“Karma. Doing the ‘right thing.’ Thinking different. Apple’s enlightened approach to building customer loyalty is now famous, generating big headlines every time CEO Steve Jobs takes on Hollywood or the music industry. Attempts to raise iTunes prices? ‘Greedy.’ A fight with NBC over revenues? ‘Give peace a chance.’ That’s Apple, your socially-conscious corporate friend, who does right by you while standing up to big bullies — sort of like a character from a Pixar movie,” Jeremy Horwitz writes for iLounge.
“But over the past two weeks, Apple’s fans have been grumbling that the company they knew and loved is transforming into another Microsoft, making short-sighted, anti-consumer decisions and carelessly releasing products with user experience-diminishing problems. In response, an increasingly angry erosion of Apple’s brand loyalty is beginning, with complaints mounting all over the Internet, including on the company’s own discussion forums,” Horwitz writes.
Horwitz covers four of issues that are “still largely unresolved by Apple, and the extreme anger and disappointment that its customers have been expressing as a result.”
• Apple Breaks 2005-2007 Video Add-Ons: No Warning, Just Buy New Ones
• iTunes Store iPod Games: Buy Them Again for New iPods
• iPod touch Screen Problems: Deny Them, Charge Restocking Fees
• iPhone Ringtones: Pay Twice for Each Song; Forget Using Your Own
Full article here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Davecc” for the heads up.]
Apple’s decision makers would do well to post the following quote in prominent places where they will be reminded of it daily:
“Goodwill is the one and only asset that competition cannot undersell or destroy.” – Karl Ludwig Börne
I don’t know what has gotten into Steve Jobs since September 5th, but the greed he’s shown since that date has been almost Redmondian. Let’s hope he’ll soon see the error in his ways.
“Each handicap is like a hurdle in a steeplechase, and when you ride up to it, if you throw your heart over, the horse will go along, too.”
– Lawrence Bixby
And this is the best list someone can come up with? Come one? #1 is going to happen, for which a new breed of software comes out to replace the old. #2 is also going to happen. Always iritating when one spends money, but I don’t automatically assume that just because I buy a new computer or device, that everthing is going to work on it as before. #3 seems to already be handled, as Apple has already stated that they are working on the solution (oh and that’s what no more than two weeks after being launched?), and #4 about ringtones is useless trivia. The world is going to have to wake up and realize that ANYTIME one starts trying to sell or distribute music in any form factor, the music labels have to be involved. Does Apple really care if you were to make your own ringtones? Probably not, but the music labels do, and since they already make mooola on them, they aren’t going to let Apple allow their patrons the make ringtones – period. A waste of 4 points that don’t add up to anything.
Come on Apple, stay with us here – Let’s not drop the ball with the basics.
“I stay up at night a lot, and I have nightmares a lot. Very bizarre dreams.”
– Kato Kaelin
Zune Tang ? Where are you?
Poor Bloomin Steve Jobs, Poor Guys he needs to have break,
What a evil world . Poor blooming guy. He needs to sell his shares and all the items he can top this discusting people and enjoy his life in wi retirement with his family, and
You will never have his great stuff again.
Amen
• Apple Breaks 2005-2007 Video Add-Ons: No Warning, Just Buy New Ones
• iTunes Store iPod Games: Buy Them Again for New iPods
• iPod touch Screen Problems: Deny Them, Charge Restocking Fees
• iPhone Ringtones: Pay Twice for Each Song; Forget Using Your Own
Don’t forget mandating glossy screens, cheaping the LCD’s and reducing graphics performance on the new AL iMac’s. Also the complicated Mighty Mouse with sticky scroll balls. And the numerous security issues with Mac OS X, some which STILL haven’t been fixed yet. Also the iMovie debacle and lackluster iWeb/.Mac combination.
I must admit, after over 20 years of Apple loyalty, that I’m having my doubts. It’s like they are burning out or getting overloaded or something.
I just hope Apple realizes these are real issues it’s customer base has and focuses on the needs of it’s users.
Still a big Apple fan.
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These issues may be irritating for those caught in the crossfire, but they are hardly redmondian in nature…
Microsoft’s business policies have had profound negative impact, illegally crippling competition, and creating “standards” that no-one should be forced to endure.
It seems the author is simply looking for ways to criticize Apple. There has got to be a better way to make a living…
Apple
is not a MS
they have not dropped the bal
They are helping dickhead customers to much.
We are conditioned from MS.
Life can;t be good we say: shame,.
A couple of things missing from that list (in my opinion):
1. Locking out developers from creating apps for the iPod and the iPhone. Sorry, Web apps are not real apps. What if I don’t have an internet connection when I need to use one of them… which brings me to the next issue.
2. Going with AT&T;for the sole service provider. Their coverage and network reliability is absolutely horrendous compared to what I was getting with Verizon. And Edge? Seriously, I rarely use it because it is so unreliable.
I’m not ready to give up on Apple yet, but the road they seem to be going down is making wonder if they are losing some of the customer friendliness that made me like their products to begin with.
That is one HUGE mole hill.
It’s not the just consumer relations that made Microsoft so bad – it’s how they treat partners. Constantly stabbing them in the back.
Stealing and constantly selling bad cheap products. Apple is a long way from that company. Microsoft is our own little China.
One more thing…
An easy fix for the sticky ball on the mighty mouse:
just turn the mouse upside down and roll it on a clean sheet of white paper…
no muss, no fuss
I don’t know about the Video Add-Ons, the iPod Touch issues, but I will comment about the other two.
First, buying the games over again is no big deal. Every time you buy a new cell phone you must repurchase any games or tools you have bought from the carrier.
Secondly, the ringtones deal is fair as far as the price goes. $.99 is cheap compared to what else is out there, but we should be able to use songs we already own. Either that or Apple needs to open up all the songs on iTunes for ringtones. I probably would purchase the tones I already have just to save the hassle of hacking and avoiding updates but they are not available.
just buy appl and shut up
go steve!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
• Apple Breaks 2005-2007 Video Add-Ons: No Warning, Just Buy New Ones
What’s this? Talking about iMovie ’08? If so, Apple didn’t break them. They came out with a new application that does not work with them. The video add-ons are not “broken” for iMovie 06 which is still available.
• iTunes Store iPod Games: Buy Them Again for New iPods
Again. Apple obviously changed the OS on the new iPods. Games operate on the iPods for which they were purchased but do not work on new gen platform. This is not unprecedented. Each new gen game box requires new game titles to be purchased as well. Now, if the new iPods required all new music file purchases you’d have a legitimate complaint.
• iPod touch Screen Problems: Deny Them, Charge Restocking Fees
I haven’t heard much about this before now. How many people have been effected by this?
• iPhone Ringtones: Pay Twice for Each Song; Forget Using Your Own
Apple’s ringtone purchase policy is more liberal than most phones carriers offer, so that argument is bogus, however the limiting of file transfer into the iPhone to use your own ringtones is a bad decision as most all other modern phones allow this.
All in all it sounds like most of these complaints are mostly an overblown sense of entitlement.
If these are the only problems people have in the world, then I don’t know if anyone should be complaining.
In addition to what has been listed above. I too have noticed a startling change in customer satisfaction when in contact with Apple Support. I often have to refer them to my web order numbers to prove just how much money I spend annually. Funny, when they look at that they have an “ah-ha” moment. I use to not have to prove that I am of any value. But anyway, over the year I have noticed that I have to make such efforts to get quality support for some issues.
Recently, I sent in my iPhone because of the touch screen lack of sensitivity or deminishing sensitivity. I sent it in, and Apple returned it pronto. Not fixed. Apparently, according to Apple. It meets specifications. In the intrim, the loaner phone they sent me worked flawlessly. Guess I am stuck on that one.
You know what the worldwide market needs?
Much more operating sytem competition.
Right now we got a choice between a poor operating system monopoly, a good but flakey hardware/OS monopoly and a poor desktop OS.
We need more ‘operating system + do most all’ software combinations that will run on the now monopolistic Intel processors to serve the needs of most people.
If only Linux would get their act together…
One last thing, in all honestly. No matter how bad Apple evolves. Really, can you imagine merging over to MafiaSoft? Perhaps Steve is well aware that despite lagging customer service he knows we too are kinda trapped. Really, where are we going to go? Still, despite the obvious lack of fan-fare for the cutomers. Apple still is supperior and I seriously doubt anyone one of us is going to run out and buy a Dell because we are unhappy with Apple’s treatment of its customers as of late. All of us are kinda stuck with no longer being of value to Apple as it grows its appeal to the masses.
What’s wrong with another Microsoft?
Frankly Microsoft could use the competition. The Zune is on top but I would like to see the geniuses in Redmond push it further. Don’t get me wrong, I love my Zune—brown, thanks for asking—but there’s always room for improvement. Of course, Apple would have to reach Microsoft’s high design, quality and end user experience standards, and lets face it, the copycats in Cupertino have a long way to go.
Your potential. Our passion.™
If the journalists just said good things about Apple then the whole would get very boring.
This negative feedback is actually good for Apple. It’s very minor if even totally irrelevant but keeps Apple in the headlines. This free press spreads the word about Apple’s evolution and shoves all the other competitors to the back.
I met a friend who I haven’t seen for years. A die-hard PC guy. Queued up for 3 hours to buy the iPhone on the first day of release. Even has one mac at his work.
The games have to be re-bought because OS is different now on the new iPods. The old code won’t work on the new OS.
Apple is also falling down when it comes to fair pricing of services. I was recently advised of the impending renewal of my .Mac account. Living in Canada, I was not surprised to see that the cost was more than the US version of the service, except that it was nearly P more and the US and Canadian dollar are more or less at par right now. Prices for hardware here in Canada are preetty close to the US price. This disparity caused me to complain to Apple. They informed me that the price was not related to currency values and that $139 was the price in Canada. Period. Nonesense I said and cancelled my renewal.
“But over the past two weeks, Apple’s fans have been grumbling that the company they knew and loved is transforming into another Microsoft…”
Hahaha! Which developmentally delayed Apple Fan in particular is grumbling that Apple is becoming Microsoft?
By trying to make mountains out of mole hils, this “writer’ (read: Microsoft Shill) is also pointing out that Microsoft is evil and the bottom to which he alleges Apple aspires.
Jeremy Horwitz = Uninformed. Blow-Hard. Ass.
Seems to me like Apple is suffering from growing pains.