[WS:] Does not this description apply, to a significant extent, to most computer products released during the past 15 or so years? Their functionality changed very little from a point of view of data manipulation number crunching and text editing - but the complexity of hardware and software increased exponentially, no? Computer gaming may be a different story but judging the entire industry by this niche is a bit like the tail wagging the dog.
I would also like to second your comments on innovation vs. stability.
Using already existing technological or organizational solutions in new products or organizations (the so called path dependence) has been extensively studied and shown to have clear advantage over "reinventing the wheel." It is my understanding that there is a great deal of path dependence in computer products (e.g. subsequent editions of Windows being "path dependent" on MS-DOS) - and the "innovation" is basically a marketing ruse and an opportunity for planned obsolescence. For example, the functionality of Office 2007/2010 is not that much different from that of Office 2003, the main "innovation" is messing with user interface, which btw is an arrogant and asinine way of treating the user.
As to Doug's question about millions of people being fooled by Apple marketing gimmicks - what is your point? It is a basic fact of life in a capitalist economy - from fashion industry to car making and to home building. Are you suggesting that Apple products are exempt from it, or what?
Wojtek
On Thu, Oct 6, 2011 at 6:59 PM, Nathan S. <n.crazeddoberman at gmail.com> wrote:
> All this talk on Jobs prompted me to join the list.
>
> I'm fairly certain that Apple employers programmers, designers and artists
> with names that are not "Steve Jobs". I'm also fairly certain it contracted
> labor to Chinese firms that permitted Apple to net something like 30000% on
> each iPhone, and the conditions of those production appear rather connected
> (and correlate, I presume) with very high suicide rates among the actual
> assemblers.
>
> Bracketing that and focusing on JobsApple the Randoid Superhero, I'm glad to
> read that he was hostile to the word "innovation". The idea of running a
> stable UNIX-derived kernel on a heavily-controlled hardware base (hence the
> system's stability) is so 20th-century, as in, it's a Fordist production
> model, that it's amazing that Apple had to practically go bankrupt before
> doing it and that no one else did at all. You can have a Mac that works with
> any chipsets you want so long as they're the original ones it shipped with.
> What's amazing is that Apple was the only game in town doing this. Anyone
> could have, like Apple, grabbed the BSD kernel, stripped it to a restricted
> hardware universe, and written a software suite in either 100% portable, or
> 100% machine language, code base , and probably have achieved if not the
> commercial success the same technical one: a personal computer that just
> worked. Microsoft, which really introduced the PC (vs. IBM's failed efforts
> IIRC), was and is so, I don't know, I can't begin to diagnose the problem.
> The other marked JobsApple innovation was an eye to, yes, case/housing
> design. Apple IIRC introduced finger-friendly bolts back in the '80s on some
> models and has always made durable prodcuts, but JobsApple made them look
> good. They hired artists to do the icons, for example, at least, I think
> they did. The iPad is a retarded device and not innovative at all (it's a
> giant iPhone with slightly more power), but it sure looks good.
>
> The analysis here, though, is controlled by something simple: price. OSX
> sells for a remarkably affordable $30, making it far cheaper than any
> Windows suite of software with that amount of function, but pretty much
> demands an Apple device as its hardware base. Apple easily charges a 60%,
> and in all honesty more like 100%, retail premium, for a computer that has
> the same amount of hardware power as something priced at half that much from
> another manufacturer. You can build a Hackintosh and dodge that huge
> Defenestration Tax, but if you have the technical skill to do that, you have
> the technical skill to use linux or BSD, which means you aren't really
> benefiting that much from Apple's 'innovative' interface design, and clearly
> not from their physical design. So price essentially undermines the creative
> potency that JobsApple brought to computing. I.e., rather than seek to sell
> a "just works" product for a large consumer base, JobsApple sold a boutique
> product. In other words, it offers Fordist product--mind you, a markedly
> superior one--at artisan prices, essentially mitigating whatever spread of
> 'potentials and powers' it unlocks. Which turns the innovation and beauty of
> Apple into another damn status symbol. Windows has done a lot of
> catching-up, but until Windows adopts a UNIX-like base or introduces a
> totally new approach to the operating system it is going to remain utter
> garbage regardless of implementing Minority-Report-style finger-waving
> devices like the Kinect, etc.
>
> This isn't so much the case with the iPhone, as it sells around the same as
> other high-end smartphones with similar power.
>
> Don't get me started on iTunes, which is a Rube Goldberg contraption of an
> internet store. That's not aesthetically pleasing or easy to use at all,
> except the 1-click-buy function.
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