Bottom line: if you add up all of the people in this thread plus all of the people who have backed every iPhone 5 dock on kickstarter, you still don't come up with a very big number. For kickstarter projects, the numbers look good, though not great, but the numbers aren't big enough to point to an obvious product hole Apple needed to fill.
As for your comment about Apple creating a solution to dock iPhones in their stores... Apple wasn't housing iPhone 4 models in their iPhone 4 docks, nor do they house iPads in their own iPad docks. Apple came up with a custom solution that better fit the needs of their stores. It only makes sense that they've done that again for the iPhone 5.
Hey, I want an iPhone 5 dock as much as you do, but people like us are in such a tiny minority that Apple decided to leave it up to other companies to fill that need.
That Belkin car charger is way overpriced. Just buy a usb car charger for less than $10 on amazon and use your existing cable.
I just wonder if this is a bellwether to a cultural shift, seemingly trivial but in retrospect something that might be viewed as another brick in the wall.
Let's say 1% of all users want a dock. That's 400,000 docks. At $25 a pop that's a ten million dollar line of business. And then there's the intangible aspect of brand loyalty.
ordered a dock and it doesn't work. Stay away!
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/321004035360?ssPageName=STRK:MEWNX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1497.l2649
That math may be a good reason not to produce a dock. I know you are just guestimating so I won't take it too literally, but what is 10 million for a company that pulls in tens of billions in revenue annually?
Sure, it may be easy sales, but they still need people to develop it, people to build it, people to manage stock and it has to take floor space in their retail chains. It might be that it's financially better to not produce it themselves and to just stock someone else's product and take a cut there. It may also free up production lines for products that will have a higher demand such as headphones or whatever.
That said...I wouldn't be surprised to see a first party dock down the line. Apple was clearly slow at getting lightening adopted (hell its still dragging on). They were slow to get adapters to the market so I don't think it is unfeasible that it also impacted their ability to release docks, and if they have a lower demand than cables then perhaps we'll see one released in 2013 once they are having an easier time getting lightening based accessories to the market.
just bought the elevation dock, yes its too expensive, but ive been looking for a good dock for a while, and at this point just needed something reliable. hopefully it all works out
Yes, it seems many people are having issues with these flat docks that seem to have the bread-board lightning connector.
Depends on perspective. Clearly the empirical evidence does not indicate sufficient demand for Apple. Your notion of sufficient demand is entirely different. Evidence can be empirical but benefit interpreted from the evidence can be subjective.but what benefit is there to categorically rule out a product that there is historic empirical evidence is in demand.
Surely Apple has made their position pretty clear? I interpret from Phil Schiller's comments that they had very little demand for a dock... no matter what people seem to think.
Apple just makes cool things that are nice to use and customers will buy. If a product doesn't fit into that philosophy they won't make or sell it. Nothing has changed at Apple in that respect. The lack of Apple dock indicates nothing deeper.
https://www.macrumors.com/2012/09/18/apples-phil-schiller-reveals-no-plans-for-an-iphone-5-dock/
if they had "very little demand" then why the iPhone 4 dock is still a best seller according to apple online store.
Depends on perspective. Clearly the empirical evidence does not indicate sufficient demand for Apple. Your notion of sufficient demand is entirely different. Evidence can be empirical but benefit interpreted from the evidence can be subjective.