82% of Teens Surveyed Now Own an iPhone, 84% Plan to Purchase

[TRDmanAE86]

I could believe this survey. I've noticed with most people, once they get a iPhone its hard for them to leave the ecosystem.

To most, I feel iPhones (especially the newest one) is regarded as a high privilege in America's young adult and teenager society to most.

In addition to that, I've noticed the process to switch from Android to Apple is seamless with the Move to iOS app. On the other hand, the process from switching from Apple to Android in general is a pain (especially when it comes to de-registering iMessage).

 

[eddjedi]

I think there's a big difference between 'preferred' and 'owns.' I've never seen a teen with a Rolex.

 

[szw-mapple fan]

Apple should launch their own version of facebook. One that doesnt data mine or run ads. With such a large and growing user base, it seems like a no brainer to me. Tim Cook spoke Friday about how their customers aren’t their product and how he wouldn’t be in a situation like Zuckerberg finds himself in, so why not launch your own social media app and capatilize on FaceBooks troubles?

Social Media is all about who is first to market and then it's about the existing user base. Unless Apple can figure out something that has some significant advantages over Facebook and can lure away a significant number of users nobody will bother. Google tried aggressively with buzz and google+, and failed both times. Most people don't value privacy and security as much as you think they do.

 

[BlargKing]

Updating the OS, installing anything, setting up email accounts, setting up notifications from social media, basic tools for computer science class (including a terminal), bookkeeping stuff like calendar and contacts (!), playing video files, saving passwords, opening a zip file or disk image, backups (Time Machine). Network, audio, shortcuts, and most other settings are also easier to manage in Sysprefs. There's a reason everyone in college uses one.


The displays have improved to follow the rMBP, but they're still worse all around. Hard to find one that has the right color and everything. Apps tend to support scaling less properly in Windows too.

IDK, I typically use a trackpad at work while coding. It's closer to my keyboard than my mouse is. But I guarantee most laptop users don't have a mouse.

-updating the OS, handled automatically by Windows
-installing software on a Mac: open a dmg, or run an installer. Windows: mostly run an installer, some software is a self-contained exe. Both are just as easy to execute.
-social media notifications: Haven't used Mac OS in a few years, but on Windows 10 I get notifications from all my social media websites on my desktop without any setup on my part. It just works, go figure.
-Mac OS has terminal, Windows has Command Prompt. Functionally the same.
-Calendar and Contacts: Don't know about either. Never used a computer for that, its all on my phone.
-Playing video files, really? MacOS: Quicktime/iTunes Windows: Windows Media Player/Groove Media Player. Both work the same, double click a file and it opens. Everyone knows VLC is better than what either OS comes with.
-Saving passwords. Again, not sure on this one. The only passwords I save are for websites, and Chrome keeps those for me.
-Opening a zip, again, really? Both OS have built in zip extraction thats functionally identical. Double click a ZIP and it opens, right-click for more advanced unzip options.
-I'll agree, Time Machine is far superior for system backups.
-Network, for the third time, really? Wireless, scan for a network, click SSID, enter key. Ethernet, plug-n-play (do Macs even have ethernet anymore?) Its literally just as easy on both OS.
-Audio: Plug in speakers/headphones to appropriate jack, works on Macs, PCs, cellphones, Mp3 players, discmans, and some portable 8-tracks.
-Settings: Mac OS I'll admit has a cleaner settings menu than Windows 10. But Windows 10 isnt so bad as to make it excessively difficult either.

All the stuff you listed is basic day to day stuff thats easy on pretty much any platform, even Linux these days. My computer illiterate mother had been using Mac OS for 4 years, bought herself a PC laptop, and needed no help to do the same tasks on it, despite never having used Windows 10. If Windows 10 was as difficult to use in day-to-day life as you try to make it out to be, it wouldn't be the most common OS, it would be relegated to enthusiasts and niche applications the way Linux is.

And I would be willing to bet more laptop users own a mouse than don't. Mice are far more comfortable and precise than trackpads.

 

[Toutou]

my niece told me that teens today would make fun of you if you had the green text

That's terrible. I thought it was a meme too.
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substantially doubt any power user will be using a trackpad for anything

As a programmer, I only use the trackpad. I do own a $10 plastic mouse. Maybe. I don't know, haven't seen it in ages.

 

[HarryWild]

Teen horologists usually favor Vaschian Constantine wrist watches! $100K+! Hard to buy used but if you buy new, it much more $$$$$$! A couple special limit edition models retail in mid $5million U.S. dollars.

 

[neuropsychguy]

All paid for with daddy's money.

I bought my teenager an iPhone (5s) (total of about $180 >1 year ago) and pay for her plan ($4 a month through an MVNO). It was (is) my money but that doesn't mean I have to spend very much.

 

[dirt_farmer]

They don't have to be rich. A smartphone is literally the most important object on earth for these kids...and many adults. They will give up anything for it. Seriously.
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The old "fickle" consumer has made Apple the most valuable and profitable company on the planet. It turns out, the Apple customer isn't your average customer. The opposite of fickle, really.

Yeah they'll do that.

High-margin products that become fashionable with the youth tend to help the balance sheet of the company that makes them. While they are in fashion.

In the 1990's, 60% of American households owned Beanie Babies.

 

[AZ63]

Those were my exact thoughts. This makes no sense. 41% of teens do not own a rolex

There was a sentence preceeding the chart. It referenced the survey being of upper income teens. So I guess it is more like, of the children of rich parents who have an expensive watch, 41% have a Rolex.
That is my read on the story.

 

[Baymowe335]

Yeah they'll do that.

High-margin products that become fashionable with the youth tend to help the balance sheet of the company that makes them. While they are in fashion.

In the 1990's, 60% of American households owned Beanie Babies.

Yeah, great comparison.

iPhone = Beanie Baby craze.

 

[travelsheep]

"plan to buy". That's why you always use a condom.

 

[dirt_farmer]

Yeah, great comparison.

iPhone = Beanie Baby craze.

Fashionable, disposable, not a necessary expense, can be abandoned on a whim by brand-conscious consumers.

Gushing fans overestimate value and utility by a factor of 1000.

Old ones sell for about 100x more than you would expect.

What seems like a "forever" market today will be a future generations' idea of a comically overblown fad.

It's not entirely off base you know.

 

[Baymowe335]

Fashionable, disposable, not a necessary expense, can be abandoned on a whim by brand-conscious consumers.

Gushing fans overestimate value and utility by a factor of 1000.

Old ones sell for about 100x more than you would expect.

What seems like a "forever" market today will be a future generations' idea of a comically overblown fad.

It's not entirely off base you know.

You couldn’t be more wrong in the comparison. You’re describing a fad. Beanie babies had no other move. It was the stuffed toy that didn’t do anything.

Apple is software and beautiful hardware they can take any form and do anything.

Apple has a moat, a powerful brand, a sticky ecosystem, and almost unlimited cash. Apple could buy Disney in cash, just as an example.

 

[dirt_farmer]

You couldn’t be more wrong in the comparison. You’re describing a fad. Beanie babies had no other move. It was the stuffed toy that didn’t do anything.

Apple is software and beautiful hardware they can take any form and do anything.

Apple has a moat, a powerful brand, a sticky ecosystem, and almost unlimited cash. Apple could buy Disney in cash, just as an example.

Same was tr

You couldn’t be more wrong in the comparison. You’re describing a fad. Beanie babies had no other move. It was the stuffed toy that didn’t do anything.

Apple is software and beautiful hardware they can take any form and do anything.

Apple has a moat, a powerful brand, a sticky ecosystem, and almost unlimited cash. Apple could buy Disney in cash, just as an example.

no argument that Steve's ideas made them a lot of money.

Their last major disruption was 11 years ago though. They are milking the same old cow relentlessly without any evidence of moving into new spaces.

That's why they're vulnerable to being dumped like any other fashion. They have all their eggs in mobile and mobile users are fickle.

Just ask blackberry, who also had a lot of cash, penetration, stickiness, and lock in. Right up until they didn't.

 

[RickInHouston]

Actually though, the green bubbles suck. Group chats are always a ****show when there are Android users in them due to the more primitive standard and some stupid phones that don't even do SMS group chats correctly. And you know the person with green bubbles isn't getting messages on his computer.

Again, I'm a green bubble. I get group messages from Apple phones. I also text from my computer with them. Mighty Text. It's a Chrome Gmail extension / app.

Keep up.

 

[fairuz]

Again, I'm a green bubble. I get group messages from Apple phones. I also text from my computer with them. Mighty Text. It's a Chrome Gmail extension / app.

Keep up.

I know those SMS web services exist and use them but have never heard of my friends using them. Doesn't matter which client you use anyway. The SMS standard is very limited. Group chats in it are basically "send this message N times, once to each of N people in the chat." Makes group management difficult and is prone to errors if any clients misbehave.

 

[Kcetech1]

Im somewhat curious as to where they polled at. at my youngest's highschool and my next oldest in her first year of college I would guess that between their classmates and people I see at the school and on campus to be almost an exact reversal, ok maybe more of a 2/3 Android 1/3 iPhone. they youngest is doing her best to convince her father to take her X and give her his Samsung 9 ( hes not warming up to the idea yet )

 

[fairuz]

-updating the OS, handled automatically by Windows
-installing software on a Mac: open a dmg, or run an installer. Windows: mostly run an installer, some software is a self-contained exe. Both are just as easy to execute.
-social media notifications: Haven't used Mac OS in a few years, but on Windows 10 I get notifications from all my social media websites on my desktop without any setup on my part. It just works, go figure.
-Mac OS has terminal, Windows has Command Prompt. Functionally the same.
-Calendar and Contacts: Don't know about either. Never used a computer for that, its all on my phone.
-Playing video files, really? MacOS: Quicktime/iTunes Windows: Windows Media Player/Groove Media Player. Both work the same, double click a file and it opens. Everyone knows VLC is better than what either OS comes with.
-Saving passwords. Again, not sure on this one. The only passwords I save are for websites, and Chrome keeps those for me.
-Opening a zip, again, really? Both OS have built in zip extraction thats functionally identical. Double click a ZIP and it opens, right-click for more advanced unzip options.
-I'll agree, Time Machine is far superior for system backups.
-Network, for the third time, really? Wireless, scan for a network, click SSID, enter key. Ethernet, plug-n-play (do Macs even have ethernet anymore?) Its literally just as easy on both OS.
-Audio: Plug in speakers/headphones to appropriate jack, works on Macs, PCs, cellphones, Mp3 players, discmans, and some portable 8-tracks.
-Settings: Mac OS I'll admit has a cleaner settings menu than Windows 10. But Windows 10 isnt so bad as to make it excessively difficult either.

All the stuff you listed is basic day to day stuff thats easy on pretty much any platform, even Linux these days. My computer illiterate mother had been using Mac OS for 4 years, bought herself a PC laptop, and needed no help to do the same tasks on it, despite never having used Windows 10. If Windows 10 was as difficult to use in day-to-day life as you try to make it out to be, it wouldn't be the most common OS, it would be relegated to enthusiasts and niche applications the way Linux is.

And I would be willing to bet more laptop users own a mouse than don't. Mice are far more comfortable and precise than trackpads.

- OS updates: First of all, there's the notorious "auto-restarting soon to install updates" appearing behind something; has screwed over many teachers giving presentations and kids gaming online. Lion and later have made major OS updates simple and unified. Windows 7 to 8 to 10 are all different installers, each with different versions, and I recall the 10 updater having the nerve to seed bit torrents.
- Installing stuff: Almost nothing you download for Windows is a standalone program, which is annoying, esp when managing what you have installed. Most Mac software is just a .app you drag in.
- Social media: Possible I was wrong. I set up Facebook in Windows and didn't have it ask me, so I thought it was a no-go.
- Terminal: It's full-featured in macOS vs barebones in Windows. CMD is so bad that day 1, every Windows user in an intro CS class installs Git Bash, which still kinda sucks. Even Ubuntu didn't get it right. I don't understand why.
- Video files: Windows somehow has issues playing videos in a browser. Quick Look is nice. WMP sucks, but true you'd just use VLC on either.
- Passwords: This is a systemwide thing in macOS, not just for browsers. Also is nice and more secure to have passwords saved in Keychain instead of each browser storing in their own way. Basically replaces 1Password for most. And this matters because security is the hardest thing for the average user.
- Zip: They still didn't get this right. It opens it like a folder instead of extracting. Sounds minor, but it's always a headache walking someone through extracting these. Still can't open gz and other archives (I know, not zip, but same idea).
- Network: Plug-n-play is the same, but if you ever need to change more detailed settings (often have to for managed or multiple networks), it either requires excessive navigation or makes things impossible. I've had to give up a few times before. Also, no VPN built in, I don't think proxies either, so people install sketchy software for that instead.
- Audio: Similar issues as network but not as bad. I always have issues with it, tbh don't remember what exactly but will next time I use my Windows boot disk.

 

[Baymowe335]

Same was tr
no argument that Steve's ideas made them a lot of money.

Their last major disruption was 11 years ago though. They are milking the same old cow relentlessly without any evidence of moving into new spaces.

That's why they're vulnerable to being dumped like any other fashion. They have all their eggs in mobile and mobile users are fickle.

Just ask blackberry, who also had a lot of cash, penetration, stickiness, and lock in. Right up until they didn't.

Do you even have a concept how different Apple is today than when Jobs died? They are far more into services, far more into wearables, sell 3X as many iPhones, design much better silicon, and are just a much more powerful and pervasive company.

Again, blackberry wasn’t even 20% of current Apple at their peak with nowhere close the cash, following, or sticky ecosystem. People liked the email and track wheel. Apple is far different with far more software/hardware advantages than Rimm. Horrible, lazy comparison.

Notice just Apple Music now has 40M paid subscribers? Just that business is a Fortune 500 company.

 

[dirt_farmer]

Do you even have a concept how different Apple is today than when Jobs died? They are far more into services, far more into wearables, sell 3X as many iPhones, design much better silicon, and are just a much more powerful and pervasive company.

Again, blackberry wasn’t even 20% of current Apple at their peak with nowhere close the cash, following, or sticky ecosystem. People liked the email and track wheel. Apple is far different with far more software/hardware advantages than Rimm. Horrible, lazy comparison.

Notice just Apple Music now has 40M paid subscribers? Just that business is a Fortune 500 company.

no question they are executing the same things Steve was doing but at a much higher level. What do you expect? They are run by a very competent administrator now and have had ten years to practice and improve.

What's conspicuous to me is what they are not doing. Which is leaping into bad technologies and revolutionizing them in the way that only Apple can.

Or could, anyway.

Edit the reference to blackberry is only as a cautionary tale about hubris. BB was the best and nobody could touch them at what they did. So they milked it for ten years while hungrier companies were preparing to explode the entire industry.

Sound familiar at all? Hold up an iPhone or Macbook pro next to a ten year old predecessor and tell me it's not just Steve's original vision on a low carb diet. Ten years is a long time to stay the same in technology .

 

[HarryWild]

It is a disposable society we live in now!

 

[dwaltwhit]

"Why are new emojis news???"

I believe this is your answer

 

[TallManNY]

Twice the useful life my rear, at least so far as doing anything remotely intensive. Considering most Macs are far behind PC in terms of performance at the time of purchase, professionals are going to have to replace their entire machines far more frequently than someone who buys a high end PC. The PC I built 4 years ago is still going strong, my mothers, brothers, and my own laptops are all still running smoothly after 2 years.

PCs don't break down nearly as fast as some people like to believe.

Sales growth doesn't necessarily mean PC is dying, maybe its because you can get a powerful PC for half the cost of a Mac and people aren't replacing them as often.

And it may be a small niche of the whole market, but I'm seeing more and more creative professionals abandoning Mac and getting a PC because of the same reasons. Cheaper, faster, just as reliable.

My 2009 iMac still works. Used it this morning. My 2011 iMac failed only weeks ago (I think CPU issue as I was able to get to hard drive booting into target mode). My GF's 2010 Macbook Pro is working fine. I know lots of people having similar experiences with Macs. The fact that you are citing 2-year old computers and talking about them working smoothly as some example of robust quality shows you aren't even living in the same world as Mac users.

Look at the sales price of PC, they aren't selling the powerful machines in high volume. They are selling sub-$800 laptops that largely aren't going to be operational 5 years from now.

But yeah, twice the useful life is probably a stretch. 50% longer useful life though, I would guess, is probably what is happening.

 

[dwaltwhit]

no question they are executing the same things Steve was doing but at a much higher level. What do you expect? They are run by a very competent administrator now and have had ten years to practice and improve.

What's conspicuous to me is what they are not doing. Which is leaping into bad technologies and revolutionizing them in the way that only Apple can.

I would contend that the wearables market, watches specifically, was bad technology before Apple stepped in.

 

[TallManNY]

82% own an iPhone, 84% plan to purchase? Really? There's something wrong there with the basic maths.

Nothing wrong with that. Though I would suspect that many people can't predict what they will buy a year or two from now. And the iPhone seems better, so they think they are buying it. Some of those teens might find they can't afford an iPhone when they go to buy. I also suspect that many teens are using hand down iPhones.
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Some PCs are junk, its true. Careful consideration and looking at reviews and feedback greatly negates that. I've been running the same PC I built for 4 years without a single hardware failure, its not terribly difficult to keep a PC running smoothly.

My company's IT guy (now ex-IT guy, but not at all because of this situation, he just moved on to a new job) suggested Toshiba laptops. They were $1,200 or so and they have been a hassle and mediocre. But they are largely all still working okay. But I'm not guessing they will last 5+ years.