We apologize in advance for the rapid-fire Thurrott articles, but we like to keep tabs on those who could pose a danger to themselves or society. We just feel safer this way.
“Thanks to strong sales of the iPod–but not the iPod Mini, which is stuck in a parts supply quagmire–Apple posted a net profit of $46 million on revenue of $1.91 billion for the quarter ending March 31. The company’s profits almost tripled when compared to the same quarter last year, and Apple shipped a whopping 807,000 iPods, making it the undisputed ruler of the portable digital audio device market,” Paul Thurrott reports for WinInfo.
“However, Apple’s core business isn’t doing so hot, especially when you consider the rate at which the wider PC market is growing. Apple sold just 749,000 Macintosh systems in the quarter, giving the company a sagging 1.7 percent of the market. Even struggling PC maker Gateway–which recently closed all of its retail stores–owned 2.7 percent of the market in the quarter, and when you combine Gateway’s market share with that of recently acquired eMachines, the company comes in with almost 6 percent of the market. So what do these financials mean for Apple? Assuming its computer business is dying and its consumer electronics business is growing–and it’s pretty clear that that’s what’s happening here–I think we can expect to see a smaller, consumer electronics company emerge. The problem for Apple, of course, is that it’s now pursuing the same proprietary strategy for the iPod that killed off its Macintosh line. Stay tuned,” Thurrott reports.
Full article here.
Thurrott’s also got a whole side issue bouncing around in his noggin where he insists the iPod mini’s success isn’t real and is actually just a made up fantasy by Apple’s Steve Jobs:
Apple reported strong iPod sales in its quarterly results yesterday, but refused to break out iPod Mini sales from iPod sales “for competitive reasons,” according to Apple SVP Peter Oppenheimer. Thus, my theories about the iPod Mini are correct: If Apple had been able to secure or deliver more than the 100,000 “pre-orders” it supposedly got for the Mini, it would have crowed about that fact to the world. Instead, with a combined shipment of 807,000 iPods for the quarter, the real number to get out of this is 10 percent: That’s how much iPod sales changed sequentially during the most recent two quarters. In other words, the iPod Mini has caused almost no statistical improvement for iPod sales at all. It’s not a flop, and I’ve never said that it was. But what I’ve been suggesting is that Apple is sugar-coating a lie, couching its inability to get parts in an “exceeds demand” piece of PR baloney that Apple fans soak up so easily. It’s astonishing that people eat it up: Once again, Apple has preannounced a product it knows it could never deliver in quantity, and then presented this problem as a good news story about how popular its products are. But numbers don’t lie. That’s why we didn’t get new iPod Mini numbers this week.
And that, ladies and gentlemen, is the Apple quarterly results report you’re not going to get from any of your Apple-loving sites. For the record, Apple posted earnings of $46 million on $1.909 billion in sales, which is great, and it sold 749,000 Macintosh computers (compared to roughly 35 million PC sold in the same time period, incidentally), which is OK (up 5 percent year-over-year). Apple gleefully describes its 807,000 iPod sales as a 909 percent increase over last year, as is their right. The company sells a lot of iPods. Too bad about that Mini though, eh? Full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Take it from this “Apple-loving site,” there is so much wrong with Thurott’s thought processes, you’d think he had a Pentium for a brain. We’re not even going to bother wasting any more time on it. For more explanation, read our takes after the articles below.
Related MacDailyNews articles:
Real: ‘We don’t understand why Steve Jobs just doesn’t want to open the iPod’ – April 15, 2004
Will Apple’s ‘go it alone’ strategy turn iPod into the next Mac? – April 15, 2004
Thurrott: Steve Jobs ‘unable to see the big picture, Windows-based music services will plow aside’ Apple’s iTunes – April 15, 2004
do i sense a thurrot obsession here, MDN? dudes obviously a mac-hating hack–why link to him and give his site hits??
Oh my god..i’m so ashamed.. first post..
Thurrott’s very entertaining..
Again..PC’s don’t last long.. market share isnt’ everything..
Excellent profit and growth by Apple..
MDN, just copy the shit to this post, so we don’t have to visit his Pentium_overheated brain farts. Thanks for ruining my Friday. I think I’ll take the rest of the day off now!
what i don’t understand is why Paul thinks his readers care about Apple. We do, sure, but why does Joe Windoze care about a company he doesn’t use.
Could someone compile a list of his willful errors about Apple. At least that way when he gets quoted by CNET we can demonstrate his unhealthy fetish with insisiting that the sky is falling.
And for the love of God – don’t go to his site, don’t email him, don’t try to show him he’s wrong. There are lost causes in the world, and he is one of them.
I have 16 machines that I have to order(3*xServe 1* xServe Raid 7*G5 dual 5*PB) . I am only waiting for WWDC announcements. Next autumn will be very busy. I know that there is more guys like me who are waiting certain announcements and replace orders immediately when those machines are available. This only a start. We change all the machines to Macs during next winter.
MDN really should skip this Thurrot totally. There is absolutely no reason to listen him.
And they talk about Steve Job’s “reality distortion field” Paul has taken it to a whole new level.
I forgot that we need also displays to these machines and those will be 23″-� or 30″ if Apple introduces those in the WWDC. That will make total of (7+2) 9 displays.
Hasn’t Apple been selling about the same amount of Mac per quarter the last few years? Why do the analysts and the thurrott like people make a BIG deal out of it??
And DO NOT GO TO HIS SITE!
HE GET’S PAYD OF EVERY CLICK YOU MAKE TO HIS SITE BECAUSE THEN HE CAN SHOW HOW “POPULAR” HE IS!
And MDN NEXT TIME SKIP THURROT!
He is not funny anymore just plain stupid
Stop! Stop the madness! Pleeeeease stop posting this garbage and giving this jackass any bit of credibility. What’s next articles from the Onion about Apple? Seriously.
more like an 8086 for a brain…
Well, if Therrot has a Pentium for a brain then we all know what Pentium stands for:
P – Processor
E – Error
N – Numbering
T – Thousands
I – In
U – Users
M – Machines
Protecting the Windows market: spreading FUD and I must admit this kind of FUD does a lot of damage. People do believe that Apple is not a viable alternative. Indeed we live in a sad world, with people thinking we are dependant on Windows crap. SAD indeed. Promoting Windows, you must be insane.
There is a reason that ROT is part of his name. He does have a jones for Apple!
Do his readers care one iota about Apple?
The only people reading his trash are Mac users. Ha!
Thurrot, LOL, the poor bastard must be livid and fuming on how well Apple is doing. ROFLMAO
“Do not believe Apple: They are dead already. PLLLEEEEEAAAASSEEE, believe me, Apple is closing business”
This guy is so blatantly idiotic one should just laugh but it is scary: are people that mad, uninformed, livid scrooges, allowed to leave the sanatorium and write!?
A churl’s courtesy rarely comes, but either for gain or falsehood, and Thurrot is king in that.
Don’t you guys have anything better to do? I’m starting to think MDN is on Thurrott’s payroll.
dennis: a good laugh is a good laugh. Thurrot livid and green while writing is madness is a real clown. It is laugh for free…
Dennis – would you like some cheese with that whine? I have seen 4 friends and relatives switch to Mac in the past year – and at my business, we are replacing the leased Dells with Macs whenever a lease ends.
For me, its been 2 years and 3 months since I switched – that’s 27 months without data loss, 27 months without a virus and 27 months of working with a computer that is up 100%. Mac: it just works.
I think we have enough of Thurrott trolling.
Since the man is obviously a bastion of Mac hate so much that he fails to see that Mac sales are up, Apple has 4.6 billion in cash making as much in interest as Mac profits, zero debt, the stock is way up, iPods made tens of millions of dollars in profit, Steve Jobs is the hottest CEO in Forbes Magazine, us Mac users are happy…
What Thurrott caters to is the fear of IT personal of what will happen to them if Apple gets very popular, similar to what happened when TV’s became solid state and disposable. The TV repairman became obsolete overnight.
So he caters to that crowd and he reaps the hit counts from mad Mac users.
Time to cut out some of his popularity.
Thurrott will now be ignored. Question is can MDN weed itself off Thurrott?
Thurott is right to a large degree (and Im a mac fan). From not delivering Xserves, G5’s (origionally), now mini’s…. What’s going on at Apple…? Anyone heard of vapour ware? This is the next best thing. I can handle waiting a month maybe for a mini, but (I’m in Canada) June???? Really, whats the point of announcing something you can’t deliver…?
I love Apple products, have tons of them, but if you are going to announce and ship MONTHS after the fact, you just make yourself look stupid…
Sorry guys, but Paul has this one right.
Sailfish you forgot one thing: even iTMS is showing a PROFIT!
It must be the only one such a service in the whole world able to do that.
Can anyone figure out what Thurrot is even trying to say with his mini comments? Seriously–what does he mean?
All I know is that I called the Apple store in King of Prussia last week to get on the waiting list for one for my wife (2 people, 3 iPods already so we of course need another one) and we are now number 355 on the waiting list.
izippy, seems you do not get it while Thurrot does not believe it.
Demands have been much more than availability. A maker (of anything) produces conservative numbers of its products. Having large stocks of anything and slow turnaround is the worst thing you may show to Wall Street.
Doing the opposite is good (seen AAPL at over 29% ?).
Anyway, who could ever bet a 900% increase in iPod sales. Would have been you to predict that and email Steve with that figures? Not even mini-disk manufacturers (so why calling in Apple in that?) to supply iPods have expected that.
C’mon, Thurrot is dense, you don’t be silly.
the above is “AAPL at over $29” of course