot Search & Destroy. What a blast from the past :D
That GIF from the /e/ foundation website shows quite well how much more, it is still a lot on an iPhone.
https://e.foundation/about-e/
https://e.foundation/about-e/
Android has find my phone as well.
And Android has had it since 2013.
I am not sure if it's simply bad marketing but I often feel like a lot of the features Android has are unknown to iPhone users (understandable) but also unknown to many Android users.
I remember a colleague of mine getting an iPhone after being on Android for years. I asked her why she switched and she told me that there were all these great features her friend had told her about that iPhones had. Turns out all those features already existed on Android, they were just unknown to her.
I am not sure if it's simply bad marketing but I often feel like a lot of the features Android has are unknown to iPhone users (understandable) but also unknown to many Android users.
I remember a colleague of mine getting an iPhone after being on Android for years. I asked her why she switched and she told me that there were all these great features her friend had told her about that iPhones had. Turns out all those features already existed on Android, they were just unknown to her.
If a feature falls in a forest and nobody is around to hear it, did it make a sound? Less cryptically, if a user isn't aware of a feature, does it really exist for them?
The ios one is just better. Or at least they present the features better. On Android I do not remember it being an app but instead a website you go to. On iOS the app has multiple functions, finding your phone/macbook/ipad, finding your friends if they enable location sharing, and finding your items via airtags. The latest version even lets you track your iphone while it is turned off via an airtags like function built in.
FYI: Its an app on Android also... and lets you find any registered device.
Its up to you to get your friends registered on it tho.
Airtags are different as there is no first party implementation, they're all 3rd party (Tile, samsung, etc).
Airtags are different as there is no first party implementation, they're all 3rd party (Tile, samsung, etc).
To counter what others are saying, switching to a samsung phone was a breeze and the camera is better. I don't have a gazillion iphone accessories so it helped. My take is: phones have peaked in their potential years ago, it's no longer 2012 and people can't keep rationalizing their purchases on technical superiority. Most people i meet who own iphones are heavily into the cult of the brand to the point where they 'll feel the need to comment about phones when they see you don't have one (for me phones are never a subject i'd bring up). My take is iphones are like LV bags: there is a lot of social signaling around phones and a lot of hyperbole over the superiority of apple to the point where it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. And unlike other signaling purhcases like cars, these are actually affordable. That's why , i think, phone sales are higher than their other products: cause you carry the phone everywhere. I like iphones; but i ve become accustomed to the freedom of androids now which i value more.
The only bummer assuming you got a flagship Samsung, you will at least get one major OS update, while a large majority of Android phones get zero.
Google focus on flagship models on their security improvements and Treble adoption related talks for a reason.
Google focus on flagship models on their security improvements and Treble adoption related talks for a reason.
i use an S10 currently which is already old, iirc it still prompts me for updates. In any case realistically i ll buy another phone in a 1-2 years. The interesting thing is that these iPhone buyers do the same, they keep buying the new models instead of keeping their old or buying used ones, so it can't be the superior updates support.
Frankly i think the biggest driver for iphone replacement is screens breaking. It's very costly to replace that on an iphone
Frankly i think the biggest driver for iphone replacement is screens breaking. It's very costly to replace that on an iphone
This is not considering whether or not the majority of iPhone users replace their phone or not and not taking into account that apple care (which can bet a monthly $5) makes screen repair $30.
But if the share of iphones in the market is not increasing, yet sales keep going up, then it means most users are replacing them
imho this is the correct answer. It's also the reason why Apple seemingly can't make up their mind - making the phone thinner, wider, taller, shorter, camera notches, buttons, colors, etc. It's intentional - there must be some easily identifiable way to tell apart those with money and status from the pauper peasants who embarrass themselves with last year phones. BMW plays the same game with the grill on their cars. And the whole fashion industry is basically 100% built on this dynamic.
I'm just surprised that people need devices. I have an iPhone and no desire to replace it -- it's basically perfect at this point.
To some extent, I wonder what the future looks like for Apple. It's like some God gave them the golden goose, the iPhone, and I just wonder what happens when people are done buying those. (It's hard to imagine a world where people aren't buying $1200 phones, but it was also hard to imagine the world in 1990 where people weren't buying $1200 personal computers. So what does 2050 look like for Apple?)
To some extent, I wonder what the future looks like for Apple. It's like some God gave them the golden goose, the iPhone, and I just wonder what happens when people are done buying those. (It's hard to imagine a world where people aren't buying $1200 phones, but it was also hard to imagine the world in 1990 where people weren't buying $1200 personal computers. So what does 2050 look like for Apple?)
Cameras get better with each phone iteration. So there's that.
Several years ago I would have had no idea that I would be able to hand-hold a 2-second low light shot with my iPhone camera.
What next?
Several years ago I would have had no idea that I would be able to hand-hold a 2-second low light shot with my iPhone camera.
What next?
The camera is literally the only reason I upgraded my 5 year old phone. There isn't really an app I use that runs better on the new phone vs the old, except the camera app of course, so it was an expensive camera upgrade (with new battery!).
I upgrade every 2 years. The processors and cameras get better every cycle and I use my phone so much that it's worth it to have a better experience. While $1200 seems like a lot, that's ~$40 /mo over 2 years (including the trade in value) for something I use for hours every day.
Do the new processors and cameras actually give you a better experience though? I used to upgrade regularly, but I'm still using my S10+ and I'm honestly not sure I'd've replaced my S8+ if it hadn't been stolen, I don't really notice a whole lot of difference. (If anything I miss the coloured notification light from the S7+).
I've found diminishing returns with upgrades recently. Since I got my iPhone XS I haven't seen anything pushing me to upgrade. I'll probably upgrade this year just to give my XS to my partner who is on a 6 and no longer receives updates.
Yeah, it's funny when people talk about workloads on their phone lol. I use it to text, make calls, slack for work, watch the occassional video and take some pictures. I'm not exactly batch processing 3d renderings on my phone and I suspect that 99% of the people out there aren't either. My 3 year old iphone is doing fine. as long as it gets security updates and isn't laggy it gets to live.
Yes. It's not that the old phone is unusable, but the new one will be noticeably faster and that's worth it to me. My most recent upgrade was going from an XR to an iPhone 12. If you compare the benchmarks, the 12 is ~30-50% faster for most workloads. And you can feel the difference when you switch between them.
I recently bought a used iPhone 7 because it will probably still receive software updates in two years. I had to retire a Samsung Nexus because SSL stopped working. Apple currently provides updates for fairly old phones, I hope they keep it up.
AR glasses to beam what used to be on your iPhone straight into your eyeballs at all times, is what Apple thinks, according to rumours.
fartcannon(3)
A new iPhone SE is $250 from Boost Mobile right now. The last time I owned a budget Android phone the MISC folder filled up with garbage that I couldn't delete until the phone was unusable. My iPhone SE will probably end up lasting something like five years. I think the iPhone SE is the best choice if you're on tight budget because its OS is better and the phone will last longer for that reason alone.
> The last time I owned a budget Android phone the MISC folder filled up with garbage that I couldn't delete until the phone was unusable.
How old are you, gramps? This hasn't been the case since Android 4 days.
How old are you, gramps? This hasn't been the case since Android 4 days.
How many do you want to buy like that?
https://www.saturn.de/de/category/smartphones-498.html?filte...
https://www.saturn.de/de/category/smartphones-498.html?filte...
I can address the iPhone at least for me. I bought my first iPhone this year. The reason is because, unfortunately, Apple is the only company that pretty much promises more than 3 years of security updates. I believe on Android, pixel is the best with offering 3 years of support (my last phone was a Pixel 3a). I could have stuck with android and found a phone that is fully supported by some of the more FOSS implementations of Android, but it is a pain to source a phone that has all of the drivers. This is the one place where I commend Apple, their phones average about 6-7 years of security updates and OS updates.
I finally got an iPad two years ago and then half a year later I got a midrange iPhone.
Reason is I'm fed up with all my Android phones after Samsung SII either lagging from day one or starting to lag after a few months. I think I have lost a few nice photos because the phone was busy doing something else when you picked it up to shoot a funny moment. It also compounds: I think I reached less often for my camera phone when I know it will fail me.
I'm also tired of Samsung stalling OS updates to sell new phones.
I'm also didn't enjoy Sony adding Amazon link on the home screen of my phone during an OS update: It is a minor thing but it nicely proved they didn't understand it is my phone after I have paid them for it.
I've also given my three oldest kids used iPhones. iPhones are easier to repair and generally nicer, easier to get covers and screen protectors for and my kids prefer them.
Taking a step away from Google is a nice bonus.
(No Apple products before 2019 except a company laptop in 2009 - 2012.)
Reason is I'm fed up with all my Android phones after Samsung SII either lagging from day one or starting to lag after a few months. I think I have lost a few nice photos because the phone was busy doing something else when you picked it up to shoot a funny moment. It also compounds: I think I reached less often for my camera phone when I know it will fail me.
I'm also tired of Samsung stalling OS updates to sell new phones.
I'm also didn't enjoy Sony adding Amazon link on the home screen of my phone during an OS update: It is a minor thing but it nicely proved they didn't understand it is my phone after I have paid them for it.
I've also given my three oldest kids used iPhones. iPhones are easier to repair and generally nicer, easier to get covers and screen protectors for and my kids prefer them.
Taking a step away from Google is a nice bonus.
(No Apple products before 2019 except a company laptop in 2009 - 2012.)
The iPhone SE and iPhone 12 mini have surprisingly compelling values. I'd consider switching if I were in the market for a new phone.
For Q2, year-on-year is comparing against the first wave of COVID last year, when the world was coming to a screeching halt. Many other tech companies like Google are posting similarly outrageous figures, simply because the baseline is low.
As for who's buying, COVID relief checks will be at least part of the answer.
As for who's buying, COVID relief checks will be at least part of the answer.
A lot of people have more money now than before the pandemic started. If you were not among the ones who lost your job, then your income remained the same but you were spending less money going out and spending.
I think my #1 reason to stay Apple for the foreseeable years is that they put Privacy up there as a value. It makes all it's money from hardware and not my data. Once you understand how Google makes it's money it doesn't make you want to use it's products.
Homekit may not be as good as Alexa/Google assistant for home automation but it makes an effort to keep all your data local and not in a cloud. A small minority of us really value that.
I understand for regular people though it's really just a status symbol. I spent X on a phone cause I'm doing well in life.
Homekit may not be as good as Alexa/Google assistant for home automation but it makes an effort to keep all your data local and not in a cloud. A small minority of us really value that.
I understand for regular people though it's really just a status symbol. I spent X on a phone cause I'm doing well in life.
For me its update length. In 2019 I did not have a single Apple product but then I needed a tablet and found that the android side was offering almost no compelling options so I picked up an iPad Air 2 (2014). I was absolutely shocked by the fact it was still getting updates (its getting ipados 15 now) which convinced me to try out the other products so I now own the iphone, watch, ipad pro and airpods. The air 2 went to my mum who still uses it today and it works well.
It's a status symbol and subsidized phones hide the true cost.
Exactly. And I'm so surprised by how many people on HN (smart people who understand psychology) don't seem to understand that people don't use rational arguments (security, specs, price, etc) when making purchase decisions.
Even if alternative smartphone exist, the iPhone is still all about status signaling. It's about implicitly communicating that you are part of the successful tribe. And Apple watches are now another such symbol.
Even if alternative smartphone exist, the iPhone is still all about status signaling. It's about implicitly communicating that you are part of the successful tribe. And Apple watches are now another such symbol.
Lol I bought an apple because it doesn't try to find out every aspect of my behavior and then send it off to 3rd part advertisers. also they get updates for 2-3x as long as android phones. The specs are close enough and I see my phone as a tool and most people I know do as well. I can't say I've ever heard someone say "ewwwwww you have an android?" . Maybe teenagers say that crap, but I've never heard an adult care.
I generalized of course. I know some people use more rational (less subconscious) reasons for buying Apple products.
But it is nevertheless useful to use generalizations and ignore the outliers (like you, for example) for understanding trends and social phenomena. People like us reading hacker news are statistically insignificant.
But it is nevertheless useful to use generalizations and ignore the outliers (like you, for example) for understanding trends and social phenomena. People like us reading hacker news are statistically insignificant.
iPhones cost about the same amount as the equivalent from Samsung and Google though? The value per dollar on Apple products is very competitive.
> Go to a carrier store and these are so many modern looking Android devices that rival the iPhone 12.
Are there really? From what I hear from non-techie friends and coworkers, what they care the most about in a modern phone is the camera (everything else being effectively indistinguishable to them); and you can count the Android phones competitive in this field on one hand.
And all of them make different tradeoffs and/or have outright problems that prevent them from being "the" iPhone killer, even if you care enough to dig into their details, which most people don't have the time or interest in. Apple is the "safe" choice as far as the general public is concerned, and not undeservedly so.
Are there really? From what I hear from non-techie friends and coworkers, what they care the most about in a modern phone is the camera (everything else being effectively indistinguishable to them); and you can count the Android phones competitive in this field on one hand.
And all of them make different tradeoffs and/or have outright problems that prevent them from being "the" iPhone killer, even if you care enough to dig into their details, which most people don't have the time or interest in. Apple is the "safe" choice as far as the general public is concerned, and not undeservedly so.
> Go to a carrier store and these are so many modern looking Android devices that rival the iPhone 12.
No. Nothing rivals the iPhone 12. Its Apple Silicon CPU makes it the most powerful smartphone by a wide margin. And Apple didn't make the galaxybrain decision to include a runtime with a GC. Because, you know, they care about the entire user experience, including battery life and everything running at a smooth 60fps.
No. Nothing rivals the iPhone 12. Its Apple Silicon CPU makes it the most powerful smartphone by a wide margin. And Apple didn't make the galaxybrain decision to include a runtime with a GC. Because, you know, they care about the entire user experience, including battery life and everything running at a smooth 60fps.
1. Most of the highest uptake in YOY were from Greater China.
2. 5G is a thing.
3. People are actually upgrading to 5G smartphone because they want their phone to last longer. Instead of buying another phone again.
4. China also has the largest 5G deployment. Their MNO upgrade to 5G is also a few years ahead of everyone else due to their needs from a high population density.
5. iOS 14 widget is surpassingly favourable among Android Switchers.
6. Google's reputation due to privacy concern is having some effect on Android market.
7. The urge to spend due to not being able to do much at home.
Basically it is lots of factors creating a perfect storm.
I still maintain the same analogy as 10 years ago, iOS / iPhone is a smartphone appliance trying to push upwards into a computer, while Android is a pocket computer trying to be like a Smartphone Appliance. Both have their appeals, but generally speaking I tend to prefer the less complex, simple model of iOS. But yes they are increasingly alike.
2. 5G is a thing.
3. People are actually upgrading to 5G smartphone because they want their phone to last longer. Instead of buying another phone again.
4. China also has the largest 5G deployment. Their MNO upgrade to 5G is also a few years ahead of everyone else due to their needs from a high population density.
5. iOS 14 widget is surpassingly favourable among Android Switchers.
6. Google's reputation due to privacy concern is having some effect on Android market.
7. The urge to spend due to not being able to do much at home.
Basically it is lots of factors creating a perfect storm.
I still maintain the same analogy as 10 years ago, iOS / iPhone is a smartphone appliance trying to push upwards into a computer, while Android is a pocket computer trying to be like a Smartphone Appliance. Both have their appeals, but generally speaking I tend to prefer the less complex, simple model of iOS. But yes they are increasingly alike.
Flagship android devices have been ahead of apple (other than maybe cpu speed which doesn't much matter) in almost all features for the past decade. I got an iphone because google screwed up my account and it was like pulling teeth to get access back so I switched to Apple and enjoyed the extras of a much more private OS and a company not trying to sell me out to every shyster who pays a few bucks to their ad revenue branch. I still use linux for work and personal computing. I did on a whim by a low end mac mini to play with the OS though but I don't do anything serious on it. Also I'll be able to update my phone 2-3x as long as an android phone. I usually keep a phone for at least 4 years so that's important to me.
I’m not sure how many people have spent multiple years on each iOS and Android but I have. And the experience quality isn’t even comparable. Android feels like using a Windows PC where you are always having to fiddle with some setting, install something, kill a process, fuck with the registry. iOS is absolutely hands-off in a way that nothing else is (including Mac OS). For a touchscreen device people are willing to sacrifice configurability for reliability. As phones become increasingly important to people’s lives they will spend the money to get the good stuff (and, iOS has come down in price, and due to the longevity of the products, is far cheaper over the long run. My wife is still using an iPhone 6S, and it’s still snappy).
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I think the iPhone upgrade program is pretty compelling. For a lot of folks that means you can get a new iPhone every year for ~$50/mo, which is pretty manageable for most people. Having the new iPhone every year is fun and conveys a certain status. I’m not sure there’s any Android phone that conveys status. So, that’s probably got a lot to do with it.
Maybe we travel in different circles. Most people I know who get an iphone get a new one when it "breaks" or the battery dies too quickly.
The main reason why I recommend iPhone to any one that asks is because they can just walk any "phone store" and just pick the one that looks the way they want - it doesn't matter which one they pick, they're all excellent phones. Just like Macs used to.
The same reason people pay $100+ for a pair of jeans, simply because of the label.
I don't think that argument works for Apple products. They're expensive rather than exclusive. Nothing about buying an iPhone suggests you have better taste than other people, because mobile phones are basic commodity items these days.
Not among teenagers. I know a lot of teenagers and they judge each other heavily based on whether they have an Apple phone or not. It doesn't even need to be a top of the line Apple phone. It's the little apple on the back that matters more than anything.
Depends. I bought my first iPhone this year because iPhones average about 6-7 years of security and OS updates. I would have stuck with Android, but the best support I could find was 3 years with a Pixel (my last android was a Pixel 3a).
Teenager’s parents money
iPhone is a known quantity. There are a few models, updated every year.
Which of the hundreds of models of "modern Android devices" should one get?
Which of the hundreds of models of "modern Android devices" should one get?
[deleted]
Have you used an Android phone lately?
There's just no comparison.
There's just no comparison.
Yes, iOS and Android developer here. Switched my daily driver from iPhone to a Pixel 3a. Difference is negligible in everything except for cost.
I’ve switched back and forth several times. Nexus, Pixel, OnePlus, Galaxy, multiple generations for all but OnePlus. iPhones 3G and later (on the latest generation). The polish of the experience on iOS still beats android for me, although the last time I tried a pixel I think it was the closest it’s ever been. Google has some cool tricks, but apples integration with the rest of their ecosystem pushes it over the edge for me, and I do have other Google products like home/nest WiFi.
Similar. I mostly got tired of switching back and forth.
It's probably just because I'm used to Android, but whenever I use my company issued iPhone it just feels slugish and unintuitive to me. My android makes me feel like I'm operating a handheld computer with specialized software, an iPhone makes me feel like I picked up some weird foreign device at a farmers market.
I haven't use an apple product since 2015/2016. I switched to android (some junky Chinese phone) because of price, was a downgrade. Now I recently updated to a newer and nicer android device and the whole experience is much nicer than my old Apple product was. What has changed to make there be "no comparison" in your mind? I'm interested.
Is that comparable though? Seems like you're comparing the 2021 Android "experience" to the 2016 Apple "experience."
I'm comparing my 500$ Samsung S10e to my gf's 1200$ iPhone 11 Pro, the difference is there but it's definitely not worth extra 700$.
I said:
> What has changed to make there be "no comparison" in your mind? I'm interested.
I'm asking the question because I genuinely have no idea what's changed in Apple products over the years. I was replying to someone who seems like they have and I was asking for them to explain what's changed and what makes them so much better/worse respectively.
> What has changed to make there be "no comparison" in your mind? I'm interested.
I'm asking the question because I genuinely have no idea what's changed in Apple products over the years. I was replying to someone who seems like they have and I was asking for them to explain what's changed and what makes them so much better/worse respectively.
I believe Tim Cook said they have the top two phones in China this past quarter. They were also the top 2 in many (or most) markets. Their global penetration is legit.
I think apple has growing to be more reliable and seamless since Tim Cook took over?
Although many complaints that apple has less innovation compared to the Steve's era, however the ecosystem that Tim has built between apple's product has been awesome. You can just feel it when you use your mac, apple watch, iphone, airpods. It ONLY happens between apple products though.
Then when I go back to my windows PC and try to use apple music, or even try to transfer videos / photos, I started cursing apple again.
Then when I go back to my windows PC and try to use apple music, or even try to transfer videos / photos, I started cursing apple again.
every time i use osx i fucking start cursing due to how god forsaken slow it is. apple even managed to make it so slow I notice it when helping my coworkers debug their code.
It is only slow if you compare it to some obscure i3 linux thingy. Out of all major desktop players, Mac OS is the most performant.
Hard disagree. Comparing over the past year with my Linux box, windows laptop, and Chromebook macOS is clearly the worst performing.
this is easily and demonstrably false. I use gnome-shell, generally the whipping boy of the linux DMs. the problem isn't with the UI frameworks its with the filesystem.
macosx chokes hard compared to linux and any filesystem access suffers from it.
download a medium sized javascript git repo with node_modules `rm -rf node_modules && git checkout -- .` my shittier linux laptop crushes my macosx laptop.
macosx chokes hard compared to linux and any filesystem access suffers from it.
download a medium sized javascript git repo with node_modules `rm -rf node_modules && git checkout -- .` my shittier linux laptop crushes my macosx laptop.
Honestly it is not slow at all for me, what're you using it for? With the exception of gaming, productivity, development, and usage has been great for me.
The build quality of macbook is more sturdy than its competitors like xps, thinkpad, makes me so confident and comfortable to bring it everywhere with me honestly.
The build quality of macbook is more sturdy than its competitors like xps, thinkpad, makes me so confident and comfortable to bring it everywhere with me honestly.
do a `rm -rf ./* && git checkout -- .` on a git repo. then do the same thing on a linux box, we're not talking a few milliseconds difference. even our small repos take minute or more for macosx vs linux. this impacts shit like indexing code bases, spinning up the local server etc.
As someone who owns an iPad, airpods, and a MBP (just to state some non-apple-hater credentials) I was just commenting yesterday to someone that despite owning all 3 of these products I have no way to plug in either of the first two into the third one. I have zero cords that connect them because of decisions that have been made about them. And despite them being on the same "ecosystem" I have never needed any kind of syncing or wireless connection between my iPad and my MBP. I wish Apple would focus more on strengthening the quality of their PRODUCTS rather than their "ecosystem".
Unclear why you would connect these devices via a cord. The AirPods are inherently wireless but do easily switch between the iPad and the MBP. You could connect the iPad to the MBP using either a lightning cable or USB-C depending on which iPad you have but I don’t see what benefit that would give you though you could use that to charge the iPad. The products seem to work fine.
I’m doing a distance learning course with my local university and recently availed of the student discount to buy a new iPad Pro, and it came with a pair of AirPods Pro. The iPad Pro came with a USB-C cable, the AirPods a Lightning to USB-C cable, and all macs since 2016 have usb-c/thunderbolt ports.
This was a valid critique a couple of years ago, but not now.
This was a valid critique a couple of years ago, but not now.
Those devices actually do have the capability of connecting to each other.
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That is not at all what antifragile is.
To be antifragile you need to always have top talent and have them work on deep projects and produce top notch products.
Apple had that with Steve Jobs.
I don't think it has that now. I haven't seen anything really interesting from Apple after Steve Jobs passed away. Their macbook offerings keep getting worse: the touch bar is a UX disaster. The desktop keeps getting slower. The UI keeps getting flatter and worse.
Apple used to be a market leader: they would release a new product every few years and everyone would soon follow suit: iPhone, iPad.
Now Apple is just trying to mimick other companies: producing various sizes and version of iPhone and iPad.
Having a strong supply chain is not antifragile.
To be antifragile you need to always have top talent and have them work on deep projects and produce top notch products.
Apple had that with Steve Jobs.
I don't think it has that now. I haven't seen anything really interesting from Apple after Steve Jobs passed away. Their macbook offerings keep getting worse: the touch bar is a UX disaster. The desktop keeps getting slower. The UI keeps getting flatter and worse.
Apple used to be a market leader: they would release a new product every few years and everyone would soon follow suit: iPhone, iPad.
Now Apple is just trying to mimick other companies: producing various sizes and version of iPhone and iPad.
Having a strong supply chain is not antifragile.
Why do you think that the M1 chip isn't interesting enough?
Other than that, their apple watches also have some very novel technologies.
Also, their newer iPads with the M1 chip are processing power houses.
M1 chip is not a product. It's a component in a product. It doesn't really do that much for the end user. Software runs faster now but in a few years everything will become slower again, as always happens.
No, the M1 is not a product. A Macbook with an M1 chip is, though, and a Macbook with an M1 chip is an amazing product, right now. Nothing else gets close.
It really is, it's so buttery smooth and the battery life and how quiet it is is quite slick. I don't own one but I did borrow one from a friend for a day trip and it was really nice. Not nice enough for me to not wait until I run my current battery hog linux daily driver into the ground but it was really nice and did a decent job compiling my rust projects.
> Now Apple is just trying to mimick other companies: producing various sizes and version of iPhone and iPad.
Disagree: AirPods are a cultural phenomenon with many copy cats and the Apple Watch is the most popular and profitable watch (not just smart watch) in the world.
Disagree: AirPods are a cultural phenomenon with many copy cats and the Apple Watch is the most popular and profitable watch (not just smart watch) in the world.
> I don't think it has that now. I haven't seen anything really interesting from Apple after Steve Jobs passed away
It's not revolutionary but the new M1 laptops from Apple are one of the best hardware-related things I have purchased in the last 10 years or so. Presumably it won't bring Apple tens of billions in profits but they have managed to gain some developers' goodwill for the platform.
It's not revolutionary but the new M1 laptops from Apple are one of the best hardware-related things I have purchased in the last 10 years or so. Presumably it won't bring Apple tens of billions in profits but they have managed to gain some developers' goodwill for the platform.
I disagree. Apple moving to ARM is going to push the industry more towards that architecture. It's going to be monumental.
Not only that, but the M1 is a fantastic chip. If Apple is able to iterate on the M1 they'll outshine AMD/Intel in no time (if they don't already).
Not only that, but the M1 is a fantastic chip. If Apple is able to iterate on the M1 they'll outshine AMD/Intel in no time (if they don't already).
They are antifragile in producing the current class of consumer electronics?
I agree that optimized supply chains and economies of scale are generally fragile. If other types of devices become popular, they'll have inertia other innovators won't.
But I don't think this question is black and white. Apple has fragile, robust and antifragile aspects.
I agree that optimized supply chains and economies of scale are generally fragile. If other types of devices become popular, they'll have inertia other innovators won't.
But I don't think this question is black and white. Apple has fragile, robust and antifragile aspects.
Two years ago a lot of people would have thought your comment was spot on. Now it's just demonstrably false.
Airpods would like a word!
The best part about these kinds of stories is that we all get to share our feelings about Apple! Tell us why you prefer iOS or Android -- I can't wait to find out!!
> I can't wait to find out!
I know, right!? It’s not like we haven’t heard the same opinions 1,000x before on each and every single previous Apple article.
I know, right!? It’s not like we haven’t heard the same opinions 1,000x before on each and every single previous Apple article.
Then why would you possibly bother reading the comments? Just to troll and say lololol stupid platform wars!
Because of the same reason I read the comments in any HN thread. Often times you will find additional links or insights that are more useful than the source article itself. That's the awesome thing about HN to me. The problem with anything Apple related is that you have to sift through a ton of heavily regurgitated "religious" beliefs to find that nugget of useful knowledge in the comments.
They are still coupled to manufacturing in China. If you look at the capricious nature of CCP regulation just in the past year, with Didi, Ant, Ed Tech, etc or even the government news apparatus sicking mobs on to Tesla triggering a decline in Tesla sales over what looks to be a staged protest over brakes, it is not good situation to be in. TSMC is building tons of a fabs, including two in Arizona right now, so they will have some protection from the CCP starting an invasion, but such a conflict would undoubtedly draw the US into it, if only by proxy, and set off a major split in diplomatic/economic relations, which would threaten pretty much any US company with significant manufacturing base in China.
Tim Cook should be looking to shift more production to India, Southeast Asia, Brazil, etc. That way, he doesn't have to engage in major acting performances at Chinese conferences, like saying that Apple shares China's vision of an "open" internet.
Tim Cook should be looking to shift more production to India, Southeast Asia, Brazil, etc. That way, he doesn't have to engage in major acting performances at Chinese conferences, like saying that Apple shares China's vision of an "open" internet.
I had trouble getting past:
"Imagine a heavy, cast-iron kettlebell. If you put it on top of a paper cup, it crushes the cup. Put it on top of a concrete block and the concrete block supports it just fine. But if you lift that kettlebell repeatedly (with good form), you will get stronger. The paper cup is fragile, the concrete block is robust, and your body is antifragile (even if it doesn’t always feel that way)."
If you put (for some value of "put" - i.e. drop from 6 inches) a kettlebell on the human head, you will discover that the human body isn't all that antifragile.
Honestly the word I think the author is looking for is "diversified."
If you put (for some value of "put" - i.e. drop from 6 inches) a kettlebell on the human head, you will discover that the human body isn't all that antifragile.
Honestly the word I think the author is looking for is "diversified."
Taleb would call that “ruin risk”. Even in anti-fragile systems, if the stressor overburdens the system, you create ruin.
Apple isn't "antifragile", they're just monstrously big. Since they have an iron grip on their supply chain, it makes sense that they'd benefit right now while their competitors struggle.
Having 200 billion dollars in liquid cash sitting in the bank helps too.
And 100 billion in debt helps less
100 billion dollars in cash is more than the entire market cap of many of the companies they're competing against.
And that's assuming those competitors have no debt, which is false.
And that's assuming those competitors have no debt, which is false.
As other people is saying, the arguments from the article point Apple to be robust, not antifragile. As it still has many single points of failure in its design the whole thing may still break by a hardware bug, or the lack of software or whatever.
In order to be antifragile it should become stronger after each stressor is applied, but we can only see it becoming stronger by the stressors over the competitors not onto itself.
Still apples strategy is very good, but not as antifragile as something like a Linux OS which by not having hardware and being crossplatform may still grow market and show strength from such lack of hardware vendors.
In order to be antifragile it should become stronger after each stressor is applied, but we can only see it becoming stronger by the stressors over the competitors not onto itself.
Still apples strategy is very good, but not as antifragile as something like a Linux OS which by not having hardware and being crossplatform may still grow market and show strength from such lack of hardware vendors.
This is a big misunderstanding of Nassim Taleb's "Antifragile" heuristic.
"Blue chip" corporations like Apple fall more into the "Turkey Problem" i.e people expecting the big, to continue being big.
"Blue chip" corporations like Apple fall more into the "Turkey Problem" i.e people expecting the big, to continue being big.
The author of this post does not appear to have actually read the book "antifragile," and seems to think it just means "company that has reduced its weak spots."
Nothing in this post has anything to do with anti-fragility.
This author also doesn't seem to understand basic economics. They seem to be confusing that PS5 is unavailable and Mac isn't as an issue of Apple doing better with supply, when the actual issue is that there's far more demand for the PlayStation.
This is not a person to learn from.
Nothing in this post has anything to do with anti-fragility.
This author also doesn't seem to understand basic economics. They seem to be confusing that PS5 is unavailable and Mac isn't as an issue of Apple doing better with supply, when the actual issue is that there's far more demand for the PlayStation.
This is not a person to learn from.
Anti-fragile is not the correct word here.
One big danger for Apple is a further escalation of the US-China tech war. If China starts retaliating for the US sanctions against Huawei, Xiaomi etc by going after big US companies then Apple can be seriously hurt, even though they are probably not first in line.
One big danger for Apple is a further escalation of the US-China tech war. If China starts retaliating for the US sanctions against Huawei, Xiaomi etc by going after big US companies then Apple can be seriously hurt, even though they are probably not first in line.
One could have made many of the same claims for General Motors or General Electric at various times.
yes, and those companies were big and dominant for long periods of time and endured lots of problems before starting to get really hurt. Antifragility or robustness is not the same as impervious and immortal.
Yes, the indicators are very strong.
However, we thought similarly about Nokia, Intel, SpaceX competitors, etc.
However, we thought similarly about Nokia, Intel, SpaceX competitors, etc.
Hmmm. Apple may have benefited from lockdown - people working from home and so using and consuming more on their devices but I think that's a fairly weak case for being Antifragile.
By that measure Google, MS, FB, Zoom etc are all Antifragile.
To be truly Antifragile a firm has to be able to benefit from a whole range of stressors.
I actually think FB may be the most Antifragile of the big tech firms. They have been stressed in a number of key ways already (eg shift to mobile, Google+) and seem to come out stronger.
By that measure Google, MS, FB, Zoom etc are all Antifragile.
To be truly Antifragile a firm has to be able to benefit from a whole range of stressors.
I actually think FB may be the most Antifragile of the big tech firms. They have been stressed in a number of key ways already (eg shift to mobile, Google+) and seem to come out stronger.
>Analyst Ben Bajarin said it’s due to Apple locking in its chip supply.
( Takes a Deep Breath )
Why is it Chip supply again? Why is it TSMC again? This is very very tiring. No wonder why people stop reading any sort of media once they are pass certain age.
How about locking in all component supply? From OLED, NAND, DRAM, Modem to everything else down to speaker piece. The 26% YoY increase is exactly inlined with the current projection of 90M new iPhone in 2021.
X: But these are just rumours, we dont know for a fact.......
Look, You dont move 90 Million of leading edge / high quality / high premium components within a single quarter without pretty much anyone in the supply chains knows what you are doing. I mean, you dont even need to be inside the supply chain or connection with supply chain. Even if you work or have connection with logistics like DHL. Moving 90M smartphone without a short period of time is no small feat.
And the whole Antifragile thesis is based on Apple making record quarter, or specifically making Record quarter under supposedly market stress. This analysis is about as bad as the Apple is doomed narrative for the past ten years or Apple is doomed in 2019 because of a drip in sales in Greater China. [1] And it is the same thing happening again. Greater China manage to pull in huge increase of iPhone sales YoY. And it is now Antifragile? Not to mention that remote learning and Staying at Home drove sales of iPad and Mac to new height along with M1. Services Revenue because more people are staying at home with digital spending. ( Look at the Disney+ numbers ). 5G is driving Smartphone sales, whether you like it or not. But most ( if not all ) tech forums are still in 5G denial.
I see Apple as a Robust company. But Anti-fragility was not a results of Apple's doing within the pandemic period. It was preparation of product line and services that just happen to hit home during it. This Anti Apple is Doomed thesis has now turned into Apple is Booned. ( Sorry People I know Boon is not a verb, cant think of a better word though. )
[1] Which is the single biggest problem with Analysing truly Global multinational companies. None of those analyst understand a single thing about China. Zero. And yet China is representing 26% of Apple's total revenue.
( Takes a Deep Breath )
Why is it Chip supply again? Why is it TSMC again? This is very very tiring. No wonder why people stop reading any sort of media once they are pass certain age.
How about locking in all component supply? From OLED, NAND, DRAM, Modem to everything else down to speaker piece. The 26% YoY increase is exactly inlined with the current projection of 90M new iPhone in 2021.
X: But these are just rumours, we dont know for a fact.......
Look, You dont move 90 Million of leading edge / high quality / high premium components within a single quarter without pretty much anyone in the supply chains knows what you are doing. I mean, you dont even need to be inside the supply chain or connection with supply chain. Even if you work or have connection with logistics like DHL. Moving 90M smartphone without a short period of time is no small feat.
And the whole Antifragile thesis is based on Apple making record quarter, or specifically making Record quarter under supposedly market stress. This analysis is about as bad as the Apple is doomed narrative for the past ten years or Apple is doomed in 2019 because of a drip in sales in Greater China. [1] And it is the same thing happening again. Greater China manage to pull in huge increase of iPhone sales YoY. And it is now Antifragile? Not to mention that remote learning and Staying at Home drove sales of iPad and Mac to new height along with M1. Services Revenue because more people are staying at home with digital spending. ( Look at the Disney+ numbers ). 5G is driving Smartphone sales, whether you like it or not. But most ( if not all ) tech forums are still in 5G denial.
I see Apple as a Robust company. But Anti-fragility was not a results of Apple's doing within the pandemic period. It was preparation of product line and services that just happen to hit home during it. This Anti Apple is Doomed thesis has now turned into Apple is Booned. ( Sorry People I know Boon is not a verb, cant think of a better word though. )
[1] Which is the single biggest problem with Analysing truly Global multinational companies. None of those analyst understand a single thing about China. Zero. And yet China is representing 26% of Apple's total revenue.
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All dominant market share companies are antifragile, all rich people are antifragile, each economic crisis makes the rich richer and most of the poor poorer.
There’s a pandemic that forced everyone inside and remote. Computer companies does great. End of story.
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Their devices are still fragile though.
Please explain. Apple devices last longer than any Android device, or for that matter 95% of all electronics sold
The newer Corning glass used on the front of the current iPhone is certainly much more durable than prior versions.
>With the screen still holding strong, we decided to go even higher, using a step ladder to reach nine feet. Again this is not a realistic drop unless you happen to slide your phone off a second floor balcony, but we wanted to see how far we could take it.
We repeated this drop two more times... The frame had a few more bumps and bruises, but the screen still looked like new after three back-to-back drops from nine feet.
https://www.cnet.com/tech/mobile/iphone-12-scratch-drop-test...
>With the screen still holding strong, we decided to go even higher, using a step ladder to reach nine feet. Again this is not a realistic drop unless you happen to slide your phone off a second floor balcony, but we wanted to see how far we could take it.
We repeated this drop two more times... The frame had a few more bumps and bruises, but the screen still looked like new after three back-to-back drops from nine feet.
https://www.cnet.com/tech/mobile/iphone-12-scratch-drop-test...
Take public transportation sometime. Notice all the devices with cracked screens. Totally "anti-fragile" :). Android devices are no better, but the article is talking about Apple.
I would consider that anti-fragile, actually. Cracked front or back glass is limited to a visual defect most of the time, hence why so many people continue to use it.
In comparison, something like an old iPod with a spinning HDD could have a storage failure from a fall.
That modern phones, not just iPhones, are these completely solid devices, packed to the brim, with no more moving pieces makes them surprisingly resilient.
They're even water and dust resistant now just as a standard. Dropping your phone in water was a death sentence a decade ago - it's whatever now.
In comparison, something like an old iPod with a spinning HDD could have a storage failure from a fall.
That modern phones, not just iPhones, are these completely solid devices, packed to the brim, with no more moving pieces makes them surprisingly resilient.
They're even water and dust resistant now just as a standard. Dropping your phone in water was a death sentence a decade ago - it's whatever now.
That is robustness. A robust thing can endure many stressors, but the stressors either leave it as is or make it worse.
Antifragile systems can get better from being stressed, at least to a limit. Muscles are antifragile, as one example. You stress them moderately, and you grow stronger. Stress them too much and you'll break, but within limits your muscles don't just endure the stress, they improve from it.
No physical phone is antifragile.
Antifragile systems can get better from being stressed, at least to a limit. Muscles are antifragile, as one example. You stress them moderately, and you grow stronger. Stress them too much and you'll break, but within limits your muscles don't just endure the stress, they improve from it.
No physical phone is antifragile.
They build glass phones with glass on both sides. Glass. You know that super durable material that is broken by kids with baseballs and breaks easy when dropped?
iPhones get more updates sure. More durable? No. I'm pretty sure a Samsung Active can withstand more abuse. I'm pretty confident that my plastic backed with only a glass screen average Android phone could too.
iPhones get more updates sure. More durable? No. I'm pretty sure a Samsung Active can withstand more abuse. I'm pretty confident that my plastic backed with only a glass screen average Android phone could too.
I’m not a person who is gentle with their tech - it’s a tool, not a fetish - and in 14 years of owning an iPhone,
I have only broken the glass once. This is tough stuff - it’s not like it’s the single pane my dad installed in the garage door that I promptly broke by looking sideways at it.
Yes, it could be sturdier. But that would require other trade offs. Just because you don’t value those decisions doesn’t mean there’s anything wrong. It just means your values were not the primary use case. Diversity is good because people value different sets of trade offs!
Yes, it could be sturdier. But that would require other trade offs. Just because you don’t value those decisions doesn’t mean there’s anything wrong. It just means your values were not the primary use case. Diversity is good because people value different sets of trade offs!
You must not have kids that demand to play with games on your phone then. I have witnessed many iPhones get smashed when said kids drop the phone (almost always by accident). One person I know went through 3 iPhones in a year due to this :(
Do people have some weird objection to phone cases? I've got a $5 case on my 12 Pro and I've dropped it many, many times in the past year without a single issue.
That's hard to believe from my personal experience. Every, and I mean every, Apple product I have ever owned has had major issues, including basically becoming bricks, all on their own. If I include my family's failures, it gets worse. It's enough that it is giving me pause on potentially buying a new iPad. Why do I need a new iPad? Failures are why. The large iPad Pro has begun to bend, a common issue with them (not due to a drop, I can see a stress point in the aluminum chassis since it's poorly designed with holes in the thin chassis right in the middle on all sides). My iPad Air I paid Apple to "repair" (i.e., replace) after it suddenly bricked itself by not being able to charge. It was replaced with a new iPad Air with literally the exact same issue out of the box and was then replaced again by Apple. Now, just a few months later, the touchscreen seems to be failing and is becoming errant and unusable at times.
Out of all my Microsoft Surface computers and Android phones, only one phone ever had a major issue, but it was replaced under LG's two year warranty.
Out of all my Microsoft Surface computers and Android phones, only one phone ever had a major issue, but it was replaced under LG's two year warranty.
> Every, and I mean every, Apple product I have ever owned has had major issues, including basically becoming bricks, all on their own.
You should buy a lottery ticket with some of that hyperbolic bad luck.
You should buy a lottery ticket with some of that hyperbolic bad luck.
I don't think it's bad luck. I think it's Apple not caring about how long their products last or how robust they are. Many of these issues are well known and reported but rarely unchanged between models.
I simply gave my own personal experience, stated as such, and am heavily downvoted, so it's hard to believe Apple cult followers about anything regarding their products.
Apple is devilishly brilliant at marketing.
I simply gave my own personal experience, stated as such, and am heavily downvoted, so it's hard to believe Apple cult followers about anything regarding their products.
Apple is devilishly brilliant at marketing.
>> including basically becoming bricks, all on their own.
> I don't think it's bad luck
I’ve owned around 30 iPhones, 20 iPads, 10 iPod Touches, 8 Apple Watches, 15 MBPs, 4 Mac Pros, 2 iMacs, 5 AirPods, etc etc putting them through hell in many cases (including testing unproven baseband, iBoot, and other firmware exploits), yet have never had an Apple device “basically become a brick, _all on their own_”. So either I have the worlds best luck, or my point stands about yours. I’m not calling you a liar, but at minimum your comment was hyperbolic.
> I don't think it's bad luck
I’ve owned around 30 iPhones, 20 iPads, 10 iPod Touches, 8 Apple Watches, 15 MBPs, 4 Mac Pros, 2 iMacs, 5 AirPods, etc etc putting them through hell in many cases (including testing unproven baseband, iBoot, and other firmware exploits), yet have never had an Apple device “basically become a brick, _all on their own_”. So either I have the worlds best luck, or my point stands about yours. I’m not calling you a liar, but at minimum your comment was hyperbolic.
30 iPhones? What you doing with them? Eating them?
The number is actually a bit higher than that actually, but there’s at least 30 that I know where they are. The 7 generations after the first one (aka 3G, 3GS, 4, 4S, 5, 5S, 5C) had multiple different baseband variations and for several reasons (one of which I previously mentioned) required me having one of each. After I was done using them and had restored them to stock (always kept at least one of each generation jailbreaked though), I’d rent them out to friends who lived in SF/NYC who needed to test their apps on older versions of phones or with specific OS versions (as back then, I could install almost any OS version on demand). I made enough doing that to continue my trend of buying multiple of every generation up to the iPhone 8. Around that time factors changed and beginning with the iPhone X, I started buying just one from each generation. So long story short, that’s one way that someone ends up with lots of iPhones.
As a counter argument none, not one of their devices failed on me in 15 years, and I bought a lot
Isn’t it still Q3? Are these forecasted numbers or are they Q2 numbers reported in Q3?
As is common, the article uses "antifragile" to mean "robust", despite claiming not to.
> it’s antifragile thanks to a diverse mix of strong products.
> it’s antifragile thanks to a diverse mix of strong products.
Just quoting that line is confusing. The thesis in those paragraphs is that COVID benefitted major lines of their business more than it hurt others and that was due to characteristics of the supply chain.
I agree anti-fragile is often misused but the author takes care to define robustness first and contrasts his antifragility thesis to the robustness of the overall sound business.
That said, I would look at other companies for examples of “true antifragility” although it’s interesting to try to analyze how a top global company can still raise the limit of its performance in situations that hurt its competitors.
I agree anti-fragile is often misused but the author takes care to define robustness first and contrasts his antifragility thesis to the robustness of the overall sound business.
That said, I would look at other companies for examples of “true antifragility” although it’s interesting to try to analyze how a top global company can still raise the limit of its performance in situations that hurt its competitors.
The external shocks to a process benefit the process and make it stronger. Eg your immune system gets stronger by exposed to some amount of bugs that it needs to fight, despite your getting sick while it's fighting them.
The distinction is whether it's "This is fine, we did ok through this" which is robust vs "This is something where we are now in a stronger position from being knocked about a bit."
A well made double brick wall may be robust and survive the cyclone looking good but is not anti-fragile.
The distinction is whether it's "This is fine, we did ok through this" which is robust vs "This is something where we are now in a stronger position from being knocked about a bit."
A well made double brick wall may be robust and survive the cyclone looking good but is not anti-fragile.
Yes, I understand. I think they were trying hard to make that distinction in the article with the long section about robustness and the long section about antifragility, as well as the definitions up front that match yours.
I may have hit reply on the wrong comment there. Sorry.
Because the concept of antifragile is nonsense. People don’t get stronger by lifting kettle bells, they get stronger from the rest and nutrition they take after lifting kettle bells. If you put the human body under constant stress, it just breaks down—like anything else under constant stress.
Apple showed excellent robustness under the stress from the impact of COVID. It did so via strong capital reserves and diverse lines of business. Which is great, but it’s bog-standard corporate strategy. Very hard to execute well, though.
Apple showed excellent robustness under the stress from the impact of COVID. It did so via strong capital reserves and diverse lines of business. Which is great, but it’s bog-standard corporate strategy. Very hard to execute well, though.
The main point of fragility I see with Apple that their profits mostly come from a relatively small group of people who live on the Apple ecosystem. Apple may have many product lines, but these products and services are mostly sold to the same group of people. If quality starts to degrade across the product line, or another company releases a killer product that's incompatible with the iWares, it's not inconceivable that Apple would start losing their loyal customers, thus lowering sales in all categories.
I don't see this happening in the near future since arguably Apple has never made better products than today, but you must understand that most of Apple's growth prospects come from them selling more wares to their existing customers than from Apple winning over new customers. In fact, I recently changed to an iPhone from Android, and the change was quite painful. The Apple store even called me back after sending out the order, wondering if me buying an iPhone as a new customer was a mistake (seems like that doesn't happen very often).
I don't see this happening in the near future since arguably Apple has never made better products than today, but you must understand that most of Apple's growth prospects come from them selling more wares to their existing customers than from Apple winning over new customers. In fact, I recently changed to an iPhone from Android, and the change was quite painful. The Apple store even called me back after sending out the order, wondering if me buying an iPhone as a new customer was a mistake (seems like that doesn't happen very often).
The problem now is that they do everything so, now they have to be best at everything.
If you want to run graphics or ML on the Mac, you have to use Apple hardware and APIS, you cant use nVidia hardware or a lot of industry standard APIs, so apple is at a disadvantage.
If you want to develop on Mac, you have to use Xcode, you cant use any other tools. So Apple is at a disadvantage.
Try connecting a variable refresh rate screen to a mac, or a VR headset, or Thundebolt device, or just a USB device in to one of their mobile devices. Try playing the latest hot AAA game everyone is talking about. Try installing a better voice assistant, store, browser or music player and you will find that Apple has made it hard or impossible.
Everything that Apple itself isn't heavily invested in and market leader at sucks. Apple isn't leveraging the industry to its advantage.
Apple is fine now, because its great at a few things and good enough at the rest of the things it needs to find a large market. How long can a company not fail at one of so many things?