Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
While I agree, I was definitely a Mac user long before the introduction of the iPhone. They just had a pretty decent upgrade to the MacBook Pro, and are releasing Lion soon. To their credit I would say they have not forgotten about us :p

I'm daring to say that the impact the iPhone caused in people's lives also made the Mac more attractive to them.

Believe it or not, I still don't have an iPhone, but several of my friends do. Several of them even told me that the iPhone changed their lives ( ? ). Some were Mac haterz, but now own more than one Mac. :D
 
I'm just going to leave this here

The best part of this is:

“There’s no chance that the iPhone is going to get any significant market share. No chance. It’s a $500 subsidized item. They may make a lot of money. But if you actually take a look at the 1.3 billion phones that get sold, I’d prefer to have our software in 60 percent or 70 percent or 80 percent of them, than I would to have 2 percent or 3 percent, which is what Apple might get.”

(Think Tron: Legacy)
"WINDOWS 7 PHONE! WHERE ARE YOU NOW?"
 
Remember Jobs saying how awesome the iPod was and how it was going to do SO MUCH and revolutionize the computer industry, etc. etc., I can't recall the exact words...

Everyone liked the iPod, but we just sat there scratching our heads. An mp3 player. It was an mp3 player. Had no idea what he was aiming for. Though the iPhone is a hit and did revolutionize the phone industry, the iPad is now revolutionizing the entire computer market, and who knows what comes beyond.
 
This is quite impressive seeing Apple only makes one model while Nokia sells dozens.



Actually Nokia does have their own factories making their phones. ;)

Oh, the Finnish phone manufacturer with 8 of 9 manufacturing facilities in Manaus, Brazil; Cluj, Romania; Beijing and Dongguan , China; Komárom, Hungary; Chennai, India; Reynosa, Mexico; and Masan, South Korea.

Give me a break. The respective phones wouldn't exist if Nokia or Apple didn't have them built, regardless of the "name" slapped up on the side of the factory in China or any other country.
 
Where's Mr. "Android slaughter" now? :)

It's good to see that Apple has developed a sustainable business model. It ensures they'll be around for a while in this market unless they make a huge mistake. But that does not seem to be happening any time soon.

Other companies should take note... customers will pay for quality and service and you don't have to give away product to attract customers. But I guess that's a different model that works for some?

This is why I don't understand why analysts and Wall Street are so hyped up over Android's smartphone market share. Supposedly Wall Street is supposed to be concerned with finance and revenue-making business models. Where is all the revenue that Android is making? I'm guessing once the rapid growth ends, Android will be more trouble than it's worth. Only HTC and Samsung seem to be making any money from Android. Motorola and LG certainly aren't. They're always talking about Android crushing iOS in some harmful fashion, but they must be using some perfect projection that won't necessarily hold true depending on whether Apple changes the smartphone industry again.

I realize Android has had fantastic growth, but it's to be expected somewhat considering most cellphone vendors didn't have a modern smartphone OS and Android is free for the taking. In some ways, taking the Google shortcut could be damaging in the long run if Google loses interest in supporting Android. Especially if they're losing money supporting Android. Who will mainly decide what platform comes out on top is the consumer who is willing to pay top dollar to own a quality device. iOS's business model will be sustainable for years to come if overall smartphone growth continues thanks in part of economies of scale spread over at least four similar iOS devices.
 
Hummm... No, It's more like a Car company becoming a Motorcycle company. Different Industries but not as different as you paint them.

Actually, the correctest analogy would be a car company becoming a motorcycle company, but also redefining the motorcycle to have 4 wheels.

Apple didn't just enter the phone market. It converted phones into computers. Before then phones were expected to be completely independent of the computing industry (e.g., the creation of a parallel internet WAP, for cellphones).
 
The best part of this is:

That being said, I don't think Ballmer deserves all the heat he is getting for those statements.

If the iPhone had remained a $500 product, with a 2 year contract, I doubt it would be selling even a tenth of what it does now.

Ballmer did not recognize that Apple had the ability to change its plans. And that changing a pricing plan was far easier than changing your entire software ecosystem (which is what MS is having to do to compete).
 
This is why I don't understand why analysts and Wall Street are so hyped up over Android's smartphone market share.

The answer to this is that, well, they aren't hyped up over Android. They are interested in it to the extent that Android will hurt Apple's iOS based businesses.

And they are learning now, that Android is not going to contribute any additional revenue to Google's bottom line. Only revenue growth associated with the rise of the mobile search market (fun fact...a recent Wired article revealed that Google gives away the 30%-CC fees Store cut to Verizon).
 
Apple didn't just enter the phone market. It converted phones into computers. Before then phones were expected to be completely independent of the computing industry (e.g., the creation of a parallel internet WAP, for cellphones).

The Sony Ericsson P900 I had back in 03/04 has a few things to say about that. Obviously the iPhone is a far superior device, but a lot of the Internet convergence device stuff that people talk about started with that series of smart phones.
 
That being said, I don't think Ballmer deserves all the heat he is getting for those statements.

If the iPhone had remained a $500 product, with a 2 year contract, I doubt it would be selling even a tenth of what it does now.

Ballmer did not recognize that Apple had the ability to change its plans. And that changing a pricing plan was far easier than changing your entire software ecosystem (which is what MS is having to do to compete).

You're right. But good things is, things change. Apple does adapt for the market and this is why I don't worry about any feature that is lacking now or in the future. Given time, Apple does seem not only to bring us things we ask for, but also surprises us with something we didn't think of.

With that said... Balmer does deserve the heat. As CEO of the largest software company on this planet and shipping millions of phones, he should have been able to see the writing on the wall. He choose not to or couldn't see past the present. MS really needs to move on past Balmer. I think he hurts more than helps. No vision.
 
While I agree, I was definitely a Mac user long before the introduction of the iPhone. They just had a pretty decent upgrade to the MacBook Pro, and are releasing Lion soon. To their credit I would say they have not forgotten about us :p

Yes. The Macbook upgrade is actually pretty impressive under the hood, which is something people considered Macs to be poor at.
 
While I agree, I was definitely a Mac user long before the introduction of the iPhone. They just had a pretty decent upgrade to the MacBook Pro, and are releasing Lion soon. To their credit I would say they have not forgotten about us :p

I'm fine with them using the extra revenue from the mobile sales to continue to support the smaller market share Mac has. If for some reason it ever goes defunct, I guess I'll be hopping over to Linux. :)
 
I'm daring to say that the impact the iPhone caused in people's lives also made the Mac more attractive to them.

Believe it or not, I still don't have an iPhone, but several of my friends do. Several of them even told me that the iPhone changed their lives ( ? ). Some were Mac haterz, but now own more than one Mac. :D

Yep, my mom says her next laptop is probably going to be a Mac. And her first Apple product was the iPhone 4 (she got convinced after she got a Blackberry and saw other people's iphones that she wanted one). She loved it so much she know has the most recent iPod Touch (though I have no clue why she'd buy that when she already has the iphone?) and now an iPad 2 (That she loves). And she says after talking to people with macs she'll probably get one when it's time to replace her laptop (she though recently just got a Dell laptop about the time she got the iPhone so that will be a few years I think).

The iPhone quickly converted her into an Apple fan :). And she used to snub her nose at my Macs (she was a total Windows person when I was a kid).
 
The Sony Ericsson P900 I had back in 03/04 has a few things to say about that. Obviously the iPhone is a far superior device, but a lot of the Internet convergence device stuff that people talk about started with that series of smart phones.

While it may be true, it's not very relevant. This type of thing happens all the time. Was whoever the first company to use device A? No, some Jon doe ran a business out of his garage selling it, but no one used it or knew about it.

Apple is very good at taking something someone else creates 1 step further, or figuring out how to actually make people WANT to buy it. Face it. People complained iPads were too expensive, yet people in droves WANT to pay that money for it, even with MUCH CHEAPER options on the market.

Apple may have slowed down on internal innovation(stuff exclusively Apple), but they've leaped ahead in droves in expanding on ideas and marketing them.
 
Apple makes 3 models. 2 for GSM (AT&T still sells a lot of brand new 3GS's) and 1 for CDMA (you have to look carefully to see the differences in the metal band).

Apple makes one model with three variants of that one model.

One chasis with the same engine (iOS), and various different parts to drive the gears. One model, several variants.
 
The Sony Ericsson P900 I had back in 03/04 has a few things to say about that. Obviously the iPhone is a far superior device, but a lot of the Internet convergence device stuff that people talk about started with that series of smart phones.

Hah...I had the SE P900 also. Great phone, and just amazing for the time.

But, my point wasn't about internet convergence (this was just an example). The P900 did the internet really well (especially considering the poor HTML standards of the time, and the IE lock in, and the obviously poorer processor capabilities).

The point was about thinking of the phone as a computer. The iPhone, even before the App Store, screamed "develop for me, like you would for a mac". Which is why people were developing apps for it (on jailbroken phones) even before the App store.
 
There are an awful lot of share holders in this thread.... of course this is just an assumption because people are cheer apple for having the highest gross pf any maker. why does that matter to iphone buying customers...
 
There are an awful lot of share holders in this thread.... of course this is just an assumption because people are cheer apple for having the highest gross pf any maker. why does that matter to iphone buying customers...

The key term being "gross" profit. That is, income covering COGS, but before sales, marketing, Apple store costs, blah blah blah. A more important number would be EBITDA because it takes these expenses into account.
 
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.