[PatNY]

Originally Posted by leebase

Apple is quite different from, say, Samsung. Samsung puts out products at all price points, in a huge variety of sizes and features. Throw stuff out and see what sticks (like the new curved phone).

Yes, Samsung puts out more diversified products, caters to a wider range of people, and is in many ways more innovative than Apple. But that's neither here nor there. What has that got to do with the point I was making that Apple is often just like many other companies by following trends in order to retain or grow market share?

Just like Apple "was way behind on netbooks". Apple never made a netbook, and has yet to make a "phablet". Or a low cost mac book. Or a convertible tablet/computer.

Who mentioned netbooks? Or low-cost laptops? I talked about phablets and mid-sized tablets. And Apple, with its move to a 4" screen and the Mini, clearly was bowing to market pressures there.

Apple is rarely the first to market with anything. A few things Apple will be early on. But when Apple does make it's move, it's well though out .

Take a look at the finger print scanner on the Atrix of a year ago (or was it more?) or the HTC just released compared to the iTouch. Apple doesn't put out a feature just to put it out.

Not true. Apple has been in the forefront with many smartphone and portable music player products. But in terms of phablets and mid-sized tablets, they've been laggards.

So, you thought their maps app was "well thought out?"

And who puts out features "just to put it out?" If Apple doesn't, then neither does the competition.

Yep. They just rushed out a cr@p product to compete with the junk the marginless Android competitors were pumping out. Except that it wasn't 7" and it it wasn't low cost. It was an iPad, only smaller, thinner, lighter. Running the 350,000 made for iPad apps flawlessly.

I see you like making strawman arguments. No one said Apple "rushed" out a "crap" product.

Also, the SGT was anything but "marginless" and "junk." Samsung's mid-sized tablets at the time were very expensive. Some of them cost more than the Mini (at least here in the States). They were so much "junk" that Apple executives used and openly admired them.

The fact that the Mini wasn't 7" exactly is totally irrelevant. There were practical reasons for that. The point is that Jobs said a tablet in that size range was unusable and he would never make one. Yet, after he died, his successors changed course and belatedly jumped on the bandwagon.

Steve Jobs changed his mind all the time. Remember he also said "nobody reads" and yet prominently included books at the debut of the iPad. Said nobody wants to watch movies on a tiny screen then came out with the iPod Video. Said that iTunes would never come out on Windows...but agreed to do so anyway. Whether he changed his mind or was speaking to throw off the competition....you can never say "Steve Jobs would never..." based on anything he said.

Nope. This is different. Jobs never vehemently railed against any of those things you mentioned. But he did against smaller tablets. Also, things like books and video were just secondary ways to use existing products designed primarily for other purposes. It's not like Jobs was dismissing an entire hardware category like he did when he criticized the mid-sized tablets.

Didn't happen again this year. Nor did they come out with a cheap iPhone. Nor one with a keyboard. Nor NFC support. Nor Adobe Flash support (remember that?)

Just because it didn't happen this year, doesn't mean it didn't happen in very recent years or that it won't happen in the near future as I am predicting.

And they did come out with a cheap iPhone. The 5C.

It may happen, when Apple can do so at a great experience which includes all the existing application catalog running excellently.

And when it does, they will be late to the party, no matter how well their existing applications run on the new phablet!

--Pat