Apples Slump

[Paolo]

I've heard rumors that apples tough stage (when they were releasing the smae computer 100 times) could of been purposeful. As it is assisting there market now. Although personally I think these rumors are ********* because it seems like a pretty stupid marketing idea.
What do other people think?

[macaddict123k]

what do u mean by tough?

[Gelfin]

"[...] when they were releasing the smae computer 100 times [...]"

You mean like now, with the iMac?

Seriously, people tend to come up with theories like this, but they don't make a lot of sense. Here are a couple of other examples you may have heard in the past:

- "New Coke" was just a marketing ploy. It was designed to fail just to make "Classic Coke" more popular when they brought it back.

- The shortage of Playstation 2 consoles last Christmas was fake, engineered by Sony to increase demand, drive up prices on eBay and get press when insane parents started trampling each other to get them for Christmas.

Neither of these scenarios make much sense, because the lost business is a LOT more costly than the incremental benefit it seems to generate later. Sony lost out on a bundle by missing a Christmas season. A lot of those kids won't get their PS2s until THIS Christmas, and in the meantime they're also losing on the sales of games and accessories.

Also, companies operate quarter to quarter. In almost any company, you're far more likely to see them sacrifice long-term initiatives in order to keep shareholders happy this quarter than to sacrifice short term profits for any reason, but especially as a part of a marketing gimmick.

It's just not very credible that Apple would intentionally spend years turning out overpriced, undifferentiated beige (or platinum) boxes if they had the Next Big Thing hidden in the wings.