Curious Rat posts in response to Don Reisinger, who argues that with Jobs on medical leave, the iPhone could hurt Apple because “there’s no telling what might come out” of future development and no way of knowing how appealing those devices might be. Obviously, now Jobs isn’t at Apple day-to-day, Apple’s going to turn the iPhone into the iRetro and make it look more like the device Dom Joly used to use in Trigger-Happy TV.
But wait! Curious Rat throws a logic-shaped spanner into the bizarre-o-works:
Steve Jobs does not sit in a laboratory all day building things out of aluminum and glass.
But the tech press told us he was responsible for everything Apple has done since he become iCEO. HOW COULD THEY BE WRONG?
He does not cut metal, he is not Dr. Frankenstein and he certainly is not the only person at Apple creating beautiful things.
But that means Jony Ive isn’t just for show, to woo the ladies with his British accent and shaved head. THIS IS MAKING MY BRAIN HURT.
Steve Jobs probably has final say on what gets shipped, but he has a team of brilliant engineers and designers who have perfected their crafts over many years.
But that would mean Apple will be fine if Jobs steps down permanently, not least because Apple has effectively become Steve Jobs in company-sized form. STOP IT NOW, YOU’RE MAKING THE TECH PUNDITS CRY.
A wave of paranoia has been unleashed by discoveries that your iPhone is tracking your every move (Guardian), prompting some to assume Apple is sending the data to the mothership, in order to have you beaten to death if you don’t look at enough iAds every month. MAN, THOSE APPLE GUYS ARE EVIL.
The location data is used by software such as Maps and Camera, in order to operate;
The hidden file is neither new nor secret (it’s just moved);
The ‘discovery’ was in fact published in 2010.
But hang on… If this is all the case, then this is the media whipping up a bullshit frenzy about Apple, just because that’s more newsworthy than:
Location data still on Apple device, so location-oriented apps still work. Bloke writes app to pull data to desktop. World doesn’t explode. No-one really cares. Well, apart from editors who know they can fire up the link-bait machine. Oh, and people going ARGH, THEY KNOW WHERE I’VE BEEN while tweeting their geo-location data, checking into Foursquare and Gowalla and posting to Facebook that they’re “away from home, in a pub on the Thames, if you want to join me,” which of course has NO SECURITY IMPLICATIONS WHATSOEVER.
Poor Apple. It must be really hard for the company right now. As reported by yours truly (in a suitably bleary late-night manner), iPad sales ‘disappointed’ during Q2 and were ‘below expectations’—assuming you’re an analyst and don’t really have a clue, but like to play games with Apple stock by flinging your guesses at the internet, like a monkey throwing poo at a zoo.
But what about the iPhone? Henry Blodget already told us on Business Insider that Apple’s device was dead in the water. According to Apple’s Q2 report, here’s what ‘dead in the water’ looks like:
The Company sold 18.65 million iPhones in the quarter, representing 113 percent unit growth over the year-ago quarter.
“Fuck,” said Steve Jobs, surprisingly candidly. “Apple really is totally doomed. Despite second quarter revenue of $24.67 billion and record second quarter net profit of $5.99 billion, and us selling every iPad we can make, those analyst guys are always right, so we must be heading for a pretty big fall in Q3.” Jobs also added that the iPhone, having sold 18.65 million units in the previous quarter, was to be immediately cancelled “because that Blodget guy seems like he knows his stuff, and so I guess he knows something we don’t”.
Oh dear—my apologies. I appear to have accidentally tapped into a collective-consciousness wet-dream of Blodget’s and every analyst who reports on Apple. I HATE IT WHEN THAT HAPPENS.
Here we go again. Before bed (I’m writing this gone midnight, because I need help), I checked into the BBC and saw a slightly odd standfirst on the Apple Q2 earnings article:
Latest profits for the computer giant Apple beat most hopes with a 113% rise in iPhone sales—but iPad sales disappoint.
From what I can tell, iPad sales have been insanely swift over the past few months, but, no, there it was in grey and white (the BBC doesn’t like contrast in its text): the sales ‘disappoint’. Clicking through, there’s a little more detail:
Apple’s figures were not uniformly positive. It sold 4.69m iPad tablet computers in the quarter, below expectations.
Clearly, I’m an idiot, because 4.69 million iPads sold seems pretty damn good to me (and Apple commented: “We sold every iPad 2 we could make”). So whose expectations were these sales below? Our chums the analysts, of course—those happy campers who pull whatever figures they fancy out of their arses, and then yell at Apple for being rubbish when the company fails to match their pie-in-the-sky estimates.
If you care, CNN Money provided an exciting overview of analyst analysis (i.e. guesswork) regarding iPad sales. The range was from 8.8 million and bottomed out at 5 million. This is, presumably, why Apple selling 4.69 iPads is somehow ‘disappointing’ and ‘below expectations’, despite the fact any competitor selling anywhere near that many tablets in a quarter would be cause for a year-long celebration.
Update: it’s also worth noting that these are the exact same analysts that initially predicted doom and gloom for the iPad, suggesting Apple would sell about 17 in total, if it was lucky. As The Macalope said to me on Twitter:
Apple disappointed the analysts who suck at estimating.