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No Beatles = disappointment for me. There is nothing there of use to me except the iTunes store on my iPhone. Do I get a $200 rebate?

I was so ready to buy a lot of Beatles albums tonight. I still want the remastered Sgt. Peppers.

Ripped.

Off.

Sure, I would have liked to save $200, but it's not really that big of a deal.. I'm still happy I've had my iPhone since day one!

Really looking forward to the update too

Glad I waited. First?

ouch......

Beatles? I guess to each their own, but they are so over-rated in my opinion. I can think of maybe 3 songs that are okay.

I think Steve forgot to mention my $200 credit at the Apple Store.

weird decision.


the current line of products makes no sense.

why buy the iPod touch, without a hard drive, and not that much cheaper than the iPhone ?

why reduce the price of the iPhone by $200 ? that is really a bad sign.

i guess new iPhones are on their way, a 16GB model, maybe one with GPS ?

Of course I knew that the price would eventually come down. I would have been more upset if a 16gig iPhone came out.

$200 won't make or break me.

I am surprised there was no Beatles announcement but honesylt, I have the CD's I wanted already ripped years ago.

I like the ability to buy from my iPhone ( a bit miffed they dropped the price $200!).

What I really wanted was HD movie rentals! Oh well...the NEXT announcement I suppose.

4 GB—discontinued…
8GB—price cut…
16GB—just around the corner?

I wonder how long it will be before the 16GB version is released.

"why buy the iPod touch, without a hard drive, and not that much cheaper than the iPhone ?'

Have you somehow missed the hundreds of discussions about how people want an iPhone minus the phone? Well now they got it.

Most of iPhones features without the contract and AT&T;.

The price for the iPhone itself pales anyway in relation to the cost of the two-year contract with AT&T;.
200 USD give or take - you've got to have deep pockets one way or the other.

InTheShelter:

Unless you are of a certain age, I can (maybe) understand why you feel this way. To us 50somethings, there is still magic in those grooves (bytes)!!!!!

50 is the new 30!!!!

I could understand dropping the price after a year or something, but after just a few months? Way to punish the loyal die-hards Steve Jobs. Plus, I wanted a red shuffle back in February when they came out with ORANGE instead. So I got a blue one. And then they announe Red today. I love Apple, but today Steve Jobs is on my sh@* list.

Kinda funny how other companies lower their prices when they see disappointing sales (a la Zune), but Apple has a product that's selling like hotcakes and they surprise everyone by slashing prices like this. Talk about playing hardball. What's a competitor to do?

Why do I feel ripped off? Without a voucher or rebate to those who supported Apple in its newest venture based on faith alone, the company has just angered and alienated many in their core group of long-time enthusiasts. Six months after a product launch, sure. But six weeks? If they have any business sense, they'll hop on this and make amends.

Yesterday: I don't want an iPhone, I just a plain old cheap crap phone and an iPod that does the touch screen and wifi stuff the iPhone does.

Today: Why would anyone want a touch screen iPod?

Yesterday: The iPhone is toooooo expensive.....my broke ass can't afford it....

Today: How dare Apple lower the iPhone price $200?

Yesterday: There are larger capacity hard drives, why is the iPod stock at 80 GB.

Today: Why would anyone want a 160 GB iPod? Who has that much music?

Yesterday: The iPod hasn't been updated in so long...Apple's gonna lose market share!

Today: Who cares about iPods, I want a new Mac Pro.

Notice that no one has ever denied that Apple freaks are a bunch of whiny little cunts?

While I am surprised that the price has dropped so soon, I'm not upset by it. The more iPhones in service the more options and accessories that we are going to eventually see, just like with the iPod. The new pricing is ideal. It basically let's an iPod shopper to add cell phone functionality for just a hundred bucks; an easy upsale. It also signals new models to come.

The downside is that I am already hearing news reports spinning the price cut as an "attempt to boost sales", implying that goals aren't being met. Sales have been off the charts already and Apple wants to continue the momentum with the new pricing.

@InTheShelter

What you don't realize is that almost ALL the songs you've heard your entire life are courtesy of the Beatles influence on music.

C'mon, people! This happens every time Apple launches a new product - updates and price drops come fast and furious (though this is quicker than I would have expected). Those intent on living on the bleeding edge will always pay a premium and take a risk.

Anyone who has watched Apple for more than a couple of years knows what to expect: get it now and be an earlier adopter; wait a few months (or a few weeks) and get it cheaper and probably with initial kinks worked out.

You buys your ticket and you plays the game...

To those of you whining about, "Where's my $200?", well, uh, it's not your $200 anymore. Ya see, that's the way it works when you buy something.

I find it rather astonishing the some of you are so stupid you don't understand that products *do* come down in price. Like it or not, that's the world in which we live.

Go buy a new car, and then check out the prices a few months later when they want to make room for the new models. It happens all the time for "just introduced" products of all sorts.

Look, the rest of us knew they would come down in price, and said as much. But you wanted to be first, first, first, and live on the cutting edge. Well, that's the price you pay. Living on the cutting edge is not free. In this case, it costs you 200 clams. Deal with it!

My iPhone is the best thing I ever bought. It's not perfect, perfect until he doubles the storage & throws in gps, but otherwise the $200 for two months was worth it, to me.

Notice that no one has ever denied that OpJ is a bitchy little cunt?

To OpJ,
Speaking of your Mom, Fsck you and Fsck your family.

I would venue to guest that steve just let the food flood out for the feeding frenzy, oh poor zune.... drop the price and say how the future will be better.....

"WOW!" Your Passion and our dumb-ass products! Microsoft.

So much b|tching about 200 bucks... It doesn't take a wizard to figure out how Apple prices and upgrades their products, but oh well, it's not that big a deal in the long run.
It's far more important to drop the price point and make it more attractive to consumers. This holiday season is going to be gargantuan (there's that word again) for Apple and AAPL. You can get a pretty good deal on AAPL shares today if you hurry.

-c

What's with the pissing and moaning by the early adopters? Look folks, it's a roll of the dice when you buy the latest and greatest. You're pissed because prices were dropped, how about the fact that you could have paid $500 for a poor product? Be happy you bought a quality product, you paid what it cost at the time and that's that.

Dear Steve -

WRT that price cut... Just a quick note to say thanks for raping the early adopters.

Much love -

The customer

@Oops,

Dude, get real. Show me where Apple has EVER dropped the price of a new product by 33% within 70 days of its release.

Don't act so above it all. You're talking out your arse.

Didn't expect this, but VERY welcome. I can foresee a lot of very troubled boardrooms today as their profit margins have just been slashed by this news.

Notice the GUI on the new iPod touch is slightly different than the iPhone. It looks like the new Dock in Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard.

So, the arbitrary lack of Google Maps, Mail, Notes, and Weather on the iPod touch rubs me the wrong way. Perhaps under AT&T;'s tutelage, Apple seems to be getting more and more comfortable with crippling its products in unintuitive ways that are designed to suck out more, revenue but instead make customers feel confused and resentful.

Another case in point: the whole, fantastically limiting, ringtone 'creation' system. (What if, instead of Nelly Furtado's latest single, you simply want wildlife sounds, or a recording of your contact's voice, as a ringtone? Are you completely out of luck if you want to use a non-musical sound of your own, which no major label has ever had a chance to charge you for?)

Everything else just announced is great, though. And I am a little dazed that Apple is bringing out something so viscerally close to the holy grail of an AT&T;-less iPhone, so quickly--and that the prices are all so low.

(Since I have been waiting on an iPhone--and will probably still wait at least until after the January Macworld, when with luck the shape of the whole new product lineup will be clearer--the price drop makes me feel good, not enraged.)

"I was so ready to buy a lot of Beatles albums tonight. I still want the remastered Sgt. Peppers."

Do you really want to purchase a compressed remaster? The differences will likely be negligible. Hold out for whatever will be released on disc, then rip to iTunes/iPod at your chosen compression rate. We already missed out on the 40th anniversary of Sgt. Pepper's, so it may not be all that soon at this point.

InTheShelter: what 3 songs do you think are okay? Just curious.

You guys who are griping at the early adopters for being upset about the $200 price cut: kindly shut up.

"We knew price cuts were coming; you guys were stupid for buying early."

Really? You knew that 8 weeks after the iPhone was released they would drop the price almost in half?

Sure you did.

iPhone owners have the right to be a little upset. Not stark raging mad, but a little. As an owner, it feels a bit like a slap in the face to have such a drastic price reduction this close to launch. Let us complain and get it out of our systems while we save up to buy the next great Apple product.

Show me where ANYBODY has cut the price of a new product by 33% only 68 days after it's initial release. It flat out hasn't happened.

Apple absolutely must do something for the early adopters here, or they're going to alienate a lot of their best customers. Not only did they wait in line for it, they also dealt with AT&T;sometimes taking days to get it activated. And now they're getting f*cked out of $200 on top of all of that. Apple has to do something to make it right.

Mangina,

Since you are stupid, I wil explain something to you:

"Rape" is something done violently by force and against your will. Tell me, was your decision to become an early adopter of the iPhone violently forced upon you, or was it of your own free will and volition?

Well I for one am going to complain about a $200 price drop - that's 33% for a product that I bought less than a month ago - I have already send an email to
Apple - hope mine along with another 250,000 or so of Apple's most loyal customers will make them find some way to reward us - think of it like this - It's the price of a new nano - oh yes but i have a red one i bought in February - not complaining about that, though

While I am bummed that my 13-day-old iPhone just had a $200 price reduction, I'm very happy to see my Apple stock cover that many times over as it keeps increasing in value. A fair trade, I guess.

Opj...

iPhone! I want my iPhone NOW! Before it drops under 199€ and everybody has it!

AAPL will rocket even more when the Leopard shows it´s teeth. Good bye Micro$oftie! You are no longer needed!

"...but Apple has a product that's selling like hotcakes..."

With all due respect, it doesn't take an MBA to realize that if the iPhone was selling like hotcakes (relative to aapl's internal projections), they would not drop the price by 33%, sacrificing margin while alienating their most loyal customers.

mw: blood

You may feel that those of us who bought the iphone for $599 are either stupid or whiners BUT apple did give a $200 rebate to those of us who bought aperature early and I don't know of any other new product they made that they came out with that went down in price by 33% after only two months. So I am disappointed and it will affect my relationship with apple that has lasted since my apple II+ was bought in 1979. Apple if you read this how about sharing a little bit of the profits with us early adopters by giving us a rebate to be spent at apple stores. How about it steve.

Oh... I see. Thank you Oops. I'm so much more enlightened now.

btw suck on this.... ooIoo

"the current line of products makes no sense."

really?

"why buy the iPod touch, without a hard drive, and not that much cheaper than the iPhone ?"

because the extra money a month isn't justified if you practically live in a WiFi zone (like i do) and don't like cell phones anyway?

?why reduce the price of the iPhone by $200 ? that is really a bad sign."

yeah. bad for palm and RIM!

"i guess new iPhones are on their way, a 16GB model, maybe one with GPS ?"

why not wait a few more months, then release a 16gig for less than the 8 was but more than it is now? if they are already selling well, and the price drop speeds it up, then a cheap upgrade will do even more.

those people who doubted will look stupid in 4-5 years when the iPhone has 30-50% of the cell market wrapped up, but Apple has some smart people on board, and they know what they have is hot. my rest on your laurels and get caught napping when you can always push ahead and take everyone by surprise....

....over and over again.

Dropping the iPhone price $200 is a killer blow against Nokia, Motorola, Samsung ... . Oh, and add Verizon to that club. They are f**cked.

The new iPod/iPhone linup is like the old 1927 New York Yankees' "muderers row." The competition are just a harem of jailhouse bitches kneeling on demand before their Apple master.

If you felt that the iPhone wasn't worth the $499 or $599 you paid for it, why did you buy one? And if you did feel it was worth it, then how does a price drop 2 months later change what it was worth to you then? This complaining boggles the mind.

I've heard from some sources that the iPhone is (well, was) priced at about 2x - 3x the cost of its components. Of course that doesn't count Apple's need to recoup R&D;and software development expenses. There's probably still room for the price to slide.

Whether or not sales of the iPhone are going as Apple secretly desires is not really the point, since no one knows what their internal expectations are. This could just as easily signify that Apple kept the price unnaturally high at the outset, to temper demand and avoid shortages (or quality corner-cutting) during manufacturing ramp-up. The point is, this major of a price drop should boost sales. Hugely.

Good news: A price drop is very welcome. Competitor's boardrooms are going to be nervous today as they are losing their profit margins to remain competitive.

Bad news: The iPhone is not selling as well as they hoped meaning a price cut is perceived as needed to spur sales. Sadly it's not the price but missing or intentionally crippled features that are holding most buyers back. Releasing an official SDK and opening it up would have done a lot more to spur sales.

What the hell is it with The Beatles on iTunes? Just go buy a CD and rip the damn thing....

I hope companies like Shure and Etymotic start coming out with new iPhone headsets (not adaptors; who wants 8' of cables?). I hate my Apple ear buds. The new Touch iPod, as slim as it is, must use the same recessed headphone jack as the iPhone, so a lot more people are going to be looking to needing a new set or a tinier adaptor.

And again: earlier adopter (I am one) let go of the pricing gripes. We spent the money because we thought it was worth it. Apple might owe something to those that have purchased within the last couple of weeks, but not to those that have had their iPhones since the first week.