Linked List: December 31, 2012

Monday, 31 December 2012

One Last Morsel of 2012 Claim Chowder ★

A year ago I said this would be fun to revisit today. I was right.

Update: Even better, Deagon claims today that his year-ago prediction was right, claiming as proof Apple’s stock decline over the past three months. Year over year (as opposed to cherry-picking the last three months, when Apple’s share price has seen a sharp decline) Apple’s stock price is up 26 percent since Deagon’s original prediction. So, he’s trying to argue that stock price is a gauge of coolness, and that despite Apple’s stock being up 26 percent over the last year, he was correct that Apple would “lose cool” over 2012. Sure, makes perfect sense. (He also points to a Strategy Analytics survey that claims the number of iPhone owners who plan to buy another iPhone as their next phone dropped from 93 to 88 percent year over year, but neglects to point out that Android tends to fare terribly in such surveys. Android handset makers dream of 88 percent retention rates.)

Why TNW Decided to Stop Publishing the Android Version of Their Magazine ★

The Next Web:

All of that wouldn’t have been a problem if we had seen a market for our magazine on Android. And we did believe there would be one. We had gotten enough requests for it and had gotten the impression there were thousands of anxious Android tablets owners holding their breath for an Android version of our magazine. Unfortunately we’ve found out that although Android users are very vocal they aren’t very active when it comes to downloading and reading magazines. Or maybe they just don’t like our magazine. You never know.

To give you some insight in how little uptake we saw on Android here are some statistics: for every Android user that downloads an Android magazine we have 80 iOS downloads.

The comments are a goldmine of Church of Market Share fanaticism.

Save Publishing ★

“Just drag this bad boy into your bookmarks bar and expect your mind to be blown.” Great bookmarklet by Paul Ford.

‘I’d Rather Be Hit in the Head by an iPad Mini Than a 650-Page Book’ ★

Nick Bilton continues his crusade against the FAA’s mindless rules regarding consumer electronics:

These conflicts have been going on for several years. In 2010, a 68-year-old man punched a teenager because he didn’t turn off his phone. Lt. Kent Lipple of the Boise Police Department in Idaho, who arrested the puncher, said the man “felt he was protecting the entire plane and its occupants.” And let’s not forget Alec Baldwin, who was kicked off an American Airlines plane in 2011 for playing Words With Friends online while parked at the gate.

Dealing with the F.A.A. on this topic is like arguing with a stubborn teenager. The agency has no proof that electronic devices can harm a plane’s avionics, but it still perpetuates such claims, spreading irrational fear among millions of fliers.

Disgraceful for a U.S. government agency to be spreading what amounts to nothing more than voodoo.

The Guardian Publishes Stats on the Size of Their Commenting Community ★

Speaking of The Guardian:

At least 20% of the comments left on the Guardian website each month come from only 2,600 user accounts, who together make up just 0.0037% of the Guardian’s declared monthly audience.

Talk about a vocal minority.

A Little More 2009 Claim Chowder: ‘Should Apple Make a Netbook? If Tim Cook Wants to Be Its CEO, Yes’ ★

Charles Arthur, in February 2009:

Apple needs to react to changing market conditions. It has before: when it last made a quarterly loss, in the first quarter of 2001, Steve Jobs realised it was because he had focussed on giving the computers DVD-reader drives, rather than CD-burning ones. A rapid focus on CD burners followed, along with heavier emphasis on iTunes: the CD-inspired “rip, mix, burn” is rather better than the DVD-gazing “insert, click, watch”.

So should Apple introduce a netbook? Hell, yes. If it wants to get into a market that is expanding rapidly, which is giving an old version of Windows — the long-past-end-of-life XP, or “Windows Zombie” as it’s becoming known to analysts — then it needs to roll its sleeves up. There’s a big market there waiting to be tapped.

Ouch. Here’s where Arthur went wrong. Apple’s 2001 about-face on CD-burners (and digital music in general — they launched the first iPod later that year) was an acknowledgement of a genuine mistake. Computers were better with CD-burners because people really used them.

Netbooks, for the most part, were simply about making notebook computers cheaper, not better. Apple’s long-term strategy has been and should remain solely about making things better, and introducing great new things.

Claim Chowder, Circa 2009: ‘Why Apple Must Do a Netbook Now’ ★

David Carnoy, writing for CNet in 2009:

Ken: “A lot of people would pay $599 for an Apple Netbook.”

Me: “No one’s buying the Macbook Air at $1,800.”

Ken: “I wouldn’t say no one.”

Me: “OK, but it’s sort of the Apple TV of laptops. It’s just not that relevant. Most people would prefer buying a more powerful notebook that weighs a little more for a grand.”

Wonder what would happen if Apple sold the Air for $999?

Another From the Archive: ‘Apple to Netbooks: Drop Dead’ ★

Tim Cook on netbooks, back in 2009:

“For us, it’s about doing great products. And when I look at what is being sold in the netbook space today, I see cramped keyboards, terrible software, junky hardware, very small screens, and just not a consumer experience… that we would put the Mac brand on, quite frankly. And so it’s not a space, as it exists today, that we’re interested in, nor do we believe that customers in the long term would be interested in.”

From the Archive: ‘Apple “Netbooks”, Eh?’ ★

Yours truly, back in 2008, regarding a “prediction” that Apple was about to announce a $599 netbook at Macworld Expo:

Yes, there is a market for $500 laptops. But Apple doesn’t need to serve this market any more than BMW needs to serve the market for $12,000 sedans. Apple may well create a product in this price range in the future — perhaps the long-rumored touchscreen tablet — but their hand is not forced.

I still think a $500 or so touchscreen tablet would be a successful product for Apple.

(Also: How ancient does a story about Apple making announcements at Macworld Expo sound today?)

Sayonara, Netbooks ★

Charles Arthur, The Guardian:

Still, there’s an eWeek article from July in which ABI says that “consumer interest in netbooks shows no sign of waning, and the attraction remains the same: value rather than raw performance.”

Actually, the number sold in 2013 will be very much closer to zero than to 139m. The Taiwanese tech site Digitimes points out that Asus, which kicked off the modern netbook category with its Eee PC in 2007, has announced that it won’t make its Eee PC product after today, and that Acer doesn’t plan to make any more; which means that “the netbook market will officially end after the two vendors finish digesting their remaining inventories.”

That stinks. Apple still hasn’t gotten around to making one.