Originally Posted by paulbrock:
“I'm not sure that there is in this case. Several free/software products made that list.”
Yeah but that list had absolutely nothing to do with my post that stuart was replying to.
Apple Maps may be a terrible piece of software but that's not the same as being a niche product, which is the point he was trying to rebut.
And a number of the products on that list certainly don't fall into the niche product category, no matter how badly they sold.
Originally Posted by paulbrock:
“It certainly didn't bring them close to ruin, but it absolutely affected them and cost them sales.”
Do you know a single person who was going to buy the iPhone5 and didn't just because of Apple Maps?
Originally Posted by paulbrock:
“More and more, people don't think, "hey I want the best phone, I'll get an iphone" (as quite a few people did around the time of iphone 4), spurned on by marketing messages such as "it just works". Most savvy customers know that the playing field is a lot more level now, they're weighing up their options more, asking on forums "which phone should I buy?" and being more discerning.”
I'm not sure that there was ever a time when the iPhone sold because it was objectively better than the competition.
Spec-wise, about the only time that you could've argued that Apple pushed the market forward was the with increase in screen resolution that the iPhone4 brought about but even that was part of an on-going trend in increasing resolutions that has subsequently left Apple behind.
The Apple Maps issue will have little-to-no long-term impact on them IMO.
Originally Posted by Stuart_h:
“That was one example of an article. Not everything Apple has done has turned to gold. Apple TV is a fairly recent example of something that hasnt set the world on fire surely ???”
Of course not everything they've launched has been wildly successful but it's meaningless to look at failures dating back 20, 30 years - the world has changed drastically since then and so have Apple.
Looking at Apple in it's current iteration (which can basically be traced back to the iPod), they've had far more successes than failures.
Originally Posted by Stuart_h:
“You seem to have taken it a little personally. It certainly wasnt meant to offend. Its just a fact that Apple have had some things that have fallen by the wayside just like any other firm.”
Actually, not at all.
I only used myself as an example about potential customers because I can't speak for anyone else.
Originally Posted by Stuart_h:
“well we are going to argue over 'niche' then. Its pretty rare to see an Apple TV unit - 4 million worldwide is tiny compared to Freeview boxes or Tivos etc so I would still say its niche.”
Those figures are rather out-of-date - they sold 2 million in the last quarter alone.
Yes the figures are lower than Freeview boxes or anything similar that is required to use a particular service but the market for such devices is growing with the likes of Boxee and Roku and so on and Apple seem to be very much holding their own in it. In fact, if anything, they will have pushed the market forward because there will be a number of people who have purchased an Apple TV who would never have purchased a similar device from a different manufacturer.
Originally Posted by Stuart_h:
“And compared with iPhones and iPads and iPods its very small fry.”
So's their laptop arm yet their market-share rivals that of a number of other top-tier laptop manufacturers.
Originally Posted by Stuart_h:
“If Apple sell only 4 million iWatches worldwide in a year my guess is that the press and the shareholders would see it, rightly or wrongly, as a failure.”
They probably would but I'd be shocked if they sold that few.
Whilst this is in a number of ways a new product category for Apple, at the same time it's not at all - it's an iPhone/iPad accessory, there's already a large and proven market for them.