21 ms·

I strongly disagree about the fashion bit. The iPod was better than any competitor it faced ever. The UI with the click wheel was completely unmatched. Maybe t

I strongly disagree about the fashion bit. The iPod was better than any competitor it faced ever. The UI with the click wheel was completely unmatched. Maybe the Zune, years later, came close, but Apple absolutely crushed it with the iPhone and iPod touch. The iPhone was leaps and bounds ahead of its time, to the point that the then King of the hill, BlackBerry, didn’t even think it was possible. And the smoothness of the UI was completely unmatched. The pocketPCs of the time were clunky messes. The iPhone’s UI was so far ahead that it’s now the default UI for every phone. And finally, the AirPods are a far superior experience than the alternatives. In addition though, the AirPods are extremely competitively priced.

Fnoord 7y ago
My iRiver H340 was ahead of its time. It supported MP3 and Ogg Vorbis and had 40 GB, while the iPods of around that time were running around with 4 GB. Oh, and iTunes DRM. I bought an iPod Classic later on (with 160 GB) to experience the genius usability of the iPod. Except, I didn't experience it. The major innovation of the iPhone was that it had a capacitive touch UI (which allows finger use, gestures, etc). The iPhone did not have an App Store during release. It was missing a lot of features. It was Nokia who was the market leader around that point. I wish they fully bet on Maemo and capacitive touch instead of Windows Phone (they went the right way with the N9, but the predecessors were still too much on pen and resistive touch, or hybrid). Right now, it is oddly enough Jolla who have a partly proprietary, partly FOSS, Linux-based OS (SFOS) for which you need a paid license for. After that, they won't track you though. The iPhone would've never sustained a big pie of the smartphone market though; it is Android which killed Nokia. Official SFOS has Android emulation.
- freepor 7y ago
  I had a Nokia N95 when I first used an iPhone. It was clear within 5 minutes of using the iPhone that regardless of specs the iPhone was a vastly better experience. That’s how Apple defines “best” and the market has demonstrated that a huge chunk of the market agrees with them and will pay the price for it.
- nomel 7y ago
  Why was this downvoted? The first thing I thought of was the iRiver. It was incredible at the time.
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
  - Fnoord 7y ago
    Because on HN it is allowed to downvote based on disagreement, and it is a thread about how well Apple is currently doing.
- dkonofalski 7y ago
  Replies like this miss the point completely. The iPod wasn't aimed at people like you who know what Ogg Vorbis is/was. It was aimed at the average, non-techy person and it absolutely crushed it. Same with the iPhone. The major innovation of the iPhone was that it was simple to use and anyone could pick it up and use it without knowing anything about it.
  - Fnoord 7y ago
    Except the first iPhone was not simple to use. It didn't even have 3G. You couldn't use MMS. It lacked a ton of other basic features, such as custom software. Then there was the need for jailbreaking to get some basic features back. Ever since Web 2.0 it was clear to me that a touch-based UI would win if you used a web browser; it was Apple's capacitive touch UI which was the killer feature. Nobody had such even though Mozilla was experimenting already with a mobile browser (Fennec). (For some use-cases, a keyboard is still desirable though. E.g. a Pebble during sports is better usable than a touch-based smartwatch.) You don't need to know what Ogg Vorbis is; I knew because I ripped my CDs to Ogg Vorbis. I already paid for these. It allowed me to save even more space compared to MP3 and AAC.
    - dkonofalski 7y ago
      >It didn't even have 3G. You couldn't use MMS. It lacked a ton of other basic features, such as custom software. None of these things, in any way, take away from how simple the first iPhone was to use. Once again, you missed the point completely.
      - Fnoord 7y ago
        It was limited in its usage (terrible speed while 3G was widely available, limited applications while Symbian had these, could not update via repositories which my Nokia N-series could, could not even use a comm feature like MMS). Apple got away with it because of their iPod fame, and that the UI was a decent capacitive touch-based one which nobody else managed to do.
- elsonrodriguez 7y ago
  The iRiver H340 came out in 2004, the iPod came out in 2001. Apple basically had the world's entire supply of tiny hard drives on lock for a year or two, after that other players could finally compete in that form factor (contemporary MP3 players either had little storage or were almost walkman sized).
sandoooo 7y ago
Remember itunes? UI was horrible from day one and got worse over the years until they killed it. I don't think it was ever a dealbreaker. UI is not the whole story here.
- JoBrad 7y ago
  iTunes is very much alive for the majority of IPhone/iPad users.
  - asutekku 7y ago
    I really don’t think so. I’d say only minority is using it after streaming services became popular and you can easily do OTA updates. Not much of a reason to use it anymore, that’s why Apple even discontinued it.
    - dkonofalski 7y ago
      Uhh... what? Apple didn't "discontinue" iTunes. It just got renamed to Apple Music. They separated out the syncing features but it's still the same product.
    - JoBrad 7y ago
      It’s not discontinued for Windows. https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/p/itunes/9pb2mz1zmb1s https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/p/itunes/9pb2mz1zmb1s
  - mr_toad 7y ago
    iTunes Store? That’s not the same as the music app.
  - scarface74 7y ago
    I haven’t needed to connect an iOS device to iTunes since iOS 5 in 2011.
    - JoBrad 7y ago
      It’s pretty much the main way to get any movies from a Windows personal drive on an iPad, etc., unless you’re using something like Plex. Edit: added Windows clarification
ikeboy 7y ago
My understanding is that the Airpods are not better than the high-end competition. There's plenty of $100-150 Bluetooth earbuds that have better sound quality, and a handful of sub-$100 ones that are just as good. You're paying for the name. https://www.businessinsider.com/apple-airpods-review-wireless-headphones-sound-quality-battery-life-2019-8 https://www.businessinsider.com/apple-airpods-review-wireles... >The biggest downside? Their sound is just OK. AirPods produce a perfectly average sound that's clear in the mid-tones and is good for podcasts but doesn't pack much in the low end. And because of their open design, sound isolation is terrible. There's also no noise cancellation, so you'll be stuck hearing traffic or crowds around you. The Jabra Elite 65Ts produce much better sound at about the same price. Even budget alternatives like the $80 Anker Soundcore earbuds offer just-as-good sound for half the price. I've read pretty much the same take from most reviewers I've looked at. It matches quality on cheaper models, and is outpaced by competitors in the same price range.
- lowboy 7y ago
  Audio quality is only one of the metrics for comparison, including: - form factor (my powerbeats pro case is huge compared to airpods) - handoff between different Apple devices - BT reliability/connection strength (mostly down to BT 4 vs 5) - fit and finish - noise cancellation People weigh all of these things differently to arrive at what is "best". If a broad range of wireless buds all meet someone's threshold for acceptable audio quality, the other factors will be deciding.
  - eikenberry 7y ago
    Audio quality may be only one metric, but it is by far the most important. When shopping for headphones/iems you first listen to them and find the ones that sound how you like, then you compare on all other factors. I think most people who buy them do so because the marketing, not due to the experience. They know the brand and know they won't suck. Not that they are the best.
    - lotsofpulp 7y ago
      I doubt anyone I know cares about audio quality better than what airpods provide. What they care about is a device that works (I.e. pairs and has long battery life). Plus it has some neat features integrated with other Apple hardware, such as being able to listen to the audio from an Apple TV.
Tade0 7y ago
And finally, the AirPods are a far superior experience than the alternatives. In addition though, the AirPods are extremely competitively priced. The former is subjective, as for the latter - what's the competition to which they are favourably priced?
rconti 7y ago
And the Zune was crippled by PlaysForSure DRM, even coming later. Apple added on their own crippling DRM after that.
scottrogers86 7y ago
All made possible by multitouch coming out of MIT! This is the video if i am not mistaken: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=89sz8ExZndc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=89sz8ExZndc
filmgirlcw 7y ago
AirPods are objectively great and it has taken 3 years for anything better to come out (and I would rather have seamless pairing than negligible audio quality improvements), but fashion is absolutely part of this. The same is true of the iPod and of the iPhone. To me, that doesn’t diminish from the fact that those are/were best-in-class products, but the ubiquity is absolutely based on fashion. The same is true of the Apple Watch. Of course the irony here is the Apple Watch was very much marketed as a fashion accessory first. That didn’t work. When the messaging pivoted to health and those capabilities got better then the completion (and there is no Android Apple Watch competition. Fitbit is the closest.), adoption spiked. But again, there is a still a very strong fashion component, even tho that isn’t a large part of the marketing anymore (the attempts to target luxury fashionistas have shifted and that has IMHO made for a better product all around). You don’t get a smart watch. You get an Apple Watch.
- ikeboy 7y ago
  What exactly is this seamless pairing that Airpods do so much better than everyone else? I've not noticed much in the way of seams on the other wireless earbuds I've tried. Connect on device, it works, and autoconnects next time.
  - wrboyce 7y ago
    You can think of the AirPods being paired to your iCloud account, and connecting to any authenticated devices is generally seamless and very quick.
    - damnyou 7y ago
      So, not seamless if you use Android, Windows, Linux, a Mac laptop and an iPad like I do.
      - wrboyce 7y ago
        It would be seamless between the Mac and iPad… I'm unsure how you would expect Apple to achieve it on devices they do not control though?
rahimnathwani 7y ago
"The iPod was better than any competitor it faced ever. The UI with the click wheel was completely unmatched." I preferred the Creative Zen Touch to the iPod from the same year (2004), because: - it had a great UI (similar to the iPod's, but the scroll area was vertical instead of circular) - I could load music onto it easily (no need to use a special app) IIRC Apple and Creative had some litigation about the IP for the UI, although I don't recall the details. EDIT: I agree with your point about the iPhone.
baybal2 7y ago
iPod was a shitty player few tiers below the competition. Tiny battery life, tons of bugs, IO limitations, iTunes nonsence, original, but unergonomic ui, mechanically unsound engineering. iRivers, Cowons, and Samsungs were a head above it without any doubt. They were just never marketed in US. Same with Smartphones. Japanese phones had all features of a smartphone a decade before the rest of the world, but they never bothered to market them outside thinking of outside world being "not advanced enough" to culturally absorb a phone as an integral lifestyle element, and not as a work tool.
- barry-cotter 7y ago
  If this was true the iPhone would have made negligible inroads in the markets where those products were available. Instead it was a massive success immediately in every market where it was offered. I’m sure it had many flaws but it was enough better where it mattered to dominate the competition.
  - baybal2 7y ago
    No, Apple got literally the only one thing right, and that's their marketing
  - asdff 7y ago
    It's not a controversial opinion, it really was all marketing and polishing existing tech like the airpods. When the ipod was first revealed, even apple fanboys at the time thought it was going to be a flop given the competition used common io, didn't require proprietary software, and didn't require a proprietary OS, and also was nearly half the price. https://www.cnet.com/news/apples-ipod-spurs-mixed-reactions/ https://www.cnet.com/news/apples-ipod-spurs-mixed-reactions/ This forum thread from the 2001 release is pretty funny: https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/apples-new-thing-ipod.500/ https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/apples-new-thing-ipod.5...
    - barry-cotter 7y ago
      You say polishing, I say crushing superiority in user interface and design.
heavyset_go 7y ago
> The iPhone’s UI was so far ahead that it’s now the default UI for every phone. When it comes to multitasking, the WebOS card metaphor won out and even came to iOS.
- seppin 7y ago
  > WebOS card metaphor WebOS is now a smart TV OS
asdff 7y ago
The fashion was everything. The ipod mini with it's colors. The iconic dancing silloutte ad campaign, where the only defining characteristic is the status symbol of the all white ipod and all white headphone. Growing up during the rise of the ipod, it absolutely was a status symbol first and foremost. Owning a zune gave you more ridicule in middle school than not owning an mp3 player at all. People were buying earpods without even buying an ipod, just to have that white cord dangling out of their ear. Maybe older generations saw it as good tech only, but for late millenials, the ipod's popularity was due to an obsession for vanity. These were the years where everything had to be either lacoste, abercrombie, hollister, american eagle, or a 6 inch tall polo man, after all. Part of the airpods success is that they tap into this obsession toward vanity harbored deep within millenials, who have also moved on from mall brands to gucci/balenciaga/supreme/insert bougie brand of the decade.
- seppin 7y ago
  > The fashion was everything. The ipod mini with it's colors. The iconic dancing silloutte ad campaign, I actually bought different headphones because of that ad b/c I thought it was so stupid, but do go on.
  - jen20 7y ago
    I continued to use the (black) earphones from another device _with an iPod_ to reduce the mugging risk.
- toasterlovin 7y ago
  > Growing up during the rise of the ipod, it absolutely was a status symbol It was a status symbol for you and your teenage friends. Life expectancy is currently around 80 in the developed world and teenagers don't really have disposable income, so teenagers weren't really driving sales. Apple made cool commercials and cool colors because they could.
ScriptToddler 7y ago
I agree with your opinion on the early iPod and iPhone, but personally I bought a pair of Bang and Olufsen wireless earpods around when the earpods gen 1 were released. I was not a big fan of the Apple design. My dad got the Apple earpods and to be honest, sound quality compared to mine was very lacking. It felt like Apple was a ripoff here. As well any Apple main product this day in my opinion. Good and decent products, but severely overpriced. Nothing close to as revolutionary as they were in the early days. Look at functions in new models of iPhones or hardware upgrades in Macs, they are not new or exciting. These days they are so much alternatives, it's a wonder to me why Apple is still so popular. It has to be a fashion or prestige feeling in my opinion. And it's only a matter of time before that dies out in my opinion.
kabacha 7y ago
oof, this sort of writing is why I avoid any apple threads on hackernews. "X was better than Y" without any sort of support. How come we have such high expectations for argument quality for every other topic other than how "apple is better" - it has reached the point where I read it and I almost jump to astroturfing conclusions. Fortunately for Apple their fans are dedicated enough to astroturf for free!
- mradonic 7y ago
  You are being unreasonable. People don’t have time to analyze every point they make, and they especially don’t need to if it’s pretty much agreed to by now by everyone in tech except couple of Apple haters like yourself. If you disagree with something call it out and let the parent comments defend it, instead of complaining how hacker news is full of fanboys. It’s what forums are for after all.
- Arn_Thor 7y ago
  Okay here's ways in which I found the AirPods to be vastly superior to any other bluetooth headset or earbuds I've tried, including more expensive over-ear noise cancelling ones: -The H1 chip ensures a quick connection that's more stable than any other bluetooth device I've experienced. Much less pairing hassle and dropped connections and fiddling in menus. At a competitive price that already makes them superior to anything I'm aware was out for sale at the time. Add to that the tiny charging box that always keeps them topped up, and it's a winner for me. (This comment was indeed written at no cost)
  - kabacha 7y ago
    Everything else you wrote is purely subjective: easier to connect? better than more expensive over ear noise cancelling headphones, really? Competitive price at $160? oof.
    - Arn_Thor 7y ago
      Yes, it's subjective. As I clearly write they're ways in which I found them to be better. They certainly connect easier and more reliably than my over-ears, bought around the same time (flagship Sony noise cancelling ones). As for the price, as Wikipedia documents and many others have mentioned, they were priced lower than most other truly wireless earbuds when they launched. Since then the field has grown more competitive, which is good for the consumer.
mettamage 7y ago
I agree with this. I once thought I lost my airpods, and had some gripes with them, so I bought a similar priced bluetooth headset from another brand. I wore those for 2 weeks and had many more gripes with it. Then I found that my airpods were under the couch and I immediately switched back.

Fnoord 7y ago

My iRiver H340 was ahead of its time. It supported MP3 and Ogg Vorbis and had 40 GB, while the iPods of around that time were running around with 4 GB. Oh, and iTunes DRM. I bought an iPod Classic later on (with 160 GB) to experience the genius usability of the iPod. Except, I didn't experience it. The major innovation of the iPhone was that it had a capacitive touch UI (which allows finger use, gestures, etc). The iPhone did not have an App Store during release. It was missing a lot of features. It was Nokia who was the market leader around that point. I wish they fully bet on Maemo and capacitive touch instead of Windows Phone (they went the right way with the N9, but the predecessors were still too much on pen and resistive touch, or hybrid). Right now, it is oddly enough Jolla who have a partly proprietary, partly FOSS, Linux-based OS (SFOS) for which you need a paid license for. After that, they won't track you though. The iPhone would've never sustained a big pie of the smartphone market though; it is Android which killed Nokia. Official SFOS has Android emulation.

freepor 7y ago
I had a Nokia N95 when I first used an iPhone. It was clear within 5 minutes of using the iPhone that regardless of specs the iPhone was a vastly better experience. That’s how Apple defines “best” and the market has demonstrated that a huge chunk of the market agrees with them and will pay the price for it.
nomel 7y ago
Why was this downvoted? The first thing I thought of was the iRiver. It was incredible at the time.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- Fnoord 7y ago
  Because on HN it is allowed to downvote based on disagreement, and it is a thread about how well Apple is currently doing.
dkonofalski 7y ago
Replies like this miss the point completely. The iPod wasn't aimed at people like you who know what Ogg Vorbis is/was. It was aimed at the average, non-techy person and it absolutely crushed it. Same with the iPhone. The major innovation of the iPhone was that it was simple to use and anyone could pick it up and use it without knowing anything about it.
- Fnoord 7y ago
  Except the first iPhone was not simple to use. It didn't even have 3G. You couldn't use MMS. It lacked a ton of other basic features, such as custom software. Then there was the need for jailbreaking to get some basic features back. Ever since Web 2.0 it was clear to me that a touch-based UI would win if you used a web browser; it was Apple's capacitive touch UI which was the killer feature. Nobody had such even though Mozilla was experimenting already with a mobile browser (Fennec). (For some use-cases, a keyboard is still desirable though. E.g. a Pebble during sports is better usable than a touch-based smartwatch.) You don't need to know what Ogg Vorbis is; I knew because I ripped my CDs to Ogg Vorbis. I already paid for these. It allowed me to save even more space compared to MP3 and AAC.
  - dkonofalski 7y ago
    >It didn't even have 3G. You couldn't use MMS. It lacked a ton of other basic features, such as custom software. None of these things, in any way, take away from how simple the first iPhone was to use. Once again, you missed the point completely.
    - Fnoord 7y ago
      It was limited in its usage (terrible speed while 3G was widely available, limited applications while Symbian had these, could not update via repositories which my Nokia N-series could, could not even use a comm feature like MMS). Apple got away with it because of their iPod fame, and that the UI was a decent capacitive touch-based one which nobody else managed to do.
elsonrodriguez 7y ago
The iRiver H340 came out in 2004, the iPod came out in 2001. Apple basically had the world's entire supply of tiny hard drives on lock for a year or two, after that other players could finally compete in that form factor (contemporary MP3 players either had little storage or were almost walkman sized).

sandoooo 7y ago

Remember itunes? UI was horrible from day one and got worse over the years until they killed it. I don't think it was ever a dealbreaker. UI is not the whole story here.

JoBrad 7y ago
iTunes is very much alive for the majority of IPhone/iPad users.
- asutekku 7y ago
  I really don’t think so. I’d say only minority is using it after streaming services became popular and you can easily do OTA updates. Not much of a reason to use it anymore, that’s why Apple even discontinued it.
  - dkonofalski 7y ago
    Uhh... what? Apple didn't "discontinue" iTunes. It just got renamed to Apple Music. They separated out the syncing features but it's still the same product.
  - JoBrad 7y ago
    It’s not discontinued for Windows. https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/p/itunes/9pb2mz1zmb1s https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/p/itunes/9pb2mz1zmb1s
- mr_toad 7y ago
  iTunes Store? That’s not the same as the music app.
- scarface74 7y ago
  I haven’t needed to connect an iOS device to iTunes since iOS 5 in 2011.
  - JoBrad 7y ago
    It’s pretty much the main way to get any movies from a Windows personal drive on an iPad, etc., unless you’re using something like Plex. Edit: added Windows clarification

ikeboy 7y ago

My understanding is that the Airpods are not better than the high-end competition. There's plenty of $100-150 Bluetooth earbuds that have better sound quality, and a handful of sub-$100 ones that are just as good. You're paying for the name. https://www.businessinsider.com/apple-airpods-review-wireless-headphones-sound-quality-battery-life-2019-8 https://www.businessinsider.com/apple-airpods-review-wireles... >The biggest downside? Their sound is just OK. AirPods produce a perfectly average sound that's clear in the mid-tones and is good for podcasts but doesn't pack much in the low end. And because of their open design, sound isolation is terrible. There's also no noise cancellation, so you'll be stuck hearing traffic or crowds around you. The Jabra Elite 65Ts produce much better sound at about the same price. Even budget alternatives like the $80 Anker Soundcore earbuds offer just-as-good sound for half the price. I've read pretty much the same take from most reviewers I've looked at. It matches quality on cheaper models, and is outpaced by competitors in the same price range.

lowboy 7y ago
Audio quality is only one of the metrics for comparison, including: - form factor (my powerbeats pro case is huge compared to airpods) - handoff between different Apple devices - BT reliability/connection strength (mostly down to BT 4 vs 5) - fit and finish - noise cancellation People weigh all of these things differently to arrive at what is "best". If a broad range of wireless buds all meet someone's threshold for acceptable audio quality, the other factors will be deciding.
- eikenberry 7y ago
  Audio quality may be only one metric, but it is by far the most important. When shopping for headphones/iems you first listen to them and find the ones that sound how you like, then you compare on all other factors. I think most people who buy them do so because the marketing, not due to the experience. They know the brand and know they won't suck. Not that they are the best.
  - lotsofpulp 7y ago
    I doubt anyone I know cares about audio quality better than what airpods provide. What they care about is a device that works (I.e. pairs and has long battery life). Plus it has some neat features integrated with other Apple hardware, such as being able to listen to the audio from an Apple TV.

Tade0 7y ago

And finally, the AirPods are a far superior experience than the alternatives. In addition though, the AirPods are extremely competitively priced. The former is subjective, as for the latter - what's the competition to which they are favourably priced?

rconti 7y ago

And the Zune was crippled by PlaysForSure DRM, even coming later. Apple added on their own crippling DRM after that.

scottrogers86 7y ago

All made possible by multitouch coming out of MIT! This is the video if i am not mistaken: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=89sz8ExZndc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=89sz8ExZndc

filmgirlcw 7y ago

AirPods are objectively great and it has taken 3 years for anything better to come out (and I would rather have seamless pairing than negligible audio quality improvements), but fashion is absolutely part of this. The same is true of the iPod and of the iPhone. To me, that doesn’t diminish from the fact that those are/were best-in-class products, but the ubiquity is absolutely based on fashion. The same is true of the Apple Watch. Of course the irony here is the Apple Watch was very much marketed as a fashion accessory first. That didn’t work. When the messaging pivoted to health and those capabilities got better then the completion (and there is no Android Apple Watch competition. Fitbit is the closest.), adoption spiked. But again, there is a still a very strong fashion component, even tho that isn’t a large part of the marketing anymore (the attempts to target luxury fashionistas have shifted and that has IMHO made for a better product all around). You don’t get a smart watch. You get an Apple Watch.

ikeboy 7y ago
What exactly is this seamless pairing that Airpods do so much better than everyone else? I've not noticed much in the way of seams on the other wireless earbuds I've tried. Connect on device, it works, and autoconnects next time.
- wrboyce 7y ago
  You can think of the AirPods being paired to your iCloud account, and connecting to any authenticated devices is generally seamless and very quick.
  - damnyou 7y ago
    So, not seamless if you use Android, Windows, Linux, a Mac laptop and an iPad like I do.
    - wrboyce 7y ago
      It would be seamless between the Mac and iPad… I'm unsure how you would expect Apple to achieve it on devices they do not control though?

rahimnathwani 7y ago

"The iPod was better than any competitor it faced ever. The UI with the click wheel was completely unmatched." I preferred the Creative Zen Touch to the iPod from the same year (2004), because: - it had a great UI (similar to the iPod's, but the scroll area was vertical instead of circular) - I could load music onto it easily (no need to use a special app) IIRC Apple and Creative had some litigation about the IP for the UI, although I don't recall the details. EDIT: I agree with your point about the iPhone.

baybal2 7y ago

iPod was a shitty player few tiers below the competition. Tiny battery life, tons of bugs, IO limitations, iTunes nonsence, original, but unergonomic ui, mechanically unsound engineering. iRivers, Cowons, and Samsungs were a head above it without any doubt. They were just never marketed in US. Same with Smartphones. Japanese phones had all features of a smartphone a decade before the rest of the world, but they never bothered to market them outside thinking of outside world being "not advanced enough" to culturally absorb a phone as an integral lifestyle element, and not as a work tool.

barry-cotter 7y ago
If this was true the iPhone would have made negligible inroads in the markets where those products were available. Instead it was a massive success immediately in every market where it was offered. I’m sure it had many flaws but it was enough better where it mattered to dominate the competition.
- baybal2 7y ago
  No, Apple got literally the only one thing right, and that's their marketing
- asdff 7y ago
  It's not a controversial opinion, it really was all marketing and polishing existing tech like the airpods. When the ipod was first revealed, even apple fanboys at the time thought it was going to be a flop given the competition used common io, didn't require proprietary software, and didn't require a proprietary OS, and also was nearly half the price. https://www.cnet.com/news/apples-ipod-spurs-mixed-reactions/ https://www.cnet.com/news/apples-ipod-spurs-mixed-reactions/ This forum thread from the 2001 release is pretty funny: https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/apples-new-thing-ipod.500/ https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/apples-new-thing-ipod.5...
  - barry-cotter 7y ago
    You say polishing, I say crushing superiority in user interface and design.

heavyset_go 7y ago

> The iPhone’s UI was so far ahead that it’s now the default UI for every phone. When it comes to multitasking, the WebOS card metaphor won out and even came to iOS.

seppin 7y ago
> WebOS card metaphor WebOS is now a smart TV OS

asdff 7y ago

The fashion was everything. The ipod mini with it's colors. The iconic dancing silloutte ad campaign, where the only defining characteristic is the status symbol of the all white ipod and all white headphone. Growing up during the rise of the ipod, it absolutely was a status symbol first and foremost. Owning a zune gave you more ridicule in middle school than not owning an mp3 player at all. People were buying earpods without even buying an ipod, just to have that white cord dangling out of their ear. Maybe older generations saw it as good tech only, but for late millenials, the ipod's popularity was due to an obsession for vanity. These were the years where everything had to be either lacoste, abercrombie, hollister, american eagle, or a 6 inch tall polo man, after all. Part of the airpods success is that they tap into this obsession toward vanity harbored deep within millenials, who have also moved on from mall brands to gucci/balenciaga/supreme/insert bougie brand of the decade.

seppin 7y ago
> The fashion was everything. The ipod mini with it's colors. The iconic dancing silloutte ad campaign, I actually bought different headphones because of that ad b/c I thought it was so stupid, but do go on.
- jen20 7y ago
  I continued to use the (black) earphones from another device _with an iPod_ to reduce the mugging risk.
toasterlovin 7y ago
> Growing up during the rise of the ipod, it absolutely was a status symbol It was a status symbol for you and your teenage friends. Life expectancy is currently around 80 in the developed world and teenagers don't really have disposable income, so teenagers weren't really driving sales. Apple made cool commercials and cool colors because they could.

ScriptToddler 7y ago

I agree with your opinion on the early iPod and iPhone, but personally I bought a pair of Bang and Olufsen wireless earpods around when the earpods gen 1 were released. I was not a big fan of the Apple design. My dad got the Apple earpods and to be honest, sound quality compared to mine was very lacking. It felt like Apple was a ripoff here. As well any Apple main product this day in my opinion. Good and decent products, but severely overpriced. Nothing close to as revolutionary as they were in the early days. Look at functions in new models of iPhones or hardware upgrades in Macs, they are not new or exciting. These days they are so much alternatives, it's a wonder to me why Apple is still so popular. It has to be a fashion or prestige feeling in my opinion. And it's only a matter of time before that dies out in my opinion.

kabacha 7y ago

oof, this sort of writing is why I avoid any apple threads on hackernews. "X was better than Y" without any sort of support. How come we have such high expectations for argument quality for every other topic other than how "apple is better" - it has reached the point where I read it and I almost jump to astroturfing conclusions. Fortunately for Apple their fans are dedicated enough to astroturf for free!

mradonic 7y ago
You are being unreasonable. People don’t have time to analyze every point they make, and they especially don’t need to if it’s pretty much agreed to by now by everyone in tech except couple of Apple haters like yourself. If you disagree with something call it out and let the parent comments defend it, instead of complaining how hacker news is full of fanboys. It’s what forums are for after all.
Arn_Thor 7y ago
Okay here's ways in which I found the AirPods to be vastly superior to any other bluetooth headset or earbuds I've tried, including more expensive over-ear noise cancelling ones: -The H1 chip ensures a quick connection that's more stable than any other bluetooth device I've experienced. Much less pairing hassle and dropped connections and fiddling in menus. At a competitive price that already makes them superior to anything I'm aware was out for sale at the time. Add to that the tiny charging box that always keeps them topped up, and it's a winner for me. (This comment was indeed written at no cost)
- kabacha 7y ago
  Everything else you wrote is purely subjective: easier to connect? better than more expensive over ear noise cancelling headphones, really? Competitive price at $160? oof.
  - Arn_Thor 7y ago
    Yes, it's subjective. As I clearly write they're ways in which I found them to be better. They certainly connect easier and more reliably than my over-ears, bought around the same time (flagship Sony noise cancelling ones). As for the price, as Wikipedia documents and many others have mentioned, they were priced lower than most other truly wireless earbuds when they launched. Since then the field has grown more competitive, which is good for the consumer.

mettamage 7y ago

I agree with this. I once thought I lost my airpods, and had some gripes with them, so I bought a similar priced bluetooth headset from another brand. I wore those for 2 weeks and had many more gripes with it. Then I found that my airpods were under the couch and I immediately switched back.