Apple sells drooling fans HomePod junk!

The smart speaker market is dominated by the Amazon Echo and Google Home.

And yet Apple had the balls to think their HomePod wasn't just a good idea, but a hands down competitor right out of the gate. LOL.

My god I hate Apple, and here's why. They really thought their HomePod was another great Apple "innovation" that people would just fall in love with?

Three weeks after the HomePod launched, it nabbed only 4 percent of sales.

See if you can spot the problems:

1. The limitations around Siri.

2. It works directly only with Apple Music.


3. The $349 price could also be turning some prospective shoppers off.

4. It doesn't help that the HomePod was found to damage furniture, leaving an unsightly ring. 

Ya think? But those in the Apple bubble have another takeaway:

Apple pitched the device not necessarily as a competitor to Amazon's Echo, but rather as a high-end speaker. Apple has long viewed HomePod as a speaker first and internally viewed the device as an accessory that would work with other Apple products rather than a standalone product.

Oh sure, that's the ticket. 

Netflix Watch still better than Apple!

It's a parody, and I hate Apple:

No Fan of Apple iPhones? You'll love this...

My high schooler is just going to love watching the video below over and over. He hates Apple so much, and for all the right reasons; its bland proprietary features and obnoxious rabid fan base pictured below.

The crowd reaction is mind numbing. What is wrong with these people?

'It's all good,' he tells an onlooking crowd.

Check out this tech writers look at the latest crop of Apples. You'll laugh, you'll cry:

The Guardian-Charlie Brooker: Apple’s software updates are like changing the water in a fish tank. I’d rather let the fish die.

First they were implicated in the stolen celebrity nude photo disaster. Correct me if I’m wrong, but I don’t think the iPhone is generally marketed as a diabolical timewasting device with the potential to wreak a grotesque and devastating invasion of your personal privacy. They tend to focus more on all the cool colours it comes in.

Then they launched the horrible-looking Apple Watch, which does everything an iPhone can do, but more expensively and pointlessly, and on a slightly different part of your body. Only an unhealthily devoted Apple fanatic could bear to wear a Apple Watch, and even that poor notional idiot would have to keep putting their iPhone down in order to operate the damn thing.

 It’s not a watch. It’s a gaudy wristband aimed at raising awareness of Chinese factory conditions. Or a handy visual tag that helps con artists instantly identify gullible rich idiots in a crowd.

Apple also unveiled the all-new bigger iPhone 6. By releasing two differently sized rectangles, which in turn differ from its previous range of differently sized rectangles, Apple has selfishly exhausted the global supply of differently sized rectangles. Wars will be fought to decide which dimension becomes the standard. And when mankind finally settles on a compromise, Apple is going to start on ovals.

But the other new development – the launch of iOS 8 – is impossible for iPhone users to ignore. But if I hold out, gradually nothing will work on my existing phone. They’ll freeze me out by degrees. Cut me out of the club. Plus I’ll miss out on great features such as slightly different icons and a terrifying new form of predictive text that precisely mimics the sensation of talking to an idiot who keeps finishing your sentences for you. 

All you want to do is watch TV and rot in your own filth. Part of the problem is that smartphones are so horribly addictive, as moreish as smoking. The difference between smartphones and cigarettes is this: a cigarette robs 10 minutes from your lifespan, but at least has the decency to wait and withdraw all that time in bulk as you near the end of your life – whereas a smartphone steals your time in the present moment, by degrees. Five minutes here. Five minutes there. Then you look up and you’re 85 years old. 

Stop Buying Apple Products, NOW!!

I've hated Apple for years, and so have many others, but now it’s time to hold Apple accountable for being the money grubbing proprietary jerks they are. Remember when updating Quicktime changed all the files on your computer to its format?

Nit picky says it all, but the real reason behind their position stems from Steve Jobs threat to go nuclear on Google's Android system. Vengeance. 

When you try to take electronic advances away from competitors, like the ability to pinch to zoom or photo return (bounce back), you start to affect everyone else’s ability to progress and enjoy the basics.

NY Times; The nine jurors in the case found that Samsung infringed on a series of Apple’s patents on mobile devices, awarding Apple more than $1 billion in damages … the decision could essentially force it and other smartphone makers to redesign their products to be less Apple-like, or risk further legal defeats. Consumers may be stuck with devices that manufacturers have clumsily revamped to avoid crossing Apple.

Wonderful, huh? Remember, Apple doesn’t license its technology to anyone.

The more important effect of the jury’s decision could be the impact it has on Android, the Google operating system used by Samsung and a broad array of other companies in their devices. For every iPhone sold worldwide, more than three smartphones running Android are sold … Apple is expected to ask the judge in the Samsung case for an injunction preventing Samsung from shipping products that infringe on Apple’s patents … consumers could experience some discomfort in their use of smartphones if Samsung and other manufacturers are forced to design around certain basic functions to avoid violating Apple’s patents. Katie Cotton, an Apple spokeswoman, “We make these products to delight our customers, not for our competitors to flagrantly copy,” she said.

That’s why on the other end of the spectrum, innovators are trying to develop technologies for the public domain, free for the taking and free for developers to be creative. But not Apple. Let's hope Apple gets it back in spades:

PCWorld: A week ago, Motorola Mobility filed a claim with the U.S. International Trade Commission maintaining that the iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad infringed on MotoMobi's patents for e-mail notifications, location reminders, and media players. 

The not so final word on Apple's Chinese slave labor problem.

If you haven't read the recent articles about Apple, and the sad state of workers rights in China, this article sums it up well. Apple is starting to realize they've got a problem. A big problem.

I always thought that China's labor practices would someday reach our shores, thanks to Republican efforts to lower wages and compete with third world nations. But that may not happen after all. China's has been transformed into the world's top competitor and manufacturer, all the while using third world labor practices. Instead of the U.S., maybe it will be China that will be forced to raise wages.

Foxnews: Apple began last week by basking in record quarterly profits, but then ended the week in a public relations retreat after reports of exploited workers in factories in China assembling its hot-selling iPads and iPhones.

Behind China's remarkable economic progress toil an estimated 120 million migrant workers, typically living and working in austere factory complexes.

Two decades into China's industrial transformation, questions are being asked about how much responsibility authorities shoulder for its hukou (who-co, household registration) system that effectively institutionalizes migrant workers as second-class citizens in their own country. But for now, it is Apple in the firing line … there is enough truth about worker conditions in mainland Chinese factories to offend many of its customers and ultimately damage its premium brand.

Foxconn, which employs over a million workers in China, has been in the headlines before after a spate of worker suicides at its factories in 2010. It later set up helplines and safety nets to stop employees jumping, as well as raising salaries. Basic pay was increased to 2,000 yuan (US$315) a month, up from 1,200 yuan (US$189). The company tends to attract attention because of its size, with over 300,000 working and living in its Shenzhen complex that is the size of small town.

The depressing prospect for migrant workers is they are prevented from joining this new China. Thanks to the decades-old hukou system, they cannot enjoy resident perks such as housing, education and medical benefits available to locals.

This suits provincial authorities, who avoid bearing the costs of providing these services or the infrastructure that an influx a population the size of Foxconn's plant in Shenzhen would require. Meanwhile, they still get the tax revenue from the business located locally. Such a system might have been justified when China was starting out on its path of industrialization. But holding back a permanent rump of citizens as factory cannon fodder is inevitably going to lead to rising tensions.

Another unpalatable consequence of the hukou system on such a scale is it makes it difficult for migrant families to resettle. It is estimated 58 million children of migrant workers are left behind with relatives or in care.

If consumers are willing to demand eggs from chickens that were not factory farmed, it is not much of a stretch that they might demand smartphones assembled by workers with some basic dignity.

Apple takes a big bite out of School Budgets, with expensive iPad's, to access e-textbooks.

iPads are still very expensive when you consider what you can get now via Android tablets. While iPads hover around $400, a simple 7” android tablet has now plummeted to $80. I’m just guessing, but I think school districts would be very happy ordering hundreds of $80 tablets as opposed to $400 tablets.

 

But Apple doesn’t give a damn, as usual, as it tries to corner the e-textbook market.

Even more sinister; they’ll get their grubby little hooks into the kids who will be required to own Apple’s typically overpriced exclusive product and accessories. Ah, I can remember my first 2nd grade iPad….wrong! The greed meisters at Apple would love that to happen though.

EdWeek: Apple Inc. announced aggressive new efforts yesterday to move into the K-12 electronic-textbook market … through a partnership with three major K-12 textbook publishers—McGraw-Hill, Pearson, and Houghton Mifflin Harcourt—Apple is offering interactive textbooks through its iBooks store at $14.99 or less. The textbooks feature multimedia elements, including video, three-dimensional graphics, and photo galleries. They also allow students to highlight text to create flashcards and search within a glossary.

Big deal, right? Most Android tablets can do all that and more. But Apple wants it all:

The publishers will give Apple a cut of the revenue; 30 percent in the case of individual consumers, and an undetermined amount when selling on a state or district level. Apple announced it is upgrading iTunes U to allow teachers to create entire online courses. iTunes U is also now expanding to the K-12 market.

Slow down, what about the cost?

But some critics believe the cost of the devices could prevent the innovative textbooks from being used by the students who need them most. By the end of the year, for example, McGraw-Hill will produce five Apple-only textbooks. If the textbooks can be used on Apple devices only, it could require cash-strapped districts to decide on Apple or a lesser education.

“Unless the economy significantly improves and the state governments have a load of money, I’m not sure where the districts will find money for $400 devices, and textbooks,” said Osman Rashid, the chief executive officer and co-founder of Kno, an e-textbook company in Santa Clara, Calif., that focuses on higher education.

UPDATE: 1-30 Monday: Looks like Wisconsin schools won't have to break their budgets:

The Madison school district in Wisconsin is buying 1,400 iPads for its classrooms, and the cash to land the deal is coming from a settlement with Microsoft. The district is starting by distributing 600 iPads among students and teachers and plans to add another 800 iPads by next fall, according to the Wisconsin State Journal. Wisconsin and Microsoft settled a software-related lawsuit in 2009 that landed US$3.4 million for the state, along with $80 in technology vouchers. $2.1 million was divided between the schools, and the Madison district is using some of that to finance its iPad purchases.