蘋果新搞作

一部 iphone 成本先係 240 美金左右，ipod touch 應該更平了，如果做到大量生產，就只會賺得更多

同埋 iphone ，ipod touch 都係推動緊 mobile internet 既概念，如果可以成功咁搶到呢個市場，絕對係可以一舉打抵其他手機公司，以 599 既價錢己經係 smartphone 銷量 number 1 , 399 就直頭可以打入普通 user 既市場。淨計 ipod touch 都 299 ，加多一百蚊美金就可以做埋電話，上到網，簡直係半賣半送了，如果係美國人，都真係好難唔心動

我都叫左一個美國fd 返黎香港時帶一部返黎俾我，下個星期有實機玩，期待期待

I just have to say apple has lost its soul and started doing silly things to compete in the market.

first of all, the aggressivev price cut (from USD 599 to 399 for 8GB iphone ) and the scrapping of 4GB iphone makes me doubt if they really have to compete by price.

given the release of ipod touch by the end of SEP to address the mass market, why bother cutting the price by USD200 to appeal to the price insensitive early adopters? Do they have to it in such a cheap way to realise the economy of scale (i.e. cutting the unit cost of multi-touch screens and 8GB flash memory modules)? I think the only obstacle to the release of perfect ipod (ipod touch with >32GB flash memory) is the cost. otherwise the technology is all here.

But things have gone even worse (so as the apple share price). Steve jobs apologised and offered apple vouchers or rebate as compensation. I appreciate that steve has been considerate to customers. But he does not have to give money away to make grumpy customers happy. Think about the first bunch of iphone customers. They were price insensitive anyway when they bought the bloody phone. They only become so when they have been mistreated and they are just trying to get the most out of apple. if steve’s really under pressure to keep his customers (or shareholders) happy, then why not giving those customers VIP treatment, such as the opportunity to pre order upcoming products or priority apple care service? This doesn’t make apple give money away, but rather rake in more revenues.

But the most interesting question out of all is “What are they trying to achieve with this ipod product line-up?"

in one of my discussions with friends a few months ago, i predicted that apple would do someting to make the iphone super sexy and desirable by building lots of barriers for customers (eg. 2-year contract with AT&T, high handset price. see note below), then they would remove them soon after the release of iphone so that they unleash the iphone to the mass market in case iphones don’t sell well. At that time I really thought they were having iphone as the key product in their mind. I didn’t expect Apple to go that far to release ipod touch just 2 months after the launch of iphone. I think in this case i got it half right.

if you take one step backward, the bigger picture actually is apple is having the iphone as a spin-off of ipod touch project (rather than having ipod touch as a by-product of iphone project). if they were really serious about selling the iphones, why didn’t they have the eco-system set up for iphone (eg. online music store, starbucks partnership) back in June? despite the fact that iphone comes with wi-fi and safari browser, why did they choose 2G in favour to 3G chipset?

If you really think about the keynote presentation (which I think is the most disappointing one by far), it’s all about market share and profits. Apple is no longer the Apple we used to know, i.e. making the best and most innovative products while using the profits from ipods to fund the development of softwares and mac computers. It is sad to see Apple selling out its very soul for compromising shareholder’s value.

(NB : the key reasons why apple chooses to do exclusive deal with mobile operators is that apple is the first in the “mobile handset industry" to 1. ban handset subsidy, 2. have revenue splitting agreement with operators so that apple gets about 10-15% of mobile voice and data revenues for each iphone customer)

個人認為，iPhone減價，是為了吸納更多用戶，因為Apple想做手機上的微軟，多過想做手機上的Dell咯。

借鏡返桌面電腦，咁多年黎，最賺錢係邊間公司丫？咁梗係Bill Gate個間啦。

睇返iPhone，手機都係一部電腦，不過就可以拎出街，我好相信，手機業往後既發展，會同當年桌面電腦業大同小異。

你睇iPhone出既時候，Steve Jobs已經話，佢地唔support third party軟件，咁即係，佢地個OS，打算自己寫晒D軟件。

你試諗下，Windows係一個人人可以寫軟件既platform，都已經發大達，咁如果以後Steve Jobs統一左手機平台既OS，咁佢地可以賺既錢，就好肯定不下於今時今日既Microsoft啦！

支持米生說法！
即刻去買apple D 股票等收成。