“Apple’s new futuristic-looking Mac Pro will be a status purchase, an analyst said today as she predicted the high-priced desktop will sell better than many expect,” Gregg Keizer reports for Computerworld. “‘In a very real sense, this tower, this Darth Vader desktop, will be the high tech equivalent of the Air Jordan sneaker,'” said Laura DiDio, lead analyst at Information Technology Intelligence Consulting (ITIC). ‘It’s certainly not going to sell in huge numbers, not with a three- or four-thousand dollar price tag, but it definitely will have high-end appeal as a status thing.'”
“‘You have to remember that no matter what the financial analyst community says, there is a distinction between what the cognoscenti say and what consumers believe about Apple,’ said DiDio. ‘Consumers never bought into the idea that after Jobs died, that Apple was cooked. They love the brand and they love the products,'” Keizer reports. “‘Despite the fact that the desktop is in decline and under pressure, there is still a market for them,” said DiDio. “And Apple knows better than any other company how to target buyers.’ And how to appeal to status seekers as well as those who can put the system to productive use.”
Read more in the full article here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Brawndo Drinker” for the heads up.]
Related articles:
Hands on with the all-new Mac Pro, Apple’s miniature powerhouse – December 19, 2013
Fully maxed-out Apple Mac Pro just $9,600 – December 19, 2013
All new Mac Pro available on December 19 starting at $2999 – December 18, 2013
The Force is strong with this one…
If by status seeker she means one who uses conspicuous consumption as a badge of affluence and a pretense of virtue associated with a higher class, then I must demur; a small but trim sailboat would be the better use of coin.
But if by status seeker she envisions the artist and craftsman who aspires to a state of perfection through wielding, with delight and wonder, the sublime tools of the gods, then I say, count me amongst those climbers to the stars.
To thee oh hannajs would’st I stick tar’d feathers onto my back to soar beside thee plucking a soaring tune pon a harp to softly etch hand and footholds so that when’st thou climbestto the stars, thou shalt do so with the feeling that thou art cushioned upon a cloud!
In thy prose, bare this fool gladly! 🙂
I completely understand what you’re saying, but I don’t think there’s even one ‘small, but trim sailboat’ in the Mac Pro’s price range that most would consider a ‘status symbol’.
Now, if you meant to use the example metaphorically, then I’ll grant you that there are countless other objects of desire well-heeled poseurs could indulge themselves with.
While it’s certainly true that most who will buy the Mac Pro will do so because they’re professionals, or because they’re enthusiasts, passionate about the object of their desire, and the pursuit they’ll execute with it, there will certainly be a class who will buy it just because it’s cool, expensive, and desirable.
Think of it like a BMW: Some buy it because they love the brand, some because they’re motoring enthusiasts, and some buy because they want to show off to their friends and neighbors. I think there will be a similar mix with the new Mac Pro.
I used the If-by-whiskey logic structure in my whimsy that also dared to embed a going-places metaphor. In trying to do too much with a few words, the economics got in the way!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/If-by-whiskey
Thank you for the link hannahjs.
Well, there’s something I didn’t know before today. Thanks, Hannah!
Me too. An ole boy from Biloxi I say.
“Darth Vader”? It looks more like mini R2D2…
Ahh…You underestimate the power of the dark side!
Ahhh…..you don’t know the power of the dark side!
The dark side has clouded your vision…and your thoughts. 😉
Actually looks more like the black droid that attacks Princess Leia in the first 1977 Star Wars film.
” ‘Consumers never bought into the idea that after Jobs died, that Apple was cooked. They love the brand and they love the products,’ Keizer reports.”
Apple was not cooked, but it was Cooked.
As I posted a previous article, it’s not Darth Vader but the precursor to R2D2. haha
What the new Mac Pro needs is a flat and wide thunderbolt expansion chassis, designed to sit underneath the MacPro, so that it looks like the Cray-1.
cf.
A HP Z820 high end workstation configured the same cost more than the Mac Pro.
Who gives a damn about the status thing. Didio is just expressing her own values as a status seeker. This black beauty just symbolizes pure power and I want one – and I love their products, period. Who does not?
Exactly. I could give a damn about about owning a status symbol. I like and use powerful Macs and the Mac Pro just happens to be the best in this regard so I buy it. End of story. PCtards want you to think we buy for vacuous reasons spending a premium because we “blindly” follow the brand. Frankly I’d pay anything to avoid having to use a Windows computer. OS X is the more refined delightful OS, by a long shot. (Well duh.)
I’d go farther and say that using Windows was like being enclosed in an iron maiden by the Inquisition, OS X like a pardon from the Pope.
Are you kidding? Most of the computer industry is sure this new Mac Pro will be an instant flop.
These are some of the reasons why:
1. It doesn’t look like a computer.
2. It doesn’t come with a hard drive.
3. It’s made by Apple.
4. It’s too expensive.
5. Apple doesn’t innovate.
6. Tim Cook is Apple’s CEO.
7. It’s being assembled in the U.S.
That’s just off the top of my head but I’m sure an Apple-hater could think of another half-dozen reasons why it will become Apple’s biggest mistake in years. Just watch as the days go by and how the pundits will dump all over this new Mac Pro and consider it a scourge upon the computer industry and all mankind. Something akin to the anti-Christ of computerdom.
I’m pretty certain that much of Apple’s continued share price collapse is due to the belief the Mac Pro will be a total sales disaster.
Hey laughing stock, if you would take your head out-o-your ass and read the reviews, and check the sales, you would know you are dead wrong, and maybe you will grow up and no longer be a (stock)(boy) (use interchangeably or in combination)
I was thinking more along the lines of the breathing device sound.
Maybe some will buy it because it will sit quietly on your desk in an unobtrusive way for years and allow you to blaze through your work.
I for one cannot wait to get one so I can read my email more quickly.
LOL.
What the heck? Me too.
“Tim, sen me one. No, make it 2. One for home and one for work.”
Darth Vader to Tim Cook “I find your lack of stock disturbing” (Force Choke).
Nice one!
It’s a status symbol in the same way that a 747 cargo jet would be a status symbol for FedEX.
For the pros yes, but part of the reason those shipping times are already lengthening so badly is that some people just want the shiny-shiny. They’ll be Mac Pro purchasers all over the Mac Web in a few weeks telling us how many frames per second they get on Bioshock Infinite or whatever the latest demanding game is, and those people won’t even know how to load a file in Photoshop or Final Cut Pro.
True.
And tragic.
I work in a school system, and get tired of students endlessly going on about how proficient they are with whatever the popular game of the minute is, yet seem to not understand how to write or even properly save and essay to a file, and cannot multiply 6×8. Or cannot change a flat tire on their car in the parking lot, not because they can’t find the spare, but don’t even know what it is.
From Apples point of view, they will be the first to turn on Apple when an irrelevant technical spec is superseded by some other games irrelevant spec that is .1% faster.
We talk about how intelligent they are. No, it is cleverness, which is not at all the same thing as intelligence.
Ah well, I will spend Christmas break working on new ways to try to put something of value into their heads.
“… there is a distinction between what the cognoscenti say and what consumers believe about Apple”
The generally accepted definition of cognoscenti is somebody who is especially well informed. I don’t think that the term cognoscenti could be applied to those who claim that Apple is not doing well without Steve Jobs at the helm.
The transition to 64 bit IOS devices was done just as Steve would have hoped that it would happen if he were around and getting the iPhone 5S to a global market was achieved in a shorter timescale and in larger numbers than Steve had ever witnessed. The new Mac Pro is something that he would have been extremely proud to unveil and there is every reason to believe that new product launches in 2014 will be equally impressive too.
If these ‘cognoscenti’ believe that Apple is not doing well, perhaps they could let us know who is setting the tech trends these days ? Nobody could seriously call Samsung a trend setter – especially with their hilarious Galaxy Gear wristwatch. Dell are further on the sidelines than they have ever been, Microsoft has made a succession of failed product launches and is watching their core products whither away while nobody wants to be their CEO. Google is a company that doesn’t really have a focus – apart from exploiting the personal data it can gather from it’s users. It throws all sorts of stuff at the wall and sees what sticks.
There is only one tech company that can guarantee to make global headlines and meaningful profits every time they announce any new products and that company is Apple. They are the tech company making more money than any other and they have a flagship smartphone which is not only their best selling phone, but also the best selling smartphone in the world.
Cogniscenti ? Cockamamie is a better description for them.
Set designers will be all over this. Except to see it in TV and Theatrical productions.