A Broken Company

[BeccaPrice]

I avoid the cloud whenever possible - I live in the country and we don't have unlimited broadband available, only satellite internet, which is strictly metered. The move to having everything in the cloud, and things only be streaming, not existing on home units, has me very concerned.

[DustyDisks]

Originally Posted by BeccaPrice

I avoid the cloud whenever possible - I live in the country and we don't have unlimited broadband available, only satellite internet, which is strictly metered. The move to having everything in the cloud, and things only be streaming, not existing on home units, has me very concerned.

+1

What she said!

Not everyone can be on line all the time or have access. And also some do have data limits.

The cloud is nice but storage 'in' hand trumps storage off site.

[SeaKing]

Even with a Chrome book and its designed integral dependence on the cloud, it still isn't necessary to be online.
The Acer C7 has a 320GB HD. Others have 16GB internal SSD with 32GB SD slots.

It just takes a little thought with the new capabilities.
i.e. Google (offline) utilities.

Secondly you can add ubuntu to the Acer C7 and the others and have a dual boot system.

Much flexibility, but you have to be willing to give it a try.

[Namekuseijin]

hopefully, aliens shall land to Earth and a new market will form

assuming they are in a retro mood and willing to trade telepathy for telephony

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

TV is a *mature* business.
And the existing players are well-entrenched with deep installed bases.
So coming in and muscling aside a hundred players, dozens of which have deep resources, isn't the same as cornering the market for 2.5in hard drives for a year to muscle aside Diamond and Creative.

Getting into the TV business today is getting into a cutthroat low-margin dogfight.
It chewed up Intel. It trampled HP. Most display vendors are losing their shirts.

I've trimmed your post, but what I'm about to say applies to all of it.

Exactly the same things were said about Apple entering the mobile phone market.

Managing entry into a mature market and dominating it for a while was amazing once. It will be astonishing if Apple do it again in a different mature market.

But they might.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

Managing entry into a mature market and dominating it for a while was amazing once. It will be astonishing if Apple do it again in a different mature market.

But they might.

Yes, they might.
Ad if you notice, I keep saying "now" and the "current" market.
All I'm saying is they need a hook to get in and there isn't one now.
(No one-year monopoly on 2.5in drives in sight.)
So the analysts will have to keep on angsting a while longer.

So, sure, they might do it again...
...probably *will*, too...
...Next year or the year after...
But there is no miracle Apple HDTV coming to save the Apple stock price bubble *this* year.

[DuckieTigger]

Originally Posted by SeaKing

Even with a Chrome book and its designed integral dependence on the cloud, it still isn't necessary to be online.
The Acer C7 has a 320GB HD. Others have 16GB internal SSD with 32GB SD slots.

It just takes a little thought with the new capabilities.
i.e. Google (offline) utilities.

Secondly you can add ubuntu to the Acer C7 and the others and have a dual boot system.

Much flexibility, but you have to be willing to give it a try.

I have to check that out. Been out of touch with what is new. I am satisfied with the toys I got right now. But then again, I would love a tiny sub-notebook that is NOT android based, or at least capable of booting into Linux natively (preferably a Debian).

[SeaKing]

Originally Posted by DuckieTigger

I have to check that out. Been out of touch with what is new. I am satisfied with the toys I got right now. But then again, I would love a tiny sub-notebook that is NOT android based, or at least capable of booting into Linux natively (preferably a Debian).

Liliputing already has a series on expanding the Acer C7 with ubuntu.
For that matter, the Samsung Chromebooks also work, but they don't have that 320GB HD.

[DuckieTigger]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

I've trimmed your post, but what I'm about to say applies to all of it.

Exactly the same things were said about Apple entering the mobile phone market.

Managing entry into a mature market and dominating it for a while was amazing once. It will be astonishing if Apple do it again in a different mature market.

But they might.

That is what I was missing, thank you for putting that missing link out there.

Originally Posted by fjtorres

Yes, they might.
Ad if you notice, I keep saying "now" and the "current" market.
All I'm saying is they need a hook to get in and there isn't one now.

I been meaning to reply to your "why no HDTV now for Apple" - and I could not put my finger on it what was missing. And what you said before about Apple still holds true: Entering the TV market now is not suitable for them. Apple is not going to buy Sharp (or somebody else) and continue to churn out updated designs for much the same thing. That is just not how Apple works. They still have a chance to do something drastically new even in a seemingly mature market. Especially in a mature market. Why? Because the market is mature as everybody else is turning in circles. More big, more cheap, more fast, more resolution, more thin, more boring. The screens can't get much bigger short of inventing wallpaper like displays that you plaster across a complete wall. (IMAX @ home? don't see the potential.)

How about a Bill Gates house? Or rather a Antitrust Bill Gates spinoff house. Take your content with you (in cloud) visit somebody else, the electronics there recognize you, find something everybody likes, and start entertaining. Of course, that would take content and a system that looks at your stuff and inter- and extrapolates your likes. Pandora already does that, has been for years. It is time that system enteres into all media consumption, not just music. Big potential for Apple, all they need is the algorithm, build the database, and buy access to the content. They get there first before everybody else, and new expensive market. Exactly like they did turning dumb phones into smart phones.

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

All I'm saying is they need a hook to get in and there isn't one now.
(No one-year monopoly on 2.5in drives in sight.)
So the analysts will have to keep on angsting a while longer.

I'd be interested to hear what you think their hook was for the iPhone.

(I think that perhaps you're referring to 1.8" drives and the original iPod. And I don't recall anyone predicting success there, either.)

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

I'd be interested to hear what you think their hook was for the iPhone.

Yes, I meant the 1.8" drives. 2.5" drives was what Creative and Rio were using with their readers.

The hook for the iPhone was "an iPod inside a phone".
The idea was consumers could take their music everywhere they took their phone--one device, not two.

Behind closed doors, the hook for AT&T was the data plans.
At the time the Telcos were heavily invested in digital bandwidth and customer use was low. Apple promised higher consumer use for iTunes downloads. They delivered, too. Way more bandwidth consumption than AT&T dreamed of.

The hook for the iPad was "a bigger iPod touch".
The hook for the Apple TV was "iTunes for the living room". (Which, since iTunes has been targetting mobility customers for ten years, explains its minimal success. Only real numbers I've seen recently were 400K units sold in Dec'12.)
(And why a "TV with iTunes" hasn't materialized.)

If you look at their progression everything they've done in gadgets has been strictly evolutionary, one step at a time.
First the iPod. Then a larger capacity iPod. Then a smaller iPod. Then an even smaller iPod. Then an iPod in a Phone. Then apps for the iPod in the phone. Then an iPod that ran the phone apps. Then a way bigger iPod. Followed by a slightly smaller "bigger iPod".
No "bet the firm"/"annoy the installed base" moves.
They really have played it safe and delivered big profits. The stock market loves safe almost as much as big profits but they bid the stock up beyond what safe and evolutionary can rationally deliver and now they're clamoring for a Hail Mary pass to save their portfolios.

To be brutally frank, Apple's well-earned success over the last decade has been built on three things:
Sir Jonathan Ives' designs
Tim Cooks Logistics and negotiation skills
Steve Jobs' hucksterism.

The huksterism and hype overshadowed the truly meaningful work the other two men (and the software coders and hardware engineers) have done.

Now, because the hucksterism is gone, suddenly Apple is broken?
No. The illusion is gone but what we're seeing is what was there all along: a well-run competent company, built on incremental improvements, not a house of technological miracles.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by DuckieTigger

The screens can't get much bigger short of inventing wallpaper like displays that you plaster across a complete wall. (IMAX @ home? don't see the potential.)

Those that care about "IMAX@Home" can and do have it.

Home theater projectors are great values. The best are truly professional grade, with anamorphic lenses and special electronics to match. 3D, too.
"Mucho moolah" required but with the biggest OLEDs and LCDs running in the $10-30K range over the past few years it has been a viable option and a very nice niche for the vendors and (even better) the professional installers.

I expect that that is where 4K and 8K TV is going to make its mark this decade.
Holographic discs, too. Because 50GB is not enough for 4K movies.

Down the road there will be options and hooks galore.
Apple will get its chance to extend their ecosystem into the living room.
Just... Not.Now.
Not in time to save the bubble investors.

[rdfry]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

Yes, I meant the 1.8" drives. 2.5" drives was what Creative and Rio were using with their readers.

The hook for the iPhone was "an iPod inside a phone".
The idea was consumers could take their music everywhere they took their phone--one device, not two.

Behind closed doors, the hook for AT&T was the data plans.
At the time the Telcos were heavily invested in digital bandwidth and customer use was low. Apple promised higher consumer use for iTunes downloads. They delivered, too. Way more bandwidth consumption than AT&T dreamed of.

The hook for the iPad was "a bigger iPod touch".
The hook for the Apple TV was "iTunes for the living room". (Which, since iTunes has been targetting mobility customers for ten years, explains its minimal success. Only real numbers I've seen recently were 400K units sold in Dec'12.)
(And why a "TV with iTunes" hasn't materialized.)

If you look at their progression everything they've done in gadgets has been strictly evolutionary, one step at a time.
First the iPod. Then a larger capacity iPod. Then a smaller iPod. Then an even smaller iPod. Then an iPod in a Phone. Then apps for the iPod in the phone. Then an iPod that ran the phone apps. Then a way bigger iPod. Followed by a slightly smaller "bigger iPod".
No "bet the firm"/"annoy the installed base" moves.
They really have played it safe and delivered big profits. The stock market loves safe almost as much as big profits but they bid the stock up beyond what safe and evolutionary can rationally deliver and now they're clamoring for a Hail Mary pass to save their portfolios.

To be brutally frank, Apple's well-earned success over the last decade has been built on three things:
Sir Jonathan Ives' designs
Tim Cooks Logistics and negotiation skills
Steve Jobs' hucksterism.

The huksterism and hype overshadowed the truly meaningful work the other two men (and the software coders and hardware engineers) have done.

Now, because the hucksterism is gone, suddenly Apple is broken?
No. The illusion is gone but what we're seeing is what was there all along: a well-run competent company, built on incremental improvements, not a house of technological miracles.

It was more than Job's being a huckster.It was his distortion of reality that forced people to do what he wanted and now that is gone. I don't see them coming up with anything that will be considered innovative. In fact I see history being repeated.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by rdfry

It was more than Job's being a huckster.It was his distortion of reality that forced people to do what he wanted and now that is gone. I don't see them coming up with anything that will be considered innovative. In fact I see history being repeated.

Live by the hype, die by the hype?
I dunno...
I just don't see the "die" part any time soon.

It's just a typical stock market correction, is all.
First they bid the stock into a bubble and now the bubble's popped and they realize their expectations were unfounded. They'll get over it.

Apple will be fine as long as they don't actually try to live up the expectations and turn into Google--throwing money at every last cute idea that comes up to see if anything sticks.

[rdfry]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

Live by the hype, die by the hype?
I dunno...
I just don't see the "die" part any time soon.

It's just a typical stock market correction, is all.
First they bid the stock into a bubble and now the bubble's popped and they realize their expectations were unfounded. They'll get over it.

Apple will be fine as long as they don't actually try to live up the expectations and turn into Google--throwing money at every last cute idea that comes up to see if anything sticks.

I understand that they aren't going to go broke overnight, but that doesn't mean they won't in the future. Google does come up with some interesting ideas.