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It's been clear for quite some time that terms like "Extreme", "Pro" and "Max" are marketing terms. They are not accurate classifications of how they will be us

It's been clear for quite some time that terms like "Extreme", "Pro" and "Max" are marketing terms. They are not accurate classifications of how they will be used. If people feel strongly enough that the name is not accurate, they will have to buy a competing product that fulfills their needs at the price they are willing to pay. I suppose what would be interesting, but highly proprietary, would be Apple's marketing research information on how the "Pro" marketing term is received by their target consumers. All that being said, I personally have never bought from Apple, and think the $150 upgrade cost is ridiculous (not to mention the $300 jump from the XR, which is still $300 more than I paid for my Pixel)! So I could say the "Pro" marketing isn't working on me! But overall, they aren't hurting for customers.

askl56 7y ago
Whilst I agree with your premise, the problem is that they explicitly made the distinction that this was for professionals. I can't remember the precise verbiage but when Cook introduced it he said that this was by and for professionals.
- heavymark 7y ago
  Well they specifically said it’s Pro users... and for everyone else who wants the best of what Apple has to offer. They could certainly remove the 64gb entry option and thus increase the base price but then everyone who only needs 64gb is paying more for a feature they don’t need or want. Rather Apple usually waits until part prices make it so they can both reduce the price and this remove the previous entry model which one can assume will happen in a few years.
- gowld 7y ago
  Instgram influencers are professionals in their particular niche.
jimbokun 7y ago
"Pro" has been pretty useful, I think, as a marker in Apple's other product lines. "MacBook Pro" and "iPad Pro" are the ones you buy if you need it for work, because the increased price will pay for itself with increased productivity. But buy the "Air" or basic versions if you are primarily using it for more basic tasks and media consumption. Not sure the "Pro" distinction will hold up for iPhone, though. I guess it depends if Pro Photographers actually will give up their "Pro" cameras for an iPhone 11 Pro. And I can't think of any other profession where the iPhone Pro will "pay for itself" in productivity increases relative to other iPhones.
- hrktb 7y ago
  “Pro” is not just for productivity but comfort of use as well. As an analogy if you sit on a chair 8 hours a day you’ll want a super nice chair, even if it wouldn’t have direct effects on productivity compared to a just decent one. For most people relying on a smartphone for work, be it 700 or 1000 the device will pay for itself in a few months at most, so I think the price difference won’t matter much. Better battery performance could be significant though.
  - davnicwil 7y ago
    Honest question, who relies on a smartphone for work? I mean, obviously people rely on a phone for work, people rely on email for work, but what jobs are there where getting the iPhone pro model would make a difference to getting, say, the now much lower priced iPhone 8.. or for that matter a used 2/3 year old flagship android phone?
    - nicky0 7y ago
      Instagram influencers of course.
    - hrktb 7y ago
      I see where you’re coming from, but it also feels like asking ‘why do you want to work in a nice place ? what difference is it really making that your desk has smooth angles and is made of sturdy materials instead of a particle plank with feets we’d buy at IKEA ?’ People can be productive and do fantastic work on any working material. But why have it worse when you’ll be using the device day in day out and stare at it for years ? I don’t think we are arguing the Pro is nicer, right ?
      - davnicwil 7y ago
        No, I definitely agree, in fact I was going to give that very caveat ('aside from the pro model just being nicer to use if you use a phone all the time at work') but didn't want to presume your point too much. Also I was genuinely interested, maybe there are jobs like this and I'm just not aware of them :-)
tyscorp 7y ago
>It's been clear for quite some time that terms like "Extreme", "Pro" and "Max" are marketing terms. A great example of this is the "PS4 Pro"
- dlivingston 7y ago
  Listen pal, my eSports Twitch career won't go anywhere with just the base model /sarcasm
minimaxir 7y ago
> It's been clear for quite some time that terms like "Extreme", "Pro" and "Max" are marketing terms. They are not accurate classifications of how they will be used. The new iPhone Pros appear to mark a shift; it's the same shift the Mac Pro announcement did in June, and was also a source of contention on Hacker News.
spike021 7y ago
"Pro" probably works great to bring in people trying to elevate their social media quality. It doesn't necessarily mean (in Apple's marketing terminology) actual, legitimate professional industry anymore. I'd imagine people getting into vlogging and such, or even people who just want to be "that cool and popular" (especially younger people) that would buy in to the "Pro" moniker.
- soneil 7y ago
  I think "Pro" is just admitting that they're running into two tiers now. They released the 8 and the X together, they released the XR and XS together. The iphone has diverged into two products and hopefully they've picked a consistent name to differentiate them - because the difference between XR and XS isn't obvious at all.
  - ryantgtg 7y ago
    “XS” seemed to me like a blunder of a name. First off, I don’t know anyone who calls the X iPhones “ten” - they call them “x”. And so XS looks and sounds like “extra small.” Without knowing anything about the X phones, I at first assumed that XR was the top of the line X phone. XR just... sounds like a better phone. I think they resolved this with the 11 line.
    - sjwright 7y ago
      To me I couldn't help but read it as "excess", as in this phone is excessive.
  - dfgdghdf 7y ago
    Exactly. It's the same as with iPad and Mac. The name "pro" is just a throw-back to an earlier Apple, and it works because customers already understand the term. It doesn't matter if it is for real professionals or not.
- wastedhours 7y ago
  > It doesn't necessarily mean (in Apple's marketing terminology) actual, legitimate professional industry I made the point elsewhere, but I think that ignores "professionals in the workplace doing this alongside other things". These can easily be "pro" for content creation teams, like editorial staff for capturing Stories from events and the like. Just because they're not replacements for high-end commercial photography equipment doesn't mean they're not being used as intended by professionals. Completely agree that their terminology might be skewing, but I wouldn't be so dismissive of their use in a professional context, even if the users aren't "photography professionals" themselves.
crystaln 7y ago
I suppose they could protest a 64GB pro version or they could buy a bigger one. I guess we all pick our battles.
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
ineedasername 7y ago
Honestly I never really understood the need to chase the newest flagship given the premium price. I probably upgrade about once a year to 18 months, and purchasing the prior model flagship saves me about 60% to 70%. I upgraded to the pixel 2xl shortly after the 3 came out for about $260. Even being able to afford it I just feel I'm getting ripped off at $1000.
- luxuryballs 7y ago
  If it was a need they would probably not be able to charge so much.
- Cort3z 7y ago
  You then pay somewhere around 175 to 260 usd per year for your phone. The newest iPhones are about $1000. From my experience, and from others, they last a very long time, and a 4 year cycle can be expected, as well as passing the phones on to their kids and so on. There is also the possibility to sell it used down the line, and the iPhones keep their value much better than any Android phone. Thus the "expensive" iPhones are $250 or less per year. And they are, in my opinion, usually better than the Android equivalent. You might say; "but what if I have the same upgrade cycle with iPhones". Well, then you can have a look at what a used version of the last gen iPhone costs. Where I live; it is something like $100-200 less than what it was new. That means; some people are having the newest version of the iPhone for only $100-200 / year. That is, at least, roughly the same price as your are getting (or better, depending on resale value of the specific Android phone), but with the newest version of a more premium product. In other words. You might be getting ripped off at $260. It all comes down to money over time, not amount at a defined moment, unless the amount is prohibitive.
  - ramraj07 7y ago
    Mostly sound logic and I switched to the iPhone 5 years back after a similar calculation. Only, the 6s started becoming wonky in 3 years and I most definitely missed _some_ Android features. When it was time to upgrade, it apparently also became time for apple to jack up the price of their flagship to a thousand bucks and I just vehemently avoided that out of principle. Looking at alternatives,the Galaxy seemed like a reasonably similar premium (not polished software fosho) phone, but sticker price was similar to iPhones. However thos things go on sale a lot. Nabbed a S9 few months after release for 500 and looks like it'll last me three years at least. Super happy with the hardware (and software actually) as well. The only "flaw" in your logic above is that in principle an iPhone probably can last 4 years but that's not constant - models from them are sometimes just not as reliable (we talking 4 year reliability vs 3) and it's not just a thousand dollars, it's thousand and tax and bells and whistles (which for apple is always more). Plus you now have a premium phone that you better don't break or scratch (if you want to sell) or you're out a very large number of Benjamins.
movedx 7y ago
> All that being said, I personally have never bought from Apple, and think the $150 upgrade cost is ridiculous (not to mention the $300 jump from the XR, which is still $300 more than I paid for my Pixel)! So I could say the "Pro" marketing isn't working on me! But overall, they aren't hurting for customers. I love it when people complain about the prices Apple charge, especially given the experiences I've had with customer service at Apple, so... story time! I had an iPhone 5 when it first came out. At the time I was a heavy motorbike rider to and from work. One day when I was riding home it rained heavily (this was in England, so yeah...) and my pocket had been left open. When I got home my iPhone was completely submerged in water for at least 20 minutes. I took it to Apple the next day and they replaced it for free. Try that with your Pixel... oh that's right, you don't have any stores to take it into world wide. Shame. Fast forward to only two years ago... I was in Vienna for Christmas a few years back. We'd gone through Italy to get there. During my time in Italy I noticed my iPhone 6S' battery was dropping quickly. I couldn't work out why. By the time we got to Vienna it would drop by 20% every 15-20 minutes. I found a premium reseller who took it in and replaced the battery in 45 minutes for free. I bought the phone in Australia. Try that with your Pixel... oh that's right, you have to post your phone to the manufacturer and wait for them to fix it or replace it, a process I know to take weeks. Shame. But you saved $300 though! I personally don't think it's worth counting the pennies in that manner given the services you're getting outside of the hardware. It's not much of a price hike at all, in the grand scheme of things.
- spookware 7y ago
  So are you saying you got a new phone and battery for free?
  - zimpenfish 7y ago
    I somehow managed to get an almost invisible crack on the inside of the Gorilla glass a few years ago via a drop. Took it into an Apple Store for a screen replacement; they gave me a fresh out of the box phone for free (partially because they'd never seen that failure mode before, partially because they were busy and my slot got delayed 45 minutes.) (Admittedly, the bloke next to me with the iPhone 4 arguing that the back glass had shattered "all on its own; I didn't drop it, honestly!" probably wasn't going to get a new phone for free...)
incompatible 7y ago
If you need a "pro" phone but can't afford the iPhone, you could always get a UMIDIGI A3 Pro, or an ASUS ZenFone Max Pro M2, which are quite a bit cheaper. Naturally it's just a marketing term.
luxuryballs 7y ago
Real estate agents, industrial photographers, people who make money affiliate marketing, maintaining a (whatever) review channel on YouTube, journalists, heck even sales or running a small business, lots of professional use cases. The difference between good and great is the little things.
- moftz 7y ago
  The photos I see on real estate listings are horrendously compressed and have a potato-like quality. I have no idea if they were taken 15 years ago on a $10 point and shoot or on a brand new professional DSLR. Only thing you can sometimes tell is that they used a wide-angle lens.
  - sjwright 7y ago
    In my experience (Sydney, Australia) they tend to get professionals to shoot with a quality DSLR, then they get pimple-faced Photoshop jockeys to flatten the dynamics and punch in a fake blue sky. This new extra-wide camera is interesting as it's fairly rare for a consumer-targeted camera to exceed a 24mm (FFE) focal length. Even in expensive professional lenses, getting to 13mm (FFE) is fairly unusual. Most ultra-wide glass stops at 16mm.
- what-the-grump 7y ago
  Or you know... bring a camera and be professional. The idea that apple needs an extra $300 dollars to fit that into my phone, maybe i'll just get two pixel 3s. Or a nice point and shoot. The 'bare minimum' that the consumer will accept vs 'the average feature set expected' vs 'lets sprinkle in some unicorn dust and charge people up the wazoo' model is getting a little old. Its why I have iPhone 6s, 7s, still in the fleet of devices I support. The consumer and businesses are simply tired of this bs.
paggle 7y ago
“Pro” means more powerful. That doesn’t mean that you buy it if you need it work work. I know Fellows making $1m/year who have a MacBook Air because they prefer the low weight when they’re doing emails etc, and code from a desktop workstation.
kace91 7y ago
Pro at this point is just key for "the expensier/fancier one". It's hard to name the more expensive version to convey it's better without in turn suggesting the cheaper one is shittier. "Pro" lets you do that by suggesting that it's for a different audience, allowing consumers of the budget model to save face so to speak (I don't need it because I'm not a professional).

askl56 7y ago

Whilst I agree with your premise, the problem is that they explicitly made the distinction that this was for professionals. I can't remember the precise verbiage but when Cook introduced it he said that this was by and for professionals.

heavymark 7y ago
Well they specifically said it’s Pro users... and for everyone else who wants the best of what Apple has to offer. They could certainly remove the 64gb entry option and thus increase the base price but then everyone who only needs 64gb is paying more for a feature they don’t need or want. Rather Apple usually waits until part prices make it so they can both reduce the price and this remove the previous entry model which one can assume will happen in a few years.
gowld 7y ago
Instgram influencers are professionals in their particular niche.

jimbokun 7y ago

"Pro" has been pretty useful, I think, as a marker in Apple's other product lines. "MacBook Pro" and "iPad Pro" are the ones you buy if you need it for work, because the increased price will pay for itself with increased productivity. But buy the "Air" or basic versions if you are primarily using it for more basic tasks and media consumption. Not sure the "Pro" distinction will hold up for iPhone, though. I guess it depends if Pro Photographers actually will give up their "Pro" cameras for an iPhone 11 Pro. And I can't think of any other profession where the iPhone Pro will "pay for itself" in productivity increases relative to other iPhones.

hrktb 7y ago
“Pro” is not just for productivity but comfort of use as well. As an analogy if you sit on a chair 8 hours a day you’ll want a super nice chair, even if it wouldn’t have direct effects on productivity compared to a just decent one. For most people relying on a smartphone for work, be it 700 or 1000 the device will pay for itself in a few months at most, so I think the price difference won’t matter much. Better battery performance could be significant though.
- davnicwil 7y ago
  Honest question, who relies on a smartphone for work? I mean, obviously people rely on a phone for work, people rely on email for work, but what jobs are there where getting the iPhone pro model would make a difference to getting, say, the now much lower priced iPhone 8.. or for that matter a used 2/3 year old flagship android phone?
  - nicky0 7y ago
    Instagram influencers of course.
  - hrktb 7y ago
    I see where you’re coming from, but it also feels like asking ‘why do you want to work in a nice place ? what difference is it really making that your desk has smooth angles and is made of sturdy materials instead of a particle plank with feets we’d buy at IKEA ?’ People can be productive and do fantastic work on any working material. But why have it worse when you’ll be using the device day in day out and stare at it for years ? I don’t think we are arguing the Pro is nicer, right ?
    - davnicwil 7y ago
      No, I definitely agree, in fact I was going to give that very caveat ('aside from the pro model just being nicer to use if you use a phone all the time at work') but didn't want to presume your point too much. Also I was genuinely interested, maybe there are jobs like this and I'm just not aware of them :-)

tyscorp 7y ago

>It's been clear for quite some time that terms like "Extreme", "Pro" and "Max" are marketing terms. A great example of this is the "PS4 Pro"

dlivingston 7y ago
Listen pal, my eSports Twitch career won't go anywhere with just the base model /sarcasm

minimaxir 7y ago

> It's been clear for quite some time that terms like "Extreme", "Pro" and "Max" are marketing terms. They are not accurate classifications of how they will be used. The new iPhone Pros appear to mark a shift; it's the same shift the Mac Pro announcement did in June, and was also a source of contention on Hacker News.

spike021 7y ago

"Pro" probably works great to bring in people trying to elevate their social media quality. It doesn't necessarily mean (in Apple's marketing terminology) actual, legitimate professional industry anymore. I'd imagine people getting into vlogging and such, or even people who just want to be "that cool and popular" (especially younger people) that would buy in to the "Pro" moniker.

soneil 7y ago
I think "Pro" is just admitting that they're running into two tiers now. They released the 8 and the X together, they released the XR and XS together. The iphone has diverged into two products and hopefully they've picked a consistent name to differentiate them - because the difference between XR and XS isn't obvious at all.
- ryantgtg 7y ago
  “XS” seemed to me like a blunder of a name. First off, I don’t know anyone who calls the X iPhones “ten” - they call them “x”. And so XS looks and sounds like “extra small.” Without knowing anything about the X phones, I at first assumed that XR was the top of the line X phone. XR just... sounds like a better phone. I think they resolved this with the 11 line.
  - sjwright 7y ago
    To me I couldn't help but read it as "excess", as in this phone is excessive.
- dfgdghdf 7y ago
  Exactly. It's the same as with iPad and Mac. The name "pro" is just a throw-back to an earlier Apple, and it works because customers already understand the term. It doesn't matter if it is for real professionals or not.
wastedhours 7y ago
> It doesn't necessarily mean (in Apple's marketing terminology) actual, legitimate professional industry I made the point elsewhere, but I think that ignores "professionals in the workplace doing this alongside other things". These can easily be "pro" for content creation teams, like editorial staff for capturing Stories from events and the like. Just because they're not replacements for high-end commercial photography equipment doesn't mean they're not being used as intended by professionals. Completely agree that their terminology might be skewing, but I wouldn't be so dismissive of their use in a professional context, even if the users aren't "photography professionals" themselves.

crystaln 7y ago

I suppose they could protest a 64GB pro version or they could buy a bigger one. I guess we all pick our battles.

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

ineedasername 7y ago

Honestly I never really understood the need to chase the newest flagship given the premium price. I probably upgrade about once a year to 18 months, and purchasing the prior model flagship saves me about 60% to 70%. I upgraded to the pixel 2xl shortly after the 3 came out for about $260. Even being able to afford it I just feel I'm getting ripped off at $1000.

luxuryballs 7y ago
If it was a need they would probably not be able to charge so much.
Cort3z 7y ago
You then pay somewhere around 175 to 260 usd per year for your phone. The newest iPhones are about $1000. From my experience, and from others, they last a very long time, and a 4 year cycle can be expected, as well as passing the phones on to their kids and so on. There is also the possibility to sell it used down the line, and the iPhones keep their value much better than any Android phone. Thus the "expensive" iPhones are $250 or less per year. And they are, in my opinion, usually better than the Android equivalent. You might say; "but what if I have the same upgrade cycle with iPhones". Well, then you can have a look at what a used version of the last gen iPhone costs. Where I live; it is something like $100-200 less than what it was new. That means; some people are having the newest version of the iPhone for only $100-200 / year. That is, at least, roughly the same price as your are getting (or better, depending on resale value of the specific Android phone), but with the newest version of a more premium product. In other words. You might be getting ripped off at $260. It all comes down to money over time, not amount at a defined moment, unless the amount is prohibitive.
- ramraj07 7y ago
  Mostly sound logic and I switched to the iPhone 5 years back after a similar calculation. Only, the 6s started becoming wonky in 3 years and I most definitely missed _some_ Android features. When it was time to upgrade, it apparently also became time for apple to jack up the price of their flagship to a thousand bucks and I just vehemently avoided that out of principle. Looking at alternatives,the Galaxy seemed like a reasonably similar premium (not polished software fosho) phone, but sticker price was similar to iPhones. However thos things go on sale a lot. Nabbed a S9 few months after release for 500 and looks like it'll last me three years at least. Super happy with the hardware (and software actually) as well. The only "flaw" in your logic above is that in principle an iPhone probably can last 4 years but that's not constant - models from them are sometimes just not as reliable (we talking 4 year reliability vs 3) and it's not just a thousand dollars, it's thousand and tax and bells and whistles (which for apple is always more). Plus you now have a premium phone that you better don't break or scratch (if you want to sell) or you're out a very large number of Benjamins.

movedx 7y ago

> All that being said, I personally have never bought from Apple, and think the $150 upgrade cost is ridiculous (not to mention the $300 jump from the XR, which is still $300 more than I paid for my Pixel)! So I could say the "Pro" marketing isn't working on me! But overall, they aren't hurting for customers. I love it when people complain about the prices Apple charge, especially given the experiences I've had with customer service at Apple, so... story time! I had an iPhone 5 when it first came out. At the time I was a heavy motorbike rider to and from work. One day when I was riding home it rained heavily (this was in England, so yeah...) and my pocket had been left open. When I got home my iPhone was completely submerged in water for at least 20 minutes. I took it to Apple the next day and they replaced it for free. Try that with your Pixel... oh that's right, you don't have any stores to take it into world wide. Shame. Fast forward to only two years ago... I was in Vienna for Christmas a few years back. We'd gone through Italy to get there. During my time in Italy I noticed my iPhone 6S' battery was dropping quickly. I couldn't work out why. By the time we got to Vienna it would drop by 20% every 15-20 minutes. I found a premium reseller who took it in and replaced the battery in 45 minutes for free. I bought the phone in Australia. Try that with your Pixel... oh that's right, you have to post your phone to the manufacturer and wait for them to fix it or replace it, a process I know to take weeks. Shame. But you saved $300 though! I personally don't think it's worth counting the pennies in that manner given the services you're getting outside of the hardware. It's not much of a price hike at all, in the grand scheme of things.

spookware 7y ago
So are you saying you got a new phone and battery for free?
- zimpenfish 7y ago
  I somehow managed to get an almost invisible crack on the inside of the Gorilla glass a few years ago via a drop. Took it into an Apple Store for a screen replacement; they gave me a fresh out of the box phone for free (partially because they'd never seen that failure mode before, partially because they were busy and my slot got delayed 45 minutes.) (Admittedly, the bloke next to me with the iPhone 4 arguing that the back glass had shattered "all on its own; I didn't drop it, honestly!" probably wasn't going to get a new phone for free...)

incompatible 7y ago

If you need a "pro" phone but can't afford the iPhone, you could always get a UMIDIGI A3 Pro, or an ASUS ZenFone Max Pro M2, which are quite a bit cheaper. Naturally it's just a marketing term.

luxuryballs 7y ago

Real estate agents, industrial photographers, people who make money affiliate marketing, maintaining a (whatever) review channel on YouTube, journalists, heck even sales or running a small business, lots of professional use cases. The difference between good and great is the little things.

moftz 7y ago
The photos I see on real estate listings are horrendously compressed and have a potato-like quality. I have no idea if they were taken 15 years ago on a $10 point and shoot or on a brand new professional DSLR. Only thing you can sometimes tell is that they used a wide-angle lens.
- sjwright 7y ago
  In my experience (Sydney, Australia) they tend to get professionals to shoot with a quality DSLR, then they get pimple-faced Photoshop jockeys to flatten the dynamics and punch in a fake blue sky. This new extra-wide camera is interesting as it's fairly rare for a consumer-targeted camera to exceed a 24mm (FFE) focal length. Even in expensive professional lenses, getting to 13mm (FFE) is fairly unusual. Most ultra-wide glass stops at 16mm.
what-the-grump 7y ago
Or you know... bring a camera and be professional. The idea that apple needs an extra $300 dollars to fit that into my phone, maybe i'll just get two pixel 3s. Or a nice point and shoot. The 'bare minimum' that the consumer will accept vs 'the average feature set expected' vs 'lets sprinkle in some unicorn dust and charge people up the wazoo' model is getting a little old. Its why I have iPhone 6s, 7s, still in the fleet of devices I support. The consumer and businesses are simply tired of this bs.

paggle 7y ago

“Pro” means more powerful. That doesn’t mean that you buy it if you need it work work. I know Fellows making $1m/year who have a MacBook Air because they prefer the low weight when they’re doing emails etc, and code from a desktop workstation.

kace91 7y ago

Pro at this point is just key for "the expensier/fancier one". It's hard to name the more expensive version to convey it's better without in turn suggesting the cheaper one is shittier. "Pro" lets you do that by suggesting that it's for a different audience, allowing consumers of the budget model to save face so to speak (I don't need it because I'm not a professional).