Poll: Apple Management's response to pre-order debacle

[Shikaka]

What do you think the first Apple HQ meeting was like after the 9/12 midnight pre order nightmare:

1. The big bosses were humiliated and heads rolled.

2. A big sigh of relief. Although the website had issues, it was something that Apple anticipated and tried its best to avoid. We had problems but were still able to process a record number of orders.

3. Roaring laughter. We screwed the consumer yet still had record sales. We could do the same thing next year and those suckers would come back for more.

4. Excellent. Our planned shut down went exactly as planned, creating a feeding frenzy that is sure to boost walk-in sales on the 19th. The marketing team drew this play up perfectly!

 

[Dmal99]

what do they care they sold out and people are committing harry kari just to get a phone

they love it

 

[webbuzz]

What do you think the first Apple HQ meeting was like after the 9/12 midnight pre order nightmare:

1. The big bosses were humiliated and heads rolled.

2. A big sigh of relief. Although the website had issues, it was something that Apple anticipated and tried its best to avoid. We had problems but were still able to process a record number of orders.

3. Roaring laughter. We screwed the consumer yet still had record sales. We could do the same thing next year and those suckers would come back for more.

4. Excellent. Our planned shut down went exactly as planned, creating a feeding frenzy that is sure to boost walk-in sales on the 19th. The marketing team drew this play up perfectly!

Do you know why the store was delayed?

 

[joeblow7777]

I'm thinking #2.

It wasn't the end of the world. ****** happens. And they still sold a lot of phones.

 

[ijen0311]

Apple is a business, not a friend of yours. They sold their phones. End of story.

 

[spazma7ik]

You guys obviously know nothing about management if you seriously think they don't strive for a smoother experience and almost certainly have/will discuss this debacle and ways to improve for the next time.

 

[LizKat]

I'd hardly call it a debacle. I'd vote for #2 as well.

Save that word DEBACLE for when no one comes to the party to buy whatever it is.

Anyone remember the E1-ROKR "iTunes phone" ?? I mean as a phone it actually worked fine and was a nice sturdy little Moto candybar thing. But, as a placeholder for a leap from iPod to Apple phone with connectivity to iTunes on laptop or desktop and ability to hold, what, 25 songs or something? Wow. So bad. With some weird proprietary USB-to-GodKnowsWhat connector. I remember the keynote. The CEO of Cingular and Steve tried to put a good face on the thing as they introduced it, but you could tell they both wanted to be someplace else, preferably with no memory of the day! It mostly just served notice Apple was going to make an Apple phone ""real soon now."

 

[illutionz]

Please note that the website did not have major issues. If you are referring to people seeing the down message, that's load balancing actually working to protect the ordering system and only letting small amount of people in.

 

[Brian Y]

How was it a debacle?

Pre-orders were delayed by a bit, and the carriers systems couldn't cope. Apple's website didn't really buckle under the load, which I find astounding (considering they couldn't keep a live stream up and running).

 

[averlus]

I think the fact that their only official comment was that it was a sales record says it all about how much they care about the glitches + shipping delays.

 

[ijen0311]

You guys obviously know nothing about management if you seriously think they don't strive for a smoother experience and almost certainly have/will discuss this debacle and ways to improve for the next time.

I'm sure they will; they also got a lot of free press about all the hiccups with the pre-order. Every news outlet mentioned it, whereas if it had gone smoothly I think you'd have heard much less about it.

 

[kerrikins]

I'd hardly call it a debacle. I'd vote for #2 as well.

Save that word DEBACLE for when no one comes to the party to buy whatever it is.

Anyone remember the E1-ROKR "iTunes phone" ?? I mean as a phone it actually worked fine and was a nice sturdy little Moto candybar thing. But, as a placeholder for a leap from iPod to Apple phone with connectivity to iTunes on laptop or desktop and ability to hold, what, 25 songs or something? Wow. So bad. With some weird proprietary USB-to-GodKnowsWhat connector. I remember the keynote. The CEO of Cingular and Steve tried to put a good face on the thing as they introduced it, but you could tell they both wanted to be someplace else, preferably with no memory of the day! It mostly just served notice Apple was going to make an Apple phone ""real soon now."

I remember that phone! I worked for At&T at the time... It wasn't all that popular, I don't think.

In response to the OP - yeah, I'd vote for #2. I know people love the idea that Apple's laughing to the bank, but they can actually do that without deliberately hamstringing their sales.

 

[ZBoater]

What debacle?

Selling phones faster than they can make them? Quite a debacle indeed...

Not.

 

[AdonisSMU]

They will make improvements for the next flagship phone. However, Humiliated for selling a record number of pre-orders...yeah not likely. That's hardly a failure. Apple beefed up and the demand was more than they had anticipated. They probably should've spun up way more boxes to handle the load.

 

[sfwalter]

I'm willing cut Apple a little slack on this. Its hard to test for scenarios like this. Obviously they have enough computing power to run their stores for 364 days a year. So one day a year things run a little slow really isn't that big a deal.

It would probably take a lot of money to beef up redundant systems to handle the super large traffic that occurs for 3-5 hours for one day a year. In the end probably isn't worth it.

 

[freediverdude]

I still think they should acknowledge what happened and issue an apology statement, along with coming up with something better for next year.

All of us who got up before 3 am in the eastern time zone, sat around refreshing the web site for over 2 hours, and couldn't go to a carrier site or the app because we are T-Mobile customers, and then finally gave up and went to bed, and then later woke up and found the shipping times were late October, deserve some kind of acknowledgement.

 

[illutionz]

I still think they should acknowledge what happened and issue an apology statement, along with coming up with something better for next year.

All of us who got up before 3 am in the eastern time zone, sat around refreshing the web site for over 2 hours, and couldn't go to a carrier site or the app because we are T-Mobile customers, and then finally gave up and went to bed, and then later woke up and found the shipping times were late October, deserve some kind of acknowledgement.

I am in the same boat as you but frankly, there is nothing to apologize. There were several people who managed to get in the website between 3am-5am when it's finally "available" for everyone. Reason being is that during the 3am-5am time period, they have load balancing that restrict access to most people so the ordering system didn't get crushed.

 

[Brian Y]

I still think they should acknowledge what happened and issue an apology statement, along with coming up with something better for next year.

All of us who got up before 3 am in the eastern time zone, sat around refreshing the web site for over 2 hours, and couldn't go to a carrier site or the app because we are T-Mobile customers, and then finally gave up and went to bed, and then later woke up and found the shipping times were late October, deserve some kind of acknowledgement.

Why do you deserve an apology?

You didn't *have* to get up. You didn't *have* to order a new phone.

Do you also expect an apology from the grocery store if they run out of your favourite soda?

 

[scaredpoet]

Do you also expect an apology from the grocery store if they run out of your favourite soda?

I imagine he also demands that the shift manager and stock boys be fired for their incompetence, too. How dare they, right?

 

[JayLenochiniMac]

I seriously doubt they lost sleep over some diehards waiting 1-3 hours past 12:01 am trying to place their preorders.

 

[LizKat]

I still think they should acknowledge what happened and issue an apology statement, along with coming up with something better for next year.

All of us who got up before 3 am in the eastern time zone, sat around refreshing the web site for over 2 hours, and couldn't go to a carrier site or the app because we are T-Mobile customers, and then finally gave up and went to bed, and then later woke up and found the shipping times were late October, deserve some kind of acknowledgement.

An apology? Seriously. "We are so sorry that some of you apparently thought you'd be the only one attempting to pre order a phone."

Wow. Next time just walk into an Apple (or carrier) retail store about a month after launch and you won't have to wait to place your order. If it doesn't feel like fun to be up trying to get that pre-order into the system, just don't do it! It's just a phone...

 

[cornerexit]

People ordered simultaneously from a carrier and apple. Some bought one of each model, some bought 3 of one model. I don't know how they can plan for me dry scenario of "I have to have it first got damnit!!!!!" Now there are a million people canceling, switching who they buy from. It's literally insane.

An apology? Get a life.

 

[freediverdude]

An apology? Seriously. "We are so sorry that some of you apparently thought you'd be the only one attempting to pre order a phone."

Wow. Next time just walk into an Apple (or carrier) retail store about a month after launch and you won't have to wait to place your order. If it doesn't feel like fun to be up trying to get that pre-order into the system, just don't do it! It's just a phone...

Apple said their site would be up at 3am eastern, and it wasn't. Simple as that. That's all I'm going to say on the matter. I knew some apple apologists ( or frankly some paid apple forum members ) would come on to discourage this kind of talk, but the issue is very cut and dry.

 

[leesweet]

They did? Where? Apple said '9/12'. The carriers all said 12:01 PDT, etc. Apple did NOT say a time this year (on purpose, I'm sure). If you have a source for Apple saying 12:01 PDT, please supply it. I sure never saw it anywhere.

As was also said above, increasing hardware for one day so people can buy something they will buy anyway later is not efficient.

 

[Zetaprime]

What do you think the first Apple HQ meeting was like after the 9/12 midnight pre order nightmare:

1. The big bosses were humiliated and heads rolled.

2. A big sigh of relief. Although the website had issues, it was something that Apple anticipated and tried its best to avoid. We had problems but were still able to process a record number of orders.

3. Roaring laughter. We screwed the consumer yet still had record sales. We could do the same thing next year and those suckers would come back for more.

4. Excellent. Our planned shut down went exactly as planned, creating a feeding frenzy that is sure to boost walk-in sales on the 19th. The marketing team drew this play up perfectly!

4 sounds about right.