Comment by WarmWash
3 days ago
Apple has offered products with little value over competitors for a long time now, but they still get to command a large premium on their products because "the vibes are right".
When engineers analyze things they look at the specs, stats, and metrics. When consumers analyze things they look at what others are doing, feel for vibes, roll into the convenience, and stick with the familiar.
> Apple has offered products with little value over competitors
I'm genuinely surprised by this comment.
For example, I thought there was universal sentiment that apple silicon / M-series computers are pretty unmatched.
The overwhelming volume of Apples sales comes from people who wouldn't notice if their device was running 2016 level hardware.
If software didn't keep getting worse this might be true but the average consumer notices if their computer is slow or dies too quickly.
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> The overwhelming volume of Apples sales comes from people who wouldn't notice if their device was running 2016 level hardware.
How could we possibly know this? This is just an argument from elitism, as though the plebes should be happy playing Farmville on their gateway computers, while us haughty developers sit in our ivory towers and herald in the end of the anthropocene using machines we can actually appreciate.
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> For example, I thought there was universal sentiment that apple silicon / M-series computers are pretty unmatched.
5 years ago, sure, but the x86 world has come a long way since Apple dumped Intel. I'd certainly take a 2026 Intel machine over something with an M1-M3.
I think the point was supposed to be default apps in an OS, similar to default search engine.. What I am missing is that OpenAI is in no way that default. Every OS, browser, etc should be able to find a more profitable default than sending someone to OpenAI.
Apple is one of the very few companies committed to (hardware) quality. They make sure their entry level models are very decent. You can't buy a apple product that is complete shite.
Yes, the software side is getting worse in recent years but is it at least slightly better than the competition for average consumers.
Plus being a tech monopolist they can offer a whole ecosystem of software and hardware that works great with each other. So the value proposition is greater than the sum of its parts.
That is the problem with OpenAI, they have only one thing. Google can bleed money all day long and they don't need to care because they have other profitable business ventures.
The way to make money with LLMs is to either be technically superior which only works short term until the competition catches up or create a monopoly. The second option is dead in the water with the advent of the Chinese models. I guess they can lobby to have them banned and create a cartel with their other US based competitors. Otherwise they are screwed. That is why they are allowing military use of their model now. They need that sweet government money to survive. Also they keep talking about AGI so the government gets scared about the Chinese reaching it first and supports them. Complete scam.
it's a very different world when you switch from an iphone to an android phone or vice versa. However, Claude.ai and chatgpt.com are not very different at all. If one has ads and the other does not, it's easy to switch.
>> Apple has offered products with little value over competitors
My Pixel dropped connections unexpectedly. The battery would barely last till end of day.
Apple hardware is simply better value for the money