Apple jacks prices to juice profits because $19.3B a quarter isn't enough Subscription pricing has been on the rise for nearly every service imaginable, and Apple isn't about to miss the opportunity to squeeze its customers for a little more. The iGiant Wednesday revealed it's jacking prices by as much as 42 percent its Apple TV+ streaming service, as well as Apple News+ and Apple Arcade. In a …
Has Hell frozen over? Has a politician been caught NOT lying?
No, but - shock horror - Apple have spoken to El Reg!!!!
"In a statement provided to The Register, Apple said it'd begun rolling out new subscription pricing "in the US and select international markets.""
Oh yeah, and they've jacked their prices up as well.
>>> Now tell us how you really feel...
Apple fanboys are just victims. Ecstatic, consenting victims. Yet victims.
Victims of their ego.
Victims of their need to compensate the repressed feeling of their own shallowness and to identify with a brand selling an image of "you're-above-the-crowd [now pay for it]". Same product less expensive would sell less.
Victims of their inability to run the real thing: Linux.
Having a push of dopamine when they read that their email is "sent from my iphone".
Now you guys can downvote, if you need to take revenge for being stripped naked in front of your innermost self. Consultation was free today.
I switched to iPhone from Android because I was tired of my usable phones running out of security updates and wanted to continue using them for things like internet banking.
Apple is in a league of its own on this front, still updating very old models. Although Google and Samsung subsequently announced a slightly improved policy, they still lag considerably, both in the length of the upgrade cycle and the scope of the updates.
I'm happy to trade inferior specs for security.
I find that an old Android phone with all its risks works with the banks quite happily.
you try to put a patched later ROM on and they all fail - barclaycard is the worst
Ask them why an old android image, unpatched is fine, but a newer patched rom - albeit rooted is not.
One think I will give Apple is the upgrades. You change phone, it all comes across. Doing that with Android is no fun, even if the phone is from the same supplier
> One think I will give Apple is the upgrades. You change phone, it all comes across. Doing that with Android is no fun, even if the phone is from the same supplier
This has definitely improved. My last change, from a Samsung S8 to a Pixel 6a was painless. Everything just transferred across.
Thanks for the deep and insightful review there, it would be nice if I could say "you nailed it", but sadly your point of view is considerably lacking in both detail and direction.
Hey, I guess there's just millions of really smart people out there using Apple products who love "fancy-looking wrapping" and "lap it up for no sensible reason."
I'm one of them, writing this on my "fancy-looking wrapping" mac Pro M1, I'm lapping it up man!
There's a reason enterprise choose iOS:
97% of mobile OS malware is exclusive to Android (iOS is <1%).
There are more than 50x more malware infections on Android devices than iOS devices.
Unique CVEs are more than double for Android over iOS.
According to Google's own data, >42% of Android devices are susceptible to known exploits (the figure is likely higher than this, this is due to them no longer being able to receive security updates, rather than them not updating for other myriad reasons).
etc
etc
I personally don't want to buy any Apple devices due to excessive price and poor support, but we do have several. They're well made, both hardware and software (typically, anyway), so "inferior" isn't how I would describe them. An iPad Mini has been thrown across the room on at least 2 occasions (sprogs! grrr...), has a partly-shattered screen, and still works just fine. (I put book tape (like thicker, tougher clear packaging tape) over the cracked bits, so they're not sharp or falling out.)
Getting told I had to buy a new hard drive, at my expense, for the one that "failed" (really just ran really, really slowly) "coincidentally" starting the moment after a major OS upgrade, though, is the kind of thing that turns me off from them. (And then having the replacement price be higher than quoted when I went to pick it up, because they substituted a bigger drive than I asked for without asking or informing me.) So overpriced and with poor support, yes, but not inferior.
Apple wipe the floor with HP in terms of ripoff prices but the Apple disciples just get on their knees amd offer up their wallets as sacrifice.
Only yesterday I saw a video filled with drooling fanbois trying to justify Apple's pricing by comparing the quality of the £130 TB4 cable with a £10 Amazon basics one.
Their self delusion is worrying, never mind their lack of critical thinking skills.
Gold-plating the contacts on the plugs makes some sense; corrosion can cause issues, and that should put a stop to it. But the rest is just wire, and any kind will do.
Hmm. I wonder if you could sell nichrome wires, insulated with an odd modelling clay like material, to audiophiles as speaker wire? Warning - do NOT turn up the volume!
Oxygen free copy wires if I remember and arguments about the different type of connectors. I had a friend who spent a fortune on Hi Fi (Gyrodeck turntable with some ridiculous arm & cartridge, Naim amps and some funky speakers).
It sounded good but it did not sound 10 x better than my stuff (not bottom end).
We have just given Sky the old heave-ho and ditched their Sky Q POS. I bought a FreeSat 4K DVR with a 2TB HD for £299 and £38 for a wideband LNB.
no more subscriptions.
with retirement looming, we are starting to look at our outgoings. Netflix went around 6 months ago. Like many, we signed up during COVID but there has not been much worth watching since. As for Sky? there was just too much choice that we usually ended up watching shows that are available on FreeSat.
Almost the same here, but with Virgin. Though, the bundles are only a few pennies more than just the broadband on its own after my misses tore them one on the last renewal.
Netflix is a freebie for that. Other films / series available by other options ;), oh, and providers
I gave broadcast TV the heave ho years ago, I flick through when visiting my parents but honestly there is nothing I'd watch and near all of it seems to be iq lowering dross....
No discovery I wouldn't like to learn about anything, no I'd rather just watch storage wars..........
Isn’t it weird how soon they seem to have forgotten why people started legitimately consuming digital content and turning away from piracy.
I suspect that while nostalgic site and software names like Napster Ngnutella mIRC Edonkey Kazaa and WinMX (to name just a few) themselves are likely never to return… I sense that what they represented may well be up for a big revival.
Personal rant:
I have already taken a stern look at my family’s subs and have cut back on well over half our outlay from five years ago… now only having one streaming service down from three, and have removed ALL subscription based apps and services from my family’s phones, for example, and I’m sure I’m not the only one. I wonder how it’s working out for the shareholders of those companies people are ditching.
This “own nothing” mentality that corpos have tried to feed us needs to go and we consumers need to get back to owning the digital content we consume, not just receiving a license or renting it for an arbitrary and changeable fee.
These days companies seem to be working overtime to find out new ways to sell digital stuff that nobody needs. We've had cable TV with 500 channels of nothing on and now they've added even more (channels of nothing on) via a subscription.
No Starbucks (I have better coffee at home for pennies), no cable TV, no music subscription, no movie subscription, no Prime etc etc. What I do have is a car that's in good nick and paid off. A house that's an ongoing project, but paid off as well. I have a well equipped kitchen with a well stocked larder so I eat well for less than a McD's combo meal. I have money for projects in the workshop as well as the garden. I'm sitting in my office surrounded by tech that isn't financed via credit cards at 30% interest.
I suppose I've never had stacks of money to keep myself flooded with entertainment so I've been interested in things that don't cost the world to see and do. I also can entertain myself by selecting something from one of my many bookshelves rather than spending yet another $9.99 on a subscription for something that may turn out to be a bust. Apple can raise their prices on their virtual products all they like and it doesn't affect me at all.
Maybe because someone doesn't want to pay a full subscription for just that 10% of content they are interested in?
Piracy was big when region locking was in place & release schedules differed between geographic areas. It was easier to download the movie that had been released in the US than get hold of a legit copy (either ebay a R1 disc or wait until the released in R2)
Netflix came along and suddenly lots of stuff was easily available in one place & piracy dropped
Now everyone wants their own subscription service so you "need" 4 or 5 subs to get the content you want so Piracy is going up.
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Of all the streaming services, AppleTV+ is the one that I just don’t see any value in.. it’s the only one I didn’t ever bother to sign up for a free trial on. Maybe when they stop shovelling money into mediocre ideas... (although this isn’t just an Apple problem.. after all, it wasn’t Apple that spent a quarter of a billion dollars licencing four pages at the back of the Lord of the Rings and then blew nearly as much again on a production without bothering to write a story first...)
I find it odd that in a period when customers are rationalising their streaming expenditure and cutting services, that Apple will put up the price of one of the least compelling options, but I suppose it makes sense when you see that most of the pricing plans are bundles of multiple Apple subscription products... the age-old marketing trick of “sure, the one thing you want from us is expensive on its own, but if you give us just 15% more you can have access to these other services that you didn’t want before, won’t use now, and so won’t cost us a dime to supply to you... but look! savings!”
"Slow Horses" was excellent, but Gary Oldman can do no wrong IMO.
"For All Mankind" was entertaining for a while but just became more and more ridiculous (shock...)
"Foundations" was quite good but a bit of a struggle (didn't much like Asimov's books either, maybe my imagination isn't just as mind blowingly enormous as his)
"Hello Tomorrow" looked beautiful but seemed to have no substance by the end of the free episode.
"Invasion" was an absolute embarrassment - its so bad you have to wonder if Netflix produced it?
Couldn't get into "Severance".
Very little on ATV+ to justify a rolling subscription, but I do use the box for all my streaming needs.
I watch more of C4 catch-up than anything else (thanks Walter..). A bit of iPlayer. Have NowTV Entertainment and Movies, rarely touch it, if it wasn't for them continually rolling over my special deal it would be gone, and why oh why do I have to pay for Boost? Never touch Netflix but the family likes it for some reason. Cancelled Prime at the start of the year when they hiked the price. Not been bothered by either the loss of free delivery (less cheap tat coming through the letterbox can only be good for the planet), or video (but I must finish watching "The Expanse" sometime). Had Paramount+ for a couple of months. Had Disney+ for a couple of months.
MAINLY I record from FreeSat and time-shift. 1980's style. It still works, you just need to apply a little bit of advance planning to make sure you schedule stuff you are interested in. And you can zip through the ads. My elderly Humax has a 2TB drive in it that is perpetually knocking on 90% full.
Here's my offer to the streaming companies. 2 quid a month max to be a member. No ads, no previews, no sponsors, just take me straight to the content. Minimum HD picture quality and 5.1 surround audio. Up to 5 hours a week content included. If I go over 5 hours then charge me the tenner for that month (DO NOT auto-play next episode in case I've fallen asleep in front of the TV...).
Final offer, take it or leave it....
Thanks for the recommendation - I have heard a lot of good things about “Slow Horses” - might burn an email on it... or just buy the books. “For All Mankind” did look promising, but as you say, it seems to have suffered American TV Disease: this happens when the producers start with a story, they tell it, but then the show is popular, so more episodes are ordered, but the story has already been told, so the viewers end up with far-fetched stunts and stupid plot turns just to keep the thing going... I thought the point of directly paying for TV was that the shows could end when they reached a natural end... oh well..
I used to work at Apple, so the core concept of “Severance” sounds a little like it came from Apple itself, rather than an external pitch.
But really, I’m only replying to echo your recommendation of All4 - it’s a fantastic service, has few ads, and is entirely free (available in UK and Ireland only, though, I think). Lots of really good foreign-language drama, plus you’ve got Channel 4’s own back-catalogue, including their superb collection of comedy - I didn’t realise how good C4 was at commissioning sit-coms until I saw the list, and realised that nearly all of my favourite comedies of the 1990s had aired on Channel 4.
Tehran (female undercover Mossad agent in Iran) is quite gripping. A bit like 24.
I've received three free trials of Apple TV, courtesy of buying Apple equipment, but I wouldn't actually hand over real money for it. I have a date in my calendar for cancelling the latest free trial.
I don't why people are complaining about Apple increasing their prices. https://www.scmp.com/magazines/style/tech-design/article/3023781/how-does-apple-ceo-tim-cook-plan-be-pebble-pond-creates explains how Tim Cook can't afford to buy pants in the US vernacular ("trousers" to those of us who speak English) as he only received $625 million salary at the time the article was written.
Plus he's going to give it all to charity anyway as obviously he knows how to spend your money better than you do. Funny how these tech "titans" always complain about government spending and taxes but they're always telling us how they're going to give the cash they've taken from us to their own pet charities or spend it on really useful stuff like exploding phallic rockets.
"but they're always telling us how they're going to give the cash they've taken from us to their own pet charities or spend it on really useful stuff like exploding phallic rockets."
Seeing as how Tim Cook is gay, that statement could have a whole other dimension.
Given the governments of this world are also the biggest sponsors of charitble works it shows the bullshit that is Tim. In my country the government spends hundreds of billions on free healthcare, schools, roads, police, hospitals and more. I wonder how much Tim and his friends spent last year ?
"Remember Jobs taken a dollar a year salary?"
Like most others that were doing that, many had to take more to comply with California minimum wage laws. That's salary, of course, not total compensation. If the company is coining it, it can be a huge advantage to take stock or stock options. In the mean time, the company is paying for meals, housing, wardrobe, transportation and business trips to exotic locations. A pretty good deal for a minimum wage employee, dontcha think?
So far I have :
Prime - do use it, but order much less off Amazon than I used to. If they stick ads on it I don't think I'll miss it. Likely to keep in the interim.
Disney+ - from family. Actually reasonably good, but not sure if I'd pay for it if it was my money. Possibly.
Britbox - good if you like the content, but it's annoying they drop off content at times. Could probably just buy stuff cheap on DVD instead. iPlayer is going to receive all of Classic Who, which removes one large reason for Britbox. Also its app and reliability are absolutely awful. May be on the impending chop list..
TV License - for all its faults I like the BBC. Keeping that, even if it's mostly to stream old programs off iPlayer.
Paramount+. Definitely not worth it at full price. Bought to watch Star Trek DS9 (shouldn't have bothered..). Renewed at half price, gaining early access to Strange New Worlds and Lower Decks. Macgyver is fun. Other than that not worth it. Likely to binge bits of old Star Trek and dump subscription next year.
I'd rather prop up Bluray sales than dump more money into streaming services. Also, if DVD quality is adequate they are mostly astoundingly cheap second hand.
I feel like this is going to have the opposite to the desired effect. People around the world are slowly waking up to the fact that we're entering a global recession (as countries fall into recession one by one). The Chinese people seem to realize it, they were the first to go. Now the UK, Canadians and Australians seem to be starting to clue in. The US is likely to be last, but it seems like it's headed that way as well.
That covers most of Apple's customers right there and one of the first things people do to tighten their belts is to cancel monthly service subscriptions. Putting the price up is likely to set off a lot more cancellations.
If they can get away with it, it's fine. At some time those Apple fanbois will wake up and smell the coffee and ditch the brand.
Having said that: Apple's long-term support is light-years ahead of those cheap Chinese Android smartphones and may well be worth the extra dough you spend on it. Not to mention that it benefits the environment because it reduces e-waste.
Apple's gross profits for ‘22/’23 were $166.8BN. As a parent who is lucky enough that stuff like this won't effect my family, I can't help but think about those who are not so lucky. Right now, the vast majority of Apple TV subscribers are probably worrying about feeding their kids, paying the rent and keeping warm while trying to keep their kids happy over the holidays. Then along comes an Apple exec who think's he's a pr genius, and hikes the subscription price by 28%. What a foul message to send to an esimated 25 million families for the holidays. Ok "so what, its only £2" and "its only Apple TV we've still got regular tv". But its not "only" a number or "just Apple TV" when people are being bled-dry by banks hiking interest rates, landlords increasing rents and not maintaining their properties, credit card bills charging 90% apr, and rampant inflation devaluing whatever you've got in your pocket/bank account. For a lot of people, its yet another straw on the camels back, and they're going to have a knee-jerk reaction and cancel their subscription. The *people* that comprise major corporates like Apple must think about this kind of thing, and make it a personal rule to excercise actual social responsibility, not just open a CSR department and point to it when they feel criticsed. They should know that its not just hard to get new customers, it's harder still to get ex-customers back. Yep its a rant, but this is happening all over the place, and Apple TV just walked into my rant-sight waving their price hike at me.
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