Has Apple Lost it’s mojo?
 

Newest products from Apple are simply versions of already existing services, sure it’s nice to see more competition for Citibank and Amazon and Netflix, but is it innovative? No.
I would love to see them get as explosively innovative with something like data transmission and delivery as they did with the iPad and iPhone. Vast areas of the country aren’t served by fast internet. Apple could address that with some innovation that is as transformative as the Mac and the iPhone, but instead they want to make small tweaks to existing business models. Apple is becoming just another purveyor of consumer services.

*Heavily edited now that I have my glasses on and not typing on my iPad. Sorry for the gobbeldy gook.

A damning statement. Though I guess I’d prefer nothing over nonsense.

Jobs is dead and Apple is atrophying

The one apple product I use, I would not replace with an apple product.

Their software is durn frustratin'.

Steve was the mojo.

Apple are going all in on AR which is the stage before neural implants.

John Legere / T Mobile will be / are doing the data thing taking on the cable industry with a for realz 5G network that could very well be one of the final nails in the cable industries coffin. Can't come too soon.

This.

I love my iPhone. But I hate with a passion iTunes. I have to use it to back up my phone to my computer. I have a 128Gig phone and 80 gig of data. I will not use the cloud to store my data, especially for what they charge.

I have been using computers since 1980 when I got my Commodore Vic16. I have had countless PCs and several Macs, even some Unix machines. I have use a lot of different software packages.

Without hesitation, I can say iTunes is the worst piece of crap software on the planet that I have ever used. 100% illogical, and hard to use. Just stupid velvet collar restrictions of Apple.

How about a reliable keyboard that won't break? Until they address that, I'm not buying another Apple laptop. Tired of form>function with Apple these days.

Silicon Valley thinks tactile feedback is the devil's work. All the same nonsense minimalist 'look' the sheeple love and buy. Touchscreens suck.

rjp

I think their products are still quality but they are no longer innovative. Apple is just adding the same content to the iPhone that Samsung announced 6-12 months ago. I hate Android more than IOS, it’s the only reason I haven’t switched. Their UI has become clunky and convoluted over time, the software has more bugs, and ITunes does totally suck.

"Has Apple lost it's mojo?"


October 5, 2011,

I am on my second apple iphone and it is a 5s. The previous one was the 4s. I really enjoy the iphone but prefer non apple laptops such as hp. Having said that my apple stock is doing well. Not such whether to sell it or not.:)

What are you using? I love my Macbook Pro. The keys don't click, but I feel a definite little "pop" when I press a key.
The only keyboard failure I've had is the one I spilled a cup of coffee into.

I had a 2016 12" macbook that ate it's keyboard- it was warrantied but it wasn't even a work machine. Kinda left a negative impression. I dare not use one for work- I got a Lenovo with Win 10, now everything else but the keyboard is goofy.

I don't want to spend the cash unless it's fixed.

rjp

Just switched to an Android phone yesterday. Had Apple since smart phones came out.

My biggest frustration beside I-Tunes was letting them give me the the honor of having my defective I-phone battery replaced for only $35.....Since I live a long way from an Apple store, they advertise you go online to order a pre-paid shipping box........That web site was down for 2 months (They didn't want to do it for that price)

So, I call and takes 45 minutes to get walked thru a battery test. set up a Paypal thing thru my phone and they tell me a Fed-ex box is coming........Never Happened.

Another 45 minute call....They don't know what went wrong, but now set up an account on my Visa and they tell me I have to take it to a UPS store with a label I printed. That store is 1/2 away. They ended up charging my Paypal.....I get home and there is the FedEx box waiting for me......What a f'ed up mess for a simple battery fix.......Would have done it myself, but would have voided the warranty.......Goodbye.......

I think the mojo is gone. Used to be when Apple would announce a new product it was a big deal. Ain't no thang anymore. I don't have a single f*c* to give about Apple TV, and the new ipads and macs appear to be just more of the same....having said that, I've had an imac and a macbook pro that have been working just fine for years and years and years and they don't feel old, so I feel like the premium I paid worked out in my favor....

Oh agree very much Herr! Love my imac and MacBook pro! I didn't opt for the touch bar model and don't really see where there is value in that but otherwise it's been a great product.

Apple have become what they set out to fight. A locked down system that does everything possible to make it hard to use. Apple used to be simple, it just worked. Honestly Windows and Google have far surpassed them in usability these days. They are so locked down now it's a pain to use. Have you tried reading your own pictures or songs if you back them on a hard drive then try to read them on a different machine. It's a pain. If it wasn't' for the fact my wife is >< far from being completely electronically illiterate, she can just about navigate the Apple world, I'd kick every one of their ****-can products to the curb.

I love my Apple keyboards and have never had one break. I've owned multiples of every laptop model since day one. Still have a Blackbird in original box in a closet.

I also hoard the wired keyboards.

Me too, never had one break. Never heard of anyone having a problem w them, either. He must be really smashing the keys when he's angry on PARF or something. :)

Butterfly keys, right? The old one was good.

My 12" mac has those, and it's not as comfortable as the Windows it's passable.

I just don't want a failure on a $2K machine. That, and excel isn't multi thread in native Mac, nor any fuzzy lookup tool.

rjp

Maybe it's because you don't do anything useful with a computer, like I do.

Try again, Denis

https://www.macrumors.com/2018/06/22/apple-macbook-pro-keyboard-repair-program/

No, that is a known issue with the new ones. Keyboards fail within months on new machines. The problem is that they have made the switches very sensitive to dust intrusion.

https://www.apple.com/support/keyboard-service-program-for-macbook-and-macbook-pro/

I presume you remember the mass rush to get Windows 95 when it came out? I remember seeing the news reports of the day and lines of people clamoring to get hold of Windows 95. I waited for the crowds to die down. I had to get it on 3.5 inch floppies for some reason that I don't remember after 24 years.

I have a iPhone 6S. I will continue to use it as long as it is working fine. Most likely I will replace it with another iPhone someday.

I just wish there was an alternative to iTunes.

Mine made it 60 days then I started getting dead keys.

-cost
-excel features
-keyboard reliability

rjp

I've read of the keyboard issues as well. None on mine thus far.

I can tell you 100% of the pc laptops I've bought in past years didn't work for **** after a year or so. enduring that stupid Microsoft attempt at making their laptops look like ipads didn't help either.

nope, i'll take a MacBook any day.

I work with both Apples and PC's and no longer see a big difference in the two (other than the apple proprietary stuff)*.

Back in the day Apple was famous for innovative hardware, now? Not so much.

*I am concerned that Microsoft is now turning into a invasive monster, so much so that I pulled my wife's old XP laptop out of the recycle bin, deleted everything but Word and intend to use it as electric typewriter.

I still have a 5s. MrsWD keeps telling me to get a new phone when I yell at mine, but I don't think it would help. I get a message every day that my storage is about full and I need to rent space on iCloud or something. And Siri gives me fits:

"Siri call Joe Blow."
"I found 500436 Joes in your area."
(mumbling to myself, "I didn't say find Joe Blow.")
"Siri call Joe!"
"Here is the number for Joe BLow."
"Dammit SIRI CALL JOE BLOW!"
"Calling Joe Blow."

And + 1000 on iTunes.

I waited 3 hours in a mall for them to tell me my iPhone 7 battery was 1 month out of warranty. So they will do nothing. They couldn’t tell me that up front?
This is after my iPhone 5 and 6 batteries almost burnt a hole in an airplane.

I’m over Apple. The care little of their customers. I care little of them.

...Trip to the Apple store, like going to the DMV. The make you sit there and wait, then the damn rep tries to be bestest buddies with you, and wants to chat all day, making it an hours long 'experience'.

rjp

Worse. Apple stores are always full of true believers hanging around just to soak up the 'vibe' and play with stuff. They also enjoy chatting up the help, so if you actually have an issue with a product or really need some info, you wind up having to wait.

Apple is now a charging cable/accessories company that happens to sell things like phones.

You know, they do need a waiting lounge for tech help, let the cultists stay out on the main floor with the toys.

Off note:while waiting in those places, anyone text rude messages and death threats to your friends from the demo phones?

I do :)

rjp

Apple user since the Newton.

On the hardware side, Apple is very strong but not uniquely so. That's usually been the case. Apple has more of an advantage with the iPhone because they make more of the hardware, less with the Mac.

On the Mac OS side, I use Windows 10 a lot along with Mac OS and still find Mac easier to use and more stable and easier to use. Win 10 is pretty good but still has a lot of irritating things, the update process has been troublesome, Microsoft's browser strategy is such a mess that you have to run both Edge and IE, and in 2 years my Win 10 has had to be reinstalled to fix fatal corruption three times.

On the IOS side, I don't use Android so can't compare usability. But it's pretty clear that if you value security and privacy, IOS is the choice.

On the services side, it's kind of like the hardware. In features and usability, Apple is among the best but not uniquely superior. Compare Spotify to iTunes, Roku to Apple TV, etc. But as with IOS, security and privacy is a big differentiator.

The big advantage is the integration. Running all your devices on the same AppleID, sharing the same iCloud, handing tasks between devices - that's much harder to cobble together with a mix of Dell, Huawei, Windows, Android, Google, Spotify, etc. When your kid or spouse breaks their iPhone and you magically restore their replacement iPhone to yesterday's iCloud backup, that's utterly convenient. When your kid's MacBook is missing and you locate and lock it from your iPhone, that's really useful. When your wife takes a photo with her iPhone and you can see it on your iPad, that's cool.

I see the integration getting even tighter as Apple brings IOS and MacOS together, replaces Intel with Apple chips, builds out ApplePay, Siri, iCloud, etc.

Apple has been surprisingly timid about using its strength to integrate even more of the pieces. Airport should have been what eero is, or Apple should have bought eero. Having to cable an ugly LG monitor to an iMac is ridiculous. It feels like the beancounters have too much sway: so what if Airport was a financially immaterial business, it was important but Apple let Google and Alexa get between their parts of the customer experience.

Apple has also been too financially demanding of content providers, partners, and new products. Instead of demanding 25% revenue share up front, why not start at 10% and only go up when you've delivered 300% growth to your partner?

The "next iPhone" is out there. Apple's reluctance to pursue business models in which user data is the actual product is a limitation - they have to charge the consumer which narrows the possibilities. Apple's high profile and thus need to avoid public failures - they can't launch ten products and be happy for one success and nine disasters - makes it harder for them to trailblaze a brand new category. Buy they'll find a promising thing and take it over.

We’re already planning for the demise of direct broadcast satellite earth stations for Dish, DTV, Echostar etc. Thirdworld will still have a market for quite a while but, our push is into Q/V bands to accommodate the larger BW. Serious advances in copper are making the streaming possible, hence a death knell for cable.

We use Macs in the sound lab on campus to run LogicPro. I hate them.

I would say that Apple had a mojo when their products where truly innovative... For the last ~5 years is the same technology only more and more expensive...

Edge is missing most the buttons on purpose and is good for nothing unfortunately.
IE is for downloading FF.

What I do not like about that Apple feature is that there is no more USB hookup.
People can't store and control their own data locally without going through a cloud(someone else's computer).
I'm guessing 'thefappening' and stolen internet nudes of Hollywood stars were gaffled this way.

Apple seemed to take away any feature as soon as they started to well for customers.
It's a total loss of control for the customer.
Not sure why they would try to tick off their bread and butter like that. Only Microsoft did that.

Then I heard the iTunes updates would delete purchased music and I decided that Apple was not the platform for me.

the older guys will get this: The Pepsi guy is running things again......

Or as Jobs used to say, the guy making sugar water.

I took a Apple laptop for a test drive. I think it was a Mini. Screen was not that big. Really liked it until I saw the price. I do not think I am a tightwad but no way I was paying $1500 for that laptop. For $500 I may give it a go. Shucks, mostly just surfing the forums and Craigs list, not running a business on it.