I can't speak to the other companies, though I know google want's "all the worlds info at your fingertips" which is a reasonably high ideal... I can speak to what Apple is doing as someone whose followed the company closely for a couple decades.
Apple doesn't care whether you buy the 3.5", 4.0", 7.85", or 9.8" screen.
Apple is bringing the personal computer to the 6 billion other people who weren't able to get in on the PC revolution.
Their slogan in the 1980s used to be "The Computer for the Rest Of Us." While it isn't used for marketing, the mission hasn't really changed.
There were two key issues that prevented those people from participating in the PC revolution.
The first was that you had to be trained how to use a computer. You had to be at least literate, and you had to spend the time to overcome the significant usability hurdle that even Mac OS X presents to the random person. (Eg: your grandmother.)
iOS has revolutionized computer usability such that your grandmother can use it, even if she never made it to high school (bless her heart.)
The second is price/distribution. PCs were for the relatively rich. And while Apple never seemed to compete on the lowest end, that's simply because most people who think Apple makes expensive products think about $300 laptop as "affordable". Instead, Apple put a $50 computer in peoples hands- the iPod shuffle. Sure, it might not be as full featured as a laptop, but you have to walk before you can run.
Lets also not forget that there's a big difference between a PC that draws serious amps and thus needs a house wired for electricity... and a mobile that runs on batteries and can be charged with solar power.
Apple is toiling away building the greatest development/ design/ manufacturing/ distribution machine in history. Of course they have some key partners in this- foxconn and their suppliers.
That iPod shuffle has been replaced with the inexpensive iPod touch, which really is a PC. And of course there is the iPad mini, also a new entry on the low end pc market.
Just because they didn't choose to make zero margin crap that nobody can use (Eg: windows running netbooks), doesn't mean they aren't working their tails off to address this under filled market. They are coming in from the high end, which makes sense given that they can't make the devices fast enough. Hence scaling the company across all those axis I mentioned.
I'm sure this sounds like a radical idea, because "everyone knows" that Apple is only interested in selling "shiny things to rich people". Just keep thinking that!
Whether android ultimately beats them to it, or not, their mission is pretty damn noble, as far as I'm concerned.
The post-PC era they created is going to empower a massive number of people.
Your description of how apple is on a noble quest to bring the personal computer to the poor of the world through the '$50 computer' that is an ipod shuffle is so far from reality in so many different ways that you are verging on a parody of yourself.
I can't believe you seriously typed all that out and then submitted it.
It's a shame that you chose to ignore the point I was making, and instead post this snide, narrow minded response. Alas, this is typical of the anti-intellectualism that pervades hacker news these days.
Of course the reason you did this is that you know what I say is true. You just are an apple hater and can't even admit that this is what they're doing.
Also typical of hacker news: Burying comments that point out that others have got nothing but personal attacks, while upvoting personal attacks. Everyone who engages in this is, by definition, anti-intellectual.
So, go ahead and downvote me, it just proves to me that you are not worth wasting time on, and that this site is full of narrow minded anti-intllectual bigots.
Make a counter argument, and I can respect that. But you don't. Probably because you can't, right?
You are (thankfully!) not the sole decider of what is intellectual or not.
I attacked the frankly deluded points you made, addressing them directly, so i'm not sure what point you thought you were making. I made no counter argument because i thought it was too obvious to bother wasting my (and others') time when this submission wasn't even about apple anyway!, but since you insist;
Apple are a business (and a very good one, that makes great products and lots of money) not a charity or an NGO. They do not make literally unheard of profits and margins because they are 'struggling to find a way to address the low end' or 'bring computing to the other 6 billion'. Sorry, that is pure 'reality distortion field' delusion on your part. They have a valuable brand that does indeed intentionally place itself in the high end. Moreover, the ipod shuffle isn't even close to being the first DAP of it's kind, most of which (specifically this product) have a similar UX and are much cheaper. We haven't even got to the fact that this '$50 computer', that not only can't run any custom code, but actually requires another (real) computer to be able to do anything at all! Do i really have to go on any further?!? The first device that could be called a computer with any sanity at all would be the iPod touch.. which coincidentally is (from) the same 'not affordable' $300 you quoted for the actual PC. You might bring up that they sell the previous generation from $199, but care to mention acer's $199 chromebook? Or the ipad mini.. that pioneer.. ignoring the earlier, cheaper and equally capable nexus 7, or (much more relevantly for the 'next 6bn') the Chinese android tablets (and phones) that sell for much less still and achieve the same.
You are (thankfully!) not the sole decider of what is intellectual or not.
I attacked the frankly deluded points you made, addressing them directly, so i'm not sure what point you thought you were making. I made no counter argument because i thought it was too obvious to bother wasting my (and others') time when this submission wasn't even about apple anyway!, but since you insist;
Apple are a business (and a very good one, that makes great products and lots of money) not a charity or an NGO. They do not make literally unheard of profits and margins because they are 'struggling to find a way to address the low end' or 'bring computing to the other 6 billion'. Sorry, that is pure 'reality distortion field' delusion on your part. They have a valuable brand that does indeed intentionally place itself in the high end. Moreover, the ipod shuffle isn't even close to being the first DAP of it's kind, most of which (specifically this product) have a similar UX and are much cheaper. We haven't even got to the fact that this '$50 computer', that not only can't run any custom code, but actually requires another (real) computer to be able to do anything at all! Do i really have to go on any further?!? The first device that could be called a computer with any sanity at all would be the iPod touch.. which coincidentally is (from) the same 'not affordable' $300 you quoted for the actual PC. You might bring up that they sell the previous generation from $199, but care to mention acer's $199 chromebook? Or the ipad mini.. that pioneer.. ignoring the earlier, cheaper and equally capable nexus 7, or (much more relevantly for the 'next 6bn') the Chinese android tablets (and phones) that sell for much less still and achieve the same.
EDIT: I see further down you say you meant apple gained 'experience in low cost manufacturing' from the shuffle.. this isn't really true either as; there were many mass-market ipods before the shuffle (or even the macs themselves), they are not designed for lowest cost (eg. they are made of aluminium, not plastic), apple don't actually do any of the manufacturing anyway, and low cost manufacture does not infer a low cost product (nor does an expensive product exclude low cost manufacturing) and it is not really close in manufacturing terms to a full computing device. Apple have had the capacity to bring a masssss-market low cost computing device (in terms of 'low cost manufacturing experience', in whatever form factor) since at least the 2/3 gen iPod. You could argue the iPhone was relevant because it was their first post-PC device, but in no way the shuffle IMO.
Instead, Apple put a $50 computer in peoples hands- the iPod shuffle. Sure, it might not be as full featured as a laptop, but you have to walk before you can run.
This is the type of out-of-touch-with-reality comment that tech nerds make that make people laugh at us.
The Shuffle is absolutely nothing new. We had a device that did everything the Shuffle does in the 80s, and it was widespread, and at around the same pricepoint. The only things it lacked was capacity (though you could change tapes) and on-the-fly shuffling of songs. Plenty of them had radios, so there's a function the Shuffle doesn't have. The Shuffle is not a 'computer', it's a 'portable media device'. An LCD does not a computer make. And unlike the Walkman, it also need a computer in order to get it set up.
To try and paint the Shuffle as 'brave new world' territory is flat-out peculiar. We had an appliance doing the same thing 25 years beforehand.
You're not even trying to understand my point, are you? I never the shuffle was anything like brave new world. I pointed out that it was an exercise in low cost mass manufacturing.
Do you hate apple so much that you're going to claim that the walkman proves that they aren't innovative with the shuffle, when that isn't even the point of discussion?
Apple put a $50 computer in peoples hands- the iPod shuffle. Sure, it might not be as full featured as a laptop, but you have to walk before you can run.
Yes, it's me 'hating Apple' because I think you're missing your calling as a spin doctor. A patronising one at that ("your grandmother, bless her heart")
> Instead, Apple put a $50 computer in peoples hands- the iPod shuffle. Sure, it might not be as full featured as a laptop, but you have to walk before you can run.
Lets draw a line between a device like the Shuffle and a general purpose computer. Apple is creating devices for consuming media not for creating which I think is the more important goal. For actually creating and learning there are much better devices than what Apple is putting out, and much cheaper. See the Pi or any number of similar devices.
Also dismissing (windows) netbooks as unusable is short sighted, also they've improved greatly since they were first introduced. For all the problems with these devices they're still fully functional computers which don't rely on Apple to decide what you should be able to run.
As much as I agree that it can be a pain to edit a document or watch a video or, god forbid, write a computer program on a netbook, I can't help but feel that it would be more difficult on an iPod Shuffle.
More dishonest than pretending that an iPod shuffle, which has no screen (and at one time no buttons!) and is functionally tethered to a real PC, is some kind of entry-level computer/grand charitable effort by Apple to make a computer "for the rest of us"? Or that an iPod Touch, which is not significantly cheaper than many laptops, can substitute as a real computer for anybody with more than the most casual, consumption-driven computer needs? Calling it a "great device" for the things you listed is very, very generous. Acting as though a $300 laptop is not also a "great device" for those things is just ridiculous.
Apple doesn't care whether you buy the 3.5", 4.0", 7.85", or 9.8" screen.
Apple is bringing the personal computer to the 6 billion other people who weren't able to get in on the PC revolution.
Their slogan in the 1980s used to be "The Computer for the Rest Of Us." While it isn't used for marketing, the mission hasn't really changed.
There were two key issues that prevented those people from participating in the PC revolution.
The first was that you had to be trained how to use a computer. You had to be at least literate, and you had to spend the time to overcome the significant usability hurdle that even Mac OS X presents to the random person. (Eg: your grandmother.)
iOS has revolutionized computer usability such that your grandmother can use it, even if she never made it to high school (bless her heart.)
The second is price/distribution. PCs were for the relatively rich. And while Apple never seemed to compete on the lowest end, that's simply because most people who think Apple makes expensive products think about $300 laptop as "affordable". Instead, Apple put a $50 computer in peoples hands- the iPod shuffle. Sure, it might not be as full featured as a laptop, but you have to walk before you can run.
Lets also not forget that there's a big difference between a PC that draws serious amps and thus needs a house wired for electricity... and a mobile that runs on batteries and can be charged with solar power.
Apple is toiling away building the greatest development/ design/ manufacturing/ distribution machine in history. Of course they have some key partners in this- foxconn and their suppliers.
That iPod shuffle has been replaced with the inexpensive iPod touch, which really is a PC. And of course there is the iPad mini, also a new entry on the low end pc market.
Just because they didn't choose to make zero margin crap that nobody can use (Eg: windows running netbooks), doesn't mean they aren't working their tails off to address this under filled market. They are coming in from the high end, which makes sense given that they can't make the devices fast enough. Hence scaling the company across all those axis I mentioned.
I'm sure this sounds like a radical idea, because "everyone knows" that Apple is only interested in selling "shiny things to rich people". Just keep thinking that!
Whether android ultimately beats them to it, or not, their mission is pretty damn noble, as far as I'm concerned.
The post-PC era they created is going to empower a massive number of people.