Apple

[Jakensama]

I always said tablets were stupid (and still hold to that), but not that they wouldn't sell. Although that market has tapered off as people realize 99% of what an average person does can be done just fine from a phone, and the things that they can't do aren't done all that much better on a slightly larger phone without phone capabilities.

Although the tablet market has somewhat tapered off as the saturation occurred. Phones are wrapped up in your cell phone contract so the price is hidden, much better way to get people to upgrade (yes, some tablets have that option too, but its not the bulk of their sales).

As to the watch, why buy apple when you get a much cooler one with the Fallout 4 Special Edition:

[spoiler][/spoiler]

[Breand]

But tablets have advanced to the point where they are laptop replacements. I don't look at my tablet as an over sized phone, I look at it as a super portable laptop. And games suck to play on phones. =)

[Jakensama]

Most games kinda suck to play on a touchscreen too! For me, the draw of phone/tablet games is pretty much relegated to playing in the bathroom though, so YMMV

[Grieve]

The smart watch idea is like the Kinect.

Sold strong at first. Seems really neat. Not one really good reason to own one (not as if carrying a phone is onerous, especially with the wide variety of sizes available... oh wait, apple), nor does it really do anything interesting, and lack of purpose and word of mouth will eventually kill the thing.

What were you saying about word of mouth...?

http://fortune.com/2015/07/20/apple-watc...oo_fortune

[Jakensama]

"Early adopter" implies someone is a member of the cult, so it's not surprising. And 800 being such a great sampling size.

[Breand]

Funny tidbit I caught today.

Apple is sitting on so much cash that they could buy Netflix, Tesla, Twitter, Pandora, Uber, Pinterest, Spotify, AirBnB and still have money left over.

[Slamz]

I do find it bizarre that Apple has so many billions of dollars.

I just finished reading "Ready Player One", which is basically about a near-future world where a sort of "Second Life" type virtual MMORPG has taken over the entire online gaming, shopping and social scene. It's a hundreds-of-billions-of-dollars business that actually seems feasible (even if we assume there is no VR component) and raises some interesting thoughts.

Imagine if Apple spent a mere one billion dollars developing something along these lines. The potential is huge and at worst they burn a billion dollars which was otherwise doing nothing. Imagine what kind of online world you could develop with a BILLION dollars. A goddamn billion dollars, and Apple could put one hundred goddamn billion dollars into it if it really looked like it was going somewhere.


Microsoft has a shitload of cash too.


The old industry giants lost their leadership. They are piloted by people who have no sense of direction, no desire to take any risks and are basically just lending out their money because they apparently don't want to try anything.


This is why I still like Amazon (Jeff Bezos) and Tesla (Elon Musk). There must be something about this type of person (Bill Gates, Steve Jobs). These people all make pushes and take risks and whether it pays off or not, at least they're not idle. They're aiming for the Next Big Thing.

The people who inherited Apple and Microsoft are not that kind of people. No drive, no creativity, no risk taking. I assume these companies will just sit idle until technological progress renders them obsolete or until some new CEO with real drive takes over. But then, maybe the problem is that all of THOSE people are running their own companies somewhere else.


Incidentally, if the numbers I looked up are correct, Apple could take all of their cash and give every full time employee a bonus of $2,000,000.

[Jakensama]

Its the fundamental flaw of our current model of corporations, the stock value is more important than the future. There is how your money should be spent, and how its going to be spent to appease your short term investors. I don't think I ever appreciated it until I had to deal with a corporate board...

[Grieve]

Most of these firms, especially Apple, have almost all their cash overseas, so there is very little they CAN do with it, without losing tens of billions to taxes. Although it does seem a tax holiday may be getting more likely.

Saying they are not doing anything innovative is a little blinkered. Most companies don't broadcast every little thing they are working on like Google and, to a lesser extent, Amazon do. The Internet of Things is going to bring about massive change to the world in the next decade or two, and I guarantee all these companies have secret projects in areas we haven't even imagined yet.

But sure, until then Apple will focus on iPhone, and Microsoft on Windows, and Google on search/ads, and Amazon on selling stuff - it's their bread and butter.

[Vanraw]

Imagine if Apple spent a mere one billion dollars developing something along these lines. The potential is huge and at worst they burn a billion dollars which was otherwise doing nothing. Imagine what kind of online world you could develop with a BILLION dollars. A goddamn billion dollars, and Apple could put one hundred goddamn billion dollars into it if it really looked like it was going somewhere.

Have you read Otherland by Tad Williams? Similar lines, but morphs into... well I wont say.

I'm going to check out Ready Player one.

[Grieve]

I haven't read Ready Player One, but apparently Speilberg is making a movie out of it. They are casting right now. I'll wait for that - if you read the book first you almost always end up bring disappointed by the movie.

[strife]

Just read that Apple is not selling the new iPhone in stores in states that don't have a sales tax. Anyone know the line of thinking of that?

[Grieve]

That's just to avoid scalpers. Particularly people who get them here and ship them back to China (where paradoxically they cost more). It's a huge business.

[Breand]

Im halfway through Ready Player One and so far it is a must read for our generation of geeks. It's a very fun, nostalgic ride. There's a contest, and basically the people who know the most about the 1980s are the best equipped to win the contest.

[strife]

That's just to avoid scalpers. Particularly people who get them here and ship them back to China (where paradoxically they cost more). It's a huge business.

So $40 in taxes is going to stop scalpers? Seems pretty stupid to me.

[Grieve]

If you buy 10000 phones and are making $100 profit on each, $40 makes a big difference.

[strife]

If you buy 10000 phones and are making $100 profit on each, $40 makes a big difference.

Wouldn't it make more sense to limit how many you can buy at a time? How many buy 10000 at a retailer?