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iPod touch :( Dirty Money Making Scheme Protest

Spizzo said:
Yeah, seems kind of ridiculous for a company that makes software to charge for it!!!:rolleyes:
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That's not really the point here. The point is that this is a way to gain a smaller measure of price parity between the iPhone and iPod Touch. If you own an iPod Touch vs. an iPhone, why did you pick the Touch? I picked the iPod Touch because I didn't want to pay more for cell phone functionality and a long term contract with AT&T. Cost was a big factor here.

Now, I realize that Apple isn't really doing anything wrong by charging a fee for this software, but it gives the impression that iPod Touch users are being punished for not buying the iPhone. It would be one thing if Apple took the iPod Touch applications in a new direction, but what they are really doing is telling their users that if you want similar functionality to the iPhone, you can pay to get the EXACT same applications on your Touch. There is no new app in this group, nor is their any unique functionality specific to Touch users.

It's not unethical for Apple to do this, it's just stupid. They will generate far more bad will amongst their consumers than they will recoup with the software fee. The only way this strategy is a success is if Apple is truly interested in furthering the Jailbreak movement, because most of the Jailbreak fence sitters are going to do it now.

Me, I'm just going to skate along on a hacked 1.1.2 with the Apple apps for free.
 
Just think of it this way:

The iPod Touch today got a $20 price drop. (Are you mad now?)

New buyers of the iPod Touch will be required to spend $20 on this app suite in order to purchase an iPod Touch.

What if the new iPod Touch buyer has no use for the apps? They were now forced into purchasing a $20 application suite they may never use. Existing owners at least got a choice. If you bought it in the last 14 days you should be able to argue that you can get them free, so that makes the cost to you of less than $1.43 per day for the privilege of using you're iPod Touch for the last two weeks while other people were Touchless...
 
Has an update ever cost money before for an iPod/iPhone/:apple:TV/Mac OS X (other then from Panther to Tiger, etc,)?

No, I've sent my feedback, and yes, I wrote a very angry letter.:mad:

They can't do this to us, just because were early adopters. What I should do now is give my iPod touch a fatal error and take it to the Apple Store and ask for a new, 1.1.3 iPod touch in return.:apple:
 
Pippen Man said:
Has an update ever cost money before for an iPod/iPhone/:apple:TV/Mac OS X (other then from Panther to Tiger, etc,)?
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They've been charging for games (new applications) on the iPod for well over a year now, and most games cost $5. Five apps for $20 is a good deal. It would be nicer if it was $5 apiece and all five for $20 so that if you don't need them all you can get only the one or two you want.
 
I'm fine with paying for Maps, and to a slightly lesser extent, Mail, but $20 for these is absurd. Maybe $10- the price of two games, is better. For the fact that the other three are essentially widgets- there's no point in paying for them, I'll just code one and post it on my iMac.

I sent a letter to "Steve" to complain, I hope to see something back.
 
Good show Apple. We talk up the Touch to friends and family and help you sell millions of the bastards and you pay us back by charging us $20 for software that should have come free on day of purchase.

Your ******** story about "Accounting problems" and having to charge us the $20 is just that, a ******** story.

If MS pulled this people would be screaming like a lynch mob but too many people want to spooge all over Steve Jobs shoes and let this kind of crap slide.
 
What I find funny is all these 'threats' to go back to Windows Xp and the like.

That's hilarious!!..

So because you don't want to spend $20 for some extra apps ( that never came with your product when you bought it and you don't 'apparently want') your going to go WASTE a ton of money buying what YOU KNOW to be second rate junk just to 'show Apple'..

Well, whilst your putting yourself back into the dark ages of technology we'll still be here loving Apple kit, buying it ( yeah that's right - paying for things we like that are 'amazing') and just generally being really happy about our technology - and lots of other people will be wising up and buying Apple kit to replace the handful who 'went nuts over $20'...

I mean that's a cab fare isn't it?


So...go knock yourselves out - the choice is yours...
 
macfan881 said:
ill admit its funny though how people whine bout stuff like this but you never here any one complains over The Online games paying 50 bucks for the game than 15 or more for the service :rolleyes:
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Actually, they do complain about the monthly fee. However, the monthly fee is justified since programmers work tirelessly to add quests, gear, fix balancing issues and other bugs. They do charge (usually $20) for substantial upgrades, but they are usually huge upgrades and released a year after the initial game was released.

Apple is releasing programs that have already been written and working with the Touch (as evident by the fact that they are on my Touch right now). They had to change nothing, save the "sent from my iphone" message in mail, to release them for the Touch for free. Instead, they have the balls to charge $20 for FREE programs. I mean really, you can download them as widgets for free on a Mac (or very similar ones).

We'll see how investors react to the keynote and the quarter. Intel didn't meet guidance, I expect AAPL to do the same. Interesting Jobs didn't announce ipod sales...
 
atszyman said:
Just think of it this way:

The iPod Touch today got a $20 price drop. (Are you mad now?)

New buyers of the iPod Touch will be required to spend $20 on this app suite in order to purchase an iPod Touch.

What if the new iPod Touch buyer has no use for the apps? They were now forced into purchasing a $20 application suite they may never use. Existing owners at least got a choice. If you bought it in the last 14 days you should be able to argue that you can get them free, so that makes the cost to you of less than $1.43 per day for the privilege of using you're iPod Touch for the last two weeks while other people were Touchless...
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Your analogy is bad...the Touch didn't get a price drop, it got a price increase. Christmas buyers just payed $20 more for their iPod than today's buyers for an e-mail client and a couple of widgets.

Apple is within their rights to ask for money for these applications, but that doesn't make it smart. In fact, it's downright stupid. More people will now jailbreak their iPods, and people will now always be leary of how much more they have to spend to get upgrades that iPhone users get for free.
 
I didn't want the new apps, they all seem useless to me anyway. I wanted to be able to add items to my home screen but apparently all the update does is add a "+" symbol to Safari. This came in the 160MB download. If they want to get money for the apps then I don't care but I'm peeved about not customizing the home screen. Feedback has been sent, for the second time with the Touch. First time was a calendar you couldn't add events to.
 
Buy the update and move on. Just be happy that they gave you these apps that everyone has wanted. They're not going to change anything.

In fact, this is exactly what the users of the iPod touch asked for when it came out: Downloadable apps available for purchase on iTunes for $2-5 each.
 
akonradi said:
In fact, this is exactly what the users of the iPod touch asked for when it came out: Downloadable apps available for purchase on iTunes for $2-5 each.
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But they aren't $2-5 each, if I want one I have to buy the lot for the whole $20.
 
surferfromuk said:
What I find funny is all these 'threats' to go back to Windows Xp and the like.

That's hilarious!!..

So because you don't want to spend $20 for some extra apps ( that never came with your product when you bought it and you don't 'apparently want') your going to go WASTE a ton of money buying what YOU KNOW to be second rate junk just to 'show Apple'..

Well, whilst your putting yourself back into the dark ages of technology we'll still be here loving Apple kit, buying it ( yeah that's right - paying for things we like that are 'amazing') and just generally being really happy about our technology - and lots of other people will be wising up and buying Apple kit to replace the handful who 'went nuts over $20'...

I mean that's a cab fare isn't it?


So...go knock yourselves out - the choice is yours...
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No, the choice is to jailbreak and get them for free and not buy another iPod from Apple. Just curious, but how would you feel about Apple charging for every point release of OS X? They often add new features and enhancements, maybe they should charge for them, too? What if Apple charged more for iLife on a Pro model than they do on a consumer machine? After all, Pros should be using pro apps, right?

Spin all you want, but this is a bad business move...especially when AppleTV and the iPhone all got free upgrades.
 
akonradi said:
Buy the update and move on. Just be happy that they gave you these apps that everyone has wanted. They're not going to change anything.

In fact, this is exactly what the users of the iPod touch asked for when it came out: Downloadable apps available for purchase on iTunes for $2-5 each.
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Why? Jailbreak and get them for free. Apple is going to regret this in the future.
 
Wow, people are really pissed off! I definately understand why, but its $20 dollars for chrissakes! Like some one earlier posted, were complaining about 20 bucks to update something that costs $400! That's nothing compared to the cost of the touch! Besides, the firmware update is free... you don't have to buy the apps I'm sure it'll be jailbroken within a week anyways, so who cares? If you want to go legit, you pay 20 bucks and get the most useful apps. Plus you get to keep your ipod up to date. If that isn't important to you, than don't buy them! I opted to pay the money, and hope that the SDK will be worth it. If not, than I'll go back to jailbreaking. Either way, it is an amazing device, and I absolute love it, and see 20 bucks as a small price to pay. But that's just me...
 
Mikey B said:
Wow, people are really pissed off! I definately understand why, but its $20 dollars for chrissakes! Like some one earlier posted, were complaining about 20 bucks to update something that costs $400! That's nothing compared to the cost of the touch! Besides, the firmware update is free... you don't have to buy the apps I'm sure it'll be jailbroken within a week anyways, so who cares? If you want to go legit, you pay 20 bucks and get the most useful apps. Plus you get to keep your ipod up to date. If that isn't important to you, than don't buy them! I opted to pay the money, and hope that the SDK will be worth it. If not, than I'll go back to jailbreaking. Either way, it is an amazing device, and I absolute love it, and see 20 bucks as a small price to pay. But that's just me...
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Again, it's not the cost, it's the principle. You look at $20 as no big deal for the consumer, but when the consumer has shelled out $400 already and the applications cost nothing for Apple to move to the Touch, the $20 should be no big deal for Apple. The apps have already been developed and recouped, it's no loss for Apple to give them to Touch users. Apple could have and should have offered these for free.
 
I hear you, volk, believe me, I wish they came free with the update. But I guess I've made peace with it. Everything with Apple costs a little bit more, but for me, it's always been money well spent.
 
volk said:
Again, it's not the cost, it's the principle. You look at $20 as no big deal for the consumer, but when the consumer has shelled out $400 already and the applications cost nothing for Apple to move to the Touch, the $20 should be no big deal for Apple. The apps have already been developed and recouped, it's no loss for Apple to give them to Touch users. Apple could have and should have offered these for free.
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You bought a Touch. They added functionality to it. You can pay for that added functionality, or not. It is a loss for Apple to give them to Touch users. They calculated that they would make more money by charging for it than if a few defectors got angry and decided not to purchase an Apple product in the future. If you're mad about it, then don't purchase anything and be quiet. But until then, you all sound childish for thinking you somehow "deserve" this update for free. I don't give a rat's (blank) if it wouldn't have cost Apple that much more to make it available to you for free, they're in the business to make money. I bought my Powerbook without iLife 07. They released iLife 07 without a hardware upgrade to my Powerbook and charged for it. I didn't cry about it.


/rant
 
volk said:
Again, it's not the cost, it's the principle. You look at $20 as no big deal for the consumer, but when the consumer has shelled out $400 already and the applications cost nothing for Apple to move to the Touch, the $20 should be no big deal for Apple. The apps have already been developed and recouped, it's no loss for Apple to give them to Touch users. Apple could have and should have offered these for free.
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Believe it or not, Apple is in the game for money. It doesn't matter if you want to pay or not. It's their product, their software, their decision. It's obvious that you want these apps. If you want your warranty as well, they're advising you to get them this way. If you don't like it this way, go buy a Zune.
 
volk said:
No, the choice is to jailbreak and get them for free and not buy another iPod from Apple. Just curious, but how would you feel about Apple charging for every point release of OS X? They often add new features and enhancements, maybe they should charge for them, too? What if Apple charged more for iLife on a Pro model than they do on a consumer machine? After all, Pros should be using pro apps, right?

Spin all you want, but this is a bad business move...especially when AppleTV and the iPhone all got free upgrades.
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No - this analogy is all wrong...

1) Yes, you can go 'rip' them for free - your correct that is a 'choice' - a personal decision - for those who don't want to do that they can now buy them - that's also a choice - one Apple has given us ( thankfully) - so why you complaining about that? You can go rip em and stay happy.

2) This is not a 'point' release - it's a suite of applications that never shipped with the product I purchased nor where they ever promised for it.

Feature updates to apps, O/S enhancements or bug fixes for products I already own I expect to get free - and I do!

Five totally new apps that I never bought or owned ? no, I don't expect that - who should?

I agree that the current ipod touch is an even more amazing deal than ever but I'm still happy that Apple haven't left me 'stuck without' like so many other companies do...

3) Iphone users never got new apps - they got 'updates. Apple TV never got new apps - they got new features spawned from itunes - the same ones we got in itunes for our ipod touch and our macs.
 
i just don't understand why it's free for iPhone users, but iPod Touch people have to pay.
 
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