If that were the case, Apple wouldn't sell as many devices.
Specs do matter, but in Apple's case. Even when under spec'd to competitors. Apple's products tend to
1) Just work. Especially well within "their" eco-system. AirPods, watch, Mac.
2) They have brand loyalty. People "know" Apple. If they sell it, it's worth a look to see if you like it.
3) Specs don't always equate to actual real world performance. They tend to overachieve with lower (on paper) specs.
Samsung, Google or some Chinese company would quickly snap up their market share and Apple would be gone from the smartphone market. Why? You said it yourself: if specs matter, someone else will sell a smartphone to rival the iPhone at hundreds of dollars less.
I can't remember the name of the Chinese manufacture that basically copied Apple's design and even more recently just sells mobile phones with the absolute highest end specs of any device out there. But, they and others do make higher spec'd devices (at least on paper) than Apple does. Samsung, Google/Pixel, Sony and others sell "higher" spec'd devices (again on paper) than Apple. They all seem to get a decent piece of the pie. They do all run Android (or their flavor of it) thought, so that may or may not hurt what they could potentially do if they had another OS option. Which is why Apple does not have the highest marketshare of the group. In the US, its higher but globally not as much. They sell more than enough devices to make money, yes. But they are not outselling their competition.
So yes, Apple doesn't outsell the competition. Others are selling devices cheaper and on paper "better" than what Apple does. They don't wipe Apple off the map because it's Apple, and not LG (when it comes to smartphones).
I have little doubt they'll try to, by leveraging their patent portfolio, if a viable competitor emerged.
That's fair for anyone though. That's why we have patents.
But the companies aren't actively preventing others much from giving it a go.
Sure, they're trying to entice and "tie" customers to their ecosystem ...but so does everyone else.
Exactly. Any company needs to keep making their product better so that people will want to stay with them. I don't like the idea that any company is "tying" you to their product. To me that's nonsense. I have a choice to stay or go.
And any company that leaves room for another one to improve upon a feature or service that the first company neglected too. Can succeed in opening up a new market, product, service, etc.
It is - and don't think you'll disagree with me on this - a result current market conditions that discourage other competitors from "giving it a go" and emerge. It costs billions to develop a physical product - and since "everyone" already has a smartphone and is invested in the app and services ecosystems and, more generally, used to its user interfaces and way of working, it's very uncertain whether enough people are going to switch to an emerging competitor's system - while they'll be bleeding billions of dollars.
One suggestion is that you find your niche. Lets use SpaceX as an example. I know many people thought that NASA was it for anything space (or government agencies of other countries). You want to put something in space, you go to NASA. Now, we can go to SpaceX. They can send people to space, they can put satellites up. They can do things NASA can't do with rockets. But, they started with reusability. Something NASA did not fully get right. The Shuttle was reusable, but not the tanks. They figured out a way to save A LOT of money getting things up to orbit. They bled money to do it, but it paid off.
And Elon used money he earned from other companies he owned to build SpaceX. I'm not denying it's not going to take a F-Ton of money to get something started. But, it's not impossible. Just have to figure it out, it's hard. But it maybe worth the risk.
I think what we're (probably) disagreeing on is this
You'd probably argue along these lines:
"The market has decided (at least for the time being).
YES
On which mobile OS and App Stores are popular with whom and why.
YES. And if people (actual people not representatives of people) want more options on iOS. They should petition Apple to do so (allow it). And if Apple doesn't, they stop buying it. Vote with your dollars.
The companies developed their products as they pleased - and customers adopted them as they liked the products - by exercising true choice.
YES
That's what lead to current market conditions and should be respected and not be interfered with by government intervention and regulation."
YES, as long as that happened by following the rules. YES, it should be allowed to continue as is.
And I'd say customers choice is severely limited - because there's just two dominant platforms whose policies are often so similar that they seem to be implicitly colluding. And that operators are abusing their gatekeeping role for anticompetitive behavior.
We would have to prove this. And at least one thing against this argument is that Apple started well into the heights of the smartphone market. You had many options to pick from. For business, for consumer, and for those that simply wanted a basic phone to call people with. Their (Apple's) entrant into his market was stock full of competition. At lower or higher price points. Consumers (people) voted with their money.
Now for the abuse of their "gatekeeping" role. Apple didn't push anyone out of iOS. So we can't say they are anti-competitive. They didn't have competition within the OS to push out. They (Apple) most likely took the approach of the phone being the infrastructure of a physical store. And the AppStore being the registers, shelves, and people making the place function. You (the customer) walked into the building, and browsed the store and made a purchase. Same as you would any physical store. Or not, maybe you just browsed. Apple didn't build say, a Mall. Where Apple could be a store amongst other stores. That's not what they built. So that is why I don't agree with these gov't rules/regulations being proposed/implemented. They want something to be what it is not. Could it be? Yes, if Apple wanted to build that it could be. Just like macOS "Could" run on an iPad Pro. But that isn't what we have. And I don't believe anyone should be forced to build something they don't want to.
Again, these companies aren't much at fault for current state of the market, for the dominance they've achieved. It's just that the results are (sometimes) undesirable.
That's totally on perspective. I'm sure Apple is happy with the results of their work in this regard. I'm sure Motorola and Blackberry are very much NOT. It's only fair if you're the winner. Governments shouldn't be picking winners and losers. They should be promoting a fair playing field for anyone to compete. But not tipping the balance in favor of one or the other. If any company is simply too successful or there are too few (duopoly). But they have done nothing wrong. They should be left alone. Maybe tax them more. And use that additional revenue to lower the taxes on a new startup? Maybe provide an easier or more incentivised means to get some patients to be FRAND. At least the company that made it can still make money off of its use in another system. Or a patient troll can't extort and never actually use a patient that could be of great benefit to society.
I'm sure we can get creative in ways to get more competition, while not preventing those that got us here. Demoralized, and possibly disinterested in continuing to develop products and services people actually want.
Technically yes, they're cellphones. But I don't see or know people that are using them primarily as cellphones. They're using them as messengers, internet browser, etc. Much more than as a cell phone.
They are not technically a cell phone. They "are" a cell phone. Otherwise an iPod touch would be the most popular device vs the iPhone. And Apple would continue to make iPod touches if it was at least worth it to do so.
Going to space is largely funded by the government or government entities - not consumers.
Not every satellite is for the government. Star-link WI-FI satellites are supposed to be for consumers.
It's privately funded, and charges commercial customers and government(s) to put things in orbit. That's how it makes money to keep going. At some point they will start selling seats to put regular folks into orbit. For fun. Same for Virgin Galactic and Blue Origin.
👉 Why not? What do you think are the reasons? Their OS is pretty good, isn't it?
Their OS is VERY good. It's my preferred desktop OS. I have been using a Mac since I was 5 or 6 at my public library. Only to play Where in the world is Carmen San Diego. And in College for audio engineering.
My reasons for why they will not be more dominate in the desktop OS space is.
1) They don't license out their OS. If they did, it would be more popular for those that don't want to spend on a Mac.
2) The iMac and Mac Mini made a difference, it brought the price down. But, you still need a Mac to run macOS.
3) Microsoft was always cheaper and good enough. They also keep legacy support for MUCH longer than Apple would.
4) The areas Apple stayed relevant (Audio, Graphic design, arts) was too niche. Business use is more common/cheap.
5) They don't play nice in the business world. As above, they make changes MUCH faster than a business would like.
6) Cost again, but this was always mistaken by many. It may cost more upfront, but less later.
There are more, but that's off the top of my head.
