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Apple CEO Tim Cook is not worried about Kindle Fire
- Thread starter GarytheiPhonema
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Isn't it iPod sales in general that are down 27% year-on-year; not specifically iPod Touch?
Also it's much more likely that - assuming iPod Touch sales are declining - it's due not to the iPad but to the availability of fairly affordable iPhone 3GS and now iPhone 4.
Oh look, Amazon is already out dating the 7" Fire. Apparently they just figured out 7" tablets suck.
Link: http://www.appleinsider.com/article..._to_8_9_display_for_next_gen_kindle_fire.html
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And yes, you are correct. iPod sales are down because the iPhone and other smartphones do everything the iPod does and then some. And since phones are a necessity, while iPads and iPods are not... Well, you already figured that out. Jsh1120 on the other hand...
Link: http://www.appleinsider.com/article..._to_8_9_display_for_next_gen_kindle_fire.html
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Better to ignore jsh1120. He's usually clueless.
And yes, you are correct. iPod sales are down because the iPhone and other smartphones do everything the iPod does and then some. And since phones are a necessity, while iPads and iPods are not... Well, you already figured that out. Jsh1120 on the other hand...
1. it's a rumor
2. it's an option in the product line
3. I hope iPad comes out with a 7.85" like the one they are testing now
1. We're on a site called MacRumors.
2. True
3. If Apple does make a 7" tablet, it would be a seriously neutered iPad to be sold on the cheap. Probably mimicking the Fire. Little on board storage, no cameras, no 3G or 4g capability, no retina display and no mic. Which IMO would suck.
1. you said "apparently" as if knowing intent
2.
3. the ipod touch has camera and retina display and is much smaller than 7.85"
I can find no news articles at MR or elsewhere saying this.
I can find no references anywhere to Amazon's Kindle Fire Store. I see no references on amazon.com or anywhere else of this store.
Can you please provide some references that back up your claim?
Acually, it's very difficult to hide the branding. I'd bet that Kindle Fire apps will indeed be sold through Amazon's Android App Store.
In other words, you have no source citing any numbers, and you can't draw a clear correlation to the announcement of the Fire. Thanks for clearly communicating that.
I'll let the post above take care of the question of whether Amazon will sell apps through their Android App Store. They won't. The Fire will capitalize on the Kindle branding, not Android. And the target market for the Fire couldn't care less what OS the Fire is running.
Second, as noted, sales of the iPod are down 27% compared to the year before. The sources are numerous. The quote above is from the Financial Times. Here's the WSJ.
http://online.wsj.com/article/BT-CO-20111018-715502.html
BTW, I didn't say that iPod plummeting sales were the result of the introduction of the Fire. What I said was that the sales had been dropping in part because of the introduction of the iPad. But a $199 tablet will be the nail in the coffin of the iPod Touch.
Finally, I didn't say that a shared OS identity across devices (i.e. phone, tablet, computer) is important. You did. I simply pointed out that if you're right, Microsoft is in a far better position to take advantage of that fact than Apple. Having an operating system that runs on better than 90% of all computers where most content is created and where units still outsell tablets four to one is a very large advantage on that score.
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Sure...
"When Amazon launched its Appstore for Android in March, some wondered why Amazon would bother creating an alternative to the Android Market. Now the reason is clear: It allowed Amazon to provide access to apps on its own devices.
Amazon will vet app submissions, just like Apple, and ensure that Kindle Fire users have access only to the apps that work on their device. And while were sure that Android hackers will be busy rooting the Kindle Fire, a la the Nook Color, were equally sure that Amazon will take as many precautions as it can to keep the device untouched.
The Appstore experience on the Kindle Fire is completely customized, as opposed to the free-for-all Appstore APK for Android devices. And, unlike regular Android which can exist without the Android Market Amazons approach is much more akin to the way the App Store is built into iOS.
In short, the Amazon Appstore is a fundamental part of the operating system."
http://mashable.com/2011/09/29/amazon-kindle-fire-android-hijack/
I wouldn't be worried either, but I do think there was a huge consumer base waiting for something like the fire. I plan on getting one for my daughter as a gift for Christmas. I wanted something that was more than an ereader, but the ipad is just out of the question at her age. The price point is perfect, so I'm sold on it. It would have been great for Apple to have a device like this, but I don't think they will be able to do it at a price people are looking for.
I've seen no specific quotes about iPod Touch sales. The only number I've seen quoted by Apple referring to iPod Touch sales is that over 250M iOS devices have been sold. However, they didn't say how far north of 250M they were.
If there has actually been a decline in iPod Touch sales, the availability of low-cost iPhones has certainly been a factor.
Both of these facts have been ignored by JSH.
Apple refuses to discuss sales of individual models in the iPod line. (Not a big surprise given the overall drop in sales of the entire line.) They have said, however, that sales of the entire iPod line have been shifting away from the classic and nano models to the iPod Touch over the last two years. But an overall repeated decline in unit sales of between 25%-30% over the last year of the entire line doesn't leave any room for strong sales of any of the devices.
There's no question that growth in iPhone sales have impacted iPod sales. But there's also no question that much of the strength of iPad sales has come from a large market segment who were not interested in a laptop computer and would otherwise have been a target for the iPod.
Many analysts expected the recent iPhone announcement to include a funeral for the iPod Touch. It didn't. But what it did include as a "fire sale" (sorry) for the iPod Touch. Next time around there won't be an iPod Touch, at least not in its current configuration.
The advantage of the Fire over previous Kindles is that there are apps that read other ebook/etextbook formats. With 1024 pixels width any document is just as easy to read (OK, you have to scroll a bit more) on 7" screens as it is on my iPad2. The Kindle app allows annotating/highlighting/comments so I doubt software will be the problem. You're right though in that having every book you need in the right format is the challenge with any digital backpack replacement.
That makes sense to me. I have a Touch (also a Classic before that as well as Nano--I upgraded over time for increased usage) and when I buy my next phone it will be an Iphone since I can now buy a Verizon version. This means I won't buy a Touch replacement. My Ipad basically took the place of my Touch in May 2010 and my Touch is used almost exclusively for music now.
In other words, when you said:
You actually have no hard numbers that back up your conjecture. That is telling.
Then those analysts -- and posters here -- were wrong.
The term "fire sale" is also inappropriate. The spin term implies that Apple was selling some sort of damaged goods or selling it at a loss; that's untrue.
Thanks to the portability of software through the iOS family, the Touch is indeed a valuable device. Students or businessmen can use it to make an audio recording of a lecture/meeting (and annotate that meeting with timestamped notes). A businessman can connect his Touch to a projector and control the presentation with his iPad -- or he can control with the Touch and project with the iPad if he prefers. Customers of Apple's App Store enjoy near-universal availability of their data and their apps on all machines.
Your story is pretty common. I suspect that you bought an iPod Touch in large part because it provided a way to access Apple's apps without switching to AT&T for the iPhone. But once you bought an iPad, the value of the Touch was diminished. The combination of the iPhone availability on Verizon and the availability of iPhone/iPod Touch/iPad apps on the iPad has squeezed the iPod Touch into oblivion.
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And since iPads are not a "necessity" that's why their sales are down. Right?
Since there is no Kindle
One of the large issues is whether or not the publishers will re-paginate their books for these smaller formats. For the iPad, that is not necessary.
A second problem is PDF files, which are problematic to re-paginate. How would students view PDFs on the Fire? Would annotating/highlighting a shrunken PDF file actually work? I'd like to hear what @Palpatine and other grad students have to say about this.
It's the hardware that poses the big problem: are fingers precise enough to annotate a shrunken page?
Nothing shocking.
Anyone who read the tech sites before the Fire was announced knew...
The Fire would be based on the Blackberry tablet h/w so they would have something to release this year.
The next tablet was going to be the real one.
I have the Nook Color, the HTC flyer, the Acer A100, an Archos 70it, and a few other 7" tablets to play with. No problem viewing PDFs full page in portrait mode on any of them. It's also easy to zoom in on a paragraph or sentence to highlight/annotate it (if the app used supports annotating) with regular sized fingers. Double-tap or two-finger spread works the same in android as it does in iOS. The current Kindles have mark-up and PDF support even without having touchscreen features.
Not right. From Apple's own quarterly reports (archive here), here are the results from the start of the iPad. Note: the date is the last day of each quarter for each reporting period:
FY10Q3 6/26/2010 3.27M
FY10Q4 9/25/2010 4.19M
FY11Q1 12/25/2010 7.33M
FY11Q2 3/26/2011 4.69M
FY11Q3 6/25/2011 9.25M
FY11Q4 9/24/2011 11.12M
Facts are stubborn things. Apple just had their best sales quarter ever for iPads. Can you provide any numbers showing that iPad sales are down?
This article says Tim Cook isn't afraid of the Kindle Fire. I'm not either! Kindle Fire doesn't have half of what my wife and I need in a tablet. Cant wait for iPad 3
http://bit.ly/rtXEtC
If you can read pdf, surf the internet and watch movies on it, then Apple needs to be worried.
Because that's all I would use a tablet for.
I'm on interested in games like Angry Birds.
<sigh> Sarcasm is difficult for some to grasp. I was referencing Mac.World's comment that "iPods and iPads are not necessities" and that therefore the sales of smartphones have contributed to the iPod's declining sales. Hint: If A=C and B=C, A=B.
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There's more than enough room at the top table for another top-tier player like an Amazoon, to co-exist with Apple. It's good to have a viable alternative, but Apple will always dominate, via their immense ubiquity and mindshare.
You failed to use any indication -- like a smiley -- that you were making a sarcastic comment.
As a rule of thumb, sarcasm is a poor choice in the public discussion group -- especially a world-wide discussion where many do not speak fluent english. Minimizing your sarcasm will lower the chance of misunderstanding. Thanks.
Actually, one had none to do with the other. I was simply pointing out that phones are a necessity, while iPads and iPods are not. iPods are losing out to iPhones and their Android based equivalents because those smartphones do everything the iPod does and more AND are a necessity AND have the same form factor.
iPads do not fall into the mobile phone or mp3 demographics. It falls under the ultra portable pc demographic.
I should have worded it differently for simplistics.