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Why the iPhone Keynote Was A Mistake
Posted by
Zonk
on Sun Jan 21, 2007 05:44 PM
from the should-have-worn-a-hat dept.
from the should-have-worn-a-hat dept.
jcatcw writes "Mike Elgan at Computerworld lists six reasons why it was a mistake to make the iPhone keynote at Macworld. He argues that extremely high expectations can only lead to disappointment for consumers and investors. The focus on the phone during the keynote also took away from the Apple TV announcement, put iPod sales at risk, gave competitors a head start, and (perhaps worst of all) ruined the company's talks with Cisco over the iPhone name. From the article: 'The iPhone, despite its many media-oriented virtues and its sweet design, will do far less than most existing smart phones. The problem Apple now faces because of Jobs' premature detail-oriented announcement is that of dashed expectations. When customers expect more and don't get it, they become dissatisfied.'"
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6 months! (Score:5, Funny)
Re:6 months! (Score:5, Interesting)
1. Cingular gets to gauge consumer interest
2. Customers can plan accordingly with respects to their phone agreements (big point)
3. Customers can plan accordingly with respects to their savings (medium point)
4. They answer HIGH expectations around a new iPod release (big criticism)
5. Accessory makers have 6 months to plan (avoiding the criticised "shock" effect)
6. Customers can educate themselves about product expectations
--And the list goes on. Wait until the phone comes out before prenouncing "what went wrong", especially if there's no indication that anything isn't going according to plan. 6 months is a long time. We're still in month 1. There'll be plenty of time to second guess this month 3-4 months from now.
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Re:6 months! (Score:5, Insightful)
And if I'm wrong, at least I still get modded +5 Insightful
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Re:6 months! (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:6 months! (Score:4, Insightful)
The iPod market, as we've been hearing for the past months, is saturated. iPods are everywhere. There's more competition from other manufacturers. How much longer do you expect Apple to sit and sell the current batch of iPods? The cell phone and DAP markets have been merging for the past 2 years. Do you really think Apple is going to sit back and ignore that market? Apple isn't going to give up on the DAP market, but they can't ignore the PDA/MP3/cell phone market either.
The functionality of the iPhone might be less than the current batch of PDA's, but what functionality is most important? Is Apple going after the business market? Are they expected to go after Blackberry? Or Palm? I have a Treo 700W. I can play MP3's and video. I have a 2gig SD card. If I had the opportunity to switch without penalty, I'd do it.
Frankly, Apple will do well with the iPhone. I'm normally an early adopter. In this case, I'll be tied to Verizon for another year, and even then, my employer may not be excited about supporting an iPhone. Which leads me to my last point... the iPhone isn't going to penetrate biz markets much... but it will cause people to WANT to change... and that will alter the way the PDA/Phone market develops over the next few years. The Blackberry's around work do not play MP3's. They don't play video. Some of them browse the internet. But the functionality is limited to mostly email. If it came down to a Blackberry or an iPhone, I'd take an iPhone. If it came to an iPhone and a Treo 700W, 700P, or 750P, I'd take the Treo.
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Re:6 months! (Score:5, Insightful)
You might want to take a look at the current crop of Blackberrys. I own a Pearl and it does everything you say it can't. Effortlessly. And what you say is "limited to mostly email" can't be discounted. It's quite important to many people, an Apple is counting on its success with its own phone as well.
On a side note, when I went to the Cingular store to buy by Pearl, there was a woman there that was talking about waiting for the iPhone. She saw my phone and started asking questions. Once she saw waht it was capable of, she bought one too. She said she still will consider buying an iPhone in June when they're released, but frankly, if the iPhone doesn't offer significantly more than the smartphones already on the market, I don't see how it'll survive. Especially at the price they're quoting for a two year contract.
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But then again... (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:6 months! (Score:5, Insightful)
that said, the [Apple]TV really got the short stick this round. That was supposed to get the spotlight and Steve dropped the ball. They didn't show us anything about it we didn't already know, so all the fan hype has been very negative. And we can't even BUY it yet!!
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Re:6 months! (Score:5, Insightful)
Which, BTW, is NOT the target market. Not to mention the fact that Joe Sixpack also tends not to be an early adopter.
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FCC leaks (Score:5, Informative)
Judging from all the rumours about the Zune the future iPods that have been helped along by FCC documents, I think they made the right call.
Re:FCC leaks (Score:5, Funny)
If I was a big apple I'd submit a few dozen fake products for approval just to throw people off. When the documents about the Apple Bananaphone and the Apple ipod/condom become public, people will start taking these rumours with a bigger pinch of salt.
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Re:FCC leaks (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:FCC leaks (Score:5, Informative)
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Good Point (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Good Point (Score:5, Insightful)
That doesn't make much sense to me. First the author says it's going to be hard to sell many iPhones and uses the facts that RIM only sold 5.5M blackberrys last year and the iPhone will be Cingular only. Then he says that people aren't going to buy ipods in order to wait for the iPhone. I'm not sure how he can have it both ways there.
Now, if he wants to make a case that people may hold off on a new ipod to see if the ipod line may get the touchscreen interface I might buy into that line of reasoning.
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Re:Good Point (Score:5, Insightful)
Yeah, this article smacks of "how can I dump on Jobs to get page views?"
I've a friend who is a definite Mac geek and will be paying an early termination fee on his Verizon cell plan just to get an iPhone. That didn't stop him from buying two 80 GB video iPods last week (for him and his wife).
Since the iPhone has 8 GB max, I don't see that people who want to store their whole music collection (let alone video) are going to hold up a purchase, even if they plan on buying an iPhone in 6 months.
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cell phones are PORTABLE (Score:4, Informative)
http://www.copyright.gov/1201/index.html [copyright.gov]
"5. Computer programs in the form of firmware that enable wireless telephone handsets to connect to a wireless telephone communication network, when circumvention is accomplished for the sole purpose of lawfully connecting to a wireless telephone communication network."
I have posted this a few times now on cellphone theads, hopefully it will stick this time
With that said, I would encourage anyone to support open moko and the neo1973 instead of the iPhone,it is pretty close to half the price, totally open, no restrictions of note, free as in speech.
Support hardware vendors who support open source (and it is a sharp looking phone, and there will be a ton of apps for it, unlike apple's big FU to consumers and devs)
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It will affect competitors as well (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:It will affect competitors as well (Score:5, Insightful)
I think the article's author forgot the old saw: There's no such thing as bad publicity! This is especially true for Apple, the perennial underdog, and a new entrant into the computerized cellular telephone market.
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So Why Do Anything? (Score:5, Insightful)
In that case they shouldn't ever announce any cool products ever again. Seriously, what kind of logic is that? Apple makes cool things so people put unrealistic expectations on them. People do the same thing with Google, but Google still releases new services. The new stuff might not match the hype but Google and Apple can't change how much people obsess about them.
Re:So Why Do Anything? (Score:5, Interesting)
Apple is a public corporation and as such is supposed to put their shareholders first. Jobs announced an actual penetration target for the iPhone that some Wall Street analysts and investors are likely to take as gospel. The stock now has a lot of expectations baked into it. If Apple doesn't succeed wildly with the iPhone, the stock is likely to be punished severely as a result. The target is very aggressive based on pricepoint, lack of features, and Cingulair only distribution.
That's why it's not a good idea to set up such an aggressive target. In terms of Wall Street, they're better off under promising, and over delivering. Time will tell, but I think the article makes a lot of interesting, well thought out, and potentially valid points.
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Negotiating Position (Score:5, Interesting)
It could be the 3G network - Cringely's written a bit about Cingular insisting on selling its own music store items over 3G, which is why Apple is on EDGE only. Maybe the iPhone trademark... he made a point of boasting about patents (read: patent suit). Maybe something else - I haven't finished watching the whole keynote yet.
Unappreciated gem from the Keynote - Jobs made the audience a point of showing them pictures of penguins on the iPhone. I don't think anything Jobs does these days is uncalculated. Oh, and Mach/xnu is slow...just sayin'.
What's with the limiting to Cingular? (Score:4, Funny)
Then again, it is also a very nice bottle opener [youtube.com], an electronic razor, a blowdryer, a mousetrap......
might as well... (Score:5, Insightful)
i dont think apple is really going after the IT crowd with this, they are the only ones who will complain because it doesnt have feature X, rather than focusing on how well it performs the things it can do.
Why do they always predict doom for the iPod? (Score:5, Insightful)
From the moment the iPod was announced it seems that a commentary on Apple isn't complete without some suggestion that the iPod is in terrible danger. Eventually, maybe it'll get supplanted by some other cool little gizmo, but for now it ain't in danger guys. If he's referring to the idea that people will stop buying iPods waiting for the iPhone, I doubt that would be all that big of a sales hit....the iPhone will, for a while at least, be more far more expensive than an iPod, for far less capacity. I won't be trading in my 30GB iPod any time soon.....unless it's for an 80GB.
will do far less than most existing smart phones.. (Score:5, Interesting)
One of the key features I wanted. make something that doesn't do all of those things I don't want but does the things I do want well. Phones have been developing crazy unusable features like mad for years.
Do less but do what you do well.
Carriers (Score:5, Insightful)
Wow.
Guys, there are only two GSM carriers in the states -- Cingular and T-Mobile. You might have heard of T-Mobile, they have this rather popular device called the Sidekick that only works (really works, anyway) on their network.
Lame? You bet.
Cisco needs Apple, not the other way around... (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't think Apple feels they where going anywhere with Cisco, and that they had nothing to loose. There is some speculation that Apple thinks Cisco abandoned the trademark, and that Apple can win that point in court. Cisco needs Apple, not the other way around. Apple can name the phone device something else with little or no loss in visibility or branding power.
I wish I would have 10 cents for everyone (Score:5, Insightful)
iPhone will suck, moderate market share (Score:4, Interesting)
Simple. It's an EDGE "smartphone". And you have to deal with AT&T come Cingular. And you have to pay $$$, in addition to signing a 2 year contract.
I must admit, I'm very attracted to the idea of an Apple phone; but EDGE really sucks, and AT&T sucks worse. Once you've gone EVDO, HSDPA, or even UMTS, you'll never go back to EDGE/GPRS. It's a gigantic step backwards, and considering that Verizon/Sprint now have an additional 6 months to pursue a high-end smart phone, I would be shocked to see the iPhone succeed in any big way.
Certainly a phone utilizing yesterday's data technology will not muscle it's way to the top of the market. No video downloads over EDGE, and audio downloads will pause while you are speaking on the phone. Furthermore, it doesn't even seem that it will have a J2ME stack.
I don't have high hopes for this phone, and I'll be damned if I have to deal with AT&T to get one.
Awaiting the iPhone (Score:4, Insightful)
Of course, the wait in the UK for this phone is excessive as ever, we're always behind the US and Japan even though mobile phone ownership here has been ahead of the US as a percentage of the population. In Europe 70% of the population use mobiles, 63% in Canada and in the US 55%.
I think he completely missed the biggest issue (Score:5, Insightful)
The launch of Vista is literally days away. What does this mean?
1. Average Joe is going to start thinking about whether he needs to upgrade.
2. If he decides to upgrade to Vista, he may consider buying new hardware.
Apple should be adding a third point to this:
3. Since he's upgrading, and considering a new hardware purchase, why not tempt him to look at some of the alternatives out there?
The Vista upgrade release is a fundamental, time-lined opportunity for Apple to win converts. With Bootcamp they can even offer that upgrade with the comfort of knowing that you can still run Windows if you need to. Macintosh should have been absolutely FRONT AND CENTER of the keynote.
If a consumer upgrades buys new non-Mac hardware, that's it. Apple has lost them for *at least* another couple of years until they decide to go through the process again.
Jobs missed a golden opportunity at this keynote. Given the momentum and the increased buzz around Apple, their slowly increasing market share, more developers on board, Bootcamp etc. he could have finally presented Apple as a serious and viable alternative to Microsoft. For everyone. But instead he decided to go with a f**king phone, which doesn't even launch until the summer in the US, end of the year in Europe and 2008 in Asia.
Re:I think he completely missed the biggest issue (Score:5, Insightful)
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No, he thinks Leopard will trump Vista (Score:4, Insightful)
"Jobs missed a golden opportunity at this keynote. Given the momentum and the increased buzz around Apple, their slowly increasing market share, more developers on board, Bootcamp etc. he could have finally presented Apple as a serious and viable alternative to Microsoft. For everyone. But instead he decided to go with a f**king phone"
I disagree. There's been so much buzz about the iPhone that only a few people have been asking about Macs and Leopard, and why Jobs didn't even so much as mention them. I must admit that I was pretty dazzled by the iPhone's interface, and it took me a couple days to start sorting out the implications.
I'm convinced that Leopard's new interface will support multi-touch technology (MTI). Am I the only person who believes that Apple has already thought of vastly more expansive uses for MTI than a mere smartphone display? Hello? Mac Tablet anyone? The iPhone interface is merely the tip of the iceberg of possibilities. Take a look at the video demo [nyu.edu] at the Multi-Touch Interaction Research group's site and imagine some or most of these capabilities, or even greater capabilities, in Leopard. Interestingly, there's a note on the site that says they saw the keynote, and that they have some more exciting stuff coming up soon.
Jobs said nothing about new Macs, new displays, or OS X 10.5 for one reason: he believes that what he has up his sleeve will make Vista look like ancient technology to Joe Consumer, and he's deliberately waiting for Microsoft to launch their expensive media blitz introducing Vista before dropping a Leopard-spotted nuke on them. His aim is to embarrass Microsoft. And I believe that Microsoft came to that conclusion while the keynote was going on, but they still have no choice but to kick Vista out the door.
Joe Consumer has already seen the iPhone's interface, courtesy the mainstream media. He'll be primed for multi-touch interface on a personal computer, and I foresee PC salespeople having an interesting time in the aftermath of Leopard's introduction: "Yeah, that's a pretty cheap machine, but how come I can't just drag things around with my finger like the guy at the Apple Store showed me?"
As many here have pointed out, Macs don't do anything that PC's can't do (much less if you count games and enterprise apps); iPods do less than many other available DAP's; the iPhone won't offer any capabilities unavailable on other, existing smartphones. The difference in all three cases is how Apple pulls the interface together in ways that appeal and make sense to average users i.e., non-Slashdot readers. I believe that Jobs has high hopes that Leopard will present an interface that will finally, clearly, distinguish Macs from PC's in the minds of the average consumer, in the same way that their respective interfaces distinguish the iPod and iPhone from competing devices. I believe that Jobs honestly feels that 2007 is the year of destiny for the Macintosh.
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I think it was good idea (Score:4, Insightful)
Six months is not that much time. When you look at the details of how Cisco got the trademark, how they renamed an already existing phone practically a day before the trademark was going to expire just to create the future conflict, and various other details, it's clear that there really wasn't any doubt that Apple would and will eventually get the name.
Announcing things way ahead of time is a proven effective strategy for introducing new products. It creates so much anticipation that people are practically nuts for it once it comes out. Look at what people did to get their hands on PS2s and PS3s -- two actually pretty mediocre products -- certainly no things so wonderful as to be commensurate with the insane appetite consumers had for them once they were finally able to get their hands on.
Moreover, by announcing 6 months ahead of time, a lot of people are going to be able to say "hold on, maybe I shouldn't sign another two year contract with whoever other provider, or buy the latest "Chocolate" or other Korean knockoff of some $800 Nokia. Maybe I can bear not having the latest phone out there for about 6 more months if it means I will be able to get this iPhone thing which will be leaps and bounds better."
This word, "despite"... (Score:5, Insightful)
That's a smug way of saying "I don't get it.".
The "many media-oriented virtues" blow every other smartphone out of the water on that front. Plenty of phones will play music, videos, photos -- but they universally do a poor job of it, either because the feature was just tacked on to be a bullet point on a feature list, or because it's designed as a cash cow for the wireless provider (Verizon's V Cast, etc.). Maybe they come with only 64MB of storage, or don't let you load your own content over Bluetooth, or only support tiny 3GPP video, or don't support playlists at all, or have that fuck-you 2.5mm headphone jack--I've seen all of these faults. The iPhone, on the other hand, does everything that the world's best-selling media player does, and more. Brushing all of that aside in a sentence is probably the dumbest thing I've read in weeks.
Two Words: Pocket-W3 and iPod-connector. (Score:5, Insightful)
Two words: "Pocket-W3" and "iPod-connector".
First, "Pocket-W3"
The iPhone does a lot more than any other smart phone because the iPhone has the actual World Wide Web in it. When you point it at amazon.com or any other site on the Web, there are no compromises. WebKit is world class desktop browsing, not smart phone class browsing. Your iPhone has complete (COMPLETE!) support for HTML 4.01, CSS 2.1, JavaScript 1.8, DOM Level 1, PNG 1.0, JPEG 1.0 and also there will probably be some MPEG-4 in there, as much as has been created yet (MPEG-4 is the standardization of QuickTime). It has the best typography you will see on a screen anywhere other than Mac OS X. (Typography is kind of an old science to completely forgo just because of digital, wouldn't you say? Shouldn't the Web have typography? Shit.) Also this is the third major version of WebKit (Panther, Tiger, Leopard) and it is open source
The reason the Google CEO was there joking about merging with Apple is that this is the device that Google wants people to have to correspond to their massive "cloud" servers. You aren't supposed to run Google Maps on a PC
Second, "iPod-connector"
The iPhone does a lot more than any other smart phone because it has an iPod dock connector which enables you to use something like 3000+ accessories just by plugging them in, or easily synchronize with iTunes to get music or movies or other data. There is no software to install, or drivers to install. You just plug stuff in and it works. iTunes manages the device in the same way as with iPods and other devices.
There will probably be over 100 iPhone-specific accessories by the June. They're designing and building them right now, wherever fine iPod accessories are made. If some kind of "missing" thing is identified, there will be a number of solutions that you can plug on in no time.
Finally, do not underestimate the value of the thing actually being oriented towards making calls as its number one app. The contacts list, the ability to conference with a single button push, even the ringer turning down music playback when you have a call, are all reasons why people will buy this just to use as a phone and everything else really will be extra. Although being able to go to the actual Web while on a call is a great calling-feature in its own right.
Dogs and Cats (Score:4, Funny)
He went on to say that the iPhone keynote would also cause "Fire and brimstone coming down from the sky, rivers and seas boiling, human sacrifice, dogs and cats living together and mass hysteria."
Re:still (Score:4, Insightful)
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Re:still (Score:5, Informative)
The trouble is that Apple apparently had no choice, because it needs FCC approval which would have made the device public anyway.
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Re:still (Score:5, Interesting)
I think the FCC argument is dubious, to be honest.
Apple needed to have their device approved by the FCC, who'd have made some details of the device public. However, Apple could have had a third party (for example, their manufacturer - Apple doesn't generally make their own products) enter the product, and from the point of view of people watching the FCC lists, all they'd have seen would have been a stylish touchscreen camera phone with EDGE and 802.11, coming from Hon Hai, a company not immediately associated with Apple. Even if people put the pieces together and assumed Apple was involved, the FCC would have published no details of the software, which arguably is the most important aspect of the iPhone concept, and the part Apple needed to keep secret.
Here's what I think. I think Steve Jobs got very excited about a product, far more so than he normally does, and felt MacWorld was the opportunity to reveal it. It's that simple. I think Jobs, in common with much of the media, has overblown the importance of the Apple communicator. It's an original machine, but then original phones come out every year. It's not innovative, in that it will not introduce a technology to a mass audience (the definition of innovative, which is not a synonym for inventive), it's too expensive for that, but it may end up influencing many devices to come. But ultimately, it's a very large phone that, nonetheless, has many nice features but none that the majority of people will see as worth the price tag and Cingular handcuffs, and it'll be relegated to the designer product niche.
Meanwhile someone will popularize the genuine advantages. They'll not produce a product that's as desirable, but it'll be "good enough" and much cheaper and more accessable, just as Microsoft/Commodore/Atari and Palm did to Macintosh and Newton respectively.
But I'm getting off the subject. The point is that Jobs became convinced that this was an important product. That's why it was presented at MacWorld. Not because of the FCC, not because of a lack of other products, but Jobs being overwhelmed with excitement.
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Re:still (Score:5, Insightful)
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You can get a AirPort Extreme next month... (Score:4, Informative)
I still want a AirPort Extreme though.
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Re:Nothing to see here, but wait, don't move along (Score:5, Insightful)
Remeber, Apple doesn't get to schedule Macworld around their product readiness, it's on the calendar a year ahead of time. If a product isn't ready, I'd rather them take the extra time to make it ready than to rush it out on a specific target date like so many other companies -- notorious for making shit products -- that I could name.
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Re:still (Score:5, Insightful)
Something Apple has been held to task for here before - the company is notoriously secretive and known for not sharing future product details, much to the displeasure of IT professionals. Yet now, preannouncing is a mistake.
Poor Apple. Can't have it both ways, and gets criticized no matter whether they announce ahead of time or on the day something ships.
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Re:still (Score:4, Informative)
I can't recall any time during the past ten years that Apple has blindsided anyone by introducing a new operating system or feature as a surprise. They've been quite upfront about upcoming Enterprise features in Mac OS X Server and Client at WWDC each year. One might argue that the interface of Mac OS X Beta in 2000 was a big surprise, but the underpinnings of the OS were well-known and didn't change much from NeXTSTEP/OPENSTEP to Mac OS X with the exception of RedBox.
If anything, Apple was very open about the features and underpinnings of Mac OS X, they stuck to a release schedule after the summer of 1998, and Apple hasn't cut significant features or introduced surprises that break software since, either. A notable quibble could be that MaconIntel won't run 68k or Mac OS 9 software anymore, but after twelve and seven years respectively, it's time to give up on those old cdebases.
You can't say that Microsoft has been as punctual or diiligent in it's efforts during the same time. It's tough to underdeliver when you don't overpromise.
Hardware? Apple has been very secretive about hardware design specifications, but has always provided a well-anticipated set of interfaces, with the exception of the iMac and Blue and White G3 - disruptive machines indicitive of Steve Jobs' first releases. Nothing since has been disruptive in the sense that it wouldn't connect to an existing network or be able to use existing peripherals. Since those 1998-vintage machines, even with PowerPC, Apple has been at the forefront of compatibility and standards adoption when it comes to interfaces - USB, Bluetooth, Gigabit, Firewire, ATA, SATA, Fiber Channel...now, with Intel, we have a practical roadmap to Apple's new CPU products.
Now, with the iPod and iPhone, Apple has a "secret" product line not slaved to the expectations of corporate purchasers.
Honestly, I think the IT types just hate not being invited to Cupertino for "technology briefings" - which are useful for making one feel like a mini-God with a purchasing budget.
The adage that helps me give computer purchase advice to friends remains true for businesses - look at the roadmap for the parts, and imagine the whole. Intel's roadmap is now Apple's - unless you want me to believe IT managers are now buying based on color coordination.
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Re:still (Score:5, Funny)
I don't know what weird parallel universe you inhabit where grad students are worshiped... but as a grad student, I desperately want to go there.
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The way to always be 'fashionable' (Score:4, Insightful)
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Re:As Jobs Said... (Score:4, Funny)
It's like this club that was cool once
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Re:As Jobs Said... (Score:5, Informative)
Just about any Fortune 1000 firm in the US, for starters. Why?
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