Apple is no longer thinking different

35 points by othmanosx 3 days ago | 42 comments

I've never bought an Android device in my life; I switched from Nokia to Apple directly, and I've been buying Apple stuff ever since.

That said, I feel like Apple is no longer innovating; all the stuff I saw in the event and on youtube, these technologies are many years old. They're just changing the colors to make sure people don't mix them, same for the Duo, even the name is stolen.

With all the AI stuff going on, I'd expect innovation to take a leap, peopl using AI to advance a lot quicker, yet I see a tech giant promoting stuff that we saw many years ago. I know that can be said about a ton of other Android features, but Apple tends to perfect every feature they introduce (unlike Google who kills whole projects every other day).

I gotta say though, the execution, the animations, the attention to detail, the user experience, that's still top-notch on Apple, but for a tech giant, I would expect more.

I miss Steve Jobs' "One more thing..."

thepryz 3 days ago |

Seems a better question is who do you believe is actually innovating today?

Apple has rarely been about providing bleeding edge technology to early adopters. They've always been more concerned with evaluating technology, often building things behind closed doors to explore and iterate, and then only releasing something once they felt it was ready and able to address a defined purpose or need. It's not first to market, but often first to get it right.

Their AI strategy is actually pretty smart when you consider how they're focusing on small, local models with a clear security model. Others are spending billions to make incremental progress on models while Apple can sit back, build integrations that allow users to leverage the best models, and then once a certain level of maturity is reached, Apple can either license models or train their own using the lessons learned by everyone else.

slac 3 days ago | |

The iphone was bleeding edge... Of you disregard Neonode. But that is the only that comes to mind. The other bleeding edge has been the overall ecosystem around its product.

jjbigs 2 days ago | | |

The iPhone is the perfect example of sitting back, evaluating the technology, and delivering a great product. The first to get it right strategy.

Numerous smart phones existed with email, text, call, and internet. iPhone just made it infinitely better. They also had the advantage of convincing carriers to start making money off data rather than text/minutes. This was a paradigm shift that allowed for full web browser to exist. It guzzled data, so carriers were fine subsidizing the phones and reap profits of data plans.

mey 3 days ago | | |

BlackBerry, Windows CE, and Symbian devices were all already around as smart phones at the time. When the iPhone initially launched, it's revolution was a streamlined form factor. Their was no app ecosystem at launch. I would say their biggest innovation was system integration and refinement. Other than blackberry, few companies were really owning the product vision from top to bottom.

dd8601fn 3 days ago | |

Yeah, I’ve always thought that looking at the field of glorified prototypes and turning them into things real people actually love to use is, in fact, innovation.

I don’t think the Duo is a great example of that. Maybe it’s a fine product anyway, though?

I do also think their approach to AI is scary brilliant if they can pull it off.

It has the potential to make them the most important AI company in the world, quickly, with none of the exposure to the multi-trillion dollar horserace.

It’s a big “if”, though.

mrhottakes 3 days ago |

Apple isn't really an innovator, at least in the sense of delivering "new" things. Their success is in assessing a market and refining products for consumer adoption.

Mac wasn't the first personal computer but it was well-suited for the mass market, not just "computer people". iPod wasn't the first mp3 player but the first that was easy for regular folks to use. iPhone wasn't the first smartphone, but the first one that people actually wanted.

There's a pattern here.

_superposition_ 3 days ago | |

Yeah the pattern is "regular folks" enjoy reality tv too. Because they don't enjoy thinking. It's obviously trash but there's a market.

I feel the same way about Apple. It's target market is uninformed users. Never purchased anything from them.

Don't even get me started on the closed ecosystem. Admittedly Google/android has been closing in on that front but the initial intentions were good.

wyre 3 days ago | | |

I think you're exhibiting a bunch of bias. The world's largest ad company purchasing a smartphone operating system to continue to collect information on their users to continue powering their ad network?

Apple technology is not "reality tv". Their target market is all consumers of technology. There are countless very informed users that prefer Apple (admitingly more are moving to Linux due to it being a stronger platform for agentic development).

If your single issue when making decisions is open vs closed ecosystems, sure, avoid Apple, but to call anyone that treats their technology use with more nuanced as "uninformed" is incorrect at best, and offensive at worst.

borghives 3 days ago | | |

There is quite a leap from entertainment viewing choices to device gadget selection. It seems like a straw man to beat down and argue. My question is why? Why attached identity behind gadget choice? It is all marketing by large corporations in the end.

othmanosx 3 days ago | |

I think you're right, though you're talking about an old era, where the iPhone was truly revolutionary, but how do you think the Duo is different from the other folds now?

the first iPhone was years ahead of its time, but the first Apple foldable is arguably the exact same (if not inferior) to the competition, with the exception of the good user experience we're used to from Apple

mike_hearn 3 days ago | | |

It wasn't years ahead of its time. It was nice but the original iPhone was far behind its smartphone competitors in many respects. IIRC:

• No 3G! This made the whole "i" part of the iPhone mostly worthless when not connected to wifi. Other phones had 3G.

• No installable apps. Many argued about whether it was a smartphone at all.

• No copy/paste.

• No multi-tasking.

etc. Probably more I forgot. Its competitors had all of these.

mrhottakes 3 days ago | | |

Based on the marketing materials, the Duo is different from other folds because: - Runs iOS with lots(?) of attention to UI - Won't break from a piece of dust - IP68 rated - Will actually receive software updates unlike many Android devices

et cetera et cetera

> the first iPhone was years ahead of its time

Not really, not if you were paying attention to the market at the time. It was the first smartphone to put everything in a cohesive package instead of being a weird little computer that could make phone calls, but technologically it was comparable to features that already existed when it released. The real innovation was in UI and product design.

allthetime 3 days ago |

When did they? They just make better versions of what already exists

caycep 3 days ago | |

More importantly, they made better versions with us consumers in mind, vs. their peers that made versions with the CIO of big Fortune 500 companies in mind...

astrodust 3 days ago | |

"At the end of the day, a top tier chef just makes food like everyone else."

tamimio 3 days ago |

Apple always been that way, the “apple invented X!” always been a joke, what apple usually does is taking an already existing feature and turns it into an actual useful (mostly) one, not gimmicky, and well integrated with their eco system. That being said, smartphones hit the stagnation point long time ago, it’s really hard to bring an overly new thing besides “better camera, better cpu, better screen”, even batteries aren’t improving anymore.

vor_ 3 days ago |

Repackaging existing technologies is nothing new for Apple. The introduction of ads into their services, with considerations for adding more such as in Visual Intelligence, are the real concern, in my opinion. It's enough to make me think they've already started down an irreversible path as a company.

akudha 3 days ago |

I dunno, as a user I’d rather have the basics right first (longer battery life, no forced obsolescence, good UI etc) before having innovation. We already have enough good features, except many of them are frustrating to use. Might be a good idea to improve them first before adding more new stuff…

bigstrat2003 3 days ago |

Apple hasn't innovated in a long, long time. At a bare minimum since the 2000s. What they have done in the last 20-30 years is to take ideas that are already out there and polish them up. The "think different" stuff was just marketing speak.

alexfromapex 3 days ago |

I was not impressed with how wide the iPhone Duo is when folded closed. The whole idea is supposed to be something like a cell phone that expands to something like an iPad. They basically copied the Samsung Galaxy or similar phones with no real innovation.

khazhoux 3 days ago | |

This shows how Apple actually thought through the issue instead of just doing the most obvious thing. Because if you start with regular phone dimensions, then you wind up with basically a square screen when open, which is not natural and not useful.

mrhottakes 3 days ago | |

The Samsung foldables are an entirely different size and aspect ratio; how is the Duo a copy of something entirely different?

big_toast 3 days ago | | |

The Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 8, Xiaomi 18 Fold and Huawei Pura X Max all have pretty similar fold aspect ratios to the Duo?

Not sure 'copying' is a clarifying explanation of what is happening though.

moffkalast 3 days ago | | |

Apple allegedly uses Samsung screens in the Duo so they ought to be the exact same.

joshstrange 3 days ago |

> these technologies are many years old

That's been Apple's MO for almost forever. Very rarely do they chase the newest tech, instead they wait for it to mature. They didn't invent the smartphone or the touchscreen, they did revolutionize it. It's still to be seen how their Duo holds up and until we can play with it we don't really know. Yes there are Android folding phones, yes there are even passport-style ones, but I've seen plenty of "slop" folding phones from Android manufacturers. We will see how the Duo holds up in real use.

> same for the Duo, even the name is stolen.

Stolen from who? Surface Duo? Did they steal it from their own Powerbook Duo?

> I miss Steve Jobs' "One more thing..."

They literally did a "One more thing" in the event yesterday (and said that line). Yes, it had all leaked already but that's just the reality. There is no hardware product from Apple that doesn't leak nowadays. They are able to surprise with software sometimes and naming but everything else will leak.

I don't disagree that they should be better on the AI front and they are still cleaning up from their massive fuck-up in 2024 but I haven't seen any of their competitors do anything compelling w.r.t. AI either so I'm not quite ready to get out the pitchforks.

funnybeam 3 days ago | |

Microsoft did an Android Duo that was basically two phones hinged together, like this but with two separate screens. Didn’t last long…

Quite an odd name choice by Apple

iAMkenough 3 days ago |

They haven’t changed, you’ve just grown. It’s okay to look back fondly as you move on.

myplantlookup 3 days ago |

What do you mean by your statement, "no longer thinking different?"

othmanosx 3 days ago | |

No longer putting in the effort to make themselves distinct from the competition, or make anything different for that matter

mrhottakes 3 days ago | | |

How can you make a computer or smartphone that's distinct from the competition? These are commodity appliances built to a price point with some graphic design slapped on top to pretty it up.

astrodust 3 days ago | | |

The iPhone launch was met with a lot of derision and eye-rolling despite that being the result of a half decade "effort to make themselves distinct from the competition".

Those events are rare, the opportunities to really shake things up are fleeting, as everyone is driving forward with relentless, incremental progress that quickly closes up all but the biggest gaps.

What could they possibly do that wouldn't be slammed as derivative?

gjvc 3 days ago | |

watch apple launches from 1997 onwards

prologic 3 days ago |

I mean the thing is, I'm finding it quite difficult to pay for Apple products anymore. The new Apple iPhone Duo is a whopping A$3,500 here in Australia! I kid you not. Who has that kind of money to fork out for a god damn phone?! I'm finding it really hard to justify the crap Apple are putting out, which let's face is, is made orders of magnitude cheaper over in China/Taiwan anyway.

jnrk 3 days ago | |

To be fair, a Galaxy Z Fold8 Ultra costs just as much.

haitchfivee 3 days ago |

Upstarts who dare to think differently may be able to get a shot, since Apple are no longer confidently occupying that space. The shape of a successful upstart would probably have to unbundle Apple, turning their strength into a liability.

armchairhacker 3 days ago |

They did with Vision Pro, see how that turned out.

But I will keep saying it, VR is the future.

archonis 3 days ago | |

They just don't have the stomache to support anything new for the required gestation period. We aren't going to get anything truely new or useful until companies stop prematurely compreasing their margins so much that they squeeze out the customer as well.

Topology1 3 days ago | |

I think you are right, but with how things are going it doesn't seem like it will be the near future.

armchairhacker 3 days ago | | |

GPU prices will eventually fall, either because production increases or AI companies stop buying (maybe they'll find a better processor).

Then AI lowers the very high cost and skill barrier needed to make a good VR game.

mkrishnan 3 days ago | |

Vision Pro is a very fine product btw. it does what it supposed to be extremely well too.

HelloUsername 3 days ago | |

> But I will keep saying it, VR is the future

VR headset shipments are down 18% compared to this time last year:

https://counterpointresearch.com/en/insights/global-xr-ar-vr...