Beeblebrox's Profile

I think you want a physical keyboard, then you'll have to get a Blackberry. I'm going to go out on a limb and say that the iPhone will never come with a physical keyboard. This isn't the same kind of stubbornness that kept them from adding a second mouse button decades after the world had decided it preferred two button mice. The touch screen keyboard works for what the Apple is and what it aspires to be.

And who can forget: "The largest screen you'll ever need is 15 inches." --Steve Jobs "Video on the iPod is the wrong way to go." --Steve Jobs

"They’ll lose money because the clone makers would completely destroy Apple’s high-profit hardware business." I'll ask this more directly since you've made the claim. IF Apple's hardware is truly no more expensive than equivalent PC hardware, and IF users truly want simplicity and ease-of-use over so-called "feature creep" and IF Apple's hardware is truly superior in quality and design, then why do you have so little confidence that Apple could compete head-to-head against Dell and HP in the hardware market?

I am sure that Apple has done extensive market research and discovered that their customers don’t want a consumer computer that they can change the video card. I would bet that 98% of people use their Macs to surf the web, send/receive e-mail, and use the iLife suite for their digital lifestyle. Some of them may load up Office. My three year old G5 iMac., with one gig of RAM, does everything I need and will probably work for the next several years with the standard video card. Then by this tortured "here's why they won't do it" logic, they'd have never made anything beyond the old G5 iMac, which you argue is more than adequate for 98% of their users. So why did they continue to make more powerful computers if, as you argue, Apple never does anything that their extensive market research shows them customers don't want?

Chris, you're normally pretty good this is a travesty of an argument. And I don't just mean because it's an apologist screed, but the points you make are weak. I could come up with an almost identical list of reasons why the Macbook Air shouldn't exist, and yet there it is, with virtually no compelling features beyond it's thinness and priced at an awkward $100 less than the incredibly more powerful Macbook Pro. It's hardly the "elite" who are demanding an expandable Mac that doesn't cost $2000+. It's almost everyone other than the few "if-Apple-doesn't-make-it-then-that's-good-enough-for-me" fanboys. Look at the frenzy surrounding the (possibly fake) Open PC. There are lots of potential customers out there who want to get a Mac but don't like having to pay a substantial premium just to upgrade their own HDD or graphics card. So why don't they do it? The answer is, no one knows but Steve Jobs. The price points you list conflate laptops with desktops. Someone looking for an affordable, expandable desktop isn't likely to get a Macbook. They're next bet beyond the Mac mini is the iMac, a very nice computer for the money but even less expandable than the Mac mini. And you're a few leaps and bounds from there to the Mac Pro, which STARTS at $2300. Count me among those who think that Apple can do better than that. Heck, just license the OS. And if there's no market for this thing, as you suggest there isn't, then what do they have to worry about?

It does seem that the main complaint here is the iTunes rental service, not the ATV itself. If you never have any interest in renting HD movies, then the ATV is probably a fine enough media center. I currently use the Xbox 360 to stream content from my Mac, and it works great. The ATV probably has a better interface and it syncs (the Xbox only streams) with the trade-off being a lack of gaming. I have yet to rent an HD movie on the Xbox but the HD trailers look spectacular - way better than HD cable. The prices and selection are comparable to the ATV - ie crappy and too expensive. I keep toying with the idea of getting an ATV, with no desire whatever for the HD rentals, just the ability to easily get content from my Mac to my HDTV. If I didn't already have the Xbox, I think the ATV would fit the bill pretty nicely.

Take the lesson from Apple fellas, copying gets you no where. True. But copying, then claiming to have invented it and then accusing everyone else of copying stuff you copied from someone else, has worked miracles for Apple's bottom line. ;) But I totally agree with you otherwise. The iPhone is the interface, nothing more or less. The interface is the best in the business by a million miles. And I think the reason why they don't copy the interface is because that kind of slickness is probably really hard to do. These guys change cases like they change shirts. But no one has done what Apple has done in just using the stupid thing. It's like in my business when people look at a hit movie and copy all the wrong things. "Look, Star Wars had robots. Therefore, we need to put robots in everything!" If making a hit movie were that easy, they'd all be hits. If making a slick and easy-to-use interface were easy, they'd have done it already. I like my new cell phone, but the interface gives me a headache. Ultimately, the features and the cost win out over the iPhone, but I'd love for my phone to be that slick and easy to use.