“From June 11- 15th Apple Inc. held its annual World Wide Developers Conference to luke-warm review,” Brian Booker writes for ValueWalk. “Many were expecting or at least hoping, for an unveiling of the iPhone 5. And just about any WWDC without an iPhone 5 was all but bound to fail to meet expectations. Perhaps more tellingly, Apple failed to unveil any true innovations or ground-breaking developments.”
“Some pundits are already beginning to wonder if Apple is losing its step and if the lack of ground breaking products and services since the loss of Steve Jobs points to a loss of creativity and innovation within the firm,” Booker writes. “The most talked about announcement at the WWDC was the inclusion of the retina display on the Macbook Pro line. The Retina display is Apple’s ultra-high resolution 15.4” screen sporting 2880×1800-pixel resolution. Yes, scaling up the retina display for the Macbook [sic] Pro line is certainly an achievement, but it doesn’t have the ‘oomph’ of launching a new iPhone or Mac line. On the other hand, the launch of the Macbook Pro line with Retina does dispel a major rumor, that Apple would be dropping the Macbook line.”
Booker writes, “More importantly, Apple has arguably failed to launch a ground-breaking product since the release of the first iPad in April of 2010 and iPhone 4 in June of the same year. Since then, Apple has focused on incremental upgrades across it’s line of hardware, and despite rumors of an iPhone 4, the company has launched only the moderate upgrade iPhone 4S… So is Apple losing its step? While it may be too soon to tell, the news coming out of Apple does seem less revolutionary these days. Whether this is due to the loss of Steve Job’s business genius, difficulty in pushing an already pushed envelope, or part of a larger business strategy remains to determined. Yet after years of leading the consumer electronics market, Apple will now have to look far and wide to come up with a truly innovative product.”
Booker writes, “Apple is still the unchallenged king of the tablet market but change may be on the horizon. The Android-based Amazon Kindle Fire debuted in the 2011 Christmas season and had a strong showing, selling some 4.7 million tablets during the 4th quarter (2011). In total Android tablets account for”
MacDailyNews Take: That’s it. No, seriously, that’s exactly how that paragraph ends; with no punctuation, in midstream, it simply cuts off – just like Brian’s oxygen supply in the womb.
Oh, BTW:
• Apple’s revolutionary iPad widens lead as tablet sales surge – June 15, 2012
• Apple’s massive domination of tablet market unabated as Amazon’s tiny screen Kindle Fire demand tumbles – June 5, 2012
• Apple’s iPad remains dominant in Q112 while Amazon’s tiny screen Kindle Fire fizzles – June 4, 2012
• Amazon’s tiny screen Kindle Fire shipments have dropped off a cliff – May 9, 2012
• Amazon’s Kindle Fire shipments fizzle to anemic 4% market share – May 4, 2012
Booker writes, “Meanwhile, Microsoft is about to launch Windows 8 for tablets and will enter directly into the market with their own tablet, the ‘Surface.’ While it may be too late for Microsoft to enter the tablet market, early previews have been largely positive. Windows 8 has received promising early reviews…”
MacDailyNews Take: Booker’s definition of the word “positive” is obviously unique in all the world:
• Jason Schwarz: Top 10 reasons why Microsoft’s Surface is DOA – June 22, 2012
• Acer founder: Microsoft will quit making tablets soon – June 21, 2012
• Thanks to Apple, Microsoft is doomed in the era of mobile computing – June 20, 2012
• Apple’s revolutionary iPad vs. Microsoft’s anti-tablet ‘Surface’ – June 20, 2012
• Microsoft’s Surface tablets provokes ‘sense of betrayal’ among Windows PC assemblers – June 20, 2012
• Fox News: Copier Microsoft is doomed to fail with Surface tablet – June 19, 2012
• Microsoft’s Surface tablet destined to be as successful as the Zune – June 19, 2012
• Surface: Why Microsoft’s big mystery turns out to be a big mistake – June 19, 2012
• Microsoft’s Suicide, er… ‘Surface’ – June 19, 2012
• ZDNet Sr. Tech Editor Perlow: Microsoft’s Surface has catastrophe written all over it – June 19, 2012
• ZDNet’s Kingsley-Hughes: Microsoft’s Windows 8 is an awful, horrible, painful design disaster – June 8, 2012
• Analyst meets with big computer maker, finds ‘general lack of enthusiasm’ for Windows 8 – June 8, 2012
• Dvorak: Windows 8 an unmitigated disaster; unusable and annoying; it makes your teeth itch – June 3, 2012
• The Guardian: Microsoft’s Windows 8 is confusing as hell; an appalling user experience – March 5, 2012
Full article – Think Before You Click™ – here.
MacDailyNews Take: Unfortunately, the world is full of abjectly stupid people. If they were all herded onto an island, Brian Booker would be their king.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “BIll Elkus” for the heads up.]
WTF
“On the other hand, the launch of the Macbook Pro line with Retina does dispel a major rumor, that Apple would be dropping the Macbook line.”
At no time was there a rumour that the MacBook Pro would be discontinued. The rumour was that they would be discontinuing the Mac Pro. This guy is ether way ahead of the curve or dumb as a post.
Did someone say, “no Jobs=no Apple”? Are you really that ignorant. Apple is not the same without Jobs, but that doesn’t mean Apple isn’t still doing wonderful things. iPad 3, MacBook Pro Retina. These things can’t be ignored as the dominating products that they are. Apple never made the mainstream PC user their priority, just advancing the state of amazing design and possibilities. I can truly say I am happy with the new MBP, even though my 17″ was not included in the new generation machine nor SuperDrive which has evidently alienated some professionals. Apple does listen and will come up with solutions to complaints where they can. When I pay off my iPad 3, I’ll order the MBP, and I feel very confident in Cooks ideas and his staffs decisions even though he doesn’t have the excitement jobs had in his WWDC presentations. Apple is doing very well and Jobs is gone but not forgotten, nor required to continue making wonderful life enjoyment products!
Apple is slipping in the smart phone market due to Ggogle’s reuse of Microsoft’s tactics – copy, produce the software amd license it to builders, and flood the market. Bigger screens are attracting not only new users, but Apple users as well. Apple’s great at short changing to protect their unbielievable profit margins, but quality makes it worth it in the long run. Still, it was a mistake to not get a bigger screen introed this summer. That would have been competing! Apple is getting a bit complacent, forgetting how Gates got their goat in the 90s.
Apple is slipping in the smart phone market? The same Apple that sold over 35 million iPhones in the first 3 months of 2012, beating everyone’s expectations? Ok. I guess they would have sold 100 million if they gave it a big ass screen and a stylus. That Galaxy Note is setting the world on fire. They might hit 8 million Notes “sold” by the end of July. They haven’t sold 8 million of them yet – and it launched November of last year.
Apple better get their act together quickly.
Truly clueless.
So, someone that knows nothing about the tech biz pontificating about the future of our industry… Hummm…what could possibly go wrong with that?
I don’t agree with Booker, but.. As the saying goes, “Even if you’re on the right track, you will be run over if you stand still”. The competitors are getting more aggressive and Cook has to be ready for war. Now we are in need of a war time (consigliere) CEO, and as much as I hope Cook will step upm, I fear he won’t. Give me an Apple TV, iPad dock built into cars, iCloud upgraded beyond Dropbox and Macbook Air Retina 🙂
But Apple has had the two best quarters since Cook became the CEO. I do think the next iPhone and iPad will be beyond the “incremental” and take things to the next level. Apple does seem to be somewhat on cruise control right now but the quarterly numbers speak for themselves. We’ll see with the next iPhone. Not worried at all.
It’s not as though the pundits have a track record of correctly predicting what Apple will do, or making an accurate assessment of new products that Apple has just launched.
The rest of the industry is still playing catch up with Apple. Ultrabooks are still trying to be like MacBook airs from several years ago, but not making money. Tablets are trying to be like iPads, but not making money. iPod killers died without trace. Apart from Apple, only Samsung makes money from building smart phones and their products owe everything to the iPhone.
Apple will release it’s next “Wow” product when it’s ready. The one thing that they won’t do is to call a press conference and try to create the illusion that they have a ( sometimes ) working prototype, followed by giving the attendees the opportunity to have “hands-on” experience with a dummy keyboard.
You guys scared or what? He didn’t say they WERE losing it- he said its too soon to tell. He raises a few valid points (aside from that dumb iPhone 5 remark- but honestly… Some fools WERE expecting a iPhone 5 announcement).
Apple seems to me like they MAY be beginning to slip. I’m the biggest fan boy of all. I’ve been using Apple products since before I could walk. I have hundreds of thousands worth of Apple stock (my dad bought me in at $28 a share). I worship Apple. So believe me that any concerns I have are legit.
1) Lion is terrible. I wish I wasn’t forced me to update to use new services. I use a desktop with a standard mouse. I bought the ‘mighty mouse’ when it came out, and while it’s functionality was fine, it failed in a lot or respects. I play too many games for a magic mouse to be useful. So, right away most of the toted new ‘features’ of lion, the ‘gestures’ are unusable.
Another feature they added – launch pad. Wtf? Why would I need/want this for anything? It’s basically a dock… On my dock? Garbage. ‘but look- its designed to be like iOS!’ Why am I using a desktop? Why would I want it to emulate iOS?
And they HID a lot of the file system! Wtf?!? Users>library>application support is hidden by default. Why? That’s a vital directory and I dont want to need to jump thru hoops to ‘unhide’ it. When a .plist gets corrupted for some reason the only way to fix it is to go and move/delete the old one and generate a new one. This happens more often than you might think (I worked phone tech support for Apple from 2007-2010 and I can tell you the most common problems people had we’re resolved by fucking with the plists) and its just a bigger nuisance to have to dig into these directories now that they’re hidden. Thanks Apple for that!
Sure it might make it easier for noobs to navigate without accidentally messing with shit that they shouldn’t, but this is a gibberish, nonsensical move from a power users perspective.
2) iCloud is disappointing. Setting up iCloud on mobile with an existing mobile me account is almost impossible. They want you to create a new @me.com or completely change your primary Apple ID. Hundreds (thousands) of people have had problems with this and Apple doesn’t present a solution that isn’t bullshit. https://discussions.apple.com/thread/3380582?start=0&tstart=0
3) Apple can’t hire a lawyer that knows wtf they’re doing. The way Apples getting shit on in courts all over the world (and more importantly in the U.S) is giving me the fucking ‘fear’. Sure the court system is to blame, the ‘slavish copiers’ are to blame, the patent office is to blame… It’s just a shame, and scary that this COULD be a repeat of the vs. M$ scandal from the 80’s/90’s.
I’m Apples biggest fan. I’m worried about a few things. If you all aren’t, then you’re blind to reality. Wouldn’t it be wiser to acknowledge these few shortcomings that Apple has and push to see them remedied rather than deny them till it’s too late? For shame.
@Lordthree
Option-click the Go menu in Finder to reveal the Library—simples!
Oh and I use gestures on my Magic Mouse all the time—I find it very productive but YMMV.
=:~)
Lordthree, your fellow Apple fans are capable of keeping an eye on Apple’s progress without jumping in fear every time some clueless idiot starts crying about the Mac sky falling. Some of these same pundits/bloggers/analysts complained about the same things when SJ was still leading the company. Now they are rehashing the same ideas under the “Cook isn’t SJ” theme. Few people outside of the company has detailed knowledge of what is going to happen over the next couple of years. So why listen to these self-proclaimed ‘experts’?
One good litmus test for any of these would-be pundits…how long have you owned AAPL?
Are we moderating comments now?
Nice
iPhone 5 out in the fall 2012… Announce it at wwdc and the 4s would stop selling! So no one in their right mind would be expecting that to be announced. The major announcement is that iOS and mountain lion are working closer. Plus how Apple is rolling out their maps is bigger news than people such as this writer realize. Retina displays will be standard on all Apple products within 18 months. Tim Cook is doing just fine- the stock wouldn’t be in the 500’s if not for all his hard work over the years. So he doesn’t have the charisma of Steve, but nobody does and nobody ever will- a guy like that only comes around every 100 years or so. To me, he had more in common with Plato than Edison.
Common sense says that a shift toward an iPhone release in the fall is a better peak at Christmas sales rather than a summer release when everyone’s focus is on vacation…keeps the focus on software during WWDC and the focus on hardware in the fall.
To play devil’s advocate, though, is it that Apple is in serious trouble, or is it just that we were so used to Steve Jobs that _anyone_ who succeeded him would have fallen short of expectations? Steve Jobs was a legend. That means someone like him is so very, very rare, and we shouldn’t expect Apple under someone else to reach that wow factor. Does it mean Apple’s no longer the best? Of course not. But for now, Apple is chugging along, riding the momentum that Steve generated for it.
No way is Apple losing it’s edge under Tim Cook, there’s no company on this planet capable of dethroning the undisputed King of Tech, and in terms of a business model, Apple is as close to perfection as there is out there, simply incredible.
However, having said all that, Apple has absolutely lost some of it’s magic over the last couple of years and that’s got nothing to do with Tim Cook. I love Apple products and currently own over $10,000 of Apple equipment, but I don’t get excited by Apple announcements like I used to. Through the naughties, I couldn’t wait for WWDC and any big announcement that followed. I remember the thrill of the first gen iPods and the iPhone, the Macbook air and then the iPad, but nothing since has really knocked me off my feet. Retina display iPads, iPhone 4s and MacBooks are impressive, but those announcements haven’t left me bowled over like previous products. I suspect it’s because Apple has become big, really big and although they still innovate, they also consolidate more than they ever did and I suspect they will take less risks in the future. Which is great if you’re a share holder, but not so great if you want to keep on getting that buzz from the good old days. I suspect I’m just saying aloud what a lot of Apple fans think, I could be wrong. Also I hope i’m wrong and Apple bring out something so amazing that I feel compelled to queue up at some ungodly hour to be the first to have one, like I used to.
It sad and frustrating to hear supposed-to-be-knowledgeable people keep coming up with these silly articles. Apple is a company seeking growth, they don’t want to introduce a revolutionary product everyday! How business works is that you bring out new technologies and major upgrades when exiting product exhausts it’s shine.
While world’s largest companies like Microsoft, google, samsung, sony can’t seem to be able to steal 4% market share off Apple-dominant iPad world, this guy is crying to see next revolution from Apple.
We must remind the guy that this is building of an ecosystem. Each element of that ecosystem is introduced to the market with careful timing and upgrades of the linked products are brought in to complete the cycle where and when it is important.
It maybe worthwhile to look in to the immediate reaction from Google to it’s ad tariff, with the wake of Apple’s map. This is probably what Tim might have guessed.
1 to 2 is a 100% growth, and 100 to 150 may be just 50% growth. But which %age of these two brings more profit is key to understanding what is going on.
Google and Microsoft thinks Apple is their RND unit. Every time Apple introduces a new product / project, lives of the engineers at Microsoft and Google become harder – they need to clone it. The instruction may be “just curve the owner” or “change the color” before labeling it “MY PRODUCT” with a slogan “it’s better” or “it’s bigger”
** What a TECH world **
Apple may not be losing too much of it’s steam, but it’s not accelerating forward either.
Apple isn’t exactly winning the competition against Android and other copies.
Mac Pro users are still waiting for Thunderbolt-equipped machines with graphics options.
Apple software packages that should be world-class have been languishing.
Crappy features have been added to the Mac OS and good features have been abandoned for no obvious reason.
Apple’s update cycle on the iPhone is predictable but not necessarily competitive with the competition gunning at it.
The shopping experience at the iTunes store hasn’t improved at all in years. Too much clutter, too clumsy a search/sort/view interface.
The iTunes app remains bloated, with crap like Ping only cluttering up what could be a svelte responsive program.
Apple is wasting energy defending its manufacturing/labor practices, something that Apple should also take pride in being world-class in executing so there is not a whiff of concern. Most puzzling, though, is that Apple apparently has nothing on which to spend its cash horde, so it’s issuing a dividend. That’s the sure signal that there isn’t anything earth-shattering impressive in the pipeline.
The new Macbooks with Retina display are nice, but just like multicore processing, precious little consumer software actually takes advantage of it.
Tim is no doubt expending as much effort as anyone could, but the results aren’t overwhelming yet. There is room for improvement. And as much as Apple pays its CEO, he should be able to walk on unfrozen water and cure the sick.
Jobs is Gone
Timmy is just a CEO.. no weight
The accountants are now in charge…
no more special innovations…
could be Rimm in less than 5 years..