The Age of Apple is Over

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Not only does this article claim that the "age of Apple" is over, it goes a step further saying that the company has become the new Microsoft. Is the author of the article on to something or just on something?

This week, Apple unveiled iPhone 7 — or, rather, the company’s Twitter account accidentally leaked the release video before CEO Tim Cook could make the announcement. It’s no big deal because iPhone 7’s most noteworthy upgrades are that it comes in black, is water resistant and no longer has a headphone jack. Nothing earth-shaking.
 
Apple is based entirely on a handful of products that generate 95%+ of their revenue - usually centering on 1 or 2.

It is not Microsoft, it will never be the enterprise mecca equivalent of Microsoft.
 
Don't worry, the iPhone 8 will be revolutionary and it will change EVERYTHING!
 
It's about time I can finally choose from many other products that are generally interchangeable with Apple's products. No longer do I need to be confined to this prison with no bars, and no location!
 
Another Apple shaming article? *sigh*

So, the iPhone 7 added nothing earth-shaking. Show me another phone that has.

Most of them at least don't remove a standard port that has been used for decades and is still by far the most common port for headphones/powered speakers. No one really expects any revolutionary advancements in smartphones anymore, but we at least expect them not to go backwards.

I think proclaiming "the end of the Apple age" is a bit silly and/or clickbaity though. Somehow I think they'll still continue to make tons of money. A lot of people will keep buying their stuff pretty much no matter what they do.
 
If we factor out the headphone jack controversy, the new iPhone is a pretty solid device. It has a faster GPU, CPU, more ram, better camera, etc. Anything earth-shattering, have to have it? No, but still solid.
If the headphone jack is a big issue, at least this is well-covered and will hopefully cut down on uninformed buyers.
 
Apple's been dying since the early '90s, according to everyone. Somehow, they keep scraping by.
 
I wouldn't say Apple is the new Microsoft, if anything Apple is following the same trajectory of Sony.

Start with establishing a name as a accessible, high quality, proprietary tech company.

Progressively pollute their own eco-system with phased updates and planned obsolescence to their own proprietary technology.

Refuse to acknowledge changing market place due to increasing competition.

Slowly lose market share.

The next steps would be sporadically releasing 'new' and 'amazing' proprietary technology that continues to be less successful than prior generations, and respond by cutting product lines and services.

At this point, Apple is so large and has so much equity they can follow the decades long slide of Sony almost verbatim.

This is not a bad thing, innovation cannot continually come from one source, Apple had its rising sun. I'd say its about mid-day now.
 
Nothing really extraordinary here. Like all other large businesses that experience tremendous growth, that eventually slows down. Selling new smartphones to their customer base and expanding that base year after year, like any business model, reaches a peak. But Apple is in no danger of going anywhere. It's core business will be very lucrative to come indefinately though it's growth will probably be limited.
 
I'm not sure Apple is actually doing anything different from the R&D side. They just lack a "visionary" salesman to make the world want what they're pitching.
Had Jobs gone Ted Talks on us, the Apple Watch might have been a hit. They might have actually done something with Apple TV, too.
Apple didn't lose their way so much as they lack someone to make us think whatever they're doing is right and everyone else is half-assing it.
 
Another Apple shaming article? *sigh*

So, the iPhone 7 added nothing earth-shaking. Show me another phone that has.

Its not just the phone. None of their products is slightly remarkable in any way, in fact I'd say they're all inferior to at least one of their competitors. The only thing they had going for them was that their products were perceived as better in some way.
Sure it wont destroy the company and they'll still make lots of money but unless they can pull a few more rabbits out of hats it wouldn't surprise me if they disappear into obscurity like they did in the early 90s.
 
The next steps would be sporadically releasing 'new' and 'amazing' proprietary technology that continues to be less successful than prior generations, and respond by cutting product lines and services.

At this point, Apple is so large and has so much equity they can follow the decades long slide of Sony almost verbatim.

I think Apple might have a hard time with these two points you made. Really they only have the iPhone left to keep them afloat. They can't stay in business as just a computer maker, tablets or their various software programs and streaming services. Without the iPhone and App Store, they're done. Sony had a much wider base and could have handled the loss of any one or two of their various lines.
 
I think Apple might have a hard time with these two points you made. Really they only have the iPhone left to keep them afloat. They can't stay in business as just a computer maker, tablets or their various software programs and streaming services. Without the iPhone and App Store, they're done. Sony had a much wider base and could have handled the loss of any one or two of their various lines.

To my thinking it has little to do with number of product lines, rather your overall equity. I can't find Sony's historical equity for the 90's (didn't look to hard) but today Sony has $21.92 billion and Apple has $130.46 billion.

I think Apple will be fine, in terms of enduring and being able to ride a long time downhill.
 
I think this thing about iphone7 not being super awesome is happening to many smartphones at least feature wise
 
Stale innovation or no, there isn't another company on the planet that wouldn't eagerly accept Apple's record profits and customer loyalty.
 
Say what you will about Steve Jobs. The guy was a brilliant con man. He was exceptionally good at taking existing technology, making it seem like he invented it, and then hyping the shit out of it. Apple no longer has anyone like that. They've become boring.
 
To my thinking it has little to do with number of product lines, rather your overall equity. I can't find Sony's historical equity for the 90's (didn't look to hard) but today Sony has $21.92 billion and Apple has $130.46 billion.

I think Apple will be fine, in terms of enduring and being able to ride a long time downhill.

I honestly think that's why they keep so much cash on hand...the upper management is well aware how quickly they could go south. They could coast on pure cash for years.
 
I've never been an Apple fan, but I have liked my iPhones...until I got my iPhone 6. Total POS and my last piece of Apple crap I'll ever own. I wouldn't say Apple is becoming MS, but they have realy lost their edge and turned into another corporate behemoth, along with all the inflexibility and lack of innovation that goes with it. Sorry, the new iPhone is crap, the iPad is one lazy refresh after another, and the rest of their product line is ancient, out of date and overpriced. Their days of being the cool kid are over and it died with Jobs.
 
Maybe today was the wrong day for an article like this. The entire market is down and Apple is up due to positive preorder data and reviews. It's ok though, this is the year guys, APPLE IS DEAD!

:rolleyes:
 
i thought the camera tech and quard core was a kinda cool feature of the phone. what other phone has the camera feature set and quad core that acts the same?
 
I liked the article until I read the following passage, "You were cool if you had Windows in 1996..." UM NO, I cannot remember a time that Microsoft was ever considered cool!
 
Apple never stood on it's product quality. They stand on their brand. So one slightly worse product won't change anything. They'd need to make a series of pretty crappy products over long peroids of time, to actually loose money. But a this point they could put an i to any word and their target audience would gobble it up. Like iturd.
 
Overall, iPhone 7 will be a fantastic mobile device, but that’s not the point – most every Apple product is high-quality. That’s expected.
Apple products were always mediocre hardware in a quality package, sold at much higher prices than their hardware and technical features would warrant. They could always find the way to get in the wallets of the masses. They are selling tech to people who are absolutely clueless about tech. That's their real secret. That they convinced people that in order to be cool they need an ipod, an iphone, and an ipad.
The point is that Apple no longer pushes the envelope. The “Wow!” factor is gone. Are you lining up overnight for iPhone 7? Is it even cool to do so anymore? Didn’t think so.
Standing in line overnight for a phone was never cool. And there was no wow factor. At least not from a technological standpoint.

You can bet your ass that to the people Apple sells a new iphone to every 18 months this one is just as cool as the one before. They could literally give them the last iphone with a new sticker they'd still be satisfied.
 
I liked the article until I read the following passage, "You were cool if you had Windows in 1996..." UM NO, I cannot remember a time that Microsoft was ever considered cool!
I remember we were quite excited for Windows 95, it was this new cool thing, we wanted to try immediately.
 
I forget how much of a [H]ardon you guys get for Apple while pretending to hate them.

Meanwhile Samsungs are exploding and the headphone jack removal is a bigger deal. Yeah okay.
 
I forget how much of a [H]ardon you guys get for Apple while pretending to hate them.

Meanwhile Samsungs are exploding and the headphone jack removal is a bigger deal. Yeah okay.
So how does that work? Only the most newsworthy story gets published and everything else must be held back? "Let the rapist go, we have a murderer here" Is that the logic you're advocating?
 
So how does that work? Only the most newsworthy story gets published and everything else must be held back? "Let the rapist go, we have a murderer here" Is that the logic you're advocating?

The problem is this shit is flung around every single year, and has been wrong for what, 10+ years now?
 
Apple's been dying since the early '90s, according to everyone. Somehow, they keep scraping by.

Yeah, and I was ass deep in Apple during that period. I know the ins and outs of what transpired...

For the first time ever, I really do think Apple is in a we bit of product trouble. Jobs really did make a difference.
 
The difference being Windows isn't ever going to go the way of OS/2

I think he was referring to the slow death of the mainframe, as OS/2 was dead out the gate. The mainframe was IBM's bread-and-butter.

The mainframe died from a thousand cuts, beginning with Minicomputers, and then the microcomputer servers.

But it looks like Windows will take longer to die. And even when "dead," there are stlil people buying new System Z hardware :D
 
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