“Tim Cook closed yesterday’s Apple event with these words: ‘From everything we’ve shared with you, you can see how important these services are for us and for all the ways they extend the experiences of our customers even further. They entertain, inspire, inform, and enrich our lives. Because at Apple, the customer is, and always will be, at the center of everything that we do,'” Ben Thompson writes for Stratechery. “It’s a short statement, but a useful way to think about the event specifically, and the state of Apple generally.”
“‘From everything we’ve shared with you.’ Frankly, not much; there were far more announcements that were coming in the summer or fall than were ready today or in the next couple of weeks,” Thompson writes. “Just as disconcerting was the lack of pricing information: Apple News+ is $9.99, and the Apple Card has no fees…and that’s all we know.”
“This raises the question of what was the point of having his presentation now,” Thompson writes. “That is why I thought Cook’s most telling phrase was ‘how important these services are for us’; if Cook wanted to signify how importantly Apple was taking its efforts in developing these services, ‘to us’ would have been a more natural turn of phrase.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Yes, it seems that yesterday’s intended target audience certainly was Wall Street in large part. Otherwise, as Thomposn, asksed, why have the event now when hardly anything is ready?
SEE ALSO:
At their ‘It’s Show Time’ event, Apple brought nothing to the table but its power – March 26, 2019
Apple just revolutionized another industry with Apple Card – March 26, 2019
Apple CEO Tim Cook’s ‘It’s Show Time’ event felt rushed and incomplete – March 26, 2019
Apple unveils Apple TV+ original video subscription service – March 25, 2019
Introducing Apple Card, a new kind of credit card created by Apple – March 25, 2019
Apple launches Apple News+ – March 25, 2019
Apple introduces Apple Arcade – world’s first game subscription service for mobile, desktop and the living room – March 25, 2019
Otherwise, as Thomposn, asksed, why have the event now when hardly anything is ready?
I thought this was standard procedure at Apple. As a long time Apple user I’m not impressed by any of this. Who knows, maybe I’ll find something useful in all this. Don’t have my hopes set very high so I won’t be disappointed. As long as my hardware keeps chugging along I’m content.
Snoozefest yesterday apart from the Apple Card, for all the analysts watching for proof that Apple is truly morphing to a services company. Steve Jobs, (like Elon Musk) really hated Wall Street but with launches of amazing new products every few years, he felt immune to the analysts who ‘always’ got it wrong. I guess Tim Cook and Apple are not in that position. That is not to say they could not be again, but it has been a bit of a drought… Hard to be eternally hopeful.
I think that take in the article is spot on but like it or not Apple isn’t the company it was under Jobs it is much bigger and more mature and doesn’t have a maverick that even though he received all the negativity you see now he was able to make appear irrelevant to the progress of the company. Yes Musk is a similar figure but it scares me far more stiff than Cook if he were running the company. He is a smoke and mirrors operator where genius can make things happen, hype can disguise the realities and equally an overblown sense of immortality can drive his businesses recklessly into the quicksand while he walks away relatively untouched, if only all those who have invested money in him can’t afford to have the one thing, his ego, that gives it any value brought back to the reality of the eternal cliff edge. Reminds me of the South Sea Bubble where eventually if belatedly truth conquered years of fantasy.
“Oh, and one more thing… available now… an at a price you’ll love…”
Those days are gone, and that Apple is history:
“the customer is, and always will be, at the center of everything that we do” (Cook’s sleight of hand)
has morphed into:
“yesterday’s intended target audience certainly was Wall Street in large part” (MDN’s prescient take).
So important they forgot to update the Bluetooth radio in the newest iMacs “updated” just last week but still with 7th and 8th gen chips in all base models except for one with the latest 9th gen chip and one other base config having the 9th gen chip as an option. iMacs have had Bluetooth 4.2 since 2017. Bluetooth 5.0 was announced in 2016 and made part of Galaxy S8 in April, 2017 and iPhone 8 in September, 2017. Why Apple? Why? Does anyone have an explanation for this other than greed? The performance differences are substantial and I can’t imagine the cost the extra cost is significant. Perhaps it is just more of the same bafoonery we’ve come to expect under Cook’s “leadership.”
“Oh, and one more thing: We did not reveal the interest on the Apple Card because it’s zero!”
Unless it’s a debit card I don’t believe that.
It felt more like it was intended for the content producers when they talked about TV+ and Arcade.
If I wanted a cable company…
All that was missing was Clippy and Microsoft Bob.
This is the real sneak preview of Apple TV+
The “after midnight” version….
I can see how important services are to Apple.
The problem is that Apple doesn’t seem to understand how little these services matter to me.
I already have a credit card, there is no way I will award Goldman Sucks with more business, the economic parasites they are.