Linked List: May 4, 2023

Thursday, 4 May 2023

The Union Representing Apple Store Workers in Maryland Wants to Prompt Customers for Tips on Purchases 

Mark Gurman, reporting for Bloomberg:

Workers at Apple Inc.’s unionized store in Maryland are asking for higher pay and additional time off, along with changes that could affect the company’s tightly controlled retail experience, such as letting customers tip employees.

The employees, represented by the International Association of Machinists & Aerospace Workers, are conducting negotiations with Apple on Wednesday and Thursday. Their latest proposal calls for raises of as much as 10%, as well as major changes to the outlet’s vacation policy, bereavement leave and overtime. [...]

The workers’ negotiators also want Apple to adopt a tipping system, letting patrons offer gratuities in increments of 3%, 5% or a custom amount for in-store credit-card transactions.

“This will allow thankful patrons the ability to express gratitude for a job well done without any obligations,” the union wrote Apple. “All monies collected through this manner would be dispersed to members of the bargaining unit biweekly based on any hours worked.”

Higher pay and better vacation/holiday/leave policies are exactly the sort of things the union should ask for.

But this tipping proposal is so antithetical to Apple’s customer-first retail experience that it feels like a joke, or that the union negotiators have never even been in an Apple Store. They might as well ask for employees to be allowed to vape while working. Asking for something like tipping — on very expensive products, no less — plays right into the hands of those who argue that retail store unionization is not aligned with the interests of customers.

Stores that pay employees by commission create an obvious incentive for salespeople to pressure customers into purchasing items they don’t need or aren’t entirely comfortable with. Prompting for tips on retail sales is just a backdoor commission.

Apple Q2 2023 Results 

Jason Snell at Six Colors:

Apple announced its latest quarterly results on Thursday. The company posted $94.8 billion in revenue, down slightly from the year-ago quarter but — at least to my eyes — not down as much as we might have expected.

Mac revenue was, as expected, down 31 percent to $7.2 billion — the lowest quarter of Mac revenue since 2020. iPad was down 13 percent to $6.7 billion, the lowest iPad revenue quarter since 2020. iPhone was up 2 percent to $51.3 billion, which given the downward trend elsewhere was pretty impressive — it was a Q2 record for iPhone revenue.

Services revenue soared to an all-time record of $20.9 billion, up 5 percent. Wearables was down by one percent, to $8.8 billion.

See also: Six Colors’s transcript of Tim Cook’s prepared statement and Apple’s Q&A with analysts. I thought it was interesting which shows and movies from TV+ Cook chose to highlight:

During the past quarter, fans tuned in to incredible new series like “Shrinking” and “The Big Door Prize” and got to welcome “Ted Lasso” back into their homes for a third season. Movies like “Tetris” are captivating viewers with many more to come, including Martin Scorsese’s “Killers of the Flower Moon” later this year.

Three years since its launch, Apple TV+ programming has been celebrated across the globe with over 1,450 nominations and more than 350 wins. Recently, we were thrilled to cheer on “The Boy, The Mole, The Fox, and The Horse,” which won an Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film.

This season of our historic 10-year partnership with Major League Soccer is well underway. With MLS Season Pass, we’ve created the ultimate destination for soccer fans, offering subscribers the ability to watch every match with no blackouts. And with baseball season in full swing, Apple TV+ subscribers can watch their favorite teams with a return of Friday Night Baseball.

Sidenote: Two weeks ago IDC projected Mac sales as being down 40 percent year-over-year, which shows how large IDC’s margin of error is.