JDSoCal
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Aspiring oligarch
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Post by JDSoCal on Feb 14, 2015 12:15:14 GMT -8
Could just be CarPlay Extreme too. I'd personally prefer Apple just let Special Projects do its thing without its R&D budget "getting too out of hand" (whatever that means), and if it comes out with something great every 5-10 years, awesome. iPhone, Watch, Mac and iPad + software can keep Apple growing just fine as it is. I don't think anyone has a problem from the R&D side of things, especially since Apple has already been working on compact battery technology for 20 years. The questions are sales and margins. There is zero evidence that EV cars are commercially practicable outside of Candyland, and even there they subsidize unicorn farts. Plus, there's the issue of making all of those painstakingly built, expensive Apple stores 50X larger to fit cars inside them.
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Post by BillH on Feb 14, 2015 13:33:12 GMT -8
Could just be CarPlay Extreme too. I'd personally prefer Apple just let Special Projects do its thing without its R&D budget "getting too out of hand" (whatever that means), and if it comes out with something great every 5-10 years, awesome. iPhone, Watch, Mac and iPad + software can keep Apple growing just fine as it is. I don't think anyone has a problem from the R&D side of things, especially since Apple has already been working on compact battery technology for 20 years. The questions are sales and margins. There is zero evidence that EV cars are commercially practicable outside of Candyland, and even there they subsidize unicorn farts. Plus, there's the issue of making all of those painstakingly built, expensive Apple stores 50X larger to fit cars inside them. To say nothing of the size of table it would require. :-o
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Mav
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Post by Mav on Feb 14, 2015 13:45:06 GMT -8
Put car on table (make table bigger and stronger if needed)
Put other Apple stuff in car
Use optional roof luggage accessory as needed
Done
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Post by nagrani on Feb 14, 2015 14:01:07 GMT -8
If this rumor were true, Apple would be 5-7 years away at a minimum before it could even think of coming to market. Probably 10. Remember that iPad was on the drawing board before iPhone, and that is at least 2 magnitudes less complex than a car. So that gives me a lot of time to think and read about the subject before I form any absolute opinions. And to see if any market for electric cars whatsoever emerges; there is currently none - but there was no tablet market before 2010 either. And to see if electric cars are commercially practicable (let alone have the capacity for fat margins), which they currently are not. As I've said before, roughly 40% of a Tesla S is subsidized and they still lose $10K per car. And Tesla only sold 33,000 of them in 2014, in its 12th year in business. GM has sold 74,000 Volts in 5 model years. And that $7500 federal tax credit expires after a manufacturer has 200,000 total US EV sales. And do you think the current GOP Congress is going to extend it? So forget the subsidy model as a long-term margin-saver. That "but but we'll make money in the future at some undetermined date!" pie in the sky approach might work for Musk and Bezos, but it is a serious leap of faith to believe that WS will suddenly be really cool and let Apple adopt such a cavalier attitude towards profits. I remember when 35% GM's at Apple were a disaster of epic proportions. Remember how fun that was? BMW has ~20% gross margins. Porsche supposedly has near 50% GM's on its high end models. Which are ~$200K. The one thing Apple has going for it is the brand is a sort of Veblen good in terms of ASPs, so there's that. Jony does like his Bentleys and Austin Martins. Apple has proven it doesn't need to be first to market. So it can sit back and watch what happens to Teslas and Volts from a sales and profit standpoint. But so far, EV's are selling like cold cakes. This also assumes that it's electric rather than a hybrid. I consider hybrids much more realistic market- and performance-wise. Oil and gasoline are not going away for hundreds of years, and most people alive today will probably always want that backup energy option when the batteries die unless they are letting their dogma run over their Karma. But of course internal combustion engines add even more complexity to an already complex car. And Apple might have some battery breakthroughs in the works. Might. But that battery breakthrough wishful thinking has been going on for a century with EV's. We know Apple works on a lot of things that never see the light of day. And this rumor has some really big holes. Frankly, we have a lot of other more pressing things to worry about than a rumor about a product that is probably a decade away if it even exists at all. You seem to be awfully wound up here bud.
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JDSoCal
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Aspiring oligarch
Posts: 4,182
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Post by JDSoCal on Feb 14, 2015 14:39:35 GMT -8
You seem to be awfully wound up here bud. Thanks for your concern! But for me, this is really quite serene.
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Post by The Big Toe on Feb 14, 2015 14:49:42 GMT -8
Munster: "Apple is developing a car where, with a push of a button, a 95" Apple TV pops up out off the front grill, creating our own Apple Drive-in theater. The kink in the current project is to find away to enable this while the car is in motion. But it is coming... I've never been wrong"
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Post by dmiller on Feb 14, 2015 14:57:10 GMT -8
Much of what's being said here about the "car" sounds very reminiscent of what was said about "the phone".
And yes, disrupting the (cell) phone was closer to existing Apple products in synergy (iPod); however, there were also HUGE differences. Even the thought of having a variant of OSX running on a mobile processor with good-enough battery life and a touch screen? Had never been done before. Nobody thought it could be done. (Historically: see RIM, and also our friends at MS. And the rest of the cell phone industry). Then there's the phone stack, the chips and firmware, the need for FCC approvals, etc. etc. etc. And then an "app" store? What are apps? Didn't exist except for way overpriced craplets before then.
If you took at step back to pre-2007; and told someone, then, that what we have today (or even what existed and quickly grew in the post-2007 future) was going to exist?
Nobody would have believed it. Nobody on this board would have believed it.
There wasn't enough synergy with any previous Apple product to have predicted the iPhone in a million years. Yes, there was the small size and form factor of the iPod, which showed only that Apple was a master of manufacturing specialized, elegant, miniaturized consumer devices and taking great advantage of economies of scale. But compared to an iPhone, the iPod, in hindsight was a toy.
So what are some of the most other commonly used "things" in the world that are ripe for disruption, now that we've been shown in good hindsight, how ripe the (cell) phone was for disruption? What does "everyone" use? Cars. Personal transportation can be disrupted, just as personal communication was.
How good are today's cars? How advanced? They haven't basically changed "much" in decades other than incremental improvements. Internal combustion engines - more efficient, less frequent service needed (but: still needed) - but still not huge disruptive improvements. What we have are mostly year-to-year interior and exterior cosmetic design changes, and gradual improvements in safety (air bags, traction, blind spot monitoring). The dash panel, user interface, functionality for the driver? It's still terrible. Lots and lots of little buttons and switches that can't be changed (sound familiar?) (but of course, yes, there are reasons for physical buttons in cars that don't apply to phones; need tactile knobs etc to touch while keeping eyes on the road).
To me: ripe for disruption. Who has the resources to do this? (we know.)
More thoughts on this later tonight.
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Post by nagrani on Feb 14, 2015 15:41:18 GMT -8
U should sell and go hunt squirrels again
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Mav
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Post by Mav on Feb 14, 2015 16:56:18 GMT -8
Poor JD. We're in for another person bullish on Apple Cars. Interested in your thoughts dmiller. For now my thoughts end at "huh. Apple can break into this business for not nearly as much dough as I thought." Of course it doesn't take just money. What DID Apple tell that Mercedes guy they supposedly hired away...
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Post by tuffett on Feb 14, 2015 17:36:05 GMT -8
If this rumor were true, Apple would be 5-7 years away at a minimum before it could even think of coming to market. Probably 10. Remember that iPad was on the drawing board before iPhone, and that is at least 2 magnitudes less complex than a car. So that gives me a lot of time to think and read about the subject before I form any absolute opinions. And to see if any market for electric cars whatsoever emerges; there is currently none - but there was no tablet market before 2010 either. And to see if electric cars are commercially practicable (let alone have the capacity for fat margins), which they currently are not. As I've said before, roughly 40% of a Tesla S is subsidized and they still lose $10K per car. And Tesla only sold 33,000 of them in 2014, in its 12th year in business. GM has sold 74,000 Volts in 5 model years. And that $7500 federal tax credit expires after a manufacturer has 200,000 total US EV sales. And do you think the current GOP Congress is going to extend it? So forget the subsidy model as a long-term margin-saver. That "but but we'll make money in the future at some undetermined date!" pie in the sky approach might work for Musk and Bezos, but it is a serious leap of faith to believe that WS will suddenly be really cool and let Apple adopt such a cavalier attitude towards profits. I remember when 35% GM's at Apple were a disaster of epic proportions. Remember how fun that was? BMW has ~20% gross margins. Porsche supposedly has near 50% GM's on its high end models. Which are ~$200K. The one thing Apple has going for it is the brand is a sort of Veblen good in terms of ASPs, so there's that. Jony does like his Bentleys and Austin Martins. Apple has proven it doesn't need to be first to market. So it can sit back and watch what happens to Teslas and Volts from a sales and profit standpoint. But so far, EV's are selling like cold cakes. This also assumes that it's electric rather than a hybrid. I consider hybrids much more realistic market- and performance-wise. Oil and gasoline are not going away for hundreds of years, and most people alive today will probably always want that backup energy option when the batteries die unless they are letting their dogma run over their Karma. But of course internal combustion engines add even more complexity to an already complex car. And Apple might have some battery breakthroughs in the works. Might. But that battery breakthrough wishful thinking has been going on for a century with EV's. We know Apple works on a lot of things that never see the light of day. And this rumor has some really big holes. Frankly, we have a lot of other more pressing things to worry about than a rumor about a product that is probably a decade away if it even exists at all. I'll say this somewhat tongue-in-cheek, but it does raise a point. Almost nobody but Apple is making money from selling smartphones, and that's with carrier subsidies. Apple doesn't shy away from a market just because nobody else is succeeding at it - smartphone, tablet, smartwatch as examples. The question that needs to be asked is whether Apple can succeed in it. I think the answer is yes, but a lot needs to happen.
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Mav
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Post by Mav on Feb 14, 2015 17:40:30 GMT -8
All the Apple execs are being driven batty by just awful infotainment systems I bet.
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Post by nagrani on Feb 14, 2015 17:49:43 GMT -8
So do we gap up on Tuesday big time or what??
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JDSoCal
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Aspiring oligarch
Posts: 4,182
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Post by JDSoCal on Feb 14, 2015 19:05:37 GMT -8
Much of what's being said here about the "car" sounds very reminiscent of what was said about "the phone". And yes, disrupting the (cell) phone was closer to existing Apple products in synergy (iPod); however, there were also HUGE differences. Even the thought of having a variant of OSX running on a mobile processor with good-enough battery life and a touch screen? Had never been done before. Nobody thought it could be done. (Historically: see RIM, and also our friends at MS. And the rest of the cell phone industry). Then there's the phone stack, the chips and firmware, the need for FCC approvals, etc. etc. etc. And then an "app" store? What are apps? Didn't exist except for way overpriced craplets before then. If you took at step back to pre-2007; and told someone, then, that what we have today (or even what existed and quickly grew in the post-2007 future) was going to exist? Nobody would have believed it. Nobody on this board would have believed it. There wasn't enough synergy with any previous Apple product to have predicted the iPhone in a million years. Yes, there was the small size and form factor of the iPod, which showed only that Apple was a master of manufacturing specialized, elegant, miniaturized consumer devices and taking great advantage of economies of scale. But compared to an iPhone, the iPod, in hindsight was a toy. So what are some of the most other commonly used "things" in the world that are ripe for disruption, now that we've been shown in good hindsight, how ripe the (cell) phone was for disruption? What does "everyone" use? Cars. Personal transportation can be disrupted, just as personal communication was. How good are today's cars? How advanced? They haven't basically changed "much" in decades other than incremental improvements. Internal combustion engines - more efficient, less frequent service needed (but: still needed) - but still not huge disruptive improvements. What we have are mostly year-to-year interior and exterior cosmetic design changes, and gradual improvements in safety (air bags, traction, blind spot monitoring). The dash panel, user interface, functionality for the driver? It's still terrible. Lots and lots of little buttons and switches that can't be changed (sound familiar?) (but of course, yes, there are reasons for physical buttons in cars that don't apply to phones; need tactile knobs etc to touch while keeping eyes on the road). To me: ripe for disruption. Who has the resources to do this? (we know.) You make 2 general points. First, that an Apple smartphone wasn't predictable. I disagree with this. I long predicted convergence of one device in the pocket. I long thought iPods were obsolete when I had a cellphone that could play MP3's, plus do limited browsing. Apple did not invent the Internet-capable phone or the MP3-playing phone. It just improved it. I wanted such a device, as early as the late 90's, but the Nokia Communicator 9XXX was like $1000 before there were subsidies. So I settled and I eventually got a Cingular 3125 that was more of a room-temperature IQ phone. And I don't think the iPhone took most Apple observers by surprise, other than the details like the touchscreen and carrier subsidies and oh yeah widgets or apps or whatever Steve first called them and completely separate mobile OS. People were speculating about Apple doing a phone for years. The iPhone's magnitude of success, was of course not predictable. Second, because cellphones and carriers were ripe for disruption, and Apple did disrupt them in unpredictable ways, is not an argument that Apple can disrupt the car industry any more than it is an argument for Apple doing so in any other industry (the same logic could be applied to amusement parks or motion pictures or space travel or sexual aids or dog food). Cars are not cellphones. Of course, this is not an argument that Apple cannot disrupt the car market either. I want to emphasize, since some of the snarky retorts in here seem to be implying that I am being sarcastic or ideological or close-minded, that I am not doing so. I am trying to give you my candid opinion here, since we aren't talking about a company I don't own stock in anymore (TSLA). After all, I am the one who thinks Apple should try to disrupt the TV market (I've been predicting TV-Internet/computer convergence for like 20 years ). I think Elon Musk is an unstable nut who will eventually make Tesla stockholders cry and jump out of windows. But Tim Cook I feel entirely different about. So if Tim is doing something, I must give it another look. I can only see what I can see, and that is that there is currently no detectible demand for electric cars - unlike cellphones in 2007. If you want to try to analogize cellphones are to smartphones as traditional cars are to EV's, that's another argument. But, what value, other than being green (which most people generally don't give enough of a shit about to pay significantly more for things), will Apple add to the car experience as it did with smartphones? This is a total unknown. I have to look at this the same way one looks at the tape: You can't hope the tape ticks a certain way, because that would be so fucking cool, you need a case for it ticking a certain way, FA, TA, macro forces, etc. And it would be foolish to want a stock that our fortunes are tied up in to do something just because it would be cool, i.e., "wouldn't it be neat if Apple made these green cars?" No, it wouldn't, unless it were wildly profitable for them to do so. I'd want Tim not only fired, but lined up against a wall and blindfolded if he were considering a new product category just to be cool or green or PC. But I do not believe that. I believe Tim is a superlative conventional CEO concerned with the bottom line and the stock in ways Steve never was. If Tim is doing something of this magnitude with cars - and with all due respect Mav, I sincerely doubt that Tim has "greenlit" anything at this point other than R&D - he sees profit opportunity where I currently do not. If you've got an alternate take, I'm all ears. If all you've got is snark, great, I can appreciate that too, as a dedicated practitioner thereof. But snark isn't a take. Cheers to the longs.
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Mav
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Post by Mav on Feb 14, 2015 19:40:52 GMT -8
I don't have really have an opinion on Apple Car, other than 1) it's more affordable than I thought it might be based on Tesla (and Bloomberg - some auto industry adage about $1B to develop a presumably more conventional, higher-volume car) and 2) the R&D is so "nominal" the project could be built up to huge extent and still be totally undetectable in Apple's financials.
Margins a GIANT question mark. BMW turned in 9% net profit margin last quarter? Tesla, well, that 2020 deal.
I'm only going off of what FT/WSJ said. If they got a Ford and Mercedes exec interested, super. I'll enjoy the 6/6S/Watch/Retina MBA/iOS 9/maybe iPad Pro/retail revamp/retail expansion esp. In China/etc. (read: jam-packed) year and we'll see if Project Titan ever amounts to anything.
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Post by Luckychoices on Feb 14, 2015 20:23:12 GMT -8
Much of what's being said here about the "car" sounds very reminiscent of what was said about "the phone". And yes, disrupting the (cell) phone was closer to existing Apple products in synergy (iPod); however, there were also HUGE differences. Even the thought of having a variant of OSX running on a mobile processor with good-enough battery life and a touch screen? Had never been done before. Nobody thought it could be done. (Historically: see RIM, and also our friends at MS. And the rest of the cell phone industry). Then there's the phone stack, the chips and firmware, the need for FCC approvals, etc. etc. etc. And then an "app" store? What are apps? Didn't exist except for way overpriced craplets before then. If you took at step back to pre-2007; and told someone, then, that what we have today (or even what existed and quickly grew in the post-2007 future) was going to exist? Nobody would have believed it. Nobody on this board would have believed it. There wasn't enough synergy with any previous Apple product to have predicted the iPhone in a million years. Yes, there was the small size and form factor of the iPod, which showed only that Apple was a master of manufacturing specialized, elegant, miniaturized consumer devices and taking great advantage of economies of scale. But compared to an iPhone, the iPod, in hindsight was a toy. So what are some of the most other commonly used "things" in the world that are ripe for disruption, now that we've been shown in good hindsight, how ripe the (cell) phone was for disruption? What does "everyone" use? Cars. Personal transportation can be disrupted, just as personal communication was. How good are today's cars? How advanced? They haven't basically changed "much" in decades other than incremental improvements. Internal combustion engines - more efficient, less frequent service needed (but: still needed) - but still not huge disruptive improvements. What we have are mostly year-to-year interior and exterior cosmetic design changes, and gradual improvements in safety (air bags, traction, blind spot monitoring). The dash panel, user interface, functionality for the driver? It's still terrible. Lots and lots of little buttons and switches that can't be changed (sound familiar?) (but of course, yes, there are reasons for physical buttons in cars that don't apply to phones; need tactile knobs etc to touch while keeping eyes on the road). To me: ripe for disruption. Who has the resources to do this? (we know.) You make 2 general points. First, that an Apple smartphone wasn't predictable. I disagree with this. I long predicted convergence of one device in the pocket. I long thought iPods were obsolete when I had a cellphone that could play MP3's, plus do limited browsing. Apple did not invent the Internet-capable phone or the MP3-playing phone. It just improved it. I wanted such a device, as early as the late 90's, but the Nokia Communicator 9XXX was like $1000 before there were subsidies. So I settled and I eventually got a Cingular 3125 that was more of a room-temperature IQ phone. And I don't think the iPhone took most Apple observers by surprise, other than the details like the touchscreen and carrier subsidies and oh yeah widgets or apps or whatever Steve first called them and completely separate mobile OS. People were speculating about Apple doing a phone for years. The iPhone's magnitude of success, was of course not predictable. Second, because cellphones and carriers were ripe for disruption, and Apple did disrupt them in unpredictable ways, is not an argument that Apple can disrupt the car industry any more than it is an argument for Apple doing so in any other industry (the same logic could be applied to amusement parks or motion pictures or space travel or sexual aids or dog food). Cars are not cellphones. Of course, this is not an argument that Apple cannot disrupt the car market either. I want to emphasize, since some of the snarky retorts in here seem to be implying that I am being sarcastic or ideological or close-minded, that I am not doing so. I am trying to give you my candid opinion here, since we aren't talking about a company I don't own stock in anymore (TSLA). After all, I am the one who thinks Apple should try to disrupt the TV market (I've been predicting TV-Internet/computer convergence for like 20 years ). I think Elon Musk is an unstable nut who will eventually make Tesla stockholders cry and jump out of windows. But Tim Cook I feel entirely different about. So if Tim is doing something, I must give it another look. I can only see what I can see, and that is that there is currently no detectible demand for electric cars - unlike cellphones in 2007. If you want to try to analogize cellphones are to smartphones as traditional cars are to EV's, that's another argument. But, what value, other than being green (which most people generally don't give enough of a shit about to pay significantly more for things), will Apple add to the car experience as it did with smartphones? This is a total unknown. I have to look at this the same way one looks at the tape: You can't hope the tape ticks a certain way, because that would be so fucking cool, you need a case for it ticking a certain way, FA, TA, macro forces, etc. And it would be foolish to want a stock that our fortunes are tied up in to do something just because it would be cool, i.e., "wouldn't it be neat if Apple made these green cars?" No, it wouldn't, unless it were wildly profitable for them to do so. I'd want Tim not only fired, but lined up against a wall and blindfolded if he were considering a new product category just to be cool or green or PC. But I do not believe that. I believe Tim is a superlative conventional CEO concerned with the bottom line and the stock in ways Steve never was. If Tim is doing something of this magnitude with cars - and with all due respect Mav, I sincerely doubt that Tim has "greenlit" anything at this point other than R&D - he sees profit opportunity where I currently do not. If you've got an alternate take, I'm all ears. If all you've got is snark, great, I can appreciate that too, as a dedicated practitioner thereof. But snark isn't a take. Cheers to the longs. JD, that was a pleasure to read. An intelligent, rational, un-snarky explanation of your take on Apple, Inc venturing into the cars business. You make some very good points, detailing your reasoning, and present a willingness to change your mind if a convincing argument is made to the contrary...or if Tim gives it the green light. Even though I'm not really participating in the discussion, except as a lurker, I'm very much enjoying seeing the various member's comments regarding the pros and cons of Apple moving into cars as a product. BTW, one of your best emoticons yet ==>
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Post by phoebear611 on Feb 14, 2015 20:29:04 GMT -8
Just wanted to wish all you sweethearts a very Happy St. Valentine's Day. The day is almost done but I got to sneak it in. Been very busy today...with all the snowstorm talk here in New York I had to drive to twenty supermarkets and buy bread and milk. Nothing else - just bread and milk galore.
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Post by zzmac on Feb 14, 2015 20:51:09 GMT -8
iVehicle
1. Apple won't get involved with something unless they're going to make a shitload of coin. 2. Who says it has to be a car (as we know it). 3. Think China. 4. BTFD. 5. Cheers to the longs.
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Post by nagrani on Feb 14, 2015 21:45:01 GMT -8
Not sure there will be a D to FB
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JDSoCal
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Aspiring oligarch
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Post by JDSoCal on Feb 14, 2015 22:42:41 GMT -8
Just wanted to wish all you sweethearts a very Happy St. Valentine's Day. The day is almost done but I got to sneak it in. Been very busy today...with all the snowstorm talk here in New York I had to drive to twenty supermarkets and buy bread and milk. Nothing else - just bread and milk galore. Oh, sure, the sweethearts get a nice message from our matriarch. But what about us black-hearted curmudgeons? Do we not bleed?
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Since84
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To infinity and beyond!
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Post by Since84 on Feb 15, 2015 4:13:28 GMT -8
Oh, sure, the sweethearts get a nice message from our matriarch. But what about us black-hearted curmudgeons? Do we not bleed? An example of bad self selection?
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Since84
Moderator
To infinity and beyond!
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Post by Since84 on Feb 15, 2015 4:42:33 GMT -8
Just want to chime in that the posts on the iCar have been wonderful. The back and forth of various perspectives provides a great source for rumination. Many good points pro and con. It will be fascinating to follow the developments.
Perhaps it is worth pointing out that the illustrious 'law of large numbers' does not voice any absolute limit to how big one can get. It merely states the odds are against it. This is a 'barrier' only for those who cannot think different. Nice to see Tim out in front.
It is also worth noting that if there is an American CEO versed in the way of Chaebol it is Tim Cook. Do you think he understands their strengths and weaknesses? Can you think of anyone better suited to build one from scratch?
Is an iVehicle (because it will be unlike any other vehicle and credit to whomever coined the term) an obvious product extension for Apple? Perhaps not but then again if the game is really in delighting consumers perhaps so. We've all been reading comments here and there for years wishing Apple would get into the car business so in at least some consumer's minds it is.
Even if it's just a pie in the sky research project, it is a welcome initiative. Apple needs another iPhone magnitude product to avoid leveling off. It is nice to hear Tim & Company are out of the box looking at options. That is thinking different.
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Post by phoebear611 on Feb 15, 2015 5:19:00 GMT -8
Just wanted to wish all you sweethearts a very Happy St. Valentine's Day. The day is almost done but I got to sneak it in. Been very busy today...with all the snowstorm talk here in New York I had to drive to twenty supermarkets and buy bread and milk. Nothing else - just bread and milk galore. Oh, sure, the sweethearts get a nice message from our matriarch. But what about us black-hearted curmudgeons? Do we not bleed? On February 14th everyone is a sweetheart....and curmudgeons have the sweetest of hearts - they just don't like to show it but they are softies inside....deep inside....way way way deep inside....way way way way way deep inside!
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Post by infohunter on Feb 15, 2015 5:22:49 GMT -8
Apple has hired a couple big names from Segway over the last few years.....I'm think Apple is thinking smaller than a Tesla. Don't think USA think China,India,Thailand and places that scooters are used more than cars. www.segway.com/puma/This would not cost a lot to get into and can be expanded for the USA later.
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Post by jmolloy on Feb 15, 2015 5:23:25 GMT -8
I'm pretty surprised that no one here has picked up on this news story - was the 3rd lead item on the BBC UK news page yesterday www.bbc.co.uk/newsbeat/31470124Zane Lowe to leave Radio 1 in MarchThe interesting part is in the opening sentence: I think something huge is about to happen at Apple with regards to their music side. Relevant background detail from the article: So possibly a much better curated iTunes radio, or the A&R department for Apple Music, who knows, but definitely interesting that Apple should have poached this guy.
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Since84
Moderator
To infinity and beyond!
Posts: 3,933
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Post by Since84 on Feb 15, 2015 5:31:47 GMT -8
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Post by dmiller on Feb 15, 2015 6:44:09 GMT -8
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Post by dmiller on Feb 15, 2015 7:11:26 GMT -8
Good points - in general, I agree with much of your thinking. (But we don't have to agree on everything, which is the good reason for discourse here. :-) Re: the predicability of the iPhone: what I was trying to get across was: at the time, pre-announcement, we all felt something big was coming, after months/longer of writing and speculation, but I don't remember anyone thinking that the iPhone, as announced, was what was coming. That was the shock and unpredictability of it. Nothing at the time that had been written, none of the imagined-iPhone-contructions/drawings, predicted anything that looked or behaved like the iPhone... the way I remember it. I also don't recall any predictions of the primary user input being finger-based multitouch on a large (huge for that day) bright touch-sensitive screen. Or rubber-banded scrolling. Or data detectors. Or an icon-based app interface. Or the kinds of basic apps provided at the start. Or the Maps app. Or mobile Safari. Or OSX/iOS running under the hood on a mobile processor and being able to leverage many key technologies from desktop OSX. Or advanced components such as the proximity sensor; gyroscope; Skyhook when there wasn't a hardware GPS, and then GPS later on. Etc. etc. So I still don't believe than anyone saw "the iPhone" coming. We were all still thinking of smaller screens; hardware button(S) of some sort (not a single home button and everything else driven by touch); something more like an iPod on steroids. Certainly not the precursor of the App Store with the kinds of apps that were going to be possible. When it did come: the shock was such that, nobody knew how to react to it. (See previously well-deserved-maligned comments by Ballmer et al) Well, yeah, the details like the touch screen and the apps and all of that, as you're saying, did manage to take people by surprise... But those are the important groundbreaking differentiating parts, aren't they? As far as disruption, I wasn't trying to say that just because Apple disrupted cell phones, they could also disrupt cars or (pick your category), just "because". I think that given their known DNA of wanting to focus, that if these rumors of a car are true to the extent being leaked (and yes, this raises the question of why such a "top secret" project would or could leak), they would clearly feel that they can do something disruptive here. And they're smart about this (otherwise they would be Microsoft or Google, and we wouldn't be having this discussion).
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Post by CdnPhoto on Feb 15, 2015 7:35:22 GMT -8
so, does the iCar turn in to a TimeMachine when it hits 88mph?
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coma
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Post by coma on Feb 15, 2015 8:09:42 GMT -8
so, does the iCar turn in to a TimeMachine when it hits 88mph? Only if it has 1.21 gigawatts of electricity at the precise time it hits 88mph.
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Post by nagrani on Feb 15, 2015 8:10:58 GMT -8
So Apple making a car (if true) should help apple get a better PE ratio and that's why I'm excited for some spring in the Share price Apple cannot innovate after Steve Jobs is gone. Well - this helps put a bullet in the head of that argument
Apple is only a one trick (iphone) pony - second bullet just in case
Apple can only disrupt so much - car industry is a trillion dollar market - how much of a slice can Apple get out of it?? - third bullet.
Take no prisoners, Apple.
Game on!!!
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