“As part of his tour through France, Apple CEO Tim Cook on Monday sat down [avec Le Figaro] to discuss a few hot topics including the company’s EU tax bill, augmented reality, artificial intelligence and a Parisian retail store rumored to take root along the storied Avenue des Champs-Élysées,” Mikey Campbell reports for AppleInsider.
“Cook seemingly confirmed Apple owns a space on the Champs-Élysées but is still debating what, exactly, to do with the plot,” Campbell reports. “Rumors that Apple signed a 12-year lease for an entire seven-story building along the historic shopping avenue first appeared last year. Reports at the time claimed the company intended to dedicate the bottom floors to retail, while the upper levels would serve as corporate offices. Cook today said Apple is still figuring out how best to utilize the space.”
“Speaking about the EU’s recent ruling requiring Apple to pay some $13.6 billion in back taxes, Cook provided the same comments as usual, maintaining Apple pays its fair share of taxes and does not avoid taxes,” Campbell reports. “As for Apple’s work in the artificial intelligence and augmented reality fields, Cook told the publication that AI —specifically Siri — makes the iPhone ‘even better.’ The company is widely rumored to be working on its own AR system —Cook himself confirmed investments in the area — but when, and in what form, that solution will launch is unknown. ”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Nous avons un pipeline très excitant.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Dan K.” for the heads up.]
If Tim Cook says anything, cue the nybot, likes to refer to him as Pipeline Tim, the bot is a disgusting creature who needs to push on to some hate site where his comments don’t even register.
What a non event that story was, Cook really does have the power to take exciting subjects and reducing them to the most boring non informational answers possible. The exact opposite to Steve in fact who would delight an interviewer at all levels with possibilities and expectations taking them days to work out he hadn’t actually revealed very much of actual substance at all leading to all sorts of exciting invented accounts of the supposed exciting technology Apple was working on real or imagined while Steve sat back in his chair smiling at all the free work they were doing for him.
That’s right. Perhaps the board needs to appoint a spokesperson to drone on and leave Tim to make those rare, important announcements that actually mean something to us. He’s presenting himself as if he were a priest rather than the bishop or pope.
I don’t think “augmented reality” and “$13.6×10^9 EU tax bill” should used in the same sentence.
One point about this article bothers me:
– A seven story building on the Champs Élysées is insanely expensive to rent. And Apple doesn’t have plans for how to use it? WHAT?! It’s time for some ass-kicking.
I 100% agree.
It is a case of Apple having more money than they know what to do with properly and efficiently.
Tim, here’s a few suggestions:
Ramp up the Airport team again. Be the leader in that area like before.
Start designing, building, and shipping the best monitors again. Dell (yes, DELL!)has an “8K” (really, it’s a Super Hi-Vision monitor, not a Digital Cinema 8K monitor). Why doesn’t Apple? Or, at the very least have a line of “4K”, 5K and 6K monitors.
Ramp up the Mac Pro team. Come out with the current, leading edge equivalent of the 2012 Mac Pro (with 100% of everything at the state-of-the-art with some bleeding edge options too — options for a couple GP100 GPUs would be nice).
Ramp up the Mac Book Pro team. As with the Mac Pro, come out with a truly state-of-the-art bevy of systems.
Invest in truly secure (well, as much as humanly possible) wired (as well as wireless) home connected systems. (Some of us do have a nearly 100% connected home at Cat 6a or Cat 7. We’re future proofed for the foreseeable future. Why are not Apple’s products.)
Make CarPlay the true “hands free and eyes free” system is was touted as being when it was announced and get it into every manufacturer’s cars no later than the 2019 model year.
Fix the availability problems. There is no excuse for announcing a product and still have product shortages 3 (and sometimes 4 or more) months after product launch.
Fix the bug in Mail that people have been complaining about for the past 5+ years!
Figure out how to STOP screwing up your interfaces from one major MacOS release to another, e.g., if you have an encrypted USB drive every time you upgrade from one major MacOS version to the next, you have to wipe the drive and update the drivers on the drive! (And, by-the-by, that does NOT happen with the Windows OS.)
etc.
etc.
Tim makes a regular practice to take important occasions such as at this public appearance in a romantic place such as this to squeeze every ounce of energy and delight out of his utterances. This assures an uninspired, desiccated speech; It’s the difference between a lush peach and a prune, a grape and a resin. Obviously, he is unable to find that kernel of delight in a situation and then amplify it for the audience. Therefore, he needs to use a talented speechwriter, an idea person really, who can grasp the moment, and encapsulate it, and convey it in one sentence using energetic words, for these kinds of public appearances: “One hundred songs in your pocket.” Tim’s comment I am sure was meant to humanize Apple; It made it look unfocused. And he needs to also stop any reference to how the sausage is made.
Exactly. If true it makes no sense whatsoever.
I’m sure they know what they’re going do with it. But Apple never tells anything ahead of time. so its nothing new
Hope spring eternal…
I bet Tim enjoyed his lunch with the co-founders of startup VizEat. They probably had Freedom Fries, cause you know they sell them exclusively in Freedom and Tim’s parent country has a long standing ban on freedom cause it can’t afford the morality tax required for Freedom Fries.
Cook is overexposed thus weakenting the Apple brand. He needs to reserve his presence for key moments so that he does not dilute his representation of Apple. He overpromises, using too many words as if he’s a lower level manager. The mystery that Jobs exhuded is gone. People don’t listen to him anymore.