“Apple Inc’s newest iPhone left Wall Street and fans wishing for more than a faster version of last year’s device, drawing a rare outburst of criticism and disappointment on the Internet,” Poornima Gupta and Alexei Oreskovic report for Reuters. “Newly minted CEO Tim Cook ably helmed his first major product launch without former boss Steve Jobs, but failed to ignite the sort of excitement and buzz that the Apple co-founder once did. Investors and fans, looking to be blown away by some amazing surprise, sent the shares down as much as 4 percent.”
“Jobs did not show up as some expected. Cook, who took the reins from the Silicon Valley icon in August, and his executive team instead showed off a souped-up device that comes with voice recognition and a better camera, but it looked identical to the last phone and did little to lift the bar for smartphones,” Gupta and Oreskovic report. “‘It’s been 16 months and all you’ve got is an A5 processor in the existing iPhone 4,’ said BGC Partners’ analyst Colin Gillis. ‘It’s a mild disappointment, but they’re still going to be selling millions of units.’ WP Stewart portfolio manager Michael Walker said, ‘It’s kind of funny — if they have gone and called it the 5, the stock would have been fine, but they’re calling it the 4S, which is a disappointment to some. It’s a faster chip. The form factor is the same as the prior one, which might be a disappointment also to some people.'”
Gupta and Oreskovic report, The iPhone event took place at Apple Central — the same venue where the iPod first was introduced years ago — versus the larger, splashier venues of more recent choice such as downtown San Francisco’s Moscone center. The restricted attendance may have triggered a surge in online viewership, which slowed or crashed live blogs run by websites such as Engadget, Wired and Gizmodo.”
“Interest was high with Google emerging as a formidable competitor, but many fans came away disappointed,” Gupta and Oreskovic report. “‘Please note I will be selling some ‘S’ stickers for $0.99 so iPhone 4 owners have a cheaper upgrade option,’ wrote HAL9000 on Twitter. Tomlinsonr tweeted, ‘I’ll have a double helping of ‘meh’ with a side of ‘whatever.'”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Debacle. You either leak “no iPhone 5” to a credible outlet in order to tamp down anticipation beforehand or you name the damn thing “iPhone 5,” even if you don’t think it worthy, and be done with it. The former is far preferrable to the latter for integrity’s sake, but doing neither signals a worrying degree of tone deafness. Managing the media, not to mention peoples’ expectations, is part of your job now, too, Tim.
BTW, we are Day One iPhone buyers for every model and we will be buying iPhone 4S units on Day One, too. But we understand why iPhone 4S is different from iPhone 4 and that the 4S is simply the best damn smartphone ever made. We’re not just sure the general public is going to get it. Maybe Siri, if properly and widely demonstrated, will help sell it. Hopefully, Apple has some really good TV commercials ready to explain to the average Joe and Jane why they want an iPhone 4S. Otherwise we don’t expect to encounter any problems pre-ordering online or with in-store lines.
Related articles:
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Apple unveils new iPhone 4S with dual-core A5 and Siri intelligent assistant; launches iOS 5 and iCloud – October 4, 2011
Apple to launch iCloud on October 12 – October 4, 2011
Apple brings new features, more affordable pricing to iPod touch and iPod nano – October 4, 2011
dev- “The update to the phone is conservative. That the update is conservative is reflected in the name 4S rather than iPhone 5.”
Logical and true. It is not the 5 because it is not “revolutionizing” (a standard Apple maintains).
But, seriously, have we hit the ceiling to what a phone can look like? The MacBook Airs can’t change much now, right?
Replacing the glass with a new material?
I really don’t think just naming it iPhone 5 would of changed anyone’s mood. People wanted something to show everyone else THEY have the new iPhone. S and 5 on a back of what looks like an iPhone 4 doesnt do that. Changing the physical design does. If apple just made it a round back being a little thinner and did nothing different, people would be raving about it. Literally the only thing apple didn’t do was make the phone look different or give it more screen real estate. Other than that this is everything everyone wanted and expect out of the hopeful iPhone 5. People aren’t seeing how great this new phone is because they cant flaunt it without saying it’s an S.
It isn’t about flaunting you have a 4S (I have a 3GS that looks just like the 3G)… it is about why it took 16 months to dropa faster processor and better camera in the device?!
It took them 12 months to upgrade the iPhone to 3G (better performance, new chipset – not just a faster chip) and then 12 to 3GS (just faster) and 12 more to 4 (with a new form factor and chipset)… What has happened to Apple execution that it takes 16 months for a speed bump!?!?
IF they launched this in June/July this would be a NON issue. The could have still launched the Assistant/iOS5 stuff today and that WOULD be news.
This is my concern as an investor. Apple would have previously done what I suggested above, provide the speed bump, boost sales (especially upgrades by 3GS users that had started to come out of the 24 month contracts), and then WOWED the world with the iOS5/Assistant stuff to boost the sales into the holiday season quarter.
The iPhone 5 rumours would have persisted for a release in June/July 2012 and EVERYONE is happy, Apple, customers, investors and Wall street.
Now I will give Apple the benefit of the doubt (I am long AAPL), and say perhaps the iPhone 5 was the intended product for today, but issues have prevented it’s launch, but this is exactly my concern – they are having trouble executing if they have had to delay the iPhone 5 due to production/design/development issues. It also reflects that they have lost the concept of managing the message (one of Apple’s STRENGTHS), as a discreet leak to the media that iPhone 5 was not coming would have prevented the ho-hum response.
You are right the 4S is a brilliant phone!!! It is just 4 months late (remember competitors had 1gig memory, dual processors, 8megapixel cameras before June this year)… and the “new” upgrade cycle and persistant rumours of an ACTUAL iPhone 5 mean that a lot of 3G, 3GS and 4 users will hold off upgrading now and locking themselves into a new 2 year contract. Cause in the end – my 3GS with iOS5 is also still a GREAT phone – and THAT all up is Apple’s problem here.
so you all are telling me, if it was a car with the same taillights but was twice as powerful and had more features than last years model but, WITHOUT a price increase, you wouldn’t buy one….
not if the manufacturer is known to do that and then come out with a redesigned model 6 months later
Car analogy doesn’t work here mate.
Reason is, iOS5 means those with last years model can upgrade the suspension, handling and interior features.
Sure the thing won’t accelerate as fast as the new model, but to the rest of the world, in day to day use, it looks the same, and does the same – so if you have a 4, why upgrade at all!?!? (And let’s be clear, Apple’s sales figures are made up a fair whack of units from people that have upgraded to get the new tech/features). This means that all 4 people are off the table now. Lot’s of 3G users upgraded to 3GS, as the speed bump and ACTUAL 3G performance (not fake 4G) was worth it.
So please use analogies, but realise when they are of limited use, because mobile phones are NOT cars, and the software upgrades are the clear difference.
im sure they have the iphone 5 already design and prototype already and the 4 additional wait months been hard on apple to dsecide wether to launch the iphone 5 or not … i think they came up to a decision to wait and see what the future galaxy s III will look like and what specs it will have!
The iPhone 4S will have the same 3.5-inch 960 x 540 Retina display as found on the 2010-era iPhone 4. Just today, LG (LG, for cripes sakes!!!) announced an Android handset that has a 4.5-inch 1280 x 720p HD display.
Apple is becoming further and further behind. Yes i know that ios is awesome but come on they needed to really knock this one out of the park with 4in screen and thinner design and all the other features they did have. and no more glass on the back. Did they not remember what happened with iphone 4 and all the broken backs?
This definitely wasn’t what was “expected”, so I suppose the disappointment is predictable. But the event threw up some very interesting questions and things that one can speculate about:
1) If there really wasn’t an iPhone 5 in the works, why did Apple not dampen the expectations with a well-placed leak, as MDN suggests? Or is there an iPhone 5 that was meant to be launched but something – technical or otherwise – just didn’t click in time for it to happen today? Remember the premature announcement of the white iPhone?
2) Was this a deliberate move to dash expectations? Let’s face it, Apple these days is expected to conjure up devices on a regular basis that leave the masses breathless. This is partly because Apple has been doing that for some years now – the company’s been a victim of its own success. But come on, folks, even the brilliant minds at Cupertino must have a ceiling. Is Apple running out of out-of-this-world things to invent? Maybe this is just the first step in bringing Apple fans gently back to earth. Maybe from now on, at least until some paradigm changes, progress is going to be incremental.
3) Disappointment or not, all the hype and speculation can only be good for the company. As it is sometimes said, all publicity is good publicity when you are in the business of selling things. So the disappointment – and temporary stock market reverse – may have been an acceptable price to pay in return for being able to hog the headlines for weeks. We do forget at times that Apple is a business whose bottom line is its bottom line.
4) …. and in line with that, it might be foolish for Apple to retire something that’s still a big seller. By all accounts, the iPhone 4 is still packing them in. Why replace something that still has many more miles to run? Just soup it up for another holiday-season push, and next year, if it starts flagging, bring in the iPhone 5.
Apple’s done that before with the iMac. It changed the iMac design radically a number of times, but the present design has been a winner, and all Apple has done in the past few years is to make some cosmetic touch-ups on the outside while turning it into an increasingly powerful beast on the inside.
One thing, though, even Apple has to admit – its failure to deny the iPhone 5 speculation has meant that the significant improvements it has made to the iPhone 4 have been made to look pedestrian.
Let’s see whether that disappointment carries over to the box office as people start shopping for the holiday season. I doubt this “disappointment” will have much of an impact. After the furor and fury has died down in the coming weeks, people will begin to see that the iPhone 4 has indeed become a much better machine.
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Yep – the iPhone is a great seller, so why not do the 4S speed bump in June/July and just get it all over with!?
And as you said – they should have hised down the iPhone 5 speculation to avoid this occurring, UNLESS of course this is a demonstration of Apple failing to execute the iPhone 5 they WERE actually planning all along.
When the first iPhone came out, some people had this to say: Touch interface? That’s all you got? Microsoft phones have touch capability!
Now forward to today: an iPhone with AI via voice commands. Those same people are singing the same tune: What?! Are you kidding me? Better camera and bigger disk space? That’s it?
Mac friends, you are SO sleeping on the AI thing. Siri will do for the iPhone 4S what the capacitive touch interface did for the original iPhone.
MDN: I’m rather disappointed with your lack of vision. It is practically staring at you in the face.
Headline correction:
Apple iPhone fails to wow Pinheads and Morons!
Besides that, Apple should know better their customers as Pinheads and Morons and should have named the damn thing 5.
Everybody would be raising the new iPhone.
4s is not a phone for everyone, it’s a phone for people without an iPhone 4 😉
Apple is thinking about the big picture here, not just the people looking for whiz bang at every turn.
Siri Beta… new camera? these are all a move to and setting up the new iPhone 5, that I have a feeling will be amazing when it’s ready.
If this were just a ‘speed bump’ improvement, Apple wouldn’t have added the extra memory and wouldn’t have waited for iOS-5 to be finished before releasing the new iPhone.
The faster processor, double RAM and iOS-5 are all about enabling the iPhone with a voice interface and artificial intelligence (Siri). That’s clearly what Apple thinks will set the iPhone 4S apart from competitors.
Those who believe that Apple wasted the past 16 months since they didn’t introduce a new case/shell for the iPhone have it all wrong. Apple could have changed the case and added the A5 processor in six months … but that phone wouldn’t have impressed anyone and wouldn’t have allowed the iPhone to retain its leadership status.
Few have greater clarity of vision than Steve Jobs and his lieutenants. I say we give the benefit of the doubt to 4S and see where things stand a month from today.
You guys are warped, Apple brought a very good product to the table and all you people do is piss and moan that its not good enough. Screw you!!!
I have several Apple products an iPhone 4 is one of them, I may get the iPhone 4S, it is another great piece of tech from a company I like.
The media and all the fan boys are the ones who need to take responsibility for hyping everyone up for some miracle device that was never going to happen!!! You people are really rich you know that!!! A lot of people in the world will never be able to afford such a device and you snivelling brats are quarrelling about how Apple didn’t wow you.
I’m so disappointed in MDN if anyone you should know better.
No – not complaing about the product – it is brilliant, complaining about how it was handled, and what it may represent.
The fact is there is an iPhone 5 being developed, and it is likely if all Apple wanted to do was speed bump the 4, they would have done that in June/July (as they have done before, and should be more than capable of).
I think this is a great product, but now that the iPhone 5 rumours persist (and with good reason), then people like me wont upgrade right now (where as I would have immediately when my contract expired in June this year).
The product is brilliant, but nothing it delivers (in terms of hardware) couldn’t have been delivered in June/July.
And as I have said already, then today could have been about iOS5, and the share prices would have soared, not fell (despite the late recovery).
It also demonstrates a mistake in terms of managing the message and doing what Steve always did best – milk EVERY opportunity to maximse the wow factor. Today iOS5 (with Assistant etc) was launched which was a major WOW factor and the hardware upgrades WOULD have been a wow factor in June/July… my compaint is about TIMING of delivery and HOW the message was managed, not WHAT was delivered.
And this is why I invest in Apple, and am NOT a fanboy – I don’t think they do everything right… It isn’t whining, it is observation… Apple could have managed this MUCH better for the benefit of Apple, customers, investors and wall street types.
Manipulating the market…
I don’t care if it’s called an iPhone 4s, 5, Q, R2D2, or even iPhone Zune.
I’m getting it.
I’m disapointed, will still buy the iPhone 4s but it’s taken them 16 months to bring this small hardware upgrade out. I mean if it came out in June then great it’s more manageable. But really 16 months for an s sticker, a5 processor and a better camera… Ok a couple of other things too… Hmmm should have had an iPhone 5 too!
oh this is terrible!
– iOS 5 and all its advances really goes operational in a few days. been waiting 4 months.
– iCloud and all its advances really goes operational in a few days. been waiting 4 months.
– super new camera. i take a lot of snapshots.
– and how much better is the video? have to check it out.
– world phone at same price. now i can switch to Verizon since i travel a lot.
– battery life even better.
– a new voice system i might actually use. have to try it and see.
– everything is snappier.
but WAH! there’s no Pony! SOB! Apple didn’t add an integer! FAIL!
very disappointed. one year and a half and we still have the same design and model. I got tired of the iphone. iOS almost with all those icons. don’t you think guys that apples should have moved a little bit more far? is this what they can pull off in 1.5 years? very very disappointed. and please don’t tell me to go and get an android. I would like an iphone but time to stop with this model.
The truth is that it IS A GOOD POINT to ask “why didn’t you just call it the iPhone 5???”
It has an A5 processor, Siri, camera. Why not???
THAT IS THE DISAPPOINTMENT. Apple basically is saying “This isn’t it. This is just a slight upgrade”. Yes, I said “slight”. If it were the “awesome” upgrade then they would have called it iPhone 5!!!!!
NO, I’m not nitpicking what it is called. I am pointing out that they deliberately are leading us on, and showing us by omission that THIS IS NOT “IT”.
I was hoping for a larger screen. I have trouble reading the small print after a long day and I’m just 47 still with great vision (for 47). I want to get iPhones for my parents, who are 71, but the screen is just too small for them. Resizing everything is just not practical? I think 1/2″ would make a big difference for me at least and hopefully, them….probably a lot of others.
come on people. does it matter that much what they call this new phone? I believe Aapl was not going to call this new phone an iphone5 due to it having the same form factor as the 4.
This new iphone has all the makings of an iphone5 on the inside. but aapl is sticking with a body that is tested and works.
the iphone5 will look different…yes. next year it will arrive.
I am preordering since i have the 3gs. my contract is up with att, is sprint any good? they will prob have a good plan.
Aapl is going to sell out of these, as usual.
“the iphone5 will look different…yes. next year it will arrive.”
Right. So this is not it. Disappointed!! No way to skirt around that, IMO. The iPhone 4 is a great phone. The disappointment isn’t about Apple products. They are all great.
Disappointed the iPhone 5 did not debut. Next year is a year too late, not in my opinion, but in the expectation Apple has created.
Oh, and there is one more thing! 😉
I actually just do not like the iPhone 4 design. In my hands it feels awkward compared to the 3GS I currently own.
I also have a lot of friends that have cracked glass. I know they dropped it – blah blah – but in the end you cannot know you WON’T drop your phone EVER… I mean no one I know throws the phone on the ground, it is an accident, and the fact is the iPhone 4/4S design with raised glass above the frame on BOTH sides is more likely to shatter and/or break.
I have dropped my 3GS 3 times total (ironically last night was the 3rd) and due to it’s design it has not broken. A few scuffs on the metal frame (I don’t use a case AT ALL), but intact.
So between the shape (which looks thicker than the 3GS – even though dimensionally it is not), the way it feels holding it (slightly boxy) and the propensity to break if accidently dropped, I don’t want the 4/4S form factor… I was hoping for the return to a curved back (as rumoured) for the iPhone 5.
It is not whining because you have a preference.
IOS 5 needs an A5 processor to run. In order to release the new IOS 5 software Apple had to release a stop gap iPhone. 4S is that stop gap between 3G and 4G phones. When Apple can put a 4G, GSM and CDMA into 1 iPhone with good battery life. So far that I know that chip does not exist yet.
“IOS 5 needs an A5 processor to run. In order to release the new IOS 5 software Apple had to release a stop gap iPhone”
REALLY?!?! And so this is what they are telling 3GS users and iPhone 4 users (A4 chip) when they say they can upgrade to iOS 5?!?!
I agree they need the new A5 chip to run Assistant etc, but they didn’t have to wait until now to launch an A5 iPhone 4 (aka the 4S)… they could have done that in June/July (they had the A5 chip well before then for the iPad 2 launch), and then they could have released iOS 5 now without this debacle of people being disappointed… the disappointment is not about the hardware, it is why it took Apple 16 months to do what they used to do in 12 – and also the lacklustre (read near boring) selling by Cook… No one expects him to be Steve Jobs with his RDF – but seriously, there were points in that presentation when watching paint dry would have been more riveting… They SHOULD have leaked the fact there was no iPhone 5 to avoid all of this… UNLESS of course there is an iPhone 5 that they just could not execute on in time?
Either way this was a stuff up by Apple. Not their first, but not a great start for Cook at all.
They ha
Total disappointment. Won’t be buying it. I’ll be waiting for an upgrade that is worthwhile. Camera is hardly a reason to buy a new phone. iPhone 4 works fine for now. I have no need to throw more money at Apple.
@ Rick, this phone isn’t for you! It’s for the millions without an iPhone 4!!
I think you all miss the point of the iPhone 4s. Apple could keep coming out with new phones with new shapes to make the average person WOWed. And, I’m sure there is an iPhone 5 in out future, but seriously, they need to create millions of them in a very short period of time. Apple already has the best phone out there, why not make it better so it lasts longer in the product channel moving forward. iOS 5 and those new features will make your iPhone 4 seem new enough and that’s FREE… By the time you get used to those features an iPhone 5 will come out for you sissies that can’t understand the big picture. The goal is to set up an offering that puts iOS in everyone’s hands. People are paying for apps now, unlike when they first came out. It’s the software that is keeping your phone new..
This is no “debacle” this is a “tempest in a teapot”.
Personally I think it is a waste of time to be concerned about whatever temporary fluctuations happen to APPL stock, the trend long term is up. The day traders will manipulate to make their pennies, but who the f**k cares. Besides those f**kers have f**ked us long enough. Occupy Wall Street!
It’s Al Gore’s fault, isn’t it? Didn’t he “confirm” that TWO iPhones were on the way?