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Jonathan Ive got rich and started designing luxury products for himself. Stuff like gold Apple Watches that were soon obsolete or ridiculous luxury bands for th

by w0mbat 4y ago

Jonathan Ive got rich and started designing luxury products for himself. Stuff like gold Apple Watches that were soon obsolete or ridiculous luxury bands for them. Even a regular leather Apple Watch strap ended costing hundreds of dollars. At one point I needed a new leather band for mine and I bought a perfectly nice third party band for the same price as the sales tax on the equivalent Apple one.

gnicholas 4y ago
I think part of the reason they sold insanely expensive Apple Watches is that they wanted to compete with luxury watches. Of course, the functionality is very different; the similarity is that both are methods of conspicuous consumption. I’m not an Apple Watch fan myself (still clutching my Pebble for dear life), but I can understand why the uber-expensive Apple Watches would appeal to a certain audience.
- sangnoir 4y ago
  > I can understand why the uber-expensive Apple Watches would appeal to a certain audience. I never could understand why Apple (or anyone else) this would be a possibility. Luxury watches are almost synonymous with heirloom; there is no way anyone will be wearing a functional Gold Apple watch in 2085 with the anecdote "This was my dad's watch" - it would be hopelessly outdated, and likely non-functional by then. This is not the case with other luxury watches. This has little to do with branding, but everything to do with expected longevity and utility.
  - foobiekr 4y ago
    That heirloom stuff is purely marketing the fantasy of rich parents handing down a bauble (instead of, say, a business or real assets) aimed entirely at middle class and upper middle class people. It’s not real.
    - sangnoir 4y ago
      I may not be understanding your point: are you suggesting that 60-year-old still-functional swiss-made "baubles" don't get inherited? Old money is almost entirely defined by items inherited from forebears.
      - foobiekr 4y ago
        Old money is not about baubles it’s about the means to earn a living, connections and the knowledge of how to retain wealth. Passing down a watch or car is an incidental thing and the watches real old money passes down are not the ones like Patek Phillipe who find it necessary to run ads suggesting otherwise to the middle class readers of The Economist.
  - gnicholas 4y ago
    I agree that they won’t be heirlooms, and old money folks would never be fooled into thinking they would. But a lot of people wear luxury watches simply to show off how much disposable income they have. To these people, having a watch that is recognizably expensive is the only requirement.
  - mhh__ 4y ago
    I can. It's for an interval including instagram-flexing up to heirloom, not actually competing properly with a really nice watch. You wouldn't see a the drivers at a Grand Prix wearing an Apple Watch but the influencers (grumble) are. This is somewhat true throughout all of apple's products. Release a new Mac or iPhone, you'll notice a lot of people (especially musicians) buying them for no utilitarian reason other than because it's new and because it'll be theirs - and it's expensive. Apple's marketing and reputation is so brilliant it's ingrained almost like a religion (Certainly socially what religion was to a ye olde' peasant)

by w0mbat 4y ago

gnicholas 4y ago

I think part of the reason they sold insanely expensive Apple Watches is that they wanted to compete with luxury watches. Of course, the functionality is very different; the similarity is that both are methods of conspicuous consumption. I’m not an Apple Watch fan myself (still clutching my Pebble for dear life), but I can understand why the uber-expensive Apple Watches would appeal to a certain audience.

sangnoir 4y ago
> I can understand why the uber-expensive Apple Watches would appeal to a certain audience. I never could understand why Apple (or anyone else) this would be a possibility. Luxury watches are almost synonymous with heirloom; there is no way anyone will be wearing a functional Gold Apple watch in 2085 with the anecdote "This was my dad's watch" - it would be hopelessly outdated, and likely non-functional by then. This is not the case with other luxury watches. This has little to do with branding, but everything to do with expected longevity and utility.
- foobiekr 4y ago
  That heirloom stuff is purely marketing the fantasy of rich parents handing down a bauble (instead of, say, a business or real assets) aimed entirely at middle class and upper middle class people. It’s not real.
  - sangnoir 4y ago
    I may not be understanding your point: are you suggesting that 60-year-old still-functional swiss-made "baubles" don't get inherited? Old money is almost entirely defined by items inherited from forebears.
    - foobiekr 4y ago
      Old money is not about baubles it’s about the means to earn a living, connections and the knowledge of how to retain wealth. Passing down a watch or car is an incidental thing and the watches real old money passes down are not the ones like Patek Phillipe who find it necessary to run ads suggesting otherwise to the middle class readers of The Economist.
- gnicholas 4y ago
  I agree that they won’t be heirlooms, and old money folks would never be fooled into thinking they would. But a lot of people wear luxury watches simply to show off how much disposable income they have. To these people, having a watch that is recognizably expensive is the only requirement.
- mhh__ 4y ago
  I can. It's for an interval including instagram-flexing up to heirloom, not actually competing properly with a really nice watch. You wouldn't see a the drivers at a Grand Prix wearing an Apple Watch but the influencers (grumble) are. This is somewhat true throughout all of apple's products. Release a new Mac or iPhone, you'll notice a lot of people (especially musicians) buying them for no utilitarian reason other than because it's new and because it'll be theirs - and it's expensive. Apple's marketing and reputation is so brilliant it's ingrained almost like a religion (Certainly socially what religion was to a ye olde' peasant)