Is the Magic of Apple Fading or Are We Just Chasing Nostalgia?

[throAU]

Stuff is just simply done.

Rather than buying stuff because it has some new innovation that can improve something in our lives, it's pretty much at the pinnacle at the moment. You can tell because everything is fast, cheap, reliable and does everything we need and most of the innovations are transient ******** and experiments that fail. Everyone is getting off the hype cycle now which is what the deflated feeling is.

So instead of obsessively buying things it's about time we obsessively use them instead.

Yup. We are waiting on the next revolution. And it WILL be AR.

The Vision Pro cops a lot of flak. But it’s a prototype device for what will follow.

Ignore the form factor. Ignore that it looks dorky.

It’s a preview device for the types of apps that will come and be run on a set of spectacles within 3-5 years.

 

[hagjohn]

Not another one of these posts.

 

[Ta_whirimatea]

And what if it's us, that have changed?

It seems to me that most people's lifestyles are getting more and more out of control, with less and less time used to focus on the simple things life offers.

I think we are distracted to the point that even if something beautiful was in front of our nose, we wouldn't see it.
And I also think that's exactly how it is.

Spot on.

I think a huge part now is how social media (meta) & the likes of Amazon (& any other large shopping channels) have arrived, evolved & destroyed culture, pulling people to be slaves to their devices.

I hate seeing a bus / train full of zombies staring at their devices on any commute. Kids knowing no better than being attached to their devices (&being bullied virtually). In my day everything was physical, nothing was virtual so u knew everything.

God I miss the good old days, nothing is hidden & u could feel things etc.

My biggest gripe now is that predictive text seems to be absolutely junk now to the point u think apple deliberately makes it constantly wrong to make us use dictate functions / assistants as apple ai approaches. Just makes me want to go back to old school Sony cmd z7 mobile phone (best phone I ever had) & a Walkman for my music. Modern touch screen everything just sucks!

 

[iZac]

I've been a mac user since I was a kid, about '94 - arguably at its lowest ebb. I was the kid who PC kids made fun of, but yeah - I felt a special pride in my Mac and my copy of Marathon. I saw Jobs return and chuck out all the beige boxes and saw the iMac change the whole fortune of the company in '98. I saw the fun, exciting design explorations of the early 2000s and the gut-wrenching pain of going into Intel. The initial derision of the iPod (my 1st gen is sitting on my desk now) and the lacklustre response to the iPad along with many more.

It was a hungry company. Jobs was willing to throw sh*t at the wall and generated fun ideas with Ive that were iterated really quickly. G4 Cubes, iMacs that changed shape every year, different iPods year-after-year. They commanded attention. They needed to, because they were running on fumes.

Now they have Billions of dollars hoarded. It takes a decade for a watch to get a little bigger. A VR headset takes 8 years to come to market and it's a tech demo. Laptops, iMacs, Mac Minis don't get a redesign for a decade. I applaud that most of the mac lineup has got a redesign with Apple Silicon, but you can bet it'll be another decade before they redesign them again. The iPhone looks exactly the same as it did in 2020.

It's just not a hungry company anymore. They don't need to keep excitedly iterating, until they're back to 90s Apple. I hope that doesn't happen, but it was a fun time. for example, the Apple Watch from a hungrier company would have been the new iPod. New designs every year, some hits, some misses, but always something exciting. Instead we get a focus grouped watch strap and a slightly different shade of silver.

 

[imanidiot]

Apple is now just like any other company, just more successful. Nothing special. Tim Cook serves the shareholders, exclusively, not Apple's faceless customers. Just like any other CEO, just more successful. If one is looking for "soul" one shouldn't be looking at companies/products.

 

[Marty80]

For myself nostalgia is Steve Jobs marketing the products, and IVE designing them.

Is the magic gone, yes and no for example the iPhone is stuck in a endless S cycle. The latest MacBook brought back features that where removed from the touchbar macbook.

However there is still a sparkle of magic with the new iMac & mac mini. But sadly magic in the land of Apple comes at a cost and many sacrifices in between.

 

[stocklen]

There is a lot to say on this but...

Yes, things aren't as they were but for very good reason.

That 'one more thing' can basically never be repeated. Back in the day... well, the early 2000s Apple wasn't of mainstream interest. There wasn't the dearth of Rumour websites and people micro analysing every component and sneaking out every new phone case and enclosure so that by the time the product is announced we already know everything about it.

I have found the last few years of apple announcements a bit 'meh' just because when settling down to watch the announcement videos the product is almost exactly as 'rumoured'. Spoilers, basically.

Also, Android fans will not like this analogy but its the norm for a while for people to copy each other - and in the case of Samsung they go out of their way to lambast the latest apple product whilst behind the scenes copying the exact thing they have ridiculed for their next iteration. The Notch, and the removal of the headphone jack to name but two.

There is very little 'wow' left but thats not a criticism of Apple more the industry as a whole.
Although of course there are still advancements to be made, certainly aspects have plateaued. Although the chip processing power continues to advance at a mind boggling rate and shows no sign of slowing down... the devices in which the chips reside have reached a stage where there aren't massive leaps to be made.
Sure, things can be thinner, lighter, more powerful but a phone is still a rectangular slab. We aren't expecting a triangle shaped phone.... theres no use moaning about 'another' rectangular phone as thats where they are. There are of course attempts to do things differently such as foldables but they remain niche with downsides.
Im sure, in Apple's future, we will have under display cameras and Face ID (Touch ID is not needed to return) but its still going to be a metal and glass rectangle with a battery.

Look on it like cars. In the early days change was rapid and innovation fast and more things came out that were different and better.... but nowadays cars are cars and they all look similar with similar technology and functionality and features. People don't yearn for new form factors or a car with 5 wheels or 3..

 

[HDFan]

Do you think the “Apple magic” is gone?

The "whoa" reaction I get every time I put on my Vision Pro says no.

 

[Matz]

I'm an old guy, and have chosen Apple as a platform since my first Mac Plus in 1985. It's been a wild ride, to say the least. For that reason, my perspective differs from many folks on here. I didn't show up at a point when Apple moved from redefining whole product categories to incremental improvements of existing products. So when I look at Apple's offerings now versus then, the changes seem mind-blowing. I had no idea that such things would be possible, and eventually taken for granted.

To me, the products have always been more interesting than the personalities of the folks that present them. Yes, Jobs was unique. He was just what Apple needed to survive and then thrive, through his vision, drive, and showmanship to bring us insanely great versions of existing platforms: the smartphone, the tablet, and a really decent personal computer operating system - OSX.

And Ive was, and perhaps still is, a seriously good designer; but far from perfect. Frankly I don't miss his presentations, at all. And imho, Apple's overall product design doesn't seem to have noticeably suffered as a result of his departure.

But Jobs is gone. Sadly, going on and on about how Cook isn't Jobs is a dead horse that somehow keeps on being flogged. It's tiresome. Get over it.

The fact is that under Cook, Apple produces some of the very best personal electronic devices available, that mostly work quite well in concert with one another. Is the ecosystem perfect? Of course not. But it works better than any available alternative. And the products, by and large, keep improving, albeit more iteratively than in the past. It's the nature of technological evolution.

For example, I wear my Apple Watch every day from the time I get up until I put it on its charger for the night. And I use quite a few of its functions every day, and continue to discover new ways of using it. The AW still seems magical to me; it is a brilliant bit of tech. Mine's only an S6, but it's far better than the original AW I bought within a couple of months of launch. When the blood oxygen sensor issue finally gets sorted out, I'll buy the new version. Until then, I have no complaints.

And I continue to marvel at what my iPhone 13 Pro can do. I'll probably go for the 17 Pro when it comes out, but for now I'm quite content with what I have. The amount of processing power in such a small package, and the variety of tasks it can perform, is beyond impressive, especially when I look back at the original iPhone.

To answer the OP: No, the magic hasn't faded, and I simply don't have time for nostalgia. I live in the present. Apple makes great stuff, and as an investment, has been very good to me.

A win-win.

 

[Mr_Ed]

I suspect how we feel about Apple varies a lot depending on whether you’ve been an Apple customer for 10-15 years vs. 20-30+ years, like myself (almost 32 years for me).

The “cool” factor was never a priority for me in terms of how my devices were perceived by others. In the old days Apple products were “cool” in my mind primarily because even with the higher price tag, they offered a better value proposition rooted in actual utility, usability, and longevity. I used to sing the Mac’s praises to friends, relatives, and colleagues, not because it was “cool” but because it allowed me to focus on the task at hand while Windows at the time was constantly “in my face” with one popup notification or another. And “it just works” did not feel like a marketing ploy, there really was something behind the phrase. Through owning multiple Macs over the years, Windows improved it’s user experience while the Mac began to bug me on a more regular basis, making what I perceived as the Mac’s main advantage less of a factor. I also became frustrated by the state of gaming on Mac. I used to Bootcamp Windows to game, but eventually decided to just build my own Windows gaming rig. It then became even harder for me to justify the Apple premium for up-front upgrades in order to retain the longevity advantage.

When the iPhone hit the market, I was naturally on board from 1st gen. Apple, like all other players in the phone market, have added a dizzying array of features since 1st gen. But IMHO, they have lost sight of what made Apple great in the firs place. “Old” Apple’s products felt like they were sweating the little things that we will inevitable come in contact with many times over our time owning and using the device. I really don’t think they care anymore. It’s like they just add features for marketing purposes and to please shareholders, bugs and practical usability be damned.

Should I care that they added a “Journaling” app I didn’t ask for when I can’t reliably place a cursor with my finger and in many instances end up having to deal with whatever it decided to select?

Should I care they announced a new version of CarPlay when the current version refuses to play nice with my choice of audio source in the car and insists on taking over at strange times?

Should I care their newest devices support WiFi[version] when current devices drop connections on a regular basis?

Should I care that they have expanded text messaging support or they added new emojis when auto-correct is so bad I turned it off because I got tired of “correcting the correction”?

I would love to see Apple get back to “sweating the little things” on our behalf, but I won’t hold my breath.

 

[MetalGod1390]

been here for over 20 years in this forums. have owned quite a bit over the years. amazing how great the tech is…

but nothing will ever replace the beauty of an Aqua interface or the excitement of a Jobs keynote.

I agree with you I do miss using Panther to Tiger

 

[russell_314]

• Are we just being nostalgic

This is the answer. The past is always looked at as something better for most people. There are exceptions, but especially with older people the past was your youth. Remember today is tomorrow’s past. In the future, you’re going to look back at today like you’re looking back at the past now. Don’t live in the past because you can’t change it and you can’t go back to it.

• If you were an Apple fan in the ’80s, ’90s, or early 2000s, do you feel like the “vibe” is different now compared to the era of 2018 and beyond?

Of course it’s different. Society is different so it’s not really the Apple vibe. I can’t even get into this one without discussing politics and yeah, not in this forum 🤫🤐😂

• Is it possible for a company this successful to ever feel countercultural again?

The company isn’t feeling any way. You are feeling a way about the company. This was an ad campaign based on what was going on in society. Society has changed and ad campaigns have changed.

 

[Marbles1]

There's certainly no longer the pressure to innovate. Apple isn't engaged in a 'do or die' war for survival, there's no need to push the boundaries (but there is some will, and plenty of money to do so) and apple have certainly gone from 'disrupter' to 'mainstream premium option'. Basically if you want a decent, medium to high end laptop, phone, headphones, smart watch, you don't need to do any research, you can just get an Apple one. They're like the Levi's jeans of computer hardware.

From a European perceptive, their survival is fascinating - back in the 90s and early 90s, if you wanted a computer, you had a lot of options, all of which were hardware suppliers with their own operating systems. Commodore with the Amiga range and AmigaOS, Atari with the ST and their licensed version of Digital Research's GEM, the tail end of the Sinclair ZX Spectrum, as well as Amstrad with their CPC computers. And then even on the PC OS/2 was kicking around alongside windows. And Apple was there of course with Mac., but there was so much choice. It was a very different time to be into computers. Such a pace of change and constant new designs, each company trying to get an edge with graphics chips, or sound, or raw performance. For years the Atari ST had the edge on music production.

I don't think apple will ever be viewed as countercultural again. Are Levi's jeans any more? Were they ever really?

 

[Tyler O'Bannon]

Apple innovated when computers and smartphones were young. Now they are very, very mature. There’s no huge breakthrough with a phone. It’s got a screen, speakers, cameras, chip, modem, etc. There’s not really with a computer either. It’s got a screen, keyboard, mouse, etc. I’d argue that apples phone and computers right now are fantastic. But there’s no magic or innovation left really. Imorovements and breakthroughs, sure. But innovation, not so much. Small sure. But big, no. Apple is not the little guy anymore. It’s now a numbers game. It’s not Punch Out on the NES anymore. Apples big. They offer quality that many people, like me, desire. And to be fair, they are diving into AR/VR, as they are the only company that offers an incredible piece of hardware in that space.

I think they do better than a lot of people give them credit for.

 

[msackey]

Wow. Well I’ve used Apple products since 1986 with Apple ][e as the first product.

I think this is more of your perception though. I never needed to feel being on the cutting edge or one of the cool kids.

 

[cateye]

To my dying day I will never understand people's need to imbue functional technology tools and the company that makes them with such over-the-top emotional significance. They're just things.

 

[antiprotest]

My opinion is that Apple has become worse* in every way -- hardware, software, retail experience, marketing, etc. Other companies have caught up, and in some aspects have far exceeded Apple (e.g. AI). I still prefer Apple over other companies, and Apple is not doomed, but it is not as good as before.

Of course, "worse" is relative to the fact that technology continues to progress, so that in that sense everything is becoming better, but Apple is relatively becoming worse and worse.

This is why it feels like the "magic" is gone -- because it is gone indeed. Relatively speaking, nothing Apple is doing is so excellent or superior that it feels magical anymore.

 

[Rychiar]

The Vision Pro is a lot like the first iPhone to me and I love it just as much as I did that

 

[Andres Cantu]

I think a big part of why the Apple magic seems to be less and less is because, back in the day, Apple would be first to bring technologies such as Retina displays and Touch ID to the masses.

Nowadays, even once Apple brings OLED to more of its products, or even foldables, people have already been exposed to those technologies before in one way or another, so the "magic" won't really be there.

It's part of how Apple, for the most part, has been playing things too safe lately and doesn't take much risks.

 

[MajorFubar]

I think you're missing the Apple that took risks and was first-to-the-market with ideas that sometimes didn't necessarily work but we forgave them because of the obviouis passion and attempt to innovate. If you want something on the bleeding-edge of innovation, you mostly have to look elsewhere these days (e.g.: foldables) and hope that one day Apple will adopt it after it's matured. I'll hear the argument that the Vision Pro was maybe an attempt to innovate, but let's be fair VR headsets aren't new, the appeal is niche, they are mostly incompatible with users with visual impairments (no I don't meant the "well I wear glasses for reading" brigade), and most of all it's just too darn expensive.

 

[Mactech20]

I hear you. Maybe the "edgy" or "cool" exclusive factor is gone. Also though, I know several schools, universities, and organizations that were 100% windows based, then m1 Macs came out and were so impressed they went 50-50. Before Apple really only had a few advantages over your average PC. Now? The performance difference for cost is immeasurable which is something organizations that are buying 100+ systems notice.

an M series is roughly equivalent to a mobile i7 except the i7 has significantly worse battery life, plus it costs way more. Apple is peak in performance per dollar on the laptop market right now and that's somewhere I don't think they have ever been before.

 

[TechnoMonk]

For me Apple is at its peak, AS Mac’s are best mac I owned in over 2-3 decades. AW, iPhone, iPad Pro, and AirPods Pro all seamlessly work for me. Now Apple today lacks the Steve Jobs distortion field. It ain’t coming back, but I use Apple products as tools, not for emotional support.

 

[attohs]

"Apple is doomed," and has been since the disastrous launches of the Apple Lisa and Apple III. They'll never recover.

 

[turbineseaplane]

The easy litmus test for me is this:

Map the decisions, products and service offerings onto any number of other brands and imagine how folks would react to those things

Would we here on this forum be defending Samsung if they were continuing to pump out "meh" quality/technology low refresh screens on many/most devices?

What about the 4x+ component upgrade ripoffs?
Could you imagine how we would excoriate and laugh at Samsung for doing that to their customers?

We could go all day with examples of Apple behavior that gets defended here, but would be absolutely derided if any other company were doing it


tldr -- the magic is long gone here and Apple is a hyper optimized money harvesting operation masquerading as a tech company

Tim "Cooked it"

 

[NT1440]

been here for over 20 years in this forums. have owned quite a bit over the years. amazing how great the tech is…

but nothing will ever replace the beauty of an Aqua interface or the excitement of a Jobs keynote.

Agreed, been here since 08 I think.

I think Apple is still doing absolutely incredible things…but I’m also getting older and I’m not excited by products and announcements anymore. OP should factor in that they’re getting older and in a different stage of life.