Seems like nobody really cares anymore...

[eoblaed]

Remember the excitement? "New iPhone" OMG!!!
What has changed? Was it Steve? What's different?

I find it amusing to wait a year for a HUGE announcement - a slightly betterer camera - used to be
an official Apple line - more megapixels is not good, now it's good apparently and a faster processor
(does anyone care about the processor inside your phone?).

I don't know about you, but it all feels like an end of an era.

I'm very excited. And I'm coming from a 6 Plus.

It's not just a slightly better camera, it's a largely better camera. And yes, just packing in more pixels without other considerations is bad ... if you watched the keynote, you'll know that's not what they did. A lot of re-engineering was done to allow Apple to add 50% more pixels without sacrificing color fidelity or adding noise (most phone vendors don't care about that, they just like the big number before 'megapixels' because most consumers don't know better). 50% more pixels with the same clarity and color fidelity? Yes, please!

Also: 4K video, live photos (I'll have to play with that and see how I like it), OIS for video ... these are big changes.

And yes, faster CPU/GPU is always welcome. Everything will benefit from that.

Double the speed on the Touch ID sensor? Very excited for that. Touch ID is already quick, doubling the speed will be awesome.

3D Touch has the potential to add a whole new, streamlined way of interacting with our phones as well.

There's also the boost in RAM that has the potential to improve some experiences on the phone. LTE Advanced, faster WiFi, will also improve things.

So, yes, plenty to be excited about.

 

[FloridaGary]

The next big thing should be Apple TV if they offer a service allowing us to cut the cable. For those of you who can't appreciate the incremental improvements of the iPhone or iPad, may have a better appreciation if you understood what it takes to get these improvements to market.

 

[scaredpoet]

I think the very fact that there's 5 pages of comments to wade through in this thread is proof enough that there's lots of hype and excitement going on. If people weren't passionate, this thread, and the forum in general, would be dead.

But, it's like a drug. That first high is absolutely amazing. Then you keep trying to chase that high, but it's never gonna be as intense, ever again.

The good news is, a dose of realism goes a long way here. If you're looking for Apple keynotes to get your emotional high, then maybe you need to re-evaluate things a little. It is, and always has been, a hunk of metal and glass in the end; something we shouldn't let govern our emotional well being so much.

That said, I'm happy with the improvements of the 6S Plus, and look forward to upgrading from my 6 Plus when my new phone arrives on Friday.

I still believe that Apple died with Steve (sorry).

No, Apple didn't die, and if you think Steve was 100% behind every great idea at Apple, then you were buying into his hype like he wanted you to. You were never interested in Apple, the company... you were interested in Steve, the hype man, and what he could sell you as amazing. He's gone, and that's a sad thing, but Apple's gonna continue on, like it would've eventually had to even if he had lived another 20 years.

Think of it this way: no one is perfect. Steve Jobs (or his team) eventually would've come up with a real stinker of an idea. Not like Mobile Me... but something REALLY bad, a send-the-shares-plummeting situation. It's just the law of averages, something bound to happen. How would you have felt?

If there's a silver lining, it's that no one had to sit and cringe through such a disaster. So now we can glorify and pine for the old days... when Steve knew exactly what people wanted when it came to apps. Or that perfect design on the iPhone 4. Or how under this watch, Apple got cloud services right the first time. Because Apple under Steve never missed a step. Ever.

 

[DustinDev47]

Steve is dead. Jony Ive is very much alive. Remember that.

 

[Rayy42]

For me I believe I have gotten the best of both worlds. I broke my 6 Plus towards the end of August and did and insurance claim with AT&T. They shipped me a brand new gold 64GB Plus. I looked at when it was manufactured and it was made at the end of July. So I truly have a brand new device and so it's even more tempting than normal for me not to upgrade for the first time even though I did so every year in the past.

Force touch and Live Photos are both things that could be replicated software wise and even though I have a 64GB device, it still irks me that Apple is committing highway robbery by selling the 16GB device with 4K video.

This may be very first-world like of me to say too, but with a case who can even tell that I have a 6 Plus and not a 6s Plus?

 

[Rayy42]

I've discussed this with a lot of people in the past few years.

Is the iPhone hype dying? Maybe.

I still believe that Apple died with Steve (sorry). Ever since he passed away, the magic of Apple isn't the same for me anymore. Things were more creative/innovative with him. Now, that's not to say that every product sucks now because he's gone. I just feel that it isn't as innovative as it used to be. Then again, we're kind of at the point of "What else can one do?" Not just Apple, but anyone. We've done fingerprint sensors, heart rate monitors, updated cameras, edge displays, etc. Ideas are running low and until something awesome comes along, it'll be this way for a while.

The hype of Apple is in fact dying...but what lives on is that Apple is still a more stable and superior platform than android. Even though devices still have problems, it's still much more stable than android overall.

That's what keeps us here and still buying into Apple.

 

[TheBoxer]

I've had a lot of iPhones over the years. I've been upgrading since the first iPhone came out. I don't get exited over an upgrade because the novelty wore off, but I still care and upgrade. The next big thing for Apple will be the electronic car. That will excite again.

 

[Supermallet]

Force touch and Live Photos are both things that could be replicated software wise

Live photos likely could have been replicated with software, but if you've used an Apple Watch you'd know that the haptic feedback and pressure sensitive activation are essential to the experience of Force Touch/3D Touch. They needed the new hardware to make 3D Touch really work in a way that feels like Apple, as opposed to just stuffing it in like an Android manufacturer would have done.

This may be very first-world like of me to say too, but with a case who can even tell that I have a 6 Plus and not a 6s Plus?

Well you could tell, and isn't that all that matters?

Personally, I upgrade every year, and I'm as excited every year. Specs are great and all, but it's those demos at the keynotes that really gets me excited. I love trying the new features and seeing which ones I can integrate into my daily use. I feel the same way about the OS X demos at WWDC. Simply put, I love the Apple experience, and I love how they improve it and yes even innovate year after year.

I understand that going from a revolution to an evolution is going to feel less exciting. I remember trying to use "smartphones" before the iPhone. Either it had a finicky stylus and an overly dense UI, or it was simplistic to the point that the "smart" aspect wasn't much more than a shiny UI. The iPhone changed everything. It combined form and function and within a short span of time anyone who had one wondered how they lived without it. I remember standing in line for a 3G at an AT&T store, and the line was nothing compared to the lines we'd see for the 4/5/6, but everyone there was so palpably excited about getting the NEW iPhone, with all the big improvements! It was cheaper (subsidized), had 3G, and came in two colors!

Now we have 4 colors, 3 storage sizes, LTE-A, Siri, TouchID, 3D Touch, millions of apps, high def screens, computer-class processors, 12 MP cameras, the works. And people are blase about it. Well, I'm not blase about it. I love how the iPhone fits into my life, and I'm looking forward to all the new features and speed upgrades.

Viva la iPhone!

 

[areyes163]

I think there there is plenty of hype. It's not all over the news like in the years past but that is because new cell phone releases are not really big news anymore.

Look at all the pre order threads going on right now. People are going bonkers in there constantly checking their statuses and yelling at reps over things that are not even issues. It's like a looney farm in there. Hilarious reading comments.

 

[Zaidat]

Exactly this. I think we all sometimes get carried away with all the hypes, but keeping a healthy perspective is important. Im upgrading from an iPhone 5 as well, and literally cannot wait to get my hands on the new iPhone.

I'm upgrading from an iPhone 4. I am beyond excited.

 

[MH01]

I guess the innovation is gone for me, something only apple to spring on us. Now it's an evolution of existing devices..... Every year we just expect a refined x device, maybe getting a tad boring.

Also the expansion into luxury high end for me was the end of an era. The era of the geeks is over, era of bling has began.

 

[newmacuser14]

there is nothing new or innovative with this release, its also an "S" release which is usually small improvements instead of anything major. It was a bit underwhelming and its no surprise.

 

[potassium404]

I recently watched the iPhone 4 announcement. Steve was a genius at pitching compared to Cook and team. When you'd watch a keynote from him you left feeling "man, I need to get that now." I don't feel the same kind of excitement with a Cook keynote. Of course the devices are still immensely popular to this day and I still preorder every year, but I feel the keynotes was where I really got excited.

 

[smiddlehurst]

Or maybe it's that people feel that Apple no longer listens so much to customer wishes as they used to or think that Apple should listen more.

The absolute last thing I want Apple to do is listen to customer wishes. You'd end up with a phone that weighs more than a small moon but gives a week of battery life... which 99% of users would charge overnight anyway. It'd let apps on from any source imaginable... and would be crippled by dodgy software in about three days. It... well I can go on for a long time on that topic, let's just say there wouldn't be anything new or compelling about it and move on.

As for the excitement, the phone market in general has been on a ridiculous ramp since 2007. In eight years we've seen the sort of jump forward that took a couple of decades on the desktop (primarily because so many 'big' computer technologies could be scaled down and applied to the phone). Over the last couple of years its become a mature market with the pace of change naturally slowing down and becoming far more iterative. Hardly a surprise and certainly not a marker of doom as some seem to think but it does change the environment somewhat.

 

[warrior2000]

Remember the excitement? "New iPhone" OMG!!!
What has changed? Was it Steve? What's different?

I find it amusing to wait a year for a HUGE announcement - a slightly betterer camera - used to be
an official Apple line - more megapixels is not good, now it's good apparently and a faster processor
(does anyone care about the processor inside your phone?).

I don't know about you, but it all feels like an end of an era.

There is a ton of innovation left to untap.

3D touch opens a whole new dimension of control.

I think iPhone7 or iPhone8 will drastically shrink the foot print of the phones. I would like to see an iPhone7+ with a footprint the same size as the iPhone6. This would be possible with near zero bezel and a home button/TouchID embedded into the screen.

Later we will see foldable screens. So you can have a 6 inch display folded into a phone the size of the 5S. At that point I think smartphones will hit a peak. But that is a good 5 years down the line at least. Then the next step will be expanding wearables like the Watch.

Technology never stops. Never. I don't think you have to worry about Apple not innovating for a very very long time.

 

[warrior2000]

I recently watched the iPhone 4 announcement. Steve was a genius at pitching compared to Cook and team. When you'd watch a keynote from him you left feeling "man, I need to get that now." I don't feel the same kind of excitement with a Cook keynote. Of course the devices are still immensely popular to this day and I still preorder every year, but I feel the keynotes was where I really got excited.

Jesus christ. Another Steve Jobs worshiper. Please let the man rest in peace.

Could it be you were younger in 2010? You were more easily excited?

 

[sonicdissent]

I think this is a pretty jaded sample set compared to the average consumer, and I still see excitement. We're generally going to be less excited because we are so immersed in the apple world. We know every part of the keynote before it happens. Maybe things aren't as crazy as they were for the iphone 4, but an apple keynote is still a huge event. You don't see, outside of maybe game consoles, anything else like it.

 

[yanki01]

I grew tired of it probably after the 4. All the keynotes since then are embarrassing. prompting crowd noise and clapping after every sentence. trying to push the product by saying we'll love it, can't wait to see what you'll do with it, on and on and on. I love apple, owned most of the iPhones since the original. Have a few iPods, iPad, 2 MBP and an apple TV. I think they mostly did it to themselves too. it's not that exciting anymore. I know it's still exciting once you're about to get the phone itself but idk. they haven't done anything exciting for me. just updates to what others already have which seem to be laughing at but apple doesn't care so it seems.