“Last year, there was a lot of debate about whether the iPhone 5 (the sixth iPhone at the time) would be called the iPhone 5 or the iPhone 6,” John Brownlee reports for Cult of Mac, “and the same happened the year before as people bickered about whether Apple should call the iPhone 4S the iPhone 5.”
“Now, some slim evidence is pointing towards the notion that Apple[‘s]… next iPhone might be called the iPhone 6,” Brownlee reports. “There’s not a lot to go on here, but Vodafone UK’s stores are listing a ‘4G iPhone 6’ in their system. The shot was taken by a Vodafone employee.”
Brownlee writes, “My guess, though, is that Apple won’t call the next iPhone the iPhone 5S or the iPhone 6. Evidence is increasingly pointing to Apple launching an entirely new ‘budget’ iPhone this year to court mid-range customers. If that happens, the iPhone — for the first time! — will become a family of devices…”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Hopefully, this it true.
It’s as if Apple is naming iPhone models solely for their own internal inventory purposes, just so they can keep track of which model is which, with no regard for how the iPhones are perceived by the rest of the world – the media, the customers, etc. – outside One Infinite Loop.
The “S” doesn’t stand for “Speed,” it stands for “Stupid.” Yes, we know it’s the same case design; we know the “S” version is the one you make the big margins on; we get it. Call it the “S” internally if you must, but don’t be so engineer-ish that you insist on calling it that on the box, too!
Before the iPhone 4S, everyone was waiting for the “iPhone 5.” When the 4S debuted, disappointment reigned. All because of the name. Nearly everything else about the phone was an improvement or a new addition (Siri).
“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.” – MacDailyNews, “New Apple iPhone 4S fails to wow investors, fans,” October 4, 2011
“There are plenty of numbers in the universe. Infinite, actually. Don’t worry, Apple, you won’t run out. Wonder what the mood would be right now had Apple simply named ‘iPhone 4S’ the ‘iPhone 5?'” – MacDailyNews, “Apple underwhelms with iPhone 4S,” October 4, 2011
It’s not about sales figures or the model’s success (as long as ‘iPhone’ is in the name, it will be a success), it’s about setting a tone. In this case, with the “S,” Apple sets a tone that they are just making an incremental update (read: losing their innovation edge) which allows the media and competitors to claim, wrongly, that other companies have surpassed Apple. Why gift the naysayers with the opportunity, Apple?
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Dan K.” for the heads up.]
Related articles:
Ken Segall: Apple should name their next iPhone, ‘iPhone 6,’ not ’5S’ – April 5, 2013
