http://apple.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=7080961&cid=49229515

Reactions to the New MacBook and Apple Watch

Re:Apple - the ultimate iHipster (Score:3)

by Kjella (173770) on Tuesday March 10, 2015 @07:26PM (#49229515) Homepage

Back in the day Apple was about bringing computers to the masses, and simplifying them to make them accessible. Selling a $10K watch just proves Apple only cares about profits now. Apple has become the ultimate iHipster.

What age was that? As far back as I can remember Macs were aiming for graphics artists, designers, sound artists, movie workstations, every kind of hip, creative industry. The "boring" segment bought PCs. There were nerdier and in many cases better audio players before the iPod, but the white earphones quickly became the telltale sign of a hipster. They've never ever released a cheap product trying to undercut others on price. They did have a runaway success with the iPhone but I think you're giving Jobs more credit than he deserves if you think breaking out of the "hipster" segment and becoming mainstream was part of the plan.

They launched a $599 phone in 2007 and after seeing it sell well beyond expectations they lowered it to $399 just a few months later realizing they could make up for it on volume and it boomed. I don't think that was planned at all, they just saw the opportunity and ran with it. Hell, they even got people so pissed by lowering the price so much they gave store credit so they could buy accessories that cost Apple almost nothing to produce, but I digress. And with the app store, they were sitting on a gold mine of more users -> more apps, more apps -> more users as well as the FairPlay near-monopoly. But they're still hipsters at heart, you can just look at their iMacs and the "trash can" Mac Pro.

If anything, I think this is an attempt to make a more exclusive Apple product again, because an iPhone just isn't very hip if your mom has one too. If they can't create a new "must-have" item that's cool I think they'll stagnate. Like I broke my iPhone and decided to give a cheap Android phone a spin, mainly because I'm missing an iPhone 6 Mini. It's not impressive in any way but it does most of what my old iPhone did at a much lower cost. They need to keep pushing new and better, because I don't think they can stay and compete on price. They need to justify a $500+ sticker price.

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