Apple Analyst Meeting 2003

[Mr. Nice Guy]

http://www.apple.com/quicktime/qtv/analystmeeting03/

Apple posted a quicktime stream of their 2003 Analyst Meeting.

Relevant quotes from the Q&A Session:

Q: "Any plans to support or license WMA going forward?"
Jobs: "We decided to support an open audio codec standard rather than a proprietary one." (AAC) .... "That's our plan and we're sticking to it. We're feeling real good about it too".

Q: "Are you going to allow the iTunes to work with other devices and conversely are you going to allow the iPod to work with other online Music Services?"
Jobs: "We don't know. Right now, there is really little reason to. The iPod is the #1 MP3 player in the world .... The iTunes music store works with the most popular music player around and that's working really well for us. Conversely the iPod is working with the #1 music store. Soundscan just released data today and alst week the itms had over an 80% market share for all legally downloaded music. Why should we work with another music store when we're working with the "Microsoft" of music stores. So, right now we've got an 80%+ share in our music store and we're #1 in units and of course revenue in the iPod. We're investing a lot in that. Got some great stuff coming out over the next... uh... timeframes. And so, right now there's really not reason to spend that engineering on working with #2 or #3 or #4. I'd rather spend our engineering dollars on enhancing the iPod and enhancing the iTunes Music Store. .... Maybe there'll be a reason someday and we're flexible, but right now I think we're spending our money on the path of least resistance to do the right thing."

Q: Question regarding PowerPC/Intel and Mac OS X
Jobs: "Right now we don't see a compelling need to switch processor families and the stuff that's in the PowerPC roadmap -- which you might have heard about already -- is really good, I can't talk about it, but it's really good what's coming."

Q: Can you talk about iPod Pricing, Competitors, Plans for iPod and iTunes pricing.
Jobs: "Apple is as good or better a manufacturer than Dell" .... "We don't worry about anyone beating us on manufacturing or logistical efficiency. And one of the things to remember is that Dell does not sell through channels. Well, When you get down to a consumer product like an iPod, how do most people buy those things? They go to a store, they plunk down their credit card, and they walk away with the product. Most people do not call an 800 number and expect to get it a week later." ...."Cash and carry distribution becomes very important, and you have to pay for that." .... "You'll see some differentials in pricing from companies who only sell through the web and through a catalog vs companies that make the product available to the customer where they want to buy it." .... "But we think we've got the strategic advantage" .... "We're not concerned about pricing at all. We can be as aggressive as the next guy can and more aggressive than most. And we're not concerned about engineering" Goes on the say the other products aren't as good as the iPod.

Re iTunes: "Most of the money goes to the music companies. We are the largest by far" .... "We would like to break even/make a little bit of money but it's not a money maker. That's why when I look at Roxio with Napster and MusicMatch, These guys can never make money. They've started money losing businesses and I'm perplexed as to why." ... "They don't make iPods, so they don't have a related business where they do..."

Q: TVs and Computers?
Jobs: "This is not a new thing. People have been working on this for years. Apple was the first company to ever do this. And there is a small audience that likes this. It is not a large audience" .... "People want 42" and above plasma screens on their wall and they want to view them from far away with their friends or family" "And generally, what they want to view on their television has to do with turning their minds off" .... "Now how do I want to work on my computer? Do I want to work on it 6 feet, 8 feet, 10 feet away with my buddies? No, I want to work on it a few inches away by myself. It's a very very very different experience. We've always believed that this convergence between the computer and the television wasn't going to work. We do believe that there's room for people watching some television on a computer now and then. And we do believe there's a vast opportunity to make televisions more intelligent and home entertainment systems more intelligent and easier to use. But that does not mean that computers and televisions are coming together. And, um, the media center -- basically every young person already has their stereo on your computer - that has come together." .... "but television's another animal. And we don't see it happening in a mass way"

Q: Re: Digital Lifestyle applications. The competition is starting to make some inroads. So, how do you stay ahead? And what is the next big wave?
Jobs: "The way we stay ahead is we stay really close to the customer and keep doing what we do well. For example, digital photo apps. iPhoto is the king of that but even iPhotos have limitations that people are running up against - some major ones - those need to be solved." .... "And there are new categories of applications that people don't even think of yet, that we're working on. So, believe me, we have a lot of innovation up our sleeve when it comes the digital lifestyle/digital hub class of applications - a LOT. And, um, you'll be seeing some of it next year. Very strong stuff."

[Mr. Nice Guy]

bump

[Nubclear]

Thats nice

[Frozzy]

That's nice dear. Now what's for breakfast?

[The Mad Monk]

Q: TVs and Computers?
Jobs: "This is not a new thing. People have been working on this for years. Apple was the first company to ever do this. And there is a small audience that likes this. It is not a large audience" .... "People want 42" and above plasma screens on their wall and they want to view them from far away with their friends or family" "And generally, what they want to view on their television has to do with turning their minds off" .... "Now how do I want to work on my computer? Do I want to work on it 6 feet, 8 feet, 10 feet away with my buddies? No, I want to work on it a few inches away by myself. It's a very very very different experience. We've always believed that this convergence between the computer and the television wasn't going to work. We do believe that there's room for people watching some television on a computer now and then. And we do believe there's a vast opportunity to make televisions more intelligent and home entertainment systems more intelligent and easier to use. But that does not mean that computers and televisions are coming together. And, um, the media center -- basically every young person already has their stereo on your computer - that has come together." .... "but television's another animal. And we don't see it happening in a mass way"

I haven't used my television in maybe a year. when there's something important on where radio and the web won't cover it, I watch it on my computer.

I would really, really love a wide-screen wall mounted monitor in my living room, where I could sit on the couch with my feet up on the coffee table and game and surf the web with a wireless keyboard and mouse.

Heck, I might even watch a little TV.

[MichaeltheGreat]

Originally posted by Mr. Nice Guy
bump

Why? It's apple. It's pointless. How long has it been since Apple has had any real relevance in the general PC marketplace? (Not counting the niche market for some graphics professionals?) It's mostly like "Oh, you guys are still around? That's nice. You have a nice day too."

[Q Classic]

oh, i mean:

that's nice dear. you want a cookie?

you know, mr. nice guy, some of us who grok computers follow apple too... the mac people follow apple like kids to the pied piper... and the rest of the world just doesn't care.

[Lefty Scaevola]

Originally posted by MichaeltheGreat Why? It's apple. It's pointless. How long has it been since Apple has had any real relevance in the general PC marketplace? (Not counting the niche market for some graphics professionals?) It's mostly like "Oh, you guys are still around? That's nice. You have a nice day too."

OMG!, Asher's malevolent spirit, rather than fleeing the vengence of Urban Ranger, has taken possession of MichaeltheGreat!

Michael, you must exert your own will and TAKE THAT RING OFF!

[monolith94]

*the power of christ compells you! the power of christ compells you!!!*

[Drake Tungsten]

[MOBIUS]

Originally posted by Lefty Scaevola
OMG!, Asher's malevolent spirit, rather than fleeing the vengence of Urban Ranger, has taken possession of MichaeltheGreat!

Michael, you must exert your own will and TAKE THAT RING OFF!

Lefty actually said something funny!

[Q Classic]

just to troll...

http://reviews.cnet.com/4520-6450_7-5102324-1.html

Five reasons not to buy an iPod

For the past year, the media has been clamoring about iPod killers on the horizon--new MP3 players with more features, longer battery life, and designs nearly as svelte as the iPod's. However, this oversimplifies the situation; in truth, while the iPod rocks, it's not now, nor has it ever been, perfect for everyone.

We too have run our fair share of iPod-centric headlines--for a good reason. With about 1.5 million units sold, the iPod is the most popular MP3 player in the world, and it still makes other players look and feel inelegant in comparison. Don't get me wrong; it's still our favorite overall MP3 player. Although everyone can think of reasons why they want an iPod, I've decided to use this column to list a few reasons why not to buy one.

Before you send me rants for putting down the iPod, please read the list, realize that we still love the iPod, and take a deep breath. If you still don't think there could be reasons to go with something else, feel free to e-mail me your comments.

1. Six-plus hours of battery life is not always enough.

If you regularly take long airplane flights, you'll find that the iPod's battery craps out before you reach your destination, leaving you to rely on the low-grade tunes pumped to the arm of your seat. If you need a long battery life from your MP3 player, go with the Dell Digital Jukebox DJ (15GB), which lasted almost 20 hours in our battery test--and it's less expensive than the iPod.

2. Jogging with a hard drive-based player is not cool.

The iPod and other high-capacity MP3 players use hard drives to store music. In order to extend battery life and avoid skipping, the hard drives turn on only every once in a while to fill up a flash-memory buffer, which itself has no potentially skipping, moving parts. The flash buffer, in turn, plays the music. If something jars a hard drive-based player at the precise moment when the hard drive is spinning to load the flash buffer, the player could skip. Some experts say that it's impossible to damage the drive in this way, but I'm not buying that--hard drives spin thousands of times per minute, and they have tiny, fragile parts. Instead, use a small flash player, such as something from the iRiver iFP-3xx line. They won't skip, the batteries last longer, and they're much lighter than the iPod.

3. The iPod is expensive.

As much as we love the iPod, it sure is expensive--especially when you consider that the nonreplacable battery will lose its resiliency in a few years. Although not nearly as glamorous as the iPod, MP3 CD players offer much more megabytes per dollar and can approximate the experience of using a hard drive-based player. Since each MP3 CD holds about 10 hours of music, you could carry 20 CD-Rs in a CD wallet and have about the same amount of music that fits on the 15GB iPod. Best of all, you can pick up a decent one (the iRiver ChromeX) for less than $60.

4. You want to make high-quality digital recordings.

Apple recently announced the availability of a voice-recorder accessory for the iPod, but there's still no way to use the device to record high-quality audio. DJs who want to record their sets, people who want to encode their vinyl or cassette collections to MP3, or musicians who are looking for a replacement for their DAT recorder need this feature. Luckily for them, two new iPod competitors offer this option; compare them below.

5. You want a choice in online music stores.

Don't get me wrong, I really enjoy the Apple iTunes Music Store; its AAC-encoded files sound great, the selection is decent, and it's easy to use. But I don't like feeling hemmed in. Some other MP3 players let you choose between BuyMusic, Musicmatch, and Napster, all of which use Microsoft's secure WMA files. Those files are supported by a wide range of MP3 players but not the iPod. If you want a greater degree of choice in music services, go with an MP3 player from one of the following companies.

Rio
Creative
Samsung
Dell

Of course, if you don't care about low battery life, aren't fond of jogging, have ample disposable income, don't need to record/encode music portably, and want to purchase music downloads only from the iTunes Music Store, then the iPod is the best the way to go. While not ideal for some niche activities, it's still hands down the best-designed MP3 player in the world.

[Q Classic]

and from watchguard, makers of firewalls:

Remote Access Vulnerability
in Apple Macintosh OS 10.3
Severity: Indeterminate
6 November 2003

Summary:
Apple recently announced that there is a vulnerability in their implementation of remote access services in Mac OS 10.3. They provided no other details regarding the scope of the vulnerability or its impact. Patches to Mac OS 10.3 are currently available to the public. Administrators of Macintosh computers running the affected software should download, test, and install the patch as soon as is practical.

Exposure:
With OS 10, Apple switched the core of its operating system to Unix. As part of this switch, they implemented terminal services on the Macintosh, which enable remote management of a Macintosh and allow a user to run advanced command line tools locally.

Remote access services are enabled by default and secured with Secure Shell (SSH), a common UNIX application which provides encrypted remote access to a system. Apple gave no details in their announcement regarding the nature of the vulnerability, except that it granted remote access to an attacker.

Solution Path:
Apple has made patches to OS 10.3 available to the public. We advise administrators of Mac OS 10.3 servers and workstations to download, test, and install the patch as soon as is practical.

For WatchGuard SOHO, Firebox, and Vclass users
None of the WatchGuard firewalls allow SSH in from the outside by default. The patch above is your primary recourse.

Status:
A patch is currently available to the public on Apple's Website.

References:
Apple's security advisory page

The patch and a brief description of the issue

[mrmitchell]

In my last thread where I listed the 18 (19?) disgusting atrocities in a mac catalogue, MtG, you noted that Mac Warehouse was a sucky catalog for it. Well what would be a good place to buy Macs? (online )

[MichaeltheGreat]

Originally posted by Lefty Scaevola
OMG!, Asher's malevolent spirit, rather than fleeing the vengence of Urban Ranger, has taken possession of MichaeltheGreat!

Michael, you must exert your own will and TAKE THAT RING OFF!

I just figured (a) it's all true, so it can't be a troll.

and (b) someone has to take up the slack.

[MichaeltheGreat]

Originally posted by mrmitchell
In my last thread where I listed the 18 (19?) disgusting atrocities in a mac catalogue, MtG, you noted that Mac Warehouse was a sucky catalog for it. Well what would be a good place to buy Macs? (online )

I don't know, actually. I just knew that Mac Warehouse and PC Warehouse are the same people, they spam snailmail (how I got on the Mac Warehouse list, God doesn't even know), and I know they don't bother being competitive on the PC side, so when I saw the Mac Warehouse prices, I figured the price disparity to similar PC items has to be at least partly due to their high pricing overall.

www.pricewatch.com might lead you to some, although I don't know how many sources they follow for mac prices.

[Q Classic]

and this is even funner.

http://www.thinksecret.com/news/tsnotes7.html

Notes: Zinio, Java, Adobe, retail, more

By Nick dePlume, Publisher and Editor in Chief
November 6, 2003 - We've collected a number of news bites this week. Here are a few notes to look out for:

There are times when Apple deserves criticism and then there are times when its appears to be piling on. Last week, CNET News.com had out their shovels. Just days after releasing the final version of Panther, CNET wrote a series of stories that didn't just provide negative news -- much of it important for Mac users to know -- but delivered it with a certain tinge of attack that left readers by Friday wondering where the overall balance was. The stories included (1) Panther glitches that erase external hard drives, (2) what drive makers were doing to fix the problem, (3) security flaws in new and old versions of OS X revealed by security firm @stake, and (4) complaints from PowerBook G4 owners about an apparent flaw in their LCD displays.


While interesting stories, none of the them were shocking revelations. In some cases, they had been known to the Mac community for weeks and months. When released all in less than two days by CNET, it looked somewhat curious. Forget CNET's inconsistent coverage of Apple and their reguritating of Mac news from other Web sites. (Example: A week late in reporting the firing of a Microsoft temp who had photos of G5 Macs on the company's doorstep). Was the timing of all this bad news just coincidence, what with Microsoft announcing plans for its next OS and giving CNET an exclusive interview with Bill Gates, or was it something else? In this particular case, it looks suspicious even to other journalists.

Despite Apple showing quarterly profits, some industry analysts are starting to question more aggressively if it's time Apple came clean on whether its retail stores as a whole are making a profit. One analyst recently said to Think Secret, "They (Apple) conveniently skirt the issue about retail store profitability. They now have added retail stores as another segment of operation performance every quarter, lovingly showing us that the stores are performing better quarter-to-quarter and year-to-year. But quite frankly, I could care less about that. Is the retail division making a profit? If not, why? Investors and analysts are going to start asking these questions very directly and very bluntly and it's going to become more difficult for them to ignore this issue."

What does it say about the current state of U.S. Mac magazines when publishing houses in Great Britain -- with a much smaller market -- are trying out new, consumer-oriented Mac magazines like iCreate and Your iLife and we see no similar attempts here? Is it just a poor economic climate or just poor creativity and marketing prowess? While both of these magazines are available in the States on newsstands, neither will probably be big sellers at $10 and up. But they do show that some publishers are thinking 'outside the box' instead of just surviving and resting on their laurels. Maybe we should just be glad that the anorexicly-thin Macworld US, MacAddict and MacHome are even still around, despite the personal accolades by some of them that they are profitable and ad sales are up.

Zinio Systems, Inc. has landed a deal with Apple to have its digital magazine reader factory-installed on new Macs. It is not known when Apple will start including it. Zinio has been strongly going after other Mac magazines to go digital and playing up the news it will now be standard equipment on future Macs as a major marketing advantage.

In his new book "Illustrator CS for Dummies," Ted Alspach, Adobe's Group Product Manager for Illustration Products, advises new computer buyers to get a PC: "As of 2003, Windows systems have taken a decisive lead over Macs when it comes to performance. The difference is most apparent with graphics applications such as Photoshop and Illustrator, but you?'ll notice it with other applications as well. If you?'re thinking of purchasing a new system, and speed and responsiveness is important (or at least more important than the feel of the OS, I suggest getting a zippy PC over a (comparably) sluggish Mac.?"

On Wednesday, Apple seeded Java 1.4.2 Developer Preview 1, as well as a developer package with new headers, docs, demos, and tools. Apple told testers that DP1 replaces Panther's Java installation.

[Mr. Nice Guy]

Mac Bashers = Ignorance

[MichaeltheGreat]

It's not bashing, it's laughing at a marginal (but cutely different) little segment of a marketplace with a cult following. Lemmings indeed.

[Q Classic]

Mac Bashers = Ignorance

why?

[mrmitchell]

Mac Bashers = Ignorance

Three word post without confronting statement = Ignorance as well

[Mr. Nice Guy]

Originally posted by MichaeltheGreat
It's not bashing, it's laughing at a marginal (but cutely different) little segment of a marketplace with a cult following. Lemmings indeed.

Cult? Ha! Microsucks is a cult! Dell is a cult! Intel is a cult! Don't ge me started on this cultic stuff!

[Q Classic]

Cult? Ha! Microsucks is a cult! Dell is a cult! Intel is a cult! Don't ge me started on this cultic stuff!

yeah, you're right.

apple isn't a cult, it's a religion, a way of life. at the head of it is the cult of jobs, who wears a funny little pope hat when the picture takers aren't around.

[Mr. Nice Guy]

Originally posted by Q Cubed

Quote:

Cult? Ha! Microsucks is a cult! Dell is a cult! Intel is a cult! Don't ge me started on this cultic stuff!

yeah, you're right.

apple isn't a cult, it's a religion, a way of life. at the head of it is the cult of jobs, who wears a funny little pope hat when the picture takers aren't around.

Right back at every company in the tech industry and their CEOs!

[The Mad Monk]

Hey, I commented on topic.

[Mr. Nice Guy]

Originally posted by The Mad Monk
Hey, I commented on topic.

Thank you for pointing that out, Monk. That you did! Let's get this thread back on the right track: Back to the Analyst Meeting & Conference Call now.

[Nubclear]

Oh hi!

[Gatekeeper]

This entire thread generates a sigh and a "good grief" from me. So there! Take that!

[MOBIUS]

I must admit, I do see why the Mac Users hid out at Civ Macintosh and used it as their own OT forum...

[Mr. Nice Guy]

Originally posted by MOBIUS
I must admit, I do see why the Mac Users hid out at Civ Macintosh and used it as their own OT forum...

It would've been much more enjoyable if a certain poster from Calgary hadn't baited us.

But enough about that already! Back to the original topic. ?