3 ms·

>So, there is no other phone that can beat its design and construction, but "is it enough"? Is being the best enough? The Nokia N9, Lumia 800, 900 and 920 are

>So, there is no other phone that can beat its design and construction, but "is it enough"? Is being the best enough? The Nokia N9, Lumia 800, 900 and 920 are pretty well built and designed too. If you haven't, try going to a store and playing with one. Coming to the design itself, it's tied in with fashion and at this point the design has not changed(except for the new back) since the iPhone 4 over 2 years ago. Design and fashion do age. The iPhone 4's design was a leap over the 3GS and combined with other features warranted a new version number, while this iteration feels that it should've been named iPhone 4X, X for extra long. Why get a new iPhone 5 when you already have an iPhone 4 or 4S and can add a Galaxy or Lumia and keep the old phone around as a iPod Touch music player? Also, even if the design is superlative and timeless, for many consumers it is just one factor. The other factors are raw power, technical specs, camera quality and features(which the Lumia 920 is going to have a head start on). If the iPhone 5 cannot compete on specs with this years phones, what chance does it have with the Android phones of the next year? However, there's another bigger factor that I previously commented on: I think their problem right now is that users' choice is overwhelming them and the one-size-fits-all approach of the iPhone has diminishing returns after a point. The variety, choice of screen sizes and price ranges of the competition is only getting better by the day. A new iPhone is released only once a year, so it better be very good with a lot of new technologies, features, new designs etc. for sales to last all through the next year. iPhone 4S sales started lagging in the 3Q itself this year, compared to the 4th quarter for the iPhone 4. This is because people start waiting for the next version or switch to the competition because they have better specced devices with more features. I think Samsung timed their Galaxy S3 launch perfectly to coincide with the iPhone 4S getting old enough to beat, and they beat it in monthly sales for the first time, which is a noteworthy thing in itself. The whole situation is reminding me of the PC wars in the 80s, where Apple had a seemingly unassailable innovation lead, and then squandered it away by offering limited choice and higher prices, while Microsoft very smartly licensed DOS to Compaq and others like Dell and HP, and the rest is history. Apple's marketshare is now 17% vs. Android's 67% which is about 4 times more. No wonder Apple is going crazy with the patent war against Android. That's probably their only weapon against the equivalent of the attack of the hordes of beige boxes' that previously took them down. The iPhone 5 is good enough to get great sales and beat all sales records ever, but the key is how well it does starting about 6 months from now.

ceejayoz 14y ago
> That's probably their only weapon against the equivalent of the attack of the hordes of beige boxes' that previously took them down. This totally ignores the fact that Apple later took on those beige boxes, with the same general strategy they're using in the phone market, and carved out a perfectly nice, massively profitable niche in it that I imagine they're quite happy with.
- cooldeal 14y ago
  Agreed, but not before they went through very painful times in the 90s and came close to getting shutdown. OEMs fell into a rut so Apple had a chance to ramp up the design, and OS X was amazingly better compared to OS 9, not to mention that Vista was terrible as Microsoft tried to remedy some of the issues with XP like everyone running as admin. Probably companies go into a pattern alternating cycles of leapfrogging innovations and then to milking cash cows and then back again to innovation as the cash cows go dry. But it does feel like Apple is transitioning into milking cash cows w.r.t. to the iPhone (while perhaps concentrating on things like iTV).
- fauigerzigerk 14y ago
  That niche became dangerously small in the 90s. So small that many doubted Apple's survival.
Retric 14y ago
Granted, they still need to compete with other phones, but if you ever watched people shop for phones basically nobody cares about specks. So, is it enough is all about upgrades. And phone sales in the US are strongly linked to upgrade cycles which tend to be 18-24 month range. The percentage of people that upgrade mid cycle without breaking their old phone is tiny. So, is it worth the 800$ upgrade no, is it worth the 200$ upgrade on a 2 year old phone with some scratches and diminished battery life? probably, and that's what apple is going for.
- cooldeal 14y ago
  >but if you ever watched people shop for phones basically nobody cares about specks. You're right to some extent, but I wouldn't say "basically nobody", or the S3, Nexus etc. would be dead by now instead of selling tens of millions. Taking an extremely wild guess based on personal interactions, I would say 40% don't care, 20% care, and the other 40% ask the pople who care about their opinion. >So, is it worth the 800$ upgrade no, is it worth the 200$ upgrade on a 2 year old phone with some scratches and diminished battery life? probably, and that's what apple is going for. The only issue is that the iPhone 5 design is pretty similar to the iPhone 4, except longer. So looks wise, it's like getting a new iPhone 4 or 4S that you see in almost everyone's hands, except taller. That might steer some of those people onto other devices. How many? I don't know, it's not going to be 90% but I think it won't be just 5% either.

ceejayoz 14y ago

> That's probably their only weapon against the equivalent of the attack of the hordes of beige boxes' that previously took them down. This totally ignores the fact that Apple later took on those beige boxes, with the same general strategy they're using in the phone market, and carved out a perfectly nice, massively profitable niche in it that I imagine they're quite happy with.

cooldeal 14y ago
Agreed, but not before they went through very painful times in the 90s and came close to getting shutdown. OEMs fell into a rut so Apple had a chance to ramp up the design, and OS X was amazingly better compared to OS 9, not to mention that Vista was terrible as Microsoft tried to remedy some of the issues with XP like everyone running as admin. Probably companies go into a pattern alternating cycles of leapfrogging innovations and then to milking cash cows and then back again to innovation as the cash cows go dry. But it does feel like Apple is transitioning into milking cash cows w.r.t. to the iPhone (while perhaps concentrating on things like iTV).
fauigerzigerk 14y ago
That niche became dangerously small in the 90s. So small that many doubted Apple's survival.

Retric 14y ago

Granted, they still need to compete with other phones, but if you ever watched people shop for phones basically nobody cares about specks. So, is it enough is all about upgrades. And phone sales in the US are strongly linked to upgrade cycles which tend to be 18-24 month range. The percentage of people that upgrade mid cycle without breaking their old phone is tiny. So, is it worth the 800$ upgrade no, is it worth the 200$ upgrade on a 2 year old phone with some scratches and diminished battery life? probably, and that's what apple is going for.

cooldeal 14y ago
>but if you ever watched people shop for phones basically nobody cares about specks. You're right to some extent, but I wouldn't say "basically nobody", or the S3, Nexus etc. would be dead by now instead of selling tens of millions. Taking an extremely wild guess based on personal interactions, I would say 40% don't care, 20% care, and the other 40% ask the pople who care about their opinion. >So, is it worth the 800$ upgrade no, is it worth the 200$ upgrade on a 2 year old phone with some scratches and diminished battery life? probably, and that's what apple is going for. The only issue is that the iPhone 5 design is pretty similar to the iPhone 4, except longer. So looks wise, it's like getting a new iPhone 4 or 4S that you see in almost everyone's hands, except taller. That might steer some of those people onto other devices. How many? I don't know, it's not going to be 90% but I think it won't be just 5% either.