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Apple is fighting too many competitors at the moment. It used to just be Microsoft, but Google's dominance in smartphones and slow but constant pressure in tabl

by bane 10y ago

Apple is fighting too many competitors at the moment. It used to just be Microsoft, but Google's dominance in smartphones and slow but constant pressure in tablets and "good enough for most people" laptops is causing the company to lose focus. Microsoft also traditionally didn't have a credible hardware story, giving Apple a complete vertical integration story. Now both major competitors are vertically integrating (Microsoft with Windows + Surface and Google with Android/ChromeOS + Pixel). I think Apple is having to choose where they're going to focus and tbh, the Mac line is a smaller line of business for the company. If you simply don't use a laptop/desktop at all, then nobody cares that you can't connect your other devices cleanly to it, your other devices are your primary computing devices. Microsoft doesn't have a good story on the phone front, but it's not inconceivable that they'll try again with a shrunk down surface line if the it proves successful enough. Google's desktop story is also incomplete, but they're moving rapidly towards something if they ever stop having OS confusion. The iPad Pro is large and powerful enough that it basically can be the "good enough for most people" computing device. And they have a cohesive ecosystem from small to large in the iDevices. There's no significant future for Apple with the Mac line and the company is allergic to commodification in ways that their competitors aren't (and that's where that line is heading). Apple is more likely to keep playing with iDevice sizing and software than to continue dedicated serious resources to keeping the Mac line alive. I'm not calling it a deathwatch yet, but it's clear it's a backburner line of business for the company.

monkmartinez 10y ago
The problem with the iPad Pro is that it is still an iPad. Look at the metrics of iPad sales[1], down 15% or so. There is no compelling reason to upgrade iPads on a year over year basis for most people that have them. Everyone else bought a Kindle or Asus or <insert tablet> here for $100 and called it a day. [1]https://techcrunch.com/2016/07/26/iphone-ipad-and-mac-sales-are-down-but-apple-only-cares-about-services-now/ https://techcrunch.com/2016/07/26/iphone-ipad-and-mac-sales-...
- bane 10y ago
  This seems to speak to a larger problem for Apple of identifying their "Pro" markets and going after them. The iPad Pro seems to do a reasonable job targeting visual artists in the hardware, but the software isn't there yet. Notionally speaking, what would a Pro work environment look like using tablets? I'd argue that Pro software tends to be hard to use and complicated -- but highly efficient in that domain, and this has been a struggle for Apple to get...and fundamentally there should be some kind of solution for cobbling together several iPads and a couple peripherals into some kind of workstation, where the iPads can do dual duty as both reconfigurable low-latency interfaces and displays for various parts of a pro-oriented workflow. Or at the very least offer real support for pro workflows with a Mac as the main computer and the iPads acting as interfaces. You sort of see some of this in things like DJ setups [1], but you'll notice none of these solutions lets you just use more iPads as additional screens/interfaces. I write music as a hobby, and I wouldn't even know what to do with a single screen for it, and I feel cramped on two. I'd love to be able to get a tablet device, connect it to "the studio" and now it handles EQ or provides some virtual knobs, or gives me a spectrogram or something. And the system just sort of makes it work. A half dozen interfaces/displays would be great. I also enjoy photography, why not have one display showing a gallery, one showing the before edits, and one showing what I'm editing, with one or two providing common edit controls? But this interconnecting magic is simply missing. 1 - https://www.algoriddim.com/hardware https://www.algoriddim.com/hardware
  - walterbell 10y ago
    There's another problem with the iOS ecosystem: it is very difficult for app developers to make money: no trials, no way to reach customers, poor discovery, and other well documented challenges. This does not bode well for the future of Pro-grade software on iOS, in contrast to macOS. http://www.cultofmac.com/451594/we-made-our-app-free-and-that-sucks-or-why-freemium-is-killing-the-app-economy/ http://www.cultofmac.com/451594/we-made-our-app-free-and-tha...
heisenbit 10y ago
> Apple is fighting too many competitors at the moment. It used to just be Microsoft, but Google's dominance in smartphones and slow but constant pressure in tablets and "good enough for most people" laptops is causing the company to lose focus. The too many competitors I don't buy. The question about where their products are positioned in the market is imho. a valid one. Apple tends to leave last years product available at a somewhat lower price to measure what pricing the market bears. This works well for a continuous change of conditions. Such strategies can end up in local optima - high margin niches that are shrinking. On the iOS side after moving upwards all the time Apple recently came out with the iPhone SE - a powerful device in a less fancy package with smaller screen - to complement the portfolio on the lower end. On the MacBook side such discontinuous thinking seems to be missing. Even more worrying they are not lowing prices for the older architecture enough to properly gauge the demand on the lower end side.

by bane 10y ago

monkmartinez 10y ago

The problem with the iPad Pro is that it is still an iPad. Look at the metrics of iPad sales[1], down 15% or so. There is no compelling reason to upgrade iPads on a year over year basis for most people that have them. Everyone else bought a Kindle or Asus or <insert tablet> here for $100 and called it a day. [1]https://techcrunch.com/2016/07/26/iphone-ipad-and-mac-sales-are-down-but-apple-only-cares-about-services-now/ https://techcrunch.com/2016/07/26/iphone-ipad-and-mac-sales-...

bane 10y ago
This seems to speak to a larger problem for Apple of identifying their "Pro" markets and going after them. The iPad Pro seems to do a reasonable job targeting visual artists in the hardware, but the software isn't there yet. Notionally speaking, what would a Pro work environment look like using tablets? I'd argue that Pro software tends to be hard to use and complicated -- but highly efficient in that domain, and this has been a struggle for Apple to get...and fundamentally there should be some kind of solution for cobbling together several iPads and a couple peripherals into some kind of workstation, where the iPads can do dual duty as both reconfigurable low-latency interfaces and displays for various parts of a pro-oriented workflow. Or at the very least offer real support for pro workflows with a Mac as the main computer and the iPads acting as interfaces. You sort of see some of this in things like DJ setups [1], but you'll notice none of these solutions lets you just use more iPads as additional screens/interfaces. I write music as a hobby, and I wouldn't even know what to do with a single screen for it, and I feel cramped on two. I'd love to be able to get a tablet device, connect it to "the studio" and now it handles EQ or provides some virtual knobs, or gives me a spectrogram or something. And the system just sort of makes it work. A half dozen interfaces/displays would be great. I also enjoy photography, why not have one display showing a gallery, one showing the before edits, and one showing what I'm editing, with one or two providing common edit controls? But this interconnecting magic is simply missing. 1 - https://www.algoriddim.com/hardware https://www.algoriddim.com/hardware
- walterbell 10y ago
  There's another problem with the iOS ecosystem: it is very difficult for app developers to make money: no trials, no way to reach customers, poor discovery, and other well documented challenges. This does not bode well for the future of Pro-grade software on iOS, in contrast to macOS. http://www.cultofmac.com/451594/we-made-our-app-free-and-that-sucks-or-why-freemium-is-killing-the-app-economy/ http://www.cultofmac.com/451594/we-made-our-app-free-and-tha...

heisenbit 10y ago

> Apple is fighting too many competitors at the moment. It used to just be Microsoft, but Google's dominance in smartphones and slow but constant pressure in tablets and "good enough for most people" laptops is causing the company to lose focus. The too many competitors I don't buy. The question about where their products are positioned in the market is imho. a valid one. Apple tends to leave last years product available at a somewhat lower price to measure what pricing the market bears. This works well for a continuous change of conditions. Such strategies can end up in local optima - high margin niches that are shrinking. On the iOS side after moving upwards all the time Apple recently came out with the iPhone SE - a powerful device in a less fancy package with smaller screen - to complement the portfolio on the lower end. On the MacBook side such discontinuous thinking seems to be missing. Even more worrying they are not lowing prices for the older architecture enough to properly gauge the demand on the lower end side.