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Is Apple doomed?
- Thread starter d5aqoëp
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What makes Apple devices uniquely empowering is the way they unleash your potential to do things you never thought possible. They are tools, but tools that give you the confidence and capabilities to do your very best work. Apple is the most empowering company in human history.
Everyone can relax, for Tim Cook has decreed that the era of spatial computing is here, ushered-in by the strongest pipeline ever, full to the brim of the BEST, MOST POWERFUL products Apple has ever released, featuring best-in-class, game-changing features that take things to a whole new level. Apple can’t wait to see the incredible things customers are able to do. Apple thinks you’re gonna love it. Stay tuned!
Apple’s tutti-fruitti, phoney-baloney, plastic banana, good time, rock-n-roll PR hype aside, the continued steady profit growth provides strong evidence that Apple is not doomed.
Apple’s tutti-fruitti, phoney-baloney, plastic banana, good time, rock-n-roll PR hype aside, the continued steady profit growth provides strong evidence that Apple is not doomed.
I don't think Apple will change course any time soon, unless forced. If the AI-shenanigans continue, they may feel forced to do something though. If major software leave the platform due to not being "cloud based", they may be in for some trouble. Sure, there are alternatives, but if Adobe and MS Office leave the Mac platform, I can't see the mac staying in the business segment for long.
Office for Mac has gone downhill constantly since Bowden disappeared and if more money can be made somewhere else, this is where the big players will go. If MS decides that Windows can only be used as a full OS "in the cloud", including the Office Suite, there will be changes, big changes to the PC industry.
Office for Mac has gone downhill constantly since Bowden disappeared and if more money can be made somewhere else, this is where the big players will go. If MS decides that Windows can only be used as a full OS "in the cloud", including the Office Suite, there will be changes, big changes to the PC industry.
I am quite shocked to notice people living in their own personal bubbles and behaving as oblivious as a butterfly. The Big-Tech is changing more rapidly than what we can imagine. The next 5 years will be “make or break” for humanity with possibly big changes to how we use our personal computers.
As some are predicting what if Apple is forced to change due to market conditions? If we are left with thin clients, it will dilute importance of forums like Macrumors and supporting ecosystem. Some will dismiss it as fear mongering but this is some intuition I am getting if the AI bubble doesn’t pop.
To mistaken that AI is going to see continual hardware growth requirements is debatable; why? It depends on customer conditions. I recall that 3D cinema and tv was going to be the next big thing and content creators need to jump onboard. While it excited the audience once again it failed to stick around.
This example can be applied to many other things as well including BlackBerry, portable phone computers that ran WindowsCE, etc. What we see is that these concepts pushes the envelope in society to condition them to possibilities but it also has a collective conditioning of survival. Is AI going to threaten my ability to survive by earning a living or hallucinating and rending itself unreliable. There are more questions asked then answered.
To project that what is present is what will be the foreseeable future is foolish IMHO.
My first contact with macs was as a teen in the early days of iMovie, GarageBand etc. Learning to use those apps, along with photoshop was very empowering to me. Then later doing research and data analysis on the Mac, making my company website etc. Maybe most of those things are possible on windows, but windows never inspired me, with the Mac it just clicked and awakened something in me. I call that empowering.
Tools have literally empowered humanity for millennia.
I don’t think Apple is doomed.
A lot of the hardware they make is still relevant today. Smart phones will be around for a while, and tablets have a place.
I’m sure many people still use laptop or desktop devices for tasks or because they don’t want to rely on a cloud service.
As for AI, maybe Apple took a few missteps or stumbles. But I’m sure they are working on a plan to catchup.
For me it’s not an issue, and I some may have preferences over local options versus cloud based options.
A lot of the hardware they make is still relevant today. Smart phones will be around for a while, and tablets have a place.
I’m sure many people still use laptop or desktop devices for tasks or because they don’t want to rely on a cloud service.
As for AI, maybe Apple took a few missteps or stumbles. But I’m sure they are working on a plan to catchup.
For me it’s not an issue, and I some may have preferences over local options versus cloud based options.
This is where I think we are headed towards not owning hardware anymore*. All the big players are spending so much money. They HAVE to know the AI bubble will burst. Then what will happen? NVIDIA and Microsoft and Sony and others will all decide on what to do together and we are seeing early signs of it. Today it is the RTX 5090 going FROM $2,000 TO $5,000 MSRP. They also stated they will cut around 40% of their consumer GPU production. Where does that leave gamers? That is right, getting Xbox Cloud. When the AI bubble bursts, Microsoft can just reassign those hardware components for their cloud offering.
Microsoft has so much hardware now they cannot plug in everything. They literally do not have the power to operate all the hardware they have around. This does not make much sense from a business point of view unless you have those ulterior motives.
RAM is increasing. SSD/HDD are increasing. GPU prices increasing. Rumors of going back to DDR 3 and 8 GB of RAM. This all points to us not owning our hardware anymore. Because the AI bubble WILL burst. But they will have secondary means to use all the hardware they are getting.
We will not see Micron, NVIDIA, etc come crawling back to us consumers. They will just say "Get Geoforce Now or Xbox Cloud - you don't need hardware anymore"
- Similar aspects in the professional space too. Just using gaming as the biggest example since we have a lot of current references and services now.
* By not owning hardware, I mean the 5090 and ultra performance. We will on "thin clients".
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Not exactly. I can connect my MacBook Air to my lab which has 5 computers. I can RDP and have it render a big job if I need it to. I have even used Parsec when I was out of town to connect to my lab. Over the internet connection and I was able to get something done with the power of a 5090 and my two M2 Ultras. I think this is where we are headed (or I should say where businesses WANT us to get to).
Apple is probably not more doomed than any other business..
But there are absolutely no shortage of companies who once seemed like they had it all figured out and then they didn’t.
It seems like sooner or later most enterprise companies accumulate enough “yes men” and people with incentives to keep the status quo that it becomes more or less impossible to create anything of value.
Apple specifically has so much money in the bank that any risk of catastrophic failure is probably multiple decades away.
But there are absolutely no shortage of companies who once seemed like they had it all figured out and then they didn’t.
It seems like sooner or later most enterprise companies accumulate enough “yes men” and people with incentives to keep the status quo that it becomes more or less impossible to create anything of value.
Apple specifically has so much money in the bank that any risk of catastrophic failure is probably multiple decades away.
I just object to a company doing the empowering, but I get your point. You are empowering yourself, and using a tool to help.
I apologize for nitpicking; that's on me.
The idea isn't that Apple is some pure white knight empowering people.
The idea is that Apple is driven by (or at least has claimed for 30 years to be driven by) the value that their products empower their customers. That informs design, like protecting your privacy over the desire of advertisers to track you.
It's just the way they think about the tool they are selling you. It's not that complicated or emotional. I just don't think they are a company who will try to force people to rent cloud computing instead of continuing to try to make the best products they can. History shows there's more money in the latter anyway
The success of games like Stardew Valley and Balatro against billion dollar failures suggests that the wider gaming buying public does not see the benefit in a continuing gaming arms race. I mean next gen games look lovely and all but I can’t say I’ve played many PS5 games that look that much better than PS4 titles. They managed to wring Forbidden West out of the last gen and it still looks better than every game on the Xbox.
On the other hand I suppose via Spotify and Netflix the public have been used to not owning things for a while now. I guess gaming isn’t too far away from that future either.
Personally I hope that the government pass some sort of copyright laws allowing AI to scrape what they want. This will have three beneficial side effects:
1. It will mean that people can do the same to digital content making abandonware roms fair game, a fine alternative to being locked into a sub.
2. Artists will pivot to the physical realm where work cannot be AI scraped. Man I’d rather read a magazine than a website and it’s hard to hang a JPEG in your bathroom.
3. Social media will drown in so much slop that the platforms will collapse. Maybe we will rediscover the benefits of catching up over a coffee or beer instead of online?
Yes. It always has been, as people have been posting on here for decades now. Doomed.
"Okay....dangit- hey everyone here! who stole my fruits, nuts, seeds, vegetables and grains -- absolutely no animal products I placed on that grey plate, huh..... confess!.
that was my daily nourishment, you are all fired, scram I say!"
Steve Jobs, labs Lunch Time
Meh...people has been saying that phrase since the introduction of OG iPod. And yet, here we are.
Even if they make costly decision mistakes like they did in the past when Steve was out doing NeXT & Pixar, they could appoint a new CEO that'll correct the path easily with their huge cash reserves.
Even if they make costly decision mistakes like they did in the past when Steve was out doing NeXT & Pixar, they could appoint a new CEO that'll correct the path easily with their huge cash reserves.
I liken the OP's ignorant nonsense to the Usenet claims of 1993 that "Emacs is dying."
oh god, another apple is doomed post, and the next post on here will be someone crying about how they don't like something apple is doing.
Dude, don't kid yourself. those are ancient machines no matter what OS you throw at them.
Except you cannot counter my points explaining why Apple will not be forced to change due to existing market conditions. We are too far deep in trouble than anyone wants to believe.
So far you have ignored points that counter your original post so why would you expect others to extend you a courtesy you won't extend them?
You have yet to make any case at all as to why Apple would be forced to do anything by "market conditions".
You have yet to explain why Apple would pivot their entire company over to AI and forcing people to rent cloud computing.
You have yet to explain how Apple would even do such a thing given their focus has never been on that and they don't have the heavy hitting talent in those areas to do that.
You haven't pointed to a single thing Apple has done that shows they are heading down this path.