Apple shares fall on back of Jobs rumours

I've been lurking around the Inquirer for many years now. Over the past year or two I've got increasingly bored of the Mr Farrell's complete lack of understanding of what Apple's rise actually means in the market. What it represents is a move from nerdy feature box ticking to a more sophisticated, design based selection criteria. You Sir, are a dinosaur stuck in the dark ages when computers and electronics were the domain of the geek. The average punter doesn't care about the odd gigabyte here or there, or minutiae of the distribution methods of software/music.

The reason people buy Apple products is not because of some irrational worship, but really just an appreciation of design. That's design, not in terms of style, but the whole way something works and is conceived. People aren't as stupid as you think, and I find your stance slightly arrogant and most importantly: boring.

This is something I've thought for as long as you've been ranting away, but have held off because of the inevitable claims of fanboyism etc etc. I'm not, I am highly trained to have a clear understanding of design and quality.

"I'm not, I am highly trained to have a clear understanding of design and quality".

Then you are.

""I'm not, I am highly trained to have a clear understanding of design and quality". Then you are.
posted by : mycelo"

Ermmmm... not the clearest post in the world, but my understanding of what you are attempting to say is that if someone is qualified to assess the design of a product then they it is inevitable they are a fanboy of apple?

Assuming I deciphered correctly, I would suggest that if that is your belief then you are agreeing with my assertion about the quality of their design. I however do not think this makes me a 'fanboy', which incidentally is a horrible word I wish had never been created. It is far too easy to label someone with it, thereby creating ever greater and clearer polarisation between people with (sometimes) slightly differing opinions. Being positive about something is not a bad thing nor should it force you to align yourself at one end of a polarised discussion.

Has anyone seen him in public since his counterpart, Kim Jong-il, also went missing?

The poor lad, and all for enlightening his hordes of sophisticated, fashionable [another word for the religious], discriminating and free-thinking privileged souls. Will someone enlighten him to the fact that the cause of pancreatic problems emanate from too much thinking & analysing [oka intellectualising] along the vein of sophistication, fashion-consciousness, messiahanic deliberations and an ultra discriminatory sense of privilege even though the very expensive quacks attending to him will can not do so [whose main mantra is genetics – “you poor unfortunate wonder – oh, that’ll be another 5k {and our 1k is still a very reasonable 1000, not 1024} bucks then”], whilst not forgetting that Reality is such that those who have not attained the required level of true discretion [which is not to be confused with discrimination] will not be able to pierce through the veil which seemingly hides Reality. “Meaning, oh Cloudy Swallow, you bird-brained rambler …..” meaning that the sense of sophistication-cum-fashion-cum-privilege-cum-discrimination is what bars humans to the Reality-Club because all those aspects are self-imagined, being of illusions & delusions. Just because a dog sniffs at my orifice for confidence doesn’t mean I have any sense of [self-]valuation to offer. Remember, in Reality, one cannot do unto others that which one has not already done unto oneself. Without exception even though “chosen fews” are rubbing their hands at the thought of have gotten away with it … again.

Here’s the multi-zillion dollarh answer [should one ba able to bottle and flog it, a task especially arduous for the “we can flog anything chosen few”]. The thoughts gifted by intelligence emantes ftom the brain which, because it is intellence per se, have no thinking components whereas all other thoughts [of relativity], especially the intellectual and objective varieties, issue through the combustion of the left and right sympathetic nervous systems, the left being hydrogenation and the right being of oxidation. “Look, cloudy emanations, if you possess the answer to humanity’s ills, you should use it to benefit mankind, you load of…” ‘You are obviously ready to join your master then?’

When there is a need for utility, there is no harm in supplying the demand whereas when harm, oka “entrepreneurial creativity”, is artificially generated as an utility, not only does it becomes an addiction, it is actually brain-washing people into accepting destruction as construction. What need is there for the constant “news”, “music”, “texting”, “keeping in contact”, and similar idiocy & lunacy? People need to learn from their errors but that cannot happen when addiction, oka hypocrisy, is masquerading as an error. Addiction is that which will trap you for life and won’t relinqwuish its grip unless and until it is replaced by another “higher-valued” addiction …, or Reality. Imagine, being addicted by a brand name. That’s one religion that most cannot recognise as such whilst not forgetting that a fanatic is he who denies everything other than his saviour. To derive confidence through associating with sophistication, fashion, privilege and a messiahanic sense of discrimination. Sure, the brainless have always been doing that but they have the loot of their “chosen few” for burning. No wonder the liver has had enough and passed the job onto the pancreas which, the poor thing, didn’t realise what’s heading its way. Type 2 diabetes is an illness of too much use of the intellect and intellect is just another word for futuristic analysing and thinking … and you can only think of the past or the future. If true, any bets on when quackery can bottle and flog the info? How about a zillion-to-one, against and it still has value, such is the chasm between Reality and Thoughts.

@wonton gob
That's a rather long post there!

Apple's shares are bound to take a dive on the news of Steve Jobs illness. When Steve (Jobs) came back to Apple after NeXT, he remade Apple into what is now.

The INQ is quite accurate in referring to Apple Computer as the cult of Steve Jobs as part of Apple's following is based on those attracted to Steve's personality, especially with the older, more die-hard Apple fans.

I think that Steve will suffer the same fate as fellow Silicon Valley veteran Bill Gates and live to regret focusing his company on himself.

The people that like Apple products for their innovation and design have become a tiny bunch indeed as recently Apple has not shown any true design innovation in a long while and is being eclipsed by Lenovo, HP, Dell, VIA Technology, Intel, AMD, Sony, LG, Nokia and many others. On the other hand, the number of people defending Apple and its (relatively closed) ecosystem of hardware and software is growing at large rate, due to the people who have spent large amounts of money on Apple products, and need to justify their expenditure.

Sorry for this long post too.

This is something that I don't understand about the psychology of stock prices. In these companies where such a huge portion of the performance of the company is dependent upon one person, why does the share price plummet when something happens to this one person? This person is going to die sometime. You would think investors would have figured that out by now. Jobs and Warren Buffett are going to die some day and the shares of their companies are going to fall through the floor. So why was the price so high in the first place? It all seems rather silly.

Re: Robin. You were wondering what mycelo was trying to say. Here is the gist of it: When you have to qualify your comments with "I'm not a (blank)," you're a (blank). If you say, "I'm not a bigot, but..." you're a bigot. If you say, "...but I'm not a fanboy," you're a fanboy.

Seriously, design? I can find quite a few alternatives to Apple products that are well-designed, and cheaper to boot. Just admit it, you like Apple products.

"Re: Robin. You were wondering what mycelo was trying to say. Here is the gist of it: When you have to qualify your comments with "I'm not a (blank)," you're a (blank). If you say, "I'm not a bigot, but..." you're a bigot. If you say, "...but I'm not a fanboy," you're a fanboy.
posted by : michiganfan"

Thanks for your translation. I suppose the logic is so flawed I was having trouble grasping what mycelo was on about. Following that line of logic if I say: I am not a murderer, I am not a christian, I am not muslim, I am not a woman, I am not a cat, it would make me all of those things... no of course it doesn't. Completely flawed comment. Thanks again for explaining though.

"Seriously, design? I can find quite a few alternatives to Apple products that are well-designed, and cheaper to boot. Just admit it, you like Apple products.
posted by : thealsir"

I'm not sure what your revelation is? I've already said I generally quite like Apple's products. I object to the polarisation of the debate and hence I completely agree that there are many products around that are also well designed. What I would say though, is that there isn't a company I am aware of that has the consistency of Apple at the moment. I am prepared to be proved wrong and in fact would love to know about such great design, who's doing it and where. Again, I am not just talking about style, but the care that has gone into detailing the product (for those not in the design world, the way the joints are dealt with, the way it is made and put together), the way the whole system works together and the way it looks. I would be interested which ones you are thinking of though. Purely from an intellectual point of view!

Not for their products only, and I don't think their best.

But what i really like on Apple, is they give a real finish and try to have "one product". Not a lot of subversions, changes oder different designs an what else.

They have a clear design decision and keep exactly "this" product alive.
How much differen nokia phones are out there? hundrets? And every phone differs a lot.

And;
They are really got in giving a technology its worth. They fight against the meaning of technology has to be best, robust and should not cost anything.

As a Diablo 3 developer said
"Yes, gold will be worth something"

Just my 2cents

Oh my god, what went wrong with my grammar. Sorry for my crappy english comment.

oder = or
got = good

There can be no doubt that Apple with it's iPod have helped us all. This easy to use, flashy/stylish, gadget and there shop have done a lot for removing DRM and convincing the record companies of the way to go.

So for that I salute Apple. I am just shocked that it's taken so many years for others to finally come to market with competing products (Amazon, Nokia etc).

I've not used an Apple PC, I would like to try one out but I'm sacred that I might like it. Scared because I would check the hardware specs, see that the hardware is prices 20-30% higher than a PC and my stomach would turn over and over if I tried to pay the extra for the Mac!

It's the value for money argument that I think apple falls down on.

Their iPod is often 50-100% more expensive than similarly performing hardware.

Apple has poor battery replacement, many of it's products the batteries cannot be replaced.

There are other areas too, but still maybe if the simple to use interface is so good, maybe it's the price worth paying.

However at the moment I don't need a simple gui to use a computer! ;-)

oh yeh, ya can play apple media on any device, just so long as its, errrrrrr, made by the shiny toy maker themselves lol.

quote :- "Apple (NASD: AAPL) has added studio-backed copy-protection technology to its line of MacBooks that prevents movies purchased from the iTunes Store from playing on non-approved external monitors, causing some anger among customers, according to published reports.

The HDCP (High-bandwidth Digital Content Protection) technology is intended to prevent users from transferring media content between devices that do not have locks in place to protect against unauthorized copying.

The standard is typically used on devices like Blu-ray players and HDTVs. However, the industry has no defined labeling system for HDCP-compliant devices, and even newer televisions may not support the standard.

So if a new MacBook owner wants to watch a movie purchased from iTunes by plugging a cable from the laptop into his or her television, they may be out of luck." see here http://www.dmwmedia.com/news/2008/11/20/apple-adds-studio-backed-copy-protection-macbook-laptops its amazon thats stickin it up um :O)