15 ms·

Apple’s China Problem

124 points by uyoakaoma 9y ago

echaozh 9y ago
There's a question under which people discuss what would happen if WeChat is blocked from AppStore on a Chinese quora like Q&A site Zhihu.[1] Tencent removed a tipping the author feature from WeChat because Apple wanted a share from the tips, which made the blocking worries more realistic than many people may think. The people on Zhihu, possibly the richer and more knowledgeable among the Chinese internet users, supported WeChat, which is a vital tool for work as well as everyday life. It's an IM, and when every relative and friend uses it, it's not possible to switch overnight if Apple actually blocks it. What's more, its only competitor in China is another product of Tencent, QQ. So, Apple is facing a huge China problem, and it's trying to solve it. However, it is yet unclear if it can solve it, or be solved by it. I think the walled garden policy actually backfires in China. Android, as an open platform, is not that easy to kill, even though all Google services are blocked here. However, iOS can. Without a big enough market share, it will die like IE6, without Chinese developers willing to write apps for it. [1] https://www.zhihu.com/question/58776977 https://www.zhihu.com/question/58776977
- echaozh 9y ago
  And in China, many iPhone buyers are among the students and blue collar workers who buy it because it's subtly expensive, coming from a foreign country (though assembled in China), and was used by richer people. They don't buy it because it's a good phone, but because it's a luxury. This is beginning to change, as some Android phones are actually getting more expensive to appeal to their vanity (well, being more expensive is so much easier than the reverse), and they're working on a very appealing feature for the those who mainly use the phone to take selfies and photos of their food: automatically beautification. Also, it boosts China's computer vision technology as a side effect, which is good for us as well.
chmaynard 9y ago
In China, the most important layer of the mobile software stack is WeChat, not the operating system. If true, then the next "killer app" is already here. Connie Chan's 2015 article lays out a very convincing case for this claim (http://a16z.com/2015/08/06/wechat-china-mobile-first/ http://a16z.com/2015/08/06/wechat-china-mobile-first/). WeChat, or something like it, will soon spread to other markets. Surely, Apple executives understand this and are busy working on an Apple equivalent.
staticelf 9y ago
> None of that lock-in exists in China: Apple may be a de facto monopolist for most of the world, but in China the company is simply another smartphone vendor, and being simply another smartphone vendor is a hazardous place to be. Don't get that part. I live in Europe and sure a lot of people has an iPhone but I believe strongly that more people have an Android. Doesn't Android have like 80% or more of the world market? http://www.idc.com/promo/smartphone-market-share/os http://www.idc.com/promo/smartphone-market-share/os
- macintux 9y ago
  He's not saying that Apple has a monopoly on smartphones; he's saying it has a monopoly on iOS. His overall point is that while iOS has a strong lock-in effect for people already on the platform, in China the real platform is WeChat, so the iOS monopoly isn't as useful.
  - dilemma 9y ago
    No, he is saying that Apple has a smartphone monopoly in the quoted paragraph.
    - gvb 9y ago
      First sentence of paragraph two states the premise of the article: "...the company has a monopoly on not just MacOS but even more importantly iOS." The article does not assert that Apple has a monopoly on smartphones.
    - mikhailt 9y ago
      From the beginning of the article, which defines the rest of the them: > Moreover, the advantages go beyond margins: the best way to understand both Apple’s profits and many of its choices is to understand that the company has a monopoly on not just MacOS but even more importantly iOS. That means Apple can not only capture consumer surplus on hardware, but developer surplus when it comes to app sales; that some apps are not made is deadweight loss that Apple has chosen to bear to ensure total control.
- 9y ago
ganfortran 9y ago
Don't forget that China has biggest and most competitive smartphone market in the world, both in specs and price. iPhone is kinda underwhelming in the past year.
- Slamchunk 9y ago
  I've certainly stuck with my 6 plus, I would like another gig of ram but otherwise it does me fine. I cannot justify dumping £7-900 on a phone, so I am happy to wait it out for now.
- iplaw 9y ago
  Too bad the phones from ZTE, Huawei, OnePlus, Xiaomi, etc generally suffer from horrendous build quality. From my experience, even their flagship devices feel more like a toy and less like an actual phone. The iPhone and Galaxy, and perhaps a few one offs from other companies, set build quality and craft benchmarks.
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
  - awjr 9y ago
    I've been very impressed with the OnePlus 3T. Cannot fault it at the price (£400).
    - gideonparanoid 9y ago
      £400? I got mine for £330 last year (was £300 before GBP tanked).
  - victornomad 9y ago
    it used to be like that but nowadays they are superb. I own a Huawei P9 and even the Google Pixel looks cheapo compared to it.
  - Boothroid 9y ago
    I have a ZTE and whilst it doesn't have the build quality of the more expensive brands, I would in no way describe it as horrendous. It functions amazingly well for a phone costing £90, and at that price if it goes pop I don't really care.
dilemma 9y ago
The real problem for Apple in China is that their brand simply isn't as strong as it is in the US. It has nothing to do with WeChat.
- xiaq 9y ago
  I agree with the first part, but the article has a point on WeChat. It is a very good example of how app vendors have stronger brands while smartphones are seen as commodities in China.
  - dilemma 9y ago
    No, the article contradicts itself and makes an incorrect claim. First, it says that iPhones are bought as statement pieces, ie their hardware. Then, it says iPhones aren't as popular in China because Androids can use WeChat too. These are incompatible claims.
    - thogenhaven 9y ago
      Being a statement piece does not necessarily have anything to do with hardware. It's much more about branding.
    - ctvo 9y ago
      They are not incompatible claims. People buy things for multiple reasons. The point of the article is Apple has a problem, one of the reasons, iOS, isn't applicable in China due to WeChat being the dominate platform (and works on all devices). The author circles back to mention that it doesn't mean Apple is eliminated from that market since they still have other differentiators (status symbol).
    - valuearb 9y ago
      "First, it says that iPhones are bought as statement pieces, ie their hardware". The author said nothing of the sort, you are projecting your own (incorrect, imho) opinions. The author said that iOS is significant differentiator and that's why people buy iPhones. Except not so much in China now, because WeChat.
iplaw 9y ago
There should also be an article entitled, "China's Apple Problem." The article could go many different directions, but I like the contrast between the titles. One thought is that it could investigate the impact of big tech firms capitalizing on the Chinese market from the top down and bottom up. Utilizing cheap labor and manufacturing facilities to develop extremely expensive products which are then sold almost exclusively and at a higher relative price to the upper echelons of Chinese society. It could also focus on intellectual property concerns which are acting as a catalyst for overhauling the Chinese intellectual property system, court system, and marketplace.
ramshanker 9y ago
In India, dual SIM support is the best advantage Android has over iPhone. That holds many people away. People are not letting ONE of their number go away.
- noja 9y ago
  What do they use the second phone number for?
  - kharms 9y ago
    (1) It's often cheaper/free to call numbers on the same network. (2) Business phone/family phone. Edit: speaking from my experience in Eastern Europe. I assume it's similar in India.
    - rjsw 9y ago
      Even Western Europe, I have UK and French SIMs.
    - marcosdumay 9y ago
      In Brazil that would be 90% about (1) and 10% about (2). If you run a small business, you'll also want to connect on all networks, so your clients will have one less reason not to talk to you. (But watsapp has made this point moot recently.)
    - panzer_wyrm 9y ago
      With three's feel at home their pay as you go is usually ly the best data option in europe. And the other is your main number.
  - smcl 9y ago
    I know that many of the local shops in Edinburgh owned by Indian, Pakistani or Bangladeshi guys prominently advertised SIMs with special rates for calling numbers in those places. Perhaps it's something like 1 SIM for local every-day stuff, and another for calling your uncle/cousin/sister who's studying or living abroad? Also India is pretty huge perhaps some of the further apart states are considered sort of "abroad" for billing purposes by the carriers.
yabatopia 9y ago
I don't know if most people really consider the OS to be that important anymore, as the author strongly believes. The Windows Surface Laptop is no threat to Apple because it doesn't run macOS. Samsung's smartphones are no threat to Apple because the phones don't run iOS. Then he continues with the WeChat factor to explain the shrinking market share of Apple in China. If you consider China the trendsetter in tech, that doesn't bode well for Apple in the rest of the world. It's a clear example that an OS isn't that important anymore. If, or better when, a platform similar to WeChat emerges in Europe or the US, Apple can't rely anymore on it's OS to sell high margin hardware like the iPhone or Mac. It's not just a China problem.
- xwvvvvwx 9y ago
  Isn't the point that weechat has pretty much become the preferred operating system in China?
  - Kurtz79 9y ago
    WeChat is an application, not an Operating System. The point it is that is so widely used in China that the OS it runs on is basically indifferent to the user, since he will spend most of his time in the app itself, which replaces/supplement/embeds many services that the OS (or other third party apps) usually provides.
    - ianai 9y ago
      How does that get through Apple's restrictions?
      - baq 9y ago
        Consider what are the consequences of not having WeChat on iOS. In a sense, Apple is held hostage.
      - valuearb 9y ago
        What restrictions are you talking about? Apple has no prohibitions against making the vast majority of applications.
anjc 9y ago
> hardware differentiated by software such that said hardware can be sold with a margin much greater than nominal competitors running a commodity operating system. Apple's hardware is not differentiated by software. Their creaking software is an ancillary requirement to use their excellent hardware. If their software was their differentiator then Hackintosh's would be more widely used. Secondly, OSX is a commodity operating system. Non-commodity operating systems would be things like VOS. > The functionality is mostly the same, and if users value a sustainable advantage in the user experience Apple deserves the profits — and power — that follow. Sorry to be a dickhead but you shouldn't throw terms like "sustainable advantage" around like they're literal terms, when they have a very precise meaning in literature and research going back nearly half a century. Sustained Advantage specifically relates to Corporate Strategy and industry competition and is completely unrelated to user experience and whether or not a company "deserves" profits; advantage in an industry implies value accrual regardless of whether it's deserved or not. Nice UX might arise from functional level strategies, which arise from business level strategies, but otherwise they're unrelated concepts and it's not something the user should be aware of. Misuse of terms leads to them being confusing and meaningless (e.g. Disruption).
- ForrestN 9y ago
  While you may find it creaking, myself and many other people find the experience of using Apple software far better than any competing systems. I wouldn't work somewhere that asked me to use Windows. For me, and maybe I'm overly aesthetically sensitive, it would make my day to day life much worse. This is just to say that the authority with which you dismiss Apple's software as a point of differentiation is probably misplaced.
  - anjc 9y ago
    Differentiation also has a precise meaning in literature, and just feeling that software which comes free with Apple hardware is better than other software doesn't indicate product differentiation or a differentiation strategy. That's just personal preference. I'm not saying that you don't/shouldn't genuinely and rightly prefer Apple software, I use Apple devices every day myself. That being said, I'd hazard a guess that you wouldn't use OSX on a Dell as your primary machine? Or iOS on a cheap Android if that were possible?
tormeh 9y ago
So WeChat did what Java couldn't do: Build an abstraction that made OS irrelevant client side. I guess you could say that the browser has done this too, but not fully, I guess.
- jordanlev 9y ago
  The browser absolutely did this -- just compare the importance and dominance of MS Windows in the late 90's / early 00's to today.
thogenhaven 9y ago
The most interesting part of this article is how big incumbent companies fail. Not by direct competition, but by a new product category/service that makes the current one a pure or irrelevant commodity.
mikhailt 9y ago
This seems to confuse some people, the author is not saying Apple have a monopoly on smartphones. What the author is talking about is the locked-in ecosystem that Apple owns, iOS and macOS (watchOS/tvOS). > Moreover, the advantages go beyond margins: the best way to understand both Apple’s profits and many of its choices is to understand that the company has a monopoly on not just MacOS but even more importantly iOS. That means Apple can not only capture consumer surplus on hardware, but developer surplus when it comes to app sales; that some apps are not made is deadweight loss that Apple has chosen to bear to ensure total control. The problem that Apple is having in China is that WeChat is the driving "platform" ecosystem, not the OS or the brand. In other words, people aren't buying iPhones for its integration with Apple services in China, which could lead to an increase in growth due to the halo effects. Instead, they run WeChat and they buy things through there, which leads to no growth in Apple's services and revenue. Which also means, the customers have no desire to buy another Apple device. They can do the same on any device that can run WeChat. If Microsoft sells a Windows Phone with WeChat as the default app for everything, they may have a hit in China but it would not be a sustainable hit because again, WeChat can run on iPhone or Android or any other OS.
- MBCook 9y ago
  Great summary.
- bobsam 9y ago
  To be fair Google has even more of the same problem as their services are blocked in China.
- shmerl 9y ago
  Why is normal competition considered not sustainable, and lock-in is viewed as a norm? Lock-in should never be a norm. Apple and MS are just too used to be monopolists and can't stand fair competition.
  - eridius 9y ago
    Lock-in is a natural consequence of having a platform. It's perfectly normal and happens without even making any explicit attempt at having lock-in. Any time you provide a platform and people build on top of it, you have automatic lock-in. This has nothing to do with "fair competition".
skdotdan 9y ago
The problem with many tech analysts is that they are Apple fanboys without even knowing that they are. Stating that Microsoft Surface and Samsung S8 are not competitors of Apple just because their products don't run Mac OS/iOS is pure fanaticism at the very least. Nevertheless, I find that the main point of the article is right. But Apple's China problem is also a very important problem for Google (actually, it's worse for Google).
- tuna-piano 9y ago
  I actually think the author has a good point. When the owner of an iPhone wants a new phone, they overwhelmingly buy an iPhone. The author makes the point, and I agree, that it is because of the iOS software and not the iPhone hardware. iOS users already have made investments in iOS apps, talk to their friends using iMessage, and are used to the look and feel of the OS. If these users could buy a Samsung phone with iOS on it, I suspect many would (say for phones with better battery life or other features). So when in China a user spends the vast majority of their time in one app, that app kind of becomes the OS, and there are much lower switching costs between Android and iOS. Customers in China are in large part just choosing which hardware to run WeChat on. That said, the history in desktop OS tells a less clear story. In 1998, Windows was what almost everyone needed to buy, because they needed to run Windows software. Overtime the web browser (which works the same across operating systems) became where people spent most of their time, and ChromeOS and Mac were able to gain market share. Apple laptops still have significant market share and pricing power. But when you compare the Samsung S8 vs iPhone 7, I see much fewer differences than the MacBook vs HP/Dell whatever.
  - bonzini 9y ago
    It is neither because of the software not because of the hardware; it's because of the brand recognition, which is obviously higher for Apple than for Samsung or Nexus. It's the same for cars; I wouldn't be surprised if VW or Mercedes or even Toyota are able to keep more customers than Renault or Fiat, just because the "faithful Mercedes customer" is a thing that people talk about and the "faithful Renault customer" is not.
- 9y ago
gnrlist 9y ago
Chinese people want the Apple brand they don't care about iOS. If iOS was the status symbol it would get pirated and installed elsewhere. Apple has a strong brand because of it's history as a premium device company internationally, that's all. Their brand was their first mover advantage in China but now Chinese companies are closing that brand gap and since WeChat rules the software side Apple is going to have a hard time being a big player until it can differentiate itself on something other than brand.
- oflannabhra 9y ago
  Yep, that is the exact point of the article, but much more succinct.
  - gnrlist 9y ago
    Aside from it's verbosity, the only nit I have with the article is that it muddles it's own point by talking about iOS as a monopoly.
    - MBCook 9y ago
      I don't think so. Ben's point (as I took it) was that Apple has a monopoly on iOS (because only their devices have it) and that gives them a very strong hold on users, there is too much friction in switching to Android. But in China if people don't really care about iOS that monopoly is worthless and their normal strategy for retaining users doesn't work, which means they're competing on a completely different basis in China than anywhere else.
      - gnrlist 9y ago
        Good point, I didn't get the nuance from my first pass reading it.
- archvile 9y ago
  How would iOS get pirated when the only way to install it is by using a certificate that only Apple holds? If it was easy enough to reverse engineer iOS and remove that install requirement, I'm sure it would have been done by now.
EGreg 9y ago
What's the situation in China with WeChat's competitors? Why can't WeChat copy any product in a week, if FB does?
xiaq 9y ago
One thing Apple has totally messed up in the Chinese market is localization. When I read Apple advertisements or texts on macOS or iOS UI, I always feel it's some foreigners who just learned to speak Chinese, yet trying to use Chinese in creative ways. They are totally understandable, but just that. I think this at least partially affects Apple's brand building in China.
davidf18 9y ago
In the US at least, most of the phone is paid for by monthly installments as part of the plan so a phone which might sell for nearly $1K elsewhere appears to cost only $200 here. That has helped Apple immensely. For my needs living in NYC with tall buildings, with need for good signal, voice quality, I use yearly iPhone upgrade on Verizon network. Verizon buys the $1K iPhone and I pay them back at less than $1.50 per day. iPhone platforms have greater security than Android based ones and that is important to me as well. The iPhone - Mac integration is great and minimizes complexity making my daily life easier. Also, where I live, there are many Apple stores including a 24/365 for service for a device which is essential for my work. I've had iPhones for 4.5 years and in that time period I've had to replace the phone 3 times for various reasons. Walking into the store for replacement is great. But other people use phones for different reasons and most don't have the same constraints that I have. Apparently WeChat in China makes the platform generic for most.
- thaumasiotes 9y ago
  > I use yearly iPhone upgrade on Verizon network. Verizon buys the $1K iPhone and I pay them back at less than $1.50 per day The math here doesn't work. One year ("yearly upgrade") at $1.50 / day means you're paying Verizon back less than $600 for a $1000 phone. Assuming, of course, that a year is less than 400 days.
vanilla_nut 9y ago
>Unsurprisingly, in stark contrast to the rest of the world, according to a report earlier this year only 50% of iPhone users who bought another phone in 2016 stayed with Apple: At first, I was confused by this graphic. Then I realized that the author is dramatically misinterpreting it: the graphic actually means that 66.85% of phones purchased in 2015 were made by Apple and 50% of phones purchased in 2016 were made by Apple. So we actually have literally no information about Apple's customer retention in China from that graphic at all. (Unless I'm really reading it wrong?) I wish journalism majors were required to take a stats class in college. Sigh...
- guelo 9y ago
  I don't think this guy is a journalism major. He's an MBA with experience working marketing and strategy at Apple, Microsoft and WordPress. He's probably had a stats class.
- valuearb 9y ago
  Somehow you didn't notice the graph added up to 250%, and you snark that the author needs to brush up on statistics? Please explain how 50 of 250 is actually 50% of everything. Especially when the author writes iPhone sales are only 9.6% of the chinese market.
  - vanilla_nut 9y ago
    Good point. I guess I should have gotten a little more sleep last night... So I guess these ARE customer retention rates? Following his link brings me here: https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s?__biz=MjM5ODEyOTAyMA==&mid=2661906770&idx=2&sn=73662bbef300beda9237d30adaf374fa&chksm=bd92a5418ae52c57eb1c238a34b9f8a6418993d3384ec331758b4ae102351a4e04d2ed878336&mpshare=1&scene=1&srcid=0504Q1KjS8LTXMPois1oL3yP&key=c84baf55e7d27452d7d25e8d4216f3083fd387d19f1c1a67737c24d1dd9b45dae04bc0e728d03eada93643c901672625aa3e51158cc3bfff1934908b5c0229bee273701f7cf7b5d3c55a6dfefacb6747&ascene=0&uin=MTY1ODQwOTc0MA%3D%3D&devicetype=iMac+MacBookAir6%2C2+OSX+OSX+10.11.6+build(15G1421)&version=12020610&nettype=WIFI&fontScale=100&pass_ticket=txq8pNJOZPQCgr2USCGKoo4Q6ywoGnIyfwIIr0PTnlFp6hwHmmCF%2FvRWzEnCnVY2 https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s?__biz=MjM5ODEyOTAyMA==&mid=266190... (god, what a ridiculously lengthy URL). Looks like Apple only captured 33 and 25% of the market each year, respectively- not 66 and 50%, as I thought before. In which case I think the author should at least mention the fact that Apple's picking up a lot of their competitor's customers YoY as well- that's hardly a bad thing. Maybe the Chinese market simply has less brand loyalty.
ericjang 9y ago
Meta question: is there a "Hacker News of China" forum where I can find this article discussed from the Chinese perspective?
- LiweiZ 9y ago
  Try zhihu.com. Though I don't think the quality is anywhere close to here.
siproprio 9y ago
If the situation in China is similar to the situation in Brazil, then it is not a surprise Apple products aren't successful there. Apple services here are very poorly supported and localized, and Apple products are too expensive compared to the relative benefit we would receive. Why would you purchase a significantly more expensive device, with worse features, that sometimes don't work at all? We still haven't gotten turn by turn directions in Apple Maps, for example.
- btian 9y ago
  But you can install Google Maps or Waze on an iPhone. I like my iPhone because it's the fastest phone in the market. Pixel costs the same, and Galaxy S8 costs more than iPhone.
  - siproprio 9y ago
    You're comparing the prices of only 2 android phones, when there are a lot more models available. None of these two phones are very popular in my country or in China. The most popular devices here are mid-end Android phones, like the Moto G series phones. Furthermore, what is supposed to differentiate Apple is its software, because hardware is a commodity. Being "the fastest" doesn't appeal much to costumers as compared to price, and to the default software experience.
    - btian 9y ago
      Yeah I guess it makes sense for people who are not rich. Mid-end phones don't appeal to me at all.
shmerl 9y ago
> Unsurprisingly, in stark contrast to the rest of the world, according to a report earlier this year only 50% of iPhone users who bought another phone in 2016 stayed with Apple Interesting. This shows that Apple don't compete properly and only achieve high sales through monopoly. That probably explains their general nasty attitude to many things, and really sick lock-in mentality. > None of that lock-in exists in China: Apple may be a de facto monopolist for most of the world, but in China the company is simply another smartphone vendor, and being simply another smartphone vendor is a hazardous place to be. To be clear, it’s not all bad Why is it bad? Being "simply another smartphone vendor" is the right situation. What's bad are monopolistic markets.
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sangnoir 9y ago
The author's explanation for Apple's "China problem" is unconvincing to say the least: > [...]behind local Chinese brands like Oppo, Huawei and Vivo. All of those companies sold high-end phones of their own; the issue isn’t that Apple was too expensive, it’s that the iPhone 6S and 7 were simply too boring. Boring - that's the explanation for a significant dip in sales? I would have expected a list of exciting design or features that Oppo, Huawei and Vivo are putting into their phones to steal customers from Apple, because historically their flagships have been equally 'boring'. The "China Problem" is at the crux of the matter (title of the post), and the explanation is too hand-wavy for my taste. My default attitude to tech industry analysts is cynicism; I do wonder who exactly pays for such superficial analyses and what value do they get from them?
- draw_down 9y ago
  The idea is pretty clear, I think. Apple's problem is WeChat. It's more important than the phone OS, which is different to most other countries. The effect of WeChat combined with China's sheer size is a problem for the iPhone business.
  - sangnoir 9y ago
    WeChat is available on iPhones and its competitors. Since it is a common factor, WeChat alone cannot explain the decline in iPhone sales.
dangerous_words 9y ago
The blog post completely misses the near total influence of the Chinese government. Yes, China is a different ecosystem and that has second order effects. But it's still important to get the direction of causality right. In nearly every country around the world, Android phones are dependent on and dominated by the Google ecosystem. They aren't in China. Why? Because Google services are banned. So is Facebook. So are some of Apple's services. Even back when Google was cooperating with the PRC and trying hard for the local market, executives rightly or wrongly claimed that whenever their marketshare passed 30% regulators turned nasty. Many, many foreign companies have poured resources into China and the few that have succeeded have generally done so on the strength of a global brand—such as Coke, LV or Apple. That doesn't mean that Apple's challenges in China are simply due to market forces though. China's decision to ban all K-pop, K-dramas and other Korean media over their recent missile defense system shows that much. Simply put, WeChat violated multiple rules on Apple's App Store on its way up that have enabled it to act like the platform it does today. In any other country Apple would have simply refused to push non-compliant updates, but in China Apple faced the risk of being barred from the market entirely. Years later, WeChat is now so dominant that Apple would have to capitulate for market reasons alone. >"WeChat is that, but it is also for reading news, for hailing taxis, for paying for lunch (try and pay with cash for lunch, and you’ll look like a luddite)" That's just not true. Most lunches in China are not bought via WeChat. Even inside the 2nd ring road in Beijing, cash is very common.
brentis 9y ago
Switched to Pixel XL when iPhone 7 came out and killed headphone jack. Last thing I want on a phone, more things to charge and worry about. Quality takes may forms. Pixel camera is reviewed to be better and screen is legit sRGB and it charges in 15min and lasts 1.5 days vs iPhone 7. I also think iOS is a steaming turd. As an app dev for both platforms, I'm amazed people don't see the integration Android has with Pixel and others. Let's see them "innovate" no home button in iPhone 8 along with a curved screen. For the record this is being typed on my iPad...

124 points by uyoakaoma 9y ago

There's a question under which people discuss what would happen if WeChat is blocked from AppStore on a Chinese quora like Q&A site Zhihu.[1] Tencent removed a tipping the author feature from WeChat because Apple wanted a share from the tips, which made the blocking worries more realistic than many people may think. The people on Zhihu, possibly the richer and more knowledgeable among the Chinese internet users, supported WeChat, which is a vital tool for work as well as everyday life. It's an IM, and when every relative and friend uses it, it's not possible to switch overnight if Apple actually blocks it. What's more, its only competitor in China is another product of Tencent, QQ. So, Apple is facing a huge China problem, and it's trying to solve it. However, it is yet unclear if it can solve it, or be solved by it. I think the walled garden policy actually backfires in China. Android, as an open platform, is not that easy to kill, even though all Google services are blocked here. However, iOS can. Without a big enough market share, it will die like IE6, without Chinese developers willing to write apps for it. [1] https://www.zhihu.com/question/58776977 https://www.zhihu.com/question/58776977

echaozh 9y ago
And in China, many iPhone buyers are among the students and blue collar workers who buy it because it's subtly expensive, coming from a foreign country (though assembled in China), and was used by richer people. They don't buy it because it's a good phone, but because it's a luxury. This is beginning to change, as some Android phones are actually getting more expensive to appeal to their vanity (well, being more expensive is so much easier than the reverse), and they're working on a very appealing feature for the those who mainly use the phone to take selfies and photos of their food: automatically beautification. Also, it boosts China's computer vision technology as a side effect, which is good for us as well.

chmaynard 9y ago

In China, the most important layer of the mobile software stack is WeChat, not the operating system. If true, then the next "killer app" is already here. Connie Chan's 2015 article lays out a very convincing case for this claim (http://a16z.com/2015/08/06/wechat-china-mobile-first/ http://a16z.com/2015/08/06/wechat-china-mobile-first/). WeChat, or something like it, will soon spread to other markets. Surely, Apple executives understand this and are busy working on an Apple equivalent.

staticelf 9y ago

> None of that lock-in exists in China: Apple may be a de facto monopolist for most of the world, but in China the company is simply another smartphone vendor, and being simply another smartphone vendor is a hazardous place to be. Don't get that part. I live in Europe and sure a lot of people has an iPhone but I believe strongly that more people have an Android. Doesn't Android have like 80% or more of the world market? http://www.idc.com/promo/smartphone-market-share/os http://www.idc.com/promo/smartphone-market-share/os

macintux 9y ago
He's not saying that Apple has a monopoly on smartphones; he's saying it has a monopoly on iOS. His overall point is that while iOS has a strong lock-in effect for people already on the platform, in China the real platform is WeChat, so the iOS monopoly isn't as useful.
- dilemma 9y ago
  No, he is saying that Apple has a smartphone monopoly in the quoted paragraph.
  - gvb 9y ago
    First sentence of paragraph two states the premise of the article: "...the company has a monopoly on not just MacOS but even more importantly iOS." The article does not assert that Apple has a monopoly on smartphones.
  - mikhailt 9y ago
    From the beginning of the article, which defines the rest of the them: > Moreover, the advantages go beyond margins: the best way to understand both Apple’s profits and many of its choices is to understand that the company has a monopoly on not just MacOS but even more importantly iOS. That means Apple can not only capture consumer surplus on hardware, but developer surplus when it comes to app sales; that some apps are not made is deadweight loss that Apple has chosen to bear to ensure total control.
9y ago

ganfortran 9y ago

Don't forget that China has biggest and most competitive smartphone market in the world, both in specs and price. iPhone is kinda underwhelming in the past year.

Slamchunk 9y ago
I've certainly stuck with my 6 plus, I would like another gig of ram but otherwise it does me fine. I cannot justify dumping £7-900 on a phone, so I am happy to wait it out for now.
iplaw 9y ago
Too bad the phones from ZTE, Huawei, OnePlus, Xiaomi, etc generally suffer from horrendous build quality. From my experience, even their flagship devices feel more like a toy and less like an actual phone. The iPhone and Galaxy, and perhaps a few one offs from other companies, set build quality and craft benchmarks.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
- awjr 9y ago
  I've been very impressed with the OnePlus 3T. Cannot fault it at the price (£400).
  - gideonparanoid 9y ago
    £400? I got mine for £330 last year (was £300 before GBP tanked).
- victornomad 9y ago
  it used to be like that but nowadays they are superb. I own a Huawei P9 and even the Google Pixel looks cheapo compared to it.
- Boothroid 9y ago
  I have a ZTE and whilst it doesn't have the build quality of the more expensive brands, I would in no way describe it as horrendous. It functions amazingly well for a phone costing £90, and at that price if it goes pop I don't really care.

dilemma 9y ago

The real problem for Apple in China is that their brand simply isn't as strong as it is in the US. It has nothing to do with WeChat.

xiaq 9y ago
I agree with the first part, but the article has a point on WeChat. It is a very good example of how app vendors have stronger brands while smartphones are seen as commodities in China.
- dilemma 9y ago
  No, the article contradicts itself and makes an incorrect claim. First, it says that iPhones are bought as statement pieces, ie their hardware. Then, it says iPhones aren't as popular in China because Androids can use WeChat too. These are incompatible claims.
  - thogenhaven 9y ago
    Being a statement piece does not necessarily have anything to do with hardware. It's much more about branding.
  - ctvo 9y ago
    They are not incompatible claims. People buy things for multiple reasons. The point of the article is Apple has a problem, one of the reasons, iOS, isn't applicable in China due to WeChat being the dominate platform (and works on all devices). The author circles back to mention that it doesn't mean Apple is eliminated from that market since they still have other differentiators (status symbol).
  - valuearb 9y ago
    "First, it says that iPhones are bought as statement pieces, ie their hardware". The author said nothing of the sort, you are projecting your own (incorrect, imho) opinions. The author said that iOS is significant differentiator and that's why people buy iPhones. Except not so much in China now, because WeChat.

iplaw 9y ago

There should also be an article entitled, "China's Apple Problem." The article could go many different directions, but I like the contrast between the titles. One thought is that it could investigate the impact of big tech firms capitalizing on the Chinese market from the top down and bottom up. Utilizing cheap labor and manufacturing facilities to develop extremely expensive products which are then sold almost exclusively and at a higher relative price to the upper echelons of Chinese society. It could also focus on intellectual property concerns which are acting as a catalyst for overhauling the Chinese intellectual property system, court system, and marketplace.

ramshanker 9y ago

In India, dual SIM support is the best advantage Android has over iPhone. That holds many people away. People are not letting ONE of their number go away.

noja 9y ago
What do they use the second phone number for?
- kharms 9y ago
  (1) It's often cheaper/free to call numbers on the same network. (2) Business phone/family phone. Edit: speaking from my experience in Eastern Europe. I assume it's similar in India.
  - rjsw 9y ago
    Even Western Europe, I have UK and French SIMs.
  - marcosdumay 9y ago
    In Brazil that would be 90% about (1) and 10% about (2). If you run a small business, you'll also want to connect on all networks, so your clients will have one less reason not to talk to you. (But watsapp has made this point moot recently.)
  - panzer_wyrm 9y ago
    With three's feel at home their pay as you go is usually ly the best data option in europe. And the other is your main number.
- smcl 9y ago
  I know that many of the local shops in Edinburgh owned by Indian, Pakistani or Bangladeshi guys prominently advertised SIMs with special rates for calling numbers in those places. Perhaps it's something like 1 SIM for local every-day stuff, and another for calling your uncle/cousin/sister who's studying or living abroad? Also India is pretty huge perhaps some of the further apart states are considered sort of "abroad" for billing purposes by the carriers.

yabatopia 9y ago

I don't know if most people really consider the OS to be that important anymore, as the author strongly believes. The Windows Surface Laptop is no threat to Apple because it doesn't run macOS. Samsung's smartphones are no threat to Apple because the phones don't run iOS. Then he continues with the WeChat factor to explain the shrinking market share of Apple in China. If you consider China the trendsetter in tech, that doesn't bode well for Apple in the rest of the world. It's a clear example that an OS isn't that important anymore. If, or better when, a platform similar to WeChat emerges in Europe or the US, Apple can't rely anymore on it's OS to sell high margin hardware like the iPhone or Mac. It's not just a China problem.

xwvvvvwx 9y ago
Isn't the point that weechat has pretty much become the preferred operating system in China?
- Kurtz79 9y ago
  WeChat is an application, not an Operating System. The point it is that is so widely used in China that the OS it runs on is basically indifferent to the user, since he will spend most of his time in the app itself, which replaces/supplement/embeds many services that the OS (or other third party apps) usually provides.
  - ianai 9y ago
    How does that get through Apple's restrictions?
    - baq 9y ago
      Consider what are the consequences of not having WeChat on iOS. In a sense, Apple is held hostage.
    - valuearb 9y ago
      What restrictions are you talking about? Apple has no prohibitions against making the vast majority of applications.

anjc 9y ago

> hardware differentiated by software such that said hardware can be sold with a margin much greater than nominal competitors running a commodity operating system. Apple's hardware is not differentiated by software. Their creaking software is an ancillary requirement to use their excellent hardware. If their software was their differentiator then Hackintosh's would be more widely used. Secondly, OSX is a commodity operating system. Non-commodity operating systems would be things like VOS. > The functionality is mostly the same, and if users value a sustainable advantage in the user experience Apple deserves the profits — and power — that follow. Sorry to be a dickhead but you shouldn't throw terms like "sustainable advantage" around like they're literal terms, when they have a very precise meaning in literature and research going back nearly half a century. Sustained Advantage specifically relates to Corporate Strategy and industry competition and is completely unrelated to user experience and whether or not a company "deserves" profits; advantage in an industry implies value accrual regardless of whether it's deserved or not. Nice UX might arise from functional level strategies, which arise from business level strategies, but otherwise they're unrelated concepts and it's not something the user should be aware of. Misuse of terms leads to them being confusing and meaningless (e.g. Disruption).

ForrestN 9y ago
While you may find it creaking, myself and many other people find the experience of using Apple software far better than any competing systems. I wouldn't work somewhere that asked me to use Windows. For me, and maybe I'm overly aesthetically sensitive, it would make my day to day life much worse. This is just to say that the authority with which you dismiss Apple's software as a point of differentiation is probably misplaced.
- anjc 9y ago
  Differentiation also has a precise meaning in literature, and just feeling that software which comes free with Apple hardware is better than other software doesn't indicate product differentiation or a differentiation strategy. That's just personal preference. I'm not saying that you don't/shouldn't genuinely and rightly prefer Apple software, I use Apple devices every day myself. That being said, I'd hazard a guess that you wouldn't use OSX on a Dell as your primary machine? Or iOS on a cheap Android if that were possible?

tormeh 9y ago

So WeChat did what Java couldn't do: Build an abstraction that made OS irrelevant client side. I guess you could say that the browser has done this too, but not fully, I guess.

jordanlev 9y ago
The browser absolutely did this -- just compare the importance and dominance of MS Windows in the late 90's / early 00's to today.

thogenhaven 9y ago

The most interesting part of this article is how big incumbent companies fail. Not by direct competition, but by a new product category/service that makes the current one a pure or irrelevant commodity.

mikhailt 9y ago

This seems to confuse some people, the author is not saying Apple have a monopoly on smartphones. What the author is talking about is the locked-in ecosystem that Apple owns, iOS and macOS (watchOS/tvOS). > Moreover, the advantages go beyond margins: the best way to understand both Apple’s profits and many of its choices is to understand that the company has a monopoly on not just MacOS but even more importantly iOS. That means Apple can not only capture consumer surplus on hardware, but developer surplus when it comes to app sales; that some apps are not made is deadweight loss that Apple has chosen to bear to ensure total control. The problem that Apple is having in China is that WeChat is the driving "platform" ecosystem, not the OS or the brand. In other words, people aren't buying iPhones for its integration with Apple services in China, which could lead to an increase in growth due to the halo effects. Instead, they run WeChat and they buy things through there, which leads to no growth in Apple's services and revenue. Which also means, the customers have no desire to buy another Apple device. They can do the same on any device that can run WeChat. If Microsoft sells a Windows Phone with WeChat as the default app for everything, they may have a hit in China but it would not be a sustainable hit because again, WeChat can run on iPhone or Android or any other OS.

MBCook 9y ago
Great summary.
bobsam 9y ago
To be fair Google has even more of the same problem as their services are blocked in China.
shmerl 9y ago
Why is normal competition considered not sustainable, and lock-in is viewed as a norm? Lock-in should never be a norm. Apple and MS are just too used to be monopolists and can't stand fair competition.
- eridius 9y ago
  Lock-in is a natural consequence of having a platform. It's perfectly normal and happens without even making any explicit attempt at having lock-in. Any time you provide a platform and people build on top of it, you have automatic lock-in. This has nothing to do with "fair competition".

skdotdan 9y ago

The problem with many tech analysts is that they are Apple fanboys without even knowing that they are. Stating that Microsoft Surface and Samsung S8 are not competitors of Apple just because their products don't run Mac OS/iOS is pure fanaticism at the very least. Nevertheless, I find that the main point of the article is right. But Apple's China problem is also a very important problem for Google (actually, it's worse for Google).

tuna-piano 9y ago
I actually think the author has a good point. When the owner of an iPhone wants a new phone, they overwhelmingly buy an iPhone. The author makes the point, and I agree, that it is because of the iOS software and not the iPhone hardware. iOS users already have made investments in iOS apps, talk to their friends using iMessage, and are used to the look and feel of the OS. If these users could buy a Samsung phone with iOS on it, I suspect many would (say for phones with better battery life or other features). So when in China a user spends the vast majority of their time in one app, that app kind of becomes the OS, and there are much lower switching costs between Android and iOS. Customers in China are in large part just choosing which hardware to run WeChat on. That said, the history in desktop OS tells a less clear story. In 1998, Windows was what almost everyone needed to buy, because they needed to run Windows software. Overtime the web browser (which works the same across operating systems) became where people spent most of their time, and ChromeOS and Mac were able to gain market share. Apple laptops still have significant market share and pricing power. But when you compare the Samsung S8 vs iPhone 7, I see much fewer differences than the MacBook vs HP/Dell whatever.
- bonzini 9y ago
  It is neither because of the software not because of the hardware; it's because of the brand recognition, which is obviously higher for Apple than for Samsung or Nexus. It's the same for cars; I wouldn't be surprised if VW or Mercedes or even Toyota are able to keep more customers than Renault or Fiat, just because the "faithful Mercedes customer" is a thing that people talk about and the "faithful Renault customer" is not.
9y ago

gnrlist 9y ago

Chinese people want the Apple brand they don't care about iOS. If iOS was the status symbol it would get pirated and installed elsewhere. Apple has a strong brand because of it's history as a premium device company internationally, that's all. Their brand was their first mover advantage in China but now Chinese companies are closing that brand gap and since WeChat rules the software side Apple is going to have a hard time being a big player until it can differentiate itself on something other than brand.

oflannabhra 9y ago
Yep, that is the exact point of the article, but much more succinct.
- gnrlist 9y ago
  Aside from it's verbosity, the only nit I have with the article is that it muddles it's own point by talking about iOS as a monopoly.
  - MBCook 9y ago
    I don't think so. Ben's point (as I took it) was that Apple has a monopoly on iOS (because only their devices have it) and that gives them a very strong hold on users, there is too much friction in switching to Android. But in China if people don't really care about iOS that monopoly is worthless and their normal strategy for retaining users doesn't work, which means they're competing on a completely different basis in China than anywhere else.
    - gnrlist 9y ago
      Good point, I didn't get the nuance from my first pass reading it.
archvile 9y ago
How would iOS get pirated when the only way to install it is by using a certificate that only Apple holds? If it was easy enough to reverse engineer iOS and remove that install requirement, I'm sure it would have been done by now.

EGreg 9y ago

What's the situation in China with WeChat's competitors? Why can't WeChat copy any product in a week, if FB does?

xiaq 9y ago

One thing Apple has totally messed up in the Chinese market is localization. When I read Apple advertisements or texts on macOS or iOS UI, I always feel it's some foreigners who just learned to speak Chinese, yet trying to use Chinese in creative ways. They are totally understandable, but just that. I think this at least partially affects Apple's brand building in China.

davidf18 9y ago

In the US at least, most of the phone is paid for by monthly installments as part of the plan so a phone which might sell for nearly $1K elsewhere appears to cost only $200 here. That has helped Apple immensely. For my needs living in NYC with tall buildings, with need for good signal, voice quality, I use yearly iPhone upgrade on Verizon network. Verizon buys the $1K iPhone and I pay them back at less than $1.50 per day. iPhone platforms have greater security than Android based ones and that is important to me as well. The iPhone - Mac integration is great and minimizes complexity making my daily life easier. Also, where I live, there are many Apple stores including a 24/365 for service for a device which is essential for my work. I've had iPhones for 4.5 years and in that time period I've had to replace the phone 3 times for various reasons. Walking into the store for replacement is great. But other people use phones for different reasons and most don't have the same constraints that I have. Apparently WeChat in China makes the platform generic for most.

thaumasiotes 9y ago
> I use yearly iPhone upgrade on Verizon network. Verizon buys the $1K iPhone and I pay them back at less than $1.50 per day The math here doesn't work. One year ("yearly upgrade") at $1.50 / day means you're paying Verizon back less than $600 for a $1000 phone. Assuming, of course, that a year is less than 400 days.

vanilla_nut 9y ago

>Unsurprisingly, in stark contrast to the rest of the world, according to a report earlier this year only 50% of iPhone users who bought another phone in 2016 stayed with Apple: At first, I was confused by this graphic. Then I realized that the author is dramatically misinterpreting it: the graphic actually means that 66.85% of phones purchased in 2015 were made by Apple and 50% of phones purchased in 2016 were made by Apple. So we actually have literally no information about Apple's customer retention in China from that graphic at all. (Unless I'm really reading it wrong?) I wish journalism majors were required to take a stats class in college. Sigh...

guelo 9y ago
I don't think this guy is a journalism major. He's an MBA with experience working marketing and strategy at Apple, Microsoft and WordPress. He's probably had a stats class.
valuearb 9y ago
Somehow you didn't notice the graph added up to 250%, and you snark that the author needs to brush up on statistics? Please explain how 50 of 250 is actually 50% of everything. Especially when the author writes iPhone sales are only 9.6% of the chinese market.
- vanilla_nut 9y ago
  Good point. I guess I should have gotten a little more sleep last night... So I guess these ARE customer retention rates? Following his link brings me here: https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s?__biz=MjM5ODEyOTAyMA==&mid=2661906770&idx=2&sn=73662bbef300beda9237d30adaf374fa&chksm=bd92a5418ae52c57eb1c238a34b9f8a6418993d3384ec331758b4ae102351a4e04d2ed878336&mpshare=1&scene=1&srcid=0504Q1KjS8LTXMPois1oL3yP&key=c84baf55e7d27452d7d25e8d4216f3083fd387d19f1c1a67737c24d1dd9b45dae04bc0e728d03eada93643c901672625aa3e51158cc3bfff1934908b5c0229bee273701f7cf7b5d3c55a6dfefacb6747&ascene=0&uin=MTY1ODQwOTc0MA%3D%3D&devicetype=iMac+MacBookAir6%2C2+OSX+OSX+10.11.6+build(15G1421)&version=12020610&nettype=WIFI&fontScale=100&pass_ticket=txq8pNJOZPQCgr2USCGKoo4Q6ywoGnIyfwIIr0PTnlFp6hwHmmCF%2FvRWzEnCnVY2 https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s?__biz=MjM5ODEyOTAyMA==&mid=266190... (god, what a ridiculously lengthy URL). Looks like Apple only captured 33 and 25% of the market each year, respectively- not 66 and 50%, as I thought before. In which case I think the author should at least mention the fact that Apple's picking up a lot of their competitor's customers YoY as well- that's hardly a bad thing. Maybe the Chinese market simply has less brand loyalty.

ericjang 9y ago

Meta question: is there a "Hacker News of China" forum where I can find this article discussed from the Chinese perspective?

LiweiZ 9y ago
Try zhihu.com. Though I don't think the quality is anywhere close to here.

siproprio 9y ago

If the situation in China is similar to the situation in Brazil, then it is not a surprise Apple products aren't successful there. Apple services here are very poorly supported and localized, and Apple products are too expensive compared to the relative benefit we would receive. Why would you purchase a significantly more expensive device, with worse features, that sometimes don't work at all? We still haven't gotten turn by turn directions in Apple Maps, for example.

btian 9y ago
But you can install Google Maps or Waze on an iPhone. I like my iPhone because it's the fastest phone in the market. Pixel costs the same, and Galaxy S8 costs more than iPhone.
- siproprio 9y ago
  You're comparing the prices of only 2 android phones, when there are a lot more models available. None of these two phones are very popular in my country or in China. The most popular devices here are mid-end Android phones, like the Moto G series phones. Furthermore, what is supposed to differentiate Apple is its software, because hardware is a commodity. Being "the fastest" doesn't appeal much to costumers as compared to price, and to the default software experience.
  - btian 9y ago
    Yeah I guess it makes sense for people who are not rich. Mid-end phones don't appeal to me at all.

shmerl 9y ago

> Unsurprisingly, in stark contrast to the rest of the world, according to a report earlier this year only 50% of iPhone users who bought another phone in 2016 stayed with Apple Interesting. This shows that Apple don't compete properly and only achieve high sales through monopoly. That probably explains their general nasty attitude to many things, and really sick lock-in mentality. > None of that lock-in exists in China: Apple may be a de facto monopolist for most of the world, but in China the company is simply another smartphone vendor, and being simply another smartphone vendor is a hazardous place to be. To be clear, it’s not all bad Why is it bad? Being "simply another smartphone vendor" is the right situation. What's bad are monopolistic markets.

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sangnoir 9y ago

The author's explanation for Apple's "China problem" is unconvincing to say the least: > [...]behind local Chinese brands like Oppo, Huawei and Vivo. All of those companies sold high-end phones of their own; the issue isn’t that Apple was too expensive, it’s that the iPhone 6S and 7 were simply too boring. Boring - that's the explanation for a significant dip in sales? I would have expected a list of exciting design or features that Oppo, Huawei and Vivo are putting into their phones to steal customers from Apple, because historically their flagships have been equally 'boring'. The "China Problem" is at the crux of the matter (title of the post), and the explanation is too hand-wavy for my taste. My default attitude to tech industry analysts is cynicism; I do wonder who exactly pays for such superficial analyses and what value do they get from them?

draw_down 9y ago
The idea is pretty clear, I think. Apple's problem is WeChat. It's more important than the phone OS, which is different to most other countries. The effect of WeChat combined with China's sheer size is a problem for the iPhone business.
- sangnoir 9y ago
  WeChat is available on iPhones and its competitors. Since it is a common factor, WeChat alone cannot explain the decline in iPhone sales.

dangerous_words 9y ago

The blog post completely misses the near total influence of the Chinese government. Yes, China is a different ecosystem and that has second order effects. But it's still important to get the direction of causality right. In nearly every country around the world, Android phones are dependent on and dominated by the Google ecosystem. They aren't in China. Why? Because Google services are banned. So is Facebook. So are some of Apple's services. Even back when Google was cooperating with the PRC and trying hard for the local market, executives rightly or wrongly claimed that whenever their marketshare passed 30% regulators turned nasty. Many, many foreign companies have poured resources into China and the few that have succeeded have generally done so on the strength of a global brand—such as Coke, LV or Apple. That doesn't mean that Apple's challenges in China are simply due to market forces though. China's decision to ban all K-pop, K-dramas and other Korean media over their recent missile defense system shows that much. Simply put, WeChat violated multiple rules on Apple's App Store on its way up that have enabled it to act like the platform it does today. In any other country Apple would have simply refused to push non-compliant updates, but in China Apple faced the risk of being barred from the market entirely. Years later, WeChat is now so dominant that Apple would have to capitulate for market reasons alone. >"WeChat is that, but it is also for reading news, for hailing taxis, for paying for lunch (try and pay with cash for lunch, and you’ll look like a luddite)" That's just not true. Most lunches in China are not bought via WeChat. Even inside the 2nd ring road in Beijing, cash is very common.

brentis 9y ago

Switched to Pixel XL when iPhone 7 came out and killed headphone jack. Last thing I want on a phone, more things to charge and worry about. Quality takes may forms. Pixel camera is reviewed to be better and screen is legit sRGB and it charges in 15min and lasts 1.5 days vs iPhone 7. I also think iOS is a steaming turd. As an app dev for both platforms, I'm amazed people don't see the integration Android has with Pixel and others. Let's see them "innovate" no home button in iPhone 8 along with a curved screen. For the record this is being typed on my iPad...