Other Dear Apple,

[roland.g]

It's not hard to understand that we are at a point where smartphones are going to be innovative every year, like they were in the 2010s. If I still had an iPhone 14, the 17 models definitely have enough upgrades that would make it worth it. USB, Apple Intelligence, upgraded camera, better battery life, faster performance, better display.

USB. Whatever. I have it on my iPad and laptop but still having Lightning is fine with me. I charge via MagSafe most of the time and don’t transfer over cable so I rarely plug anything into the port.

Don’t need don’t care about AI or AI.

Never loved that the major focus each year seemed to be on camera improvements. I’m not a professional photographer or videographer and my camera does the job. I am not part of the social media selfie generation constantly taking pics and posting my life.

My 3 year old battery is working fine but sure, this is the one spot I’d welcome the 17 Pro Max I guess.

Faster performance and better display. Would either of those change how I read a webpage, or email, or do most of the things on my phone. I don’t game on it. Most of my apps don’t benefit from either of these. An upgrade would come with it, but I’m not sure I truly need either to watch a YouTube video. I can still stream NFL RedZone on my phone just fine when I need to.

The point of my post was that I still believe Apple is taking too long on the Fold and while we all knew before the event they wouldn’t release it this year and it’s supposedly pegged for next year, I think that’s unfortunate and slow on their part.

 

[orsev]

Gotta keep the stockholders happy every year....

I think that's a wider reflection on the market as whole. Even with the current state of buybacks I don't think that's likely to change anytime soon! The fact (as @NotApplicable said) that there is a literal legal requirement does not help this, especially once a given player scales to a certain point.

I would've never assumed that for a given product category, annual advancements would be as "exciting" in year 18 as it would be in year 3 or 6 or 9. It's more than logical that maturity leads to more incrementalism in updates. I don't know why it surprises anyone.

Sure, there will be some bigger blips over time, when new COMPONENT technologies similarly come into existence or become scalable, but on average, the marginal improvement with each year will obviously decrease, and honestly, good.

If every year the advancements were as significant as the Retina display or the all glass and metal construction, the amount of e-waste it would be responsible for would be absolutely insane (actually, more than that, because it already is absolutely insane). Some argue quite successfully (see frame.work) that even in the age of "no innovation," these brands are still pandering to consumerism to too high of a degree. But this is the nature of having a legal duty to make as much profit as possible.

Imagine if literally every user was compelled to upgrade every year because the rate of "innovation" was somehow constant. Again, this is impossible, but still. Sounds bad.

Agreed through and through. This is something that really grinds the gears across the whole public sphere around apple commentary. Taking the iPhone air as an example, the technology present in minimising and compacting the internals into the island is seriously impressive. It may not be as flashy as retina, or moving to ARM, but it lays the groundwork for a whole host of interesting products in the future (like a foldable, which the air looks suspiciously close to 50% of one).

Even if Apple was able to compel, or even enforce an upgrade every year, the public perception would be atrocious and run them into the ground, just look at large volume of users that are convinced there is a forced obsolescence conspiracy, where apple have a magic button they press to break iPhones...!

 

[Allen_Wentz]

Dear Apple,

Thank you.

Thank you for opting not to take my money again this year. Thank you for letting me keep $2,000+ instead of buying a new iPhone. I appreciate your thoughtfulness as you slow roll your innovation and continue to release variants of the iPhone 12 Pro. By not making the iPhone 17 Pro Max any more compelling than my iPhone 14 Pro Max, I can continue to use this device and gain productivity and enjoyment from it for another full year without squandering any of my money on a new device that does not differentiate it substantially enough to warrant replacing my current iPhone.

Thank you Apple for giving me another 12 months, though I have only ever owned Apple devices, to consider switching to another brand and platform. And thank you Apple for hoodwinking all those upgrading into thinking that this year's slate of device releases warrants their purchase. Your release cycle has blazed a path towards design maturity, letting consumers get far more utility from their purchases, and stretching the upgrade cycle by several years. Consumers no long need to have the latest and greatest since it's not that much greater.

Apple, we used to be able to count on the naming convention to showcase new generations of phones. The 4 and 4S. The 5 and 5S. The 6 and 6S. Should we call the 17 the 12X, since we he had the 12, 13 (12S), 14 (12T), 15 (12U), 16 (12W) and now the 17 (12X). Maybe it should have been called the 2026 iPhone Pro Max and likewise.

Sincerely,

Underwhelmed.

Dear Apple-

Thank you for another year of excellent iPhone upgrades. Please do bring gray/black color choices back to the Pro models asap.

Sincerely,

Pleased Again.

 

[Atomic1977]

Dear  keep on bringing up great products you are awesome your 16e is your best idea yet.

 

[ant the ninja]

What do people want? People always say they can’t innovate but honestly what is left other than a foldable? What can we possibly do differently than we already do?

Phones are rectangles with screens…how much different can they make them look? What features are we missing that you need? I guess I just don’t understand how people keep saying they can’t innovate. Innovate what? How can we possibly push our current tech any further? We are carrying around a miniature supercomputer in the palm of our hands. I mean look at the Air, almost the entirety of the phone is in the camera bump. I’d say that pretty innovative but what do I know?

I’m on the upgrade program so I upgrade every year, I just don’t think there’s anything that can really wow anyone anymore.

 

[roland.g]

The more I think about it, regardless of any personal excitement I might have or don't have in response to the reveal of the new lineup, as it sinks in, I am much more troubled by other events this week, and caring about new tech begins to massively drop down my priority list.

 

[joeblow7777]

Every time I see a post like this, I feel like people are:

1. Trying to convince themselves they are happy with what they got.
2. Can’t afford a new item.

I’m just saying this, because not once have I ever felt the need to post something like this about anything. I honestly don’t get it. I guess this is “welcome to the internet”.

I don't know that those are the only two possibilities, but I agree, there's more to the psychology of these types of posts than perhaps even the authors realize. Most people don't go out of their way to write letters about products that don't appeal to them. As someone who typically upgrades every 2-3 years, there's more iPhones that I haven't bought than ones that I have, but it's not something that I give much thought to. It's just a cellphone, and they've reached the point that revolutionary steps forward are going to be very rare. That's just what happens when a product line matures. But also, when people say that the iPhone has been the same every year since the 12 that's when I know all they're looking at and for is a new design, because internally virtually everything about the phone as improved quite notably since then.

 

[NotApplicable]

The more I think about it, regardless of any personal excitement I might have or don't have in response to the reveal of the new lineup, as it sinks in, I am much more troubled by other events this week, and caring about new tech begins to massively drop down my priority list.

Buh bye

 

[roland.g]

Thank you for affirming my point.

 

[NotApplicable]

Thank you for affirming my point.

Why are you on MacRumors forums? For your own good, you should probably go tend to those more important topics on your list!

 

[roland.g]

Don't look up. The point went right over your head.

 

[ForkHandles]

What do people want? People always say they can’t innovate but honestly what is left other than a foldable? What can we possibly do differently than we already do?

Phones are rectangles with screens…how much different can they make them look? What features are we missing that you need? I guess I just don’t understand how people keep saying they can’t innovate. Innovate what? How can we possibly push our current tech any further? We are carrying around a miniature supercomputer in the palm of our hands. I mean look at the Air, almost the entirety of the phone is in the camera bump. I’d say that pretty innovative but what do I know?

I’m on the upgrade program so I upgrade every year, I just don’t think there’s anything that can really wow anyone anymore.

I agree with all of this.

Once Apple Watch had a walkie talkie, and you could chat to your friends on a watch we’d reached peak Star Trek. The only thing left is Beaming people down, teleportation is , sadly, out of the purview of iPhone.

It would be novel, perhaps useful, if one could plug an iPhone into a thunderbolt monitor and use it as a limited desktop?

Perhaps just too tricky to work all this stock apps?

 

[orsev]

I agree with all of this.

Once Apple Watch had a walkie talkie, and you could chat to your friends on a watch we’d reached peak Star Trek. The only thing left is Beaming people down, teleportation is , sadly, out of the purview of iPhone.

It would be novel, perhaps useful, if one could plug an iPhone into a thunderbolt monitor and use it as a limited desktop?

Perhaps just too tricky to work all this stock apps?

I would have to agree with @ForkHandles also. What do people want? I think it's very reasonable to assume that the advancements here are going to be mostly software & integration based. The Vision Pro is a great example of the wider stagnation of the market currently; a very impressive piece of tech, but was it ever going to be the next iPhone? Not at all.

I don't think 'desktop' via thunderbolt is far off - this experience from the iPad is currently pretty good on RC26. It's been a few years since Samsung shelved Dex (please correct me if i'm wrong), so there isn't much market pressure / demand for it.

 

[decafjava]

Seriously, what do you all expect from a new iPhone? Ok, my 13 PM was a significant advance over the old 7 Plus which I kept for 5 years. My 15 PM not as much and if the 13 hadn't been stolen two years ago would have kept it now. I sill really like the 15 for sure just am realistic about the state of tech. Honestly, except for folding phones - not my thing - I don't see huge year to year advances with other companies as well. Smartphones are a mature technology.

 

[johhno140]

Interestingly Apple didn’t actually advertise the one major ‘innovation’ that may well allow me, and others, to buy the latest iPhone, namely the potential to disable pulse width modulation. Admittedly this should have been an option from the very first OLED phones purely for health reasons. If they’ve nailed this, then this is HUGE. I’m not holding my breath as temporal dithering is a major problem too and I don’t know whether that is an issue too, but if they’ve incorporated proper dc dimming to eliminate PWM then this is a very significant step forward.

 

[orsev]

Interestingly Apple didn’t actually advertise the one major ‘innovation’ that may well allow me, and others, to buy the latest iPhone, namely the potential to disable pulse width modulation. Admittedly this should have been an option from the very first OLED phones purely for health reasons. If they’ve nailed this, then this is HUGE. I’m not holding my breath as temporal dithering is a major problem too and I don’t know whether that is an issue too, but if they’ve incorporated proper dc dimming to eliminate PWM then this is a very significant step forward.

If you don't mind me asking, what exactly about PWM was disallowing you to obtain previous iPhone models? This is not something I have encountered before.

 

[johhno140]

If you don't mind me asking, what exactly about PWM was disallowing you to obtain previous iPhone models? This is not something I have encountered before.

Consider yourself in the lucky majority. Whilst not affecting most people, although I suspect it affects more people but they haven’t joined the dots to know the reason, PWM causes the screen to flicker. It would appear my eyes are very sensitive to this, consequently if I look at an OLED phone screen for more than about 30 seconds (and I have tried many over the years in the hope of finding one that works for me) I begin to feel a little nauseous and feel as though my eyes are tensed. Other people get severe headaches and migraines. Many suffer mild symptoms they are willing to put up with, personally I wasn’t prepared to, consequently I currently use a Motorola G75 because it has a lovely LCD screen I can use for prolonged periods without any issue.
One of the forums longest threads, currently at 488 pages and growing, is around this very subject of eye strain since Apple and other manufacturers introduced OLED phones.

 

[orsev]

Consider yourself in the lucky majority. Whilst not affecting most people, although I suspect it affects more people but they haven’t joined the dots to know the reason, PWM causes the screen to flicker. It would appear my eyes are very sensitive to this, consequently if I look at an OLED phone screen for more than about 30 seconds (and I have tried many over the years in the hope of finding one that works for me) I begin to feel a little nauseous and feel as though my eyes are tensed. Other people get severe headaches and migraines. Many suffer mild symptoms they are willing to put up with, personally I wasn’t prepared to, consequently I currently use a Motorola G75 because it has a lovely LCD screen I can use for prolonged periods without any issue.
One of the forums longest threads, currently at 488 pages and growing, is around this very subject of eye strain since Apple and other manufacturers introduced OLED phones.

Just found the thread, glad i'm not affected by this, but my sympathies go out to you and all others that experience this. I hope that the recent changes mean you can enjoy the latest handsets to the fullest. Thanks for making me aware!

 

[RKYA8866]

Apple has become a dishonest, deceiving company and they don’t even hide it anymore.
Why don’t they provide the differences between the 16 and 16pro and 16 pro max within this drop down?

 

[martint235]

I can afford a new phone.

AND. I know what I want.

An iPhone Fold. Not another version of my phone. Seen enough folds out there and seen the videos of the others. I know my use case.

Watching football this weekend there were heavy ads on the Pixel fold. Google and Samsung get it. Apple is waiting another year. That isn’t about getting right. It means that under Ive and Jobs they could do it and under Cook they either can’t get it done fast enough or Tim the actuary is milking it by doing the Air now and the Fold next year. But given how long those style phones have been available, Apple not coming to market yet is frustrating, sad, and a big finger to the customer base.

I don’t want to leave the ecosystem. But my next iPhone will be the Fold and I’m not buying a 15, 16, 17 etc in the interim.

Did you have to wait long in the preorder queue today?