As I see it, Apple had two other choices. (1) Don't release a smaller iPad, and just stick with 9.7. (2) Make a retina mini, for which they will have to charge, oh, I don't know, a starting price of $429? In any case, it will have to be a lot more expensive than $329.
In case of (1) people would be berating Apple for being behind the times and leaving the small tablet market to Google and Amazon. In case of (2), people would be berating Apple for charging too much.
In other words, whatever Apple does, somebody would complain.
No.
Apple is a technology company. They work to develop products that solve problems, and they themselves have to solve problems to make those devices. I'm also in the tech industry and excuses get you nowhere. It's up to us to design and engineer great products for people.
In other words, stop making excuses for Apple. Nobody would have thought you could cram so many pixels into a 9.7" screen, especially one that runs on a battery! But they did it with the iPad 3. And they'll do it on the Mini as well.
This is just a dumb move: they compromised way, way to much and are offering a substandard product that makes very little sense given the iDevice line up they have where ALL of it should be Retina by now.
Please don't make excuses for them, you don't have to do that. Trust me. They can do much better than this my friend.
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It's really just people working very hard to make themselves feel better that they can't afford the cost, or bought a competing piece of garbage a few months back. It's Apple's best product in a long, long time. Think about it: what possible reason would a hater post about a product he doesn't want or like, other than the above.
You, like so many others, oversimplify everything. I have over $50,000 worth of computer equipment sitting in my office. Most of it is Apple. I've got 2 iPad Minis. I think they are complete garbage because the screen is terrible.
So there. I'm not an Apple hater. The product actually sucks. Stop being delusional and accept reality that maybe, just maybe, the iPad Mini is a bad product or, even if you don't accept that, accept that people have valid criticism without stupid hater labels, etc.
And why do people complain? Why do you praise? Why do you post here? This is an Internet discussion forum, deal with it.
In my case, I'm frustrated because I make money from Apple. This product is not good for my business. I'm interested in talking to other, "mature" people about this to help my thinking in navigating decisions we have to make moving forward. I also read this forum to gauge real world users and their reaction.
It's all valid.
