With Great Sadness……

[Jeremy Garchow]

[Walter Soyka] “However, couldn’t you agree that Apple customers are buying something more than hardware alone? Couldn’t you consider that calling Apple a hardware company might be dismissive of the critical contributions of their software design?”

And that’s where the marketing comes in. All of the Apple commercials sell the experience, but force you out to the Apple store to buy….? a Phone, an Air, an iPad, an iMac……a MacPro, ok maybe not a MacPro.

You don’t see this and go buy iTunes. What do you need to get this experience?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xPQpEhuonUk

You don’t see this, go out and buy an HTC device, and run Apple software on it:

https://www.apple.com/ipad/#video

I guess the way I see it, I see it for what it really is.

You buy an Apple product for OSX, iOS, whatever, but all of that really comes “for free”. Not really free, but almost free.

The hardware does not come for free, and that’s my point. You can’t download an iTunes movie and play it on your Roku.

So, the Apple experience comes wrapped in a tightly controlled and designed hardware based environment. That’s why I said they were a smart hardware company. They build the experience to sell the hardware, make no mistake about it. And that’s often why the software is “good enough”. FCP7 was good enough for a really really long time.

Jeremy

[Jeremy Garchow]

[Chris Harlan] “Yes, you buy hardware, but you also buy apps and content, and you subscribe to storage space.”

That storage space is free (unless you pay for more).

And what did you have to buy to view all of these cool things? A Galaxy 2?

iCloud/iTunes is useless without…..?

[Chris Harlan]

[Jeremy Garchow] “[Chris Harlan] “Yes, you buy hardware, but you also buy apps and content, and you subscribe to storage space.”

That storage space is free (unless you pay for more).

And what did you have to buy to view all of these cool things? A Galaxy 2?

iCloud/iTunes is useless without…..?

“

This is getting ridiculous. Yes. Some of that storage space is free. Other storage services are not, or will not be–iTunes Match, for instance. And, since I’ve already answered the rest of your comments in the post this is a response to, let me just re-post them again:

No one in this thread is even remotely suggesting that Apple does not make the vast majority of their money through sales of physical appliances; what they are saying is that things have gotten far too complicated for the “hardware/software dichotomy” model to be of much use in describing Apple.

So, a) yes, they make most of their money through hardware sales, but b) their services have grown substantial enough that they could fuel a very large corporation on its own, and c) the way that services and hardware are intertwined creates a unique synergy that is neither one nor the other, but something more.

[Jeremy Garchow]

[Chris Harlan] “This is getting ridiculous. Yes. Some of that storage space is free. Other storage services are not, or will not be–iTunes Match, for instance. And, since I’ve already answered the rest of your comments in the post this is a response to, let me just re-post them again:

No one in this thread is even remotely suggesting that Apple does not make the vast majority of their money through sales of physical appliances; what they are saying is that things have gotten far too complicated for the “hardware/software dichotomy” model to be of much use in describing Apple.

So, a) yes, they make most of their money through hardware sales, but b) their services have grown substantial enough that they could fuel a very large corporation on its own, and c) the way that services and hardware are intertwined creates a unique synergy that is neither one nor the other, but something more.”

But it all comes back to Apple selling hardware. You don’t go into the Apple store and buy iTunes Match.

Apple has been very smart in the products they have developed to peddle their hardware, along with the OS that drives it.

I hear what you’re saying, I really do, but it comes down to the hardware that they sell.

Jeremy