5 ms·

Apple sells billions of iPhones, all with the same hardware and OS. As a result it can afford to spend a lot of money on design. You would not enjoy an iPhone

by dash2 5y ago

Apple sells billions of iPhones, all with the same hardware and OS. As a result it can afford to spend a lot of money on design. You would not enjoy an iPhone made by your local electrician.

Causality1 5y ago
Not local, but small and competitive was nice. Electronics were so much more fun twenty years ago. Nowadays a company is a bold risk-taker if their glass sandwich has an extra button on top.
- dgemm 5y ago
  Consumer stuff sure, but we didn't have today's proliferation of hobbyist platforms back then either. The fun things are still out there, they are just different.
EB66 5y ago
Have you tried the Framework Laptop? It's a great example of how small start-ups can build better devices than the giants. Difficult, yes -- impossible, no.
- dash2 5y ago
  It's a niche product for hardware hackers. (That's why its sales are so low.)
  - EB66 5y ago
    Whether it's a niche product or not is beside the point. The point is that a small entity can build a device that is arguably better designed, better reviewed, affordable and readily available for purchase.
    - dash2 5y ago
      Me, an economist: if it's better, why does nobody buy it?
      - EB66 5y ago
        People are buying it... so much so that Framework has been struggling to keep up with the demand. All of their early batches sold out well in advance. I placed my order two months ago and it was backordered for a month. Batch 6 (the current batch) is the first batch they've had all year where they haven't been massively backordered.
        dash2 5y ago
        I'm glad, but Apple ships millions of Macs every quarter. When Framework catch up, then I'll agree they're better and not niche. Of course as a hacker I might prefer Framework, believe it is better, even evangelize it. That's a different use of the word, though.
        jlokier 5y ago
        The original question was whether a small company can make a better device than a very large company. Here you've defined "better" to include "can ship very large quantities", which is almost a circular way of defining the answer to be negative, no matter what the company does. If it can ship very large quantities, it's not a small company.
        dash2 5y ago
        Indeed, my original point was that there are huge economies of scale in design. That's why it would be a bad idea for everything to be small-scale and local, which the GP was arguing for.
  - pdimitar 5y ago
    It doesn't really matter that it's a niche product. The mere fact that it's out there does show to less tech savvy people what's possible. That's very important because many of them are not even aware things can be done differently.
- School-Cotton 5y ago
  The Framework is only better than a MacBook Pro if you care about repairability, customizability, freedom, etc., which most people don’t. It’s also worse in many ways — less polished OS UI, worse screen resolution.
  - EB66 5y ago
    > The Framework is only better than a MacBook Pro if you care about repairability, customizability, freedom, etc. Those are three pretty huge things... For me personally, repairability is secondary to their very convenient modular IO port system. > Less polished OS UI. You can have them install Windows without the typical manufacturer bloatware or you can put *nix on it. For me, that's better than macOS. > worse screen resolution The resolution on the MacBook Pro 13 and the Framework are nearly the same: 2560 x 1600 vs 2256 x 1504.
  - pxc 5y ago
    Imo people overstate how good the macOS UX is. It's fine if you're used to it, but when I started using it for the first time there were lots of little unpleasant surprises and inconsistencies. The way people talk about macOS' design gave me expectations that macOS did not meet.
- dexter89_kp3 5y ago
  Framework laptop is not possible without the supply chain investments made by large conglomerates.
  - EB66 5y ago
    True, but is that relevant? All companies, big and small, depend on all manner of services, materials, infrastructure, etc that are provided by other entities.
  - pdimitar 5y ago
    Even if that's true, what does it matter and what are you implying? No innovation because the big good corps paved the way before that? Imagine what would happen if Rome made those big and long roads all across Europe and then nobody used them out of respect of all the labor that went into them. :D
0KnowledgeGoof 5y ago
I agree that there are things that are possible only from a giant organization. However, IMO both Apple and Microsoft are at best indifferent to their customers. Not fixing bad UIs even when people complain, putting ads in products you paid for, requiring centralized accounts just to install free apps. You've heard it all before. I wouldn't enjoy an iPhone made by my local electrician, but I want software to respect me. Linux DEs have genuine flaws and yet I truly miss nothing and gain everything when I move from my work Macbook or my gaming Windows partition to my Linux desktop. I don't think the decision is between a vertically-integrated big-corp device and a vertically-integrated small-corp device. Even just the current iPhone hardware (which is absolutely incredible engineering) with free software would be a big improvement.
lowwave 5y ago
with new technology such self printing IC, 3D printing. Designs specs can be easily shared, why is it not possible? The whole idea of have one big factory making one thing is quite inefficient. Decentralisation always is more resilient.

by dash2 5y ago

Apple sells billions of iPhones, all with the same hardware and OS. As a result it can afford to spend a lot of money on design. You would not enjoy an iPhone made by your local electrician.

Causality1 5y ago

Not local, but small and competitive was nice. Electronics were so much more fun twenty years ago. Nowadays a company is a bold risk-taker if their glass sandwich has an extra button on top.

dgemm 5y ago
Consumer stuff sure, but we didn't have today's proliferation of hobbyist platforms back then either. The fun things are still out there, they are just different.

EB66 5y ago

Have you tried the Framework Laptop? It's a great example of how small start-ups can build better devices than the giants. Difficult, yes -- impossible, no.

dash2 5y ago
It's a niche product for hardware hackers. (That's why its sales are so low.)
- EB66 5y ago
  Whether it's a niche product or not is beside the point. The point is that a small entity can build a device that is arguably better designed, better reviewed, affordable and readily available for purchase.
  - dash2 5y ago
    Me, an economist: if it's better, why does nobody buy it?
    - EB66 5y ago
      People are buying it... so much so that Framework has been struggling to keep up with the demand. All of their early batches sold out well in advance. I placed my order two months ago and it was backordered for a month. Batch 6 (the current batch) is the first batch they've had all year where they haven't been massively backordered.
      - dash2 5y ago
        I'm glad, but Apple ships millions of Macs every quarter. When Framework catch up, then I'll agree they're better and not niche. Of course as a hacker I might prefer Framework, believe it is better, even evangelize it. That's a different use of the word, though.
        jlokier 5y ago
        The original question was whether a small company can make a better device than a very large company. Here you've defined "better" to include "can ship very large quantities", which is almost a circular way of defining the answer to be negative, no matter what the company does. If it can ship very large quantities, it's not a small company.
        dash2 5y ago
        Indeed, my original point was that there are huge economies of scale in design. That's why it would be a bad idea for everything to be small-scale and local, which the GP was arguing for.
- pdimitar 5y ago
  It doesn't really matter that it's a niche product. The mere fact that it's out there does show to less tech savvy people what's possible. That's very important because many of them are not even aware things can be done differently.
School-Cotton 5y ago
The Framework is only better than a MacBook Pro if you care about repairability, customizability, freedom, etc., which most people don’t. It’s also worse in many ways — less polished OS UI, worse screen resolution.
- EB66 5y ago
  > The Framework is only better than a MacBook Pro if you care about repairability, customizability, freedom, etc. Those are three pretty huge things... For me personally, repairability is secondary to their very convenient modular IO port system. > Less polished OS UI. You can have them install Windows without the typical manufacturer bloatware or you can put *nix on it. For me, that's better than macOS. > worse screen resolution The resolution on the MacBook Pro 13 and the Framework are nearly the same: 2560 x 1600 vs 2256 x 1504.
- pxc 5y ago
  Imo people overstate how good the macOS UX is. It's fine if you're used to it, but when I started using it for the first time there were lots of little unpleasant surprises and inconsistencies. The way people talk about macOS' design gave me expectations that macOS did not meet.
dexter89_kp3 5y ago
Framework laptop is not possible without the supply chain investments made by large conglomerates.
- EB66 5y ago
  True, but is that relevant? All companies, big and small, depend on all manner of services, materials, infrastructure, etc that are provided by other entities.
- pdimitar 5y ago
  Even if that's true, what does it matter and what are you implying? No innovation because the big good corps paved the way before that? Imagine what would happen if Rome made those big and long roads all across Europe and then nobody used them out of respect of all the labor that went into them. :D

0KnowledgeGoof 5y ago

I agree that there are things that are possible only from a giant organization. However, IMO both Apple and Microsoft are at best indifferent to their customers. Not fixing bad UIs even when people complain, putting ads in products you paid for, requiring centralized accounts just to install free apps. You've heard it all before. I wouldn't enjoy an iPhone made by my local electrician, but I want software to respect me. Linux DEs have genuine flaws and yet I truly miss nothing and gain everything when I move from my work Macbook or my gaming Windows partition to my Linux desktop. I don't think the decision is between a vertically-integrated big-corp device and a vertically-integrated small-corp device. Even just the current iPhone hardware (which is absolutely incredible engineering) with free software would be a big improvement.

lowwave 5y ago

with new technology such self printing IC, 3D printing. Designs specs can be easily shared, why is it not possible? The whole idea of have one big factory making one thing is quite inefficient. Decentralisation always is more resilient.