I'm starting to wonder where this meme comes from. I would hardly call owning a product produced by the most successful company in the world and a household brand being a "hipster".
Apple products are not really overpriced. Try buying a capable iPad-like tablet for less than $499. Try buying something like the 11" Macbook Air for less than $999. The iPhone 3GS is $49 with a two year contract.
Is there a rebel without a cause sensibility about hating Apple?
I don't think the comparison is entirely without merit. From what I can tell, a lot of the scorn directed at hipsters (or at least the "hipster" archetype/strawperson) stems from fact (or perception) that they value cultural artifacts based on the social status that they can leverage those artifacts for, rather than for any intrinsic value they might have. Compare someone who tells their friends about a band because they like the lyrics of that one song they listened to all the time in high school, vs someone who tells their friends about the same band because they want to be the first to do so, gaining some reputation in the process. (Obviously there are more subtle gradients of behaviors and motivations here, but lets stick to broad strokes.)
Apple's branding and advertising tends to exhibit a similar focus on how their products will improve your status, rather than on the capabilities of the actual hard/software. Consider the 1984 Mac ad, or the iPod silhouette ads. They weren't telling you to buy an iPod because it could hold more songs, they were telling you that if you had an iPod, you could be one of the happy beautiful people dancing on a soundstage. Compare that to a run of GeneriCo (seriously, I've seen it like ten times but I can't recall the brand) ads that have been running for back-to-school PCs on Hulu. The whole thing is a laundry list of features without any context for why they're going to make your life better. And there's a creepy guy hanging on the wall of a girl's dorm room. They haven't even grokked JWZ's level of marketing savvy (http://www.jwz.org/doc/groupware.html) let alone Apple's.
Collide that with some long-standing geek ethics (function over form, a hard-won appreciation for the inner beauty of seemingly ugly tech, etc) and a backlash isn't all that surprising. The hipster thing is just convenient. Hating on them is already a popular internet pastime, so throwing that (as above, somewhat spiritually appropriate) label on Apple is a nice shorthand for showing how much you don't care about how big bezels should be or whether your corners are rounded. It doesn't help that there are a fairly substantial core group of Apple devotees who engage in some absurdly irrational behaviors for status-seeking reasons (which is pretty much what "hipsterism" is all about). Why, our enraged geek wants to know, would anyone stand in line at an Apple store for hours for a new iPhone? THAT IS WHAT THE INTERNET AND FEDEX IS FOR SMAAASH
So, yeah. Extending that to accusations of overpriced-ness is left as an exercise for the reader.
Back when the iPod came out, MP3 players were all about features. A pure feature for feature comparison of an iPod vs other players makes the iPod look bad. They were probably trying to play the social status card. This seemed to have changed when the iPod actually got new features like the camera, the clip. But I forget all the campaigns.
Let's look at the ad campaigns for the Mac and iOS devices. There was the Switch campaign where they had people talking about why they switched and how it made their lives better. The "I'm a Mac, I'm a PC" campaign which was a bit abstract but talked about what the Mac could do. And the iOS ads, all of which show you real life functions of the iPhone and iPad. The iPod Touch is being marketed as a game console and they are showing real games that you can play.
Contrast this to the current crop of Samsung commercials. All the ones I have seen on TV do not show the product in any useful way, do not show what you can do with their products and claim that you will be better for buying their product. They are all very abstract.
The Acer Iconia ads are much better but aren't very well made.
The Droid Does campaign was pretty good but a little impersonal. But there was also their initial iDon't ad which told you nothing about their device but subtly referenced their competitor. Then there was that Droid X space thing which was supposed to be what exactly? And then the Droid commercials where they try and show something that the phone can do and BTW, you will turn into some super awesome android guy.
So in recent times, Apple has not been playing the social status card so much. Also, geeks are just as vulnerable to the social status message. Just look at this "Apple is over priced and it is all about marketing" meme. Geeks are just seeking increased social status in a different group. But they want it just as much as the Apple crowd.
> Apple's branding and advertising tends to exhibit a similar focus on how their products will improve your status, rather than on the capabilities of the actual hard/software
Look at the lid of every mac book. Which way up is the Apple? Your way so that you naturally see it right side up when opening the lid? - no - it's upside down to you, because the point is, everyone else is supposed to see it.
It's upside down to you because it's on the back side of the LCD panel- if it were the right way facing you, then it would just be upside down when you use your computer, which just looks silly ಠ_ಠ
The point is that when you're actually using your Macbook, you do not see the back of it. It makes more sense for it to be right side up when open so that everyone else sees it the proper way instead of right side up when closed and in the process of opening when the only person seeing it is you.
It's just one more example of design that makes sense.
Almost every other laptop manufacturer also does that, at least now-a-days. And it was true when I got my first laptop, a ThinkPad in 2004. Did Apple start the trend, and was it different before that? I am not sure, I could not find enough conclusive pictures of older models.
More broadly, this is the kind of rationalizing which probably come from some irrational hate that the grandparent is talking about.
Also to talk about advertising, it generally works that way. Not just in the first world, but in the third world too.
Let me give you an anecdote. tl;dr: ads targeted towards working class in India had the decor which is not even common among wealthy, it works.
I grew up in India, in a rather wealthy family in a medium-sized city. And I mention that, because with it comes with something which is very uncommon in most of the Western world and even bigger Indian cities. I had an entourage as a kid, the kind that only old money has in US, with a pretty minute fraction of wealth. And I was close with some of my help, been to their homes, parties etc. (May sound weird, but is not that common in that part of the world.) And most ads which specifically target them, project a lifestyle which I have generally not seen even among the wealthy i.e. people who they work for. And yet, instead of shying away from those products and considering them elitist, they embraced them, as opposed to the things that used more down to earth marketing. I have not watched Indian TV for almost a decade, but I doubt that things have changed a lot.
So what's wrong with Apple projecting a slightly more stylish and affluent image. Benz does that too, and so do most startup videos I have seen, irrespective of whether they were made by Adam Lisagor.
Errata: On second thoughts, I am not sure if it was true for the ThinkPad. But the Dells and HPs were like that.
None of the Thinkpads that I have on hand (x30, T41 tablet, X201, Z61m, covers ~ 10 years) exhibit that feature, so it's not something "thinkpad does".
The difference with the Apple logo is that it is usually illuminated - rather than mere branding that you have to look for, it actually pulls your eye and works as an advertisement due to the difference in illuminance.
Yes, the difference with Apple is illuminance. But I think they started it when they were much smaller, and it was meant to be promote word-of-mouth-ish promotion. Sure now that Macs are popular, it sucks to have too many illuminated logos being thrown in your face. I don't like that either. I too find it sad that too many children these day will think the Apple logo is synonymous with computing devices. At least in the earlier days there were many different logos from different companies.
Going back to ThinkPad, I think the difference was that it was a small logo on the corner. Consider having a big ThinkPad logo in the center, and how odd it may look to anybody who looks at the user. Probably why other manufacturers also do it.
The apple logo is also designed to be viewed by others, NOT the owner.
Thinkpad's branding ("Lenovo" and the angled "Thinkpad" in the corner) face the owner when the laptop is closed.
The Apple is inverted. When the laptop lid is up (in use), it's advertising Apple to others. When the laptop lid is closed, the owner sees an upside-down apple.
That's marketing genius.
(Typed on a Thinkpad, running Debian GNU/Linux, of course: while I appreciate marketing genius, I prefer technical superiority ;-)
Do Benz fans wander around automotive forums talking about the various inherent superiorities of their car and car company? This is the part that draws the anger. No one would care if Apple fans could just be happy with their purchase and not lord it over everyone.
>Apple's branding and advertising tends to exhibit a similar focus on how their products will improve your status, rather than on the capabilities of the actual hard/software.
When I look at Apple's ads (especially the latest crop of iPad ones), I see them showing families getting closer, students learning better, people enjoying their pastimes, etc.
In a nutshell, technology enhancing peoples' lives and not just technology for the sake of it.
That's quite different from just "improving social status" in my opinion.
iMacs and mac minis are overpriced. Of course the high price also comes from using mobile components but still, you can get a Desktop PC with the same specs as an iMac (including a 27 inch screen) for several hundred $ less than an iMac.
The fact that you feel the need to disparage a man who, as part of a two-man team, charted the course for personal computing in the 1980's, workstation computing and CGI in the 1990's, and then went on to build the world's most valuable consumer electronics company – says more about you than it says about Steve Jobs. You might not like people who care about aesthetics, but I doubt you'd fare particularly well in a comparison test vs. Steve f-ing Jobs. Talk about a lack of perspective!
I don't agree with the comment you're replying to, but if we all had to be equals to the icons we criticize... the online world of commentary, discussion, and blogs would cease to exist. I'm not American, but it would be like not being able to criticize the president without someone saying "see how you'd fare in a comparison against Barack O-f-ing-Bama".
in all honesty I think wozniak deserves more credit and bill gates did more to get affordable home computers to the mass than jobs did. But I have no doubts Jobs would of been successful regardless.
If you want to think Woz and Bill Gates did "more" than Steve Jobs, then you are entitled to that view. I don't agree, but I don't care enough to argue my point.
in all honesty I think wozniak deserves more credit and bill gates did more to get affordable home computers to the mass than jobs did. But I have no doubts Jobs would of been successful regardless.
No. It's not anywhere close to enough. Wozniak might have been the way for the beginning of the PC revolution, but Jobs had the will, and more importantly, he told us all why we wanted it. Why we needed it... There is literally no amount of praise that would be excessive. For what it's worth, I would say the same of Gates, Stallman, Torvalds, K&R, Sussman, etc. etc. etc. Contrary to popular belief, enthusiasm, love, and praise are free.
Thank you for being flawed enough that you failed to stop Android taking over the phone market, and thereby preventing the world from entering a technology dark ages where hardware and software ecosystems are locked down and controlled by huge corporations.
Android is the Modern day Nokia. Android's marketshare is WORTHLESS.
Android is nothing but a 2nd rate copycat mobile OS from an evil corporation whose main goal is to steal user data and serve us shitty ads. Google is devoid of morals, ethics and taste. They sell ads for chrissakes! They're as low in the totem pole as used car salesmen!
Android is nothing without iOS. NOTHING. Google is being sued left and right because they are nothing but a bunch of COPYCAT ONE-TRICK PONY.
....and let me just say that Larry Page is an UGLY horse tooth jackass. And Andy Rubin looks like the retarded gay lover of Elton John.
While I agree fabulous's comment is totally inappropriate Im caught off guard by some comments to my submissions and or commments left.
For instance I recently unsubscribed to Groupon emails. After doing so Groupon pointed me to a page to watch a tongue and cheek video to get me to change my mind.
I hate getting spam emails and I was very eager to banish any further Groupons (signed up by mistake). There tongue and cheek video was very ineffective for me. I did think it was unique, interesting and something worth sharing. But, since I felt negatively towards it the title of my submission was "Worst Email Unsubscibe Page?". Because that is how I felt about it but still wondered what others thought.
I am someone who is actively resistant to "group-think". It often gets me in hot water to be so out of step. It's tricky to be very out of step with a group and still participate in a meaningful, constructive fashion. I try extremely hard to avoid framing things in a blatantly negative fashion. Negative framing of that sort seems to only work if the majority are pretty much guaranteed to heartily agree.
Iirc, the first title was "Worst Email Unsubscribe Page" without question mark. Also, the post was basically an editorial comment. I think it would have been flamed less if you had taken the time to write a short blog post about it and then submitted that.
Not really. Downvote is for poor responses, which are still more or less acceptable. We don't want to spend our time on HN downvoting trolling clowns and other vermin.
I understand the general idiots point, but why non-hackers? I remember that a lot of time I read very valuable comments from doctors, or lawyers, or mathematicians. Some of the articles that go to the front page are not related to hacking and this has always been fine.
Are you suggesting Android is not controlled by a huge corporation? Android is a lot more open than iOS, but the interaction with customers is completely controlled by a handful of corporations.
We need an open source hardware device running a truly open source OS. That would be really nice.
EDIT: Even if we don't have open source hardware, what would be great is having the ability to buy modular parts to build up our own devices. This used to be common practice with desktops, but got totally killed since laptops took over.
I'm worried that we'll never be able to build our own phones the way we can build our own PCs with commodity hardware due to the crazy patent situation.
Probably hardware and software will continue to be locked down (or in Android's case, released to open-source many many months after official release), but we'll be rescued by the web the same way we were in the PC era.
On the other hand, iPhone OS (or how was it called in early days) was a clear inspiration for Android. You cannot deny Apple basically invented many phone UI metaphors, that were directly copied (and I don't mean it in negative sense) into Android UI.
And to your other point... closed nature has its upsides too. Look at gaming consoles, they work quite well despite being crazy controlled. And Apple never wanted to dominate the whole phone market... if you remember the iPhone introduction, they didn't want to own the whole market. They defined its own category, basically :)
I would argue that the PC is a terrible gaming console, as crappy drivers and graphics APIs (and the wide variety of hardware) rob PC games of huge amounts of the total performance the hardware is capable of.
I'm not sure about that. The iPhone UI is definitely a good piece of engineering, and it's certainly more polished than what came before, but I don't think it invented anything novel.
I totally acknowledge that the iPhone provided a huge leap forward, and that it inspired / altered the direction android took - I'm very grateful for it.
It is precisely because it was so good that it was such a threat to the technology landscape. We could easily have descended into a windows like era of domination by one company, but this time with the company having complete control over every layer - hardware, software, even content. However we didn't, partly thanks to strategic mistakes that Jobs made (we could have a whole discussion about what those were but I think it would be counterproductive wrt this thread).
I think almost like a natural ecosystem the software world needs both open and closed systems in balance. Each one moves us forward in different ways at different times. It is when they get out of balance that we get stuck (the "windows" era being a good example).
Am I the only one who seems that this makes it seem like he's dead and just not stepping down from CEO of Apple? It's not like he's not going to do anything else in his life.
The way he phrased his resignation letter made it sound like his health is rapidly declining and is no longer good enough to serve as the CEO. That, and the November release of his official biography, are both hints that he fears his life is ending soon.
"I have always said if there ever came a day when I could no longer meet my duties and expectations as Apple’s CEO, I would be the first to let you know. Unfortunately, that day has come."
Why do you think saying thank you has to wait until someone is dead? The best time to say thank you is when the person is here and can appreciate the gratitude being expressed for them.
What if I didn't want to tweet the thank you? What apout quests?
Thanks for lovely computers and phones, especially the MacBook Air. It's my most favourite computer ever!
Hopefully the bar is raised sufficient enough that we wont go backwards in design and function. I once tried to buy a PC laptop just for something different (I've had Macs since 10.2), but nothing at all could come close to the MacBooks.
A nice screen, keyboard, trackpad and design all in one package is apparently too difficult for every other laptop manufacturer out there. Except for maybe Lenovo, they are a bit of alright. But there just isn't anything like the Air!
I am disappointed by how many of the comments flashing by in the twitter stream on that site are people insulting Steve Jobs and Apple users in general.
Not exactly surprised, but disappointed nonetheless.
There's a lot of hate and prejudice cultivated in some circles vs. Apple and people who use their products. It's certainly worthy of a cultural study or analysis. I suppose this is mainly the 'us vs. the other' mentality... Linux users get that ridiculous BS, too.
The dynamics are different when it's the mainstream hating you and those being discriminated against are significantly outnumbered. Where that applies to which group definitely varies widely by social circle.
74 comments
[ 2.8 ms ] story [ 83.0 ms ] threadJust ignore it and carry on.
Apple products are not really overpriced. Try buying a capable iPad-like tablet for less than $499. Try buying something like the 11" Macbook Air for less than $999. The iPhone 3GS is $49 with a two year contract.
Is there a rebel without a cause sensibility about hating Apple?
I don't think the comparison is entirely without merit. From what I can tell, a lot of the scorn directed at hipsters (or at least the "hipster" archetype/strawperson) stems from fact (or perception) that they value cultural artifacts based on the social status that they can leverage those artifacts for, rather than for any intrinsic value they might have. Compare someone who tells their friends about a band because they like the lyrics of that one song they listened to all the time in high school, vs someone who tells their friends about the same band because they want to be the first to do so, gaining some reputation in the process. (Obviously there are more subtle gradients of behaviors and motivations here, but lets stick to broad strokes.)
Apple's branding and advertising tends to exhibit a similar focus on how their products will improve your status, rather than on the capabilities of the actual hard/software. Consider the 1984 Mac ad, or the iPod silhouette ads. They weren't telling you to buy an iPod because it could hold more songs, they were telling you that if you had an iPod, you could be one of the happy beautiful people dancing on a soundstage. Compare that to a run of GeneriCo (seriously, I've seen it like ten times but I can't recall the brand) ads that have been running for back-to-school PCs on Hulu. The whole thing is a laundry list of features without any context for why they're going to make your life better. And there's a creepy guy hanging on the wall of a girl's dorm room. They haven't even grokked JWZ's level of marketing savvy (http://www.jwz.org/doc/groupware.html) let alone Apple's.
Collide that with some long-standing geek ethics (function over form, a hard-won appreciation for the inner beauty of seemingly ugly tech, etc) and a backlash isn't all that surprising. The hipster thing is just convenient. Hating on them is already a popular internet pastime, so throwing that (as above, somewhat spiritually appropriate) label on Apple is a nice shorthand for showing how much you don't care about how big bezels should be or whether your corners are rounded. It doesn't help that there are a fairly substantial core group of Apple devotees who engage in some absurdly irrational behaviors for status-seeking reasons (which is pretty much what "hipsterism" is all about). Why, our enraged geek wants to know, would anyone stand in line at an Apple store for hours for a new iPhone? THAT IS WHAT THE INTERNET AND FEDEX IS FOR SMAAASH
So, yeah. Extending that to accusations of overpriced-ness is left as an exercise for the reader.
Let's look at the ad campaigns for the Mac and iOS devices. There was the Switch campaign where they had people talking about why they switched and how it made their lives better. The "I'm a Mac, I'm a PC" campaign which was a bit abstract but talked about what the Mac could do. And the iOS ads, all of which show you real life functions of the iPhone and iPad. The iPod Touch is being marketed as a game console and they are showing real games that you can play.
Contrast this to the current crop of Samsung commercials. All the ones I have seen on TV do not show the product in any useful way, do not show what you can do with their products and claim that you will be better for buying their product. They are all very abstract.
The Acer Iconia ads are much better but aren't very well made.
The Droid Does campaign was pretty good but a little impersonal. But there was also their initial iDon't ad which told you nothing about their device but subtly referenced their competitor. Then there was that Droid X space thing which was supposed to be what exactly? And then the Droid commercials where they try and show something that the phone can do and BTW, you will turn into some super awesome android guy.
So in recent times, Apple has not been playing the social status card so much. Also, geeks are just as vulnerable to the social status message. Just look at this "Apple is over priced and it is all about marketing" meme. Geeks are just seeking increased social status in a different group. But they want it just as much as the Apple crowd.
Look at the lid of every mac book. Which way up is the Apple? Your way so that you naturally see it right side up when opening the lid? - no - it's upside down to you, because the point is, everyone else is supposed to see it.
It's just one more example of design that makes sense.
More broadly, this is the kind of rationalizing which probably come from some irrational hate that the grandparent is talking about.
Also to talk about advertising, it generally works that way. Not just in the first world, but in the third world too.
Let me give you an anecdote. tl;dr: ads targeted towards working class in India had the decor which is not even common among wealthy, it works.
I grew up in India, in a rather wealthy family in a medium-sized city. And I mention that, because with it comes with something which is very uncommon in most of the Western world and even bigger Indian cities. I had an entourage as a kid, the kind that only old money has in US, with a pretty minute fraction of wealth. And I was close with some of my help, been to their homes, parties etc. (May sound weird, but is not that common in that part of the world.) And most ads which specifically target them, project a lifestyle which I have generally not seen even among the wealthy i.e. people who they work for. And yet, instead of shying away from those products and considering them elitist, they embraced them, as opposed to the things that used more down to earth marketing. I have not watched Indian TV for almost a decade, but I doubt that things have changed a lot.
So what's wrong with Apple projecting a slightly more stylish and affluent image. Benz does that too, and so do most startup videos I have seen, irrespective of whether they were made by Adam Lisagor.
Errata: On second thoughts, I am not sure if it was true for the ThinkPad. But the Dells and HPs were like that.
The difference with the Apple logo is that it is usually illuminated - rather than mere branding that you have to look for, it actually pulls your eye and works as an advertisement due to the difference in illuminance.
Going back to ThinkPad, I think the difference was that it was a small logo on the corner. Consider having a big ThinkPad logo in the center, and how odd it may look to anybody who looks at the user. Probably why other manufacturers also do it.
Thinkpad's branding ("Lenovo" and the angled "Thinkpad" in the corner) face the owner when the laptop is closed.
The Apple is inverted. When the laptop lid is up (in use), it's advertising Apple to others. When the laptop lid is closed, the owner sees an upside-down apple.
That's marketing genius.
(Typed on a Thinkpad, running Debian GNU/Linux, of course: while I appreciate marketing genius, I prefer technical superiority ;-)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PowerBook_G4#Industrial_design
When I look at Apple's ads (especially the latest crop of iPad ones), I see them showing families getting closer, students learning better, people enjoying their pastimes, etc.
In a nutshell, technology enhancing peoples' lives and not just technology for the sake of it.
That's quite different from just "improving social status" in my opinion.
No ? Oh so it's not really apples-to-apples then.
you may be shocked to discover that other people worked at apple over the years
Saying thank you, like most happier emotional expressions, has a positive effect for the sender as well as the recipient.
Android is nothing but a 2nd rate copycat mobile OS from an evil corporation whose main goal is to steal user data and serve us shitty ads. Google is devoid of morals, ethics and taste. They sell ads for chrissakes! They're as low in the totem pole as used car salesmen!
Android is nothing without iOS. NOTHING. Google is being sued left and right because they are nothing but a bunch of COPYCAT ONE-TRICK PONY.
....and let me just say that Larry Page is an UGLY horse tooth jackass. And Andy Rubin looks like the retarded gay lover of Elton John.
For instance I recently unsubscribed to Groupon emails. After doing so Groupon pointed me to a page to watch a tongue and cheek video to get me to change my mind.
I hate getting spam emails and I was very eager to banish any further Groupons (signed up by mistake). There tongue and cheek video was very ineffective for me. I did think it was unique, interesting and something worth sharing. But, since I felt negatively towards it the title of my submission was "Worst Email Unsubscibe Page?". Because that is how I felt about it but still wondered what others thought.
For whatever reason because I chose a negative title the submission was flamed - http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2928041
Again that is how I felt time of writing the title because it was un-effective for me, but wondered what others thought about it.
Ive been reading HN since May '07 (various accounts) so Im not a noob. Maybe Im someone who thinks differently at times then others here?
We need an open source hardware device running a truly open source OS. That would be really nice.
EDIT: Even if we don't have open source hardware, what would be great is having the ability to buy modular parts to build up our own devices. This used to be common practice with desktops, but got totally killed since laptops took over.
If I had an extra life, that would be my startup.
Probably hardware and software will continue to be locked down (or in Android's case, released to open-source many many months after official release), but we'll be rescued by the web the same way we were in the PC era.
And to your other point... closed nature has its upsides too. Look at gaming consoles, they work quite well despite being crazy controlled. And Apple never wanted to dominate the whole phone market... if you remember the iPhone introduction, they didn't want to own the whole market. They defined its own category, basically :)
It is precisely because it was so good that it was such a threat to the technology landscape. We could easily have descended into a windows like era of domination by one company, but this time with the company having complete control over every layer - hardware, software, even content. However we didn't, partly thanks to strategic mistakes that Jobs made (we could have a whole discussion about what those were but I think it would be counterproductive wrt this thread).
I think almost like a natural ecosystem the software world needs both open and closed systems in balance. Each one moves us forward in different ways at different times. It is when they get out of balance that we get stuck (the "windows" era being a good example).
"I have always said if there ever came a day when I could no longer meet my duties and expectations as Apple’s CEO, I would be the first to let you know. Unfortunately, that day has come."
Thanks for lovely computers and phones, especially the MacBook Air. It's my most favourite computer ever!
Hopefully the bar is raised sufficient enough that we wont go backwards in design and function. I once tried to buy a PC laptop just for something different (I've had Macs since 10.2), but nothing at all could come close to the MacBooks.
A nice screen, keyboard, trackpad and design all in one package is apparently too difficult for every other laptop manufacturer out there. Except for maybe Lenovo, they are a bit of alright. But there just isn't anything like the Air!
Not exactly surprised, but disappointed nonetheless.
We created a FB event "Dress Up Like Steve Jobs Day": https://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=130179840411684 to honor Steve Jobs on Friday, September 9th.
And yes, I'm being somewhat facetious.