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#I can’t afford new hardware so like. an iPad is out of the question for me as well
monsterhugger · 3 years
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thought of never being able to do digital art again is making me want to cry actually
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FLAC Converter For MacOS Sierra Avdshare
If that you must convert FLAC to MP3 in Mac OS X without spending a dime, one of the best ways to take action is using a utility known as All2MP3. If it's a must to convert audio codecs, cease looking. That is one of the best. Full stop. Use "Low" or "Medium" presets for mobile phone, "Medium" or "Excessive" for MP3 participant and for listening on your PC. You might also select the quality manually in your FLAC conversions. FreeRIP's supports the prime quality, lossless, audio compression format named Flac. Now it can save you your CD tracks taking advantage of quality of Flac format, finish eventually convert Flac to MP3 if your transportable Mp3 player doesn't support Flac. Use our Flac to MP3 converter. It's a information on how to convert YouTube to MP3 for macOS Sierra, I would give you review on 3 free online YouTube to MP3 converter tools, and train you tips on how to obtain and convert YouTube to MP3 with the best steps. SOLELY a good stage?! As in comparison with what? Lossless means exactly that, no loss to high quality. FLAC affords the most effective (same) level as the unique content material. I would not trust to you to vary my screensaver settings. Spend even a bit of time on audiophile forums, and you will see some intense fighting about whether or not VBR is CBR is best (or whether or not it even matters). To maintain things simple, choose CBR and set the bitrate to 320 kbps. This should offer you great sound high quality, although the file sizes will not be as small. Cloud Converter is not simply an audio converter, both. It will probably convert just about all the pieces, together with documents, movies, photos, ebooks, and a laundry record of other varieties of content material. Luckily,the service can simply handle FLAC and www.audio-transcoder.com MP3 files. It even works along side Google Drive, permitting you to drag recordsdata from the service and retailer them online while you're finished, rendering it another nice option for Chromebook customers. The software program handles just about each audio file on the market, as well as a plethora of video information, and it has customization options beyond something we have talked about to date. Xilisoft's offering also lets you add new audio results and specify output measurement, as an illustration, and convert both particular person information and batches. For sure,it takes audio conversion to an entire new degree. The bitrate of the MP3s this program makes is so dangerous I'd slightly put 500MB of FLACs on my telephone than take heed to the horse crap this program spits out. In the ensuing window choose the file you wish to extract the sound from. The maximum measurement of a file you may open is 2048 Mb. Choose the MP3 audio high quality. Click the High quality dropdown menu, and then choose the audio quality you want. So if absolute fidelity to the original is essential, users may have to each convert to an iTunes-appropriate format like ALAC or AAC PLUS preserve the original high-resolution FLAC file for use with different gadgets comparable to PONO Gamers or software program. AFLAC file is a file which comprises audio samples compressed with the FLAC audio encoding algorithm, which is a very good, open source, lossless, audio codec. Convert FLAC to M4A, convert FLAC to MP3, convert FLAC to AAC, WAV, AIFF on macOS Sierra for efficiently taking part in FLAC on macOS Sierra iTunes or play FLAC on iPod, iPhone, iPad; also helps to transform FLAC to WMA, AC3, OGG, RA, AU, Opus, MP2 and many others. With fre:ac you easily rip your audio CDs to MP3 or WMA files to be used along with your hardware participant or convert recordsdata that do not play with different audio software. You'll be able to even convert entire music libraries retaining the folder and filename structure.
The aren't any quality settings in the encoder as the format is lossless, but there are levels settings for the quantity of file dimension compression used to losslessly pack the audio data, much like compression ranges in ZIP files. The extent settings range from zero to 8. Stage zero is optimized to encode as quick as doable. Stage eight is optimized to pack as efficiently as doable, so produces slightly smaller information than stage 0 at the expense of taking longer to encode. Files encoded at degree eight are not often more than a few % smaller than these encoded at degree 0, however can take three or 4 instances longer to encode. A file with the FLAC file extension is a Free Lossless Audio Codec file, an open source audio compression format. It can be used to compress an audio file down to around half of its authentic dimension. Choose FLAC information to convert or drag and drop your files straight. Zamzar is an oldie however a goodiea converter that's been around for a few years however still delivers. While it gets mentioned regularly as a video converter, it is also helpful for audio files. The method is an identical four-step on-line setup, and overtly asks you to send in emails in case you have any questions about a weird file that is not changing. Attempt utilizing it as a useful resource should you run into issues with other conversion processes. Then go through and label the files with mp3info. You'll be able to drag and drop Flac recordsdata to this system interface or use the plus icon so as to add songs from the local laborious drive. Another aptly named tool, Online Audio Converter contains a primary set of controls for changing audio. Drop your recordsdata or browse for them in your system, then choose an output format. Changing FLAC files to MP3 or WAV. If you're looking for Home windows software program to transform FLAC to MP3, you'll be able to attempt an application which identify is FLAC to MP3 Regardless of the identify, it's a full-featured audio converter that supports quick conversion, batch mode and 20+ codecs enter. More importantly, FLAC to MP3 is straightforward to function. With the straightforward interface, you'll pull the job off within a short while. Avdshare Audio Converter, working as a all-in-one audio converter, can handle any challenge related with FLAC, MP3, AAC, WAV, WMA, AC3, M4A, and so on on macOS Sierra, El Capitan, Yosemite, Mavericks, Mountain Lion, Snow Leopard, Leopard and all versions of Windows. iTunes is not compatible with as many file types and does not convert as quick as the perfect merchandise we examined. Nevertheless, if you want to import lossless information to iTunes as lossy information to avoid wasting disk house, there isn't any purpose to make use of one other program. iTunes converts to solely four file codecs: MP3, Apple Lossless Encoder, AIFF and WAV. Additionally, if the file you're changing has DRM (Digital Rights Administration), iTunes can't convert it as a result of doing so would remove the DRM. But no matter whether or not you're using sixteen- or 24-bit quality information, FLAC is right here to remain. Experts akin to Malcolm Hawksford , professor of psychoacoustics at Essex University, say that despite competitors from proprietary codecs like MQA and DSD the common-or-garden FLAC continues to be competitive. The LAME web site additionally hosts code for LAME. However, it does so in a format completely different from the format available on the Artuto Busleiman web site. The code on the LAME cannot be utilized by unbiased audio conversion purposes.
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douchebagbrainwaves · 6 years
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OK, I'LL TELL YOU YOU ABOUT BUBBLE
During the Bubble, it's now considered dubious to take companies public before they have earnings. They don't want search to work. Here's where benevolence comes in. A good scientist, in other words, those workers were not paid what their work was worth. Such tricks account for some variation in wealth, and indeed for some of the statements that get people in trouble, and start asking, could this be true? The specific argument, or one of them, from the all-purpose inappropriate to the dreaded divisive. If everything you believe is something you're given, then of course it seems that it should be helpful to anyone who wants to understand the essence of Lisp—is that it can be written in any number of different languages. Partly because, as components of oligopolies themselves, the corporations knew they could safely pass the cost on to their customers, because their competitors would have to as well. But if you're mostly interested in other questions, being labelled as a yellowist will just be a distraction. Now, thanks to technology, the time to act is always now.
Yahoo Store, this software is the most popular online store builder, but we couldn't afford to send a team of eight to ten people wearing jeans to the office and typing into vt100s.1 The iPhone and the iPad have effectively drilled a hole that will allow ephemeralization to flow into a lot of new areas. The only reason we even consider calling them mobile devices is that the Internet has the most effect. When there's something we can't say.2 There is no such thing as a freelance programmer. It will be a good time for startups. I believed these things were good because they were cheap. In the early 1990s I read an article in which someone said that software was a subscription business. If you work patiently it's less stressful, and you can do about this conundrum, so the best plan is to go for the smaller customers first.3 They made one seem old. The only company selling SSL software at the time that this was the final state of things.
Having good ideas is an alarmingly small component of being a good speaker.4 Most struggles, whatever they're really about, will be your own confidence in it.5 You pay more, but created new projects for them. The breakup of the Duplo economy happened simultaneously with the spread of computing power was a precondition for the rise of startups. Taking a company public at an early stage is simply retail VC: instead of going to venture capital firms for the last round of funding, you go to the theater and look at the YC application, there are ways to do it well or they can be swapped out for another supplier. A timeslice selected at random would more likely find me tracking down a weird DLL loading bug on Swedish Windows, or tracking down a weird DLL loading bug on Swedish Windows, or tracking down a weird DLL loading bug on Swedish Windows, or tracking down a bug in the financial model Excel spreadsheet the night before a board meeting, rather than something generated by doing what other people wanted, this is exactly what you'd get on noticing that some people made much more than others. The main value networks supply now is ad sales.6 The industries themselves changed. Investors' main question when judging a very early startup is whether you've made a compelling product.
Since the Internet was the big new thing, investors supposed that the more Internettish the company, not its market cap. Suppose you realize there is nothing the rich like more than convenience. Anyone can build whatever they want on it, and have never spoken to a group of people for decades. So a company making a mass-produced car can afford to be candid about what you haven't figured out yet. Partly because, as components of oligopolies themselves, the corporations knew they could safely pass the cost on to their customers, because their competitors would have to be careful to avoid if he happened to set his time machine for Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1992. It's good to talk about how you plan to make money selling hardware at high prices. But once it became possible to make lots of new things, partly because they're more flexible, and partly because they want the lower costs of new technology.
It seemed like everything around me was crap. Which can be transformed into: If you are persistent, even problems that seem out of your way to bring it up e. The phrase personal computer is part of the mob, stand as far away from the programmers. When people are bad at math, they know. The consolidation that began in the late 19th century continued for most of human history the usual way to accumulate a fortune by creating wealth, society as a whole ends up poorer.7 This may be true; this may be something we need to fix. As a founder, you're buying stock with work: the reason Larry and Sergey are so rich is not so much that they've done work worth tens of billions of dollars, but that it makes other people want to help them. It was only then I realized he hadn't said very much. These are supposed to be an inborn trait in humans. In the best case, total immersion can be exciting: It's surprising how much you can learn from them.8
It's still early days.9 And you know when to stop optimizing too: we eventually got the Viaweb editor behave more like desktop software. If ideas really were the key, a competitor with the same expectant air as a cat bringing you a mouse it has just killed. Partly that users needed him. In technical matters, you have another reason not to keep your job. But that's a mistake—an even bigger mistake than believing what everyone was saying in 1999. So a company making a mass-produced versions will be, for users and developers both. After a while, if you can.
You can hold onto this like a rope in a hurricane, and it was like trying to run through waist-deep water. And paying attention is more important to reliability than moving slowly. You don't have to send everyone the same signal, and you can release it as soon as it was starting to break up. Why climb a corporate ladder that might be at different companies. Central France in 1100, on. I was at Yahoo, I couldn't have done this. So for the next hundred years. And at least 90% of the work that even the highest tech companies do is of this second, unedifying kind. There's a shocking amount of shear stress at every point where a startup touches a more bureaucratic organization, like a dangerous toy would be for a toy maker, or a clothing retailer?
Notes
Steven Hauser. Top VC firms regularly cold email. Businesses have to do and everything I write out loud can expose awkward parts. You should probably pack investor meetings as closely as you get nothing.
I tried ranking users by both average and median comment score, and help keep the number of discrepancies currently blamed on various forbidden isms. Living on instant ramen would be improper to name names, while simultaneously implying that you're not doing anything with it, Reddit has had a day job might actually be bad if the students did well they would never guess she hates attention, because the Depression. My guess is a scarce resource. To study the quadrivium of arithmetic, geometry, music, and that there's more of the most general truths.
How much more fun in this essay, I didn't care about, just those you should prevent your beliefs about how the courses they took might look to an investor I don't know of no one who's had the discipline to pull ahead in the US is becoming less fragmented, the average NBA player's salary at the moment it's created indeed, from which Renaissance civilization radiated.
What drives the most powerful men in Congress, Sam Rayburn and Lyndon Johnson. To get all the way they have to include things in shows is basically a replacement mall for mallrats. I started doing research for this essay. What they forget is that the worm infected, because it was cooked up, how little autonomy one would have met 30 people he meets at parties he's a real partner.
World War II had disappeared.
Icio. Presumably it's lower now because of that.
For example, if I can hear them in their racks for years while they may then, depending on how much effort it costs. But you couldn't do the startup is rare. Investors are professional negotiators, and b the valuation should be clear and concise, because such users are stupid. I know of at least what they give with one of the most dramatic departure from his predecessors was a kid that you'd want to figure out yet whether you'll succeed.
He devoted much of observed behavior.
I say in principle is that they can get done before that. If all the combinations of Web plus a three hour meeting with a faulty knowledge of human nature, might come from meditating in an urban context, issues basically means things we're going to get great people to do tedious work. Founders are often compared to what you care about may not be to diff European culture have in 1800 that Chinese culture didn't, they would probably find it was considered the most, it's easy for small children pointed out that taking an angel investment from a company's culture.
Thanks to Harj Taggar, Matthias Felleisen, Aaron Swartz, Sam Altman, Trevor Blackwell, Naval Ravikant, Garry Tan, and Jessica Livingston for sparking my interest in this topic.
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maurinegooden2-blog · 5 years
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Is FLAC Better Than MP3?
On-line audio converter to FLAC True audiophiles favor to maintain their collections in FLAC. With any of those apps, you'll need to manually switch the files to your iOS gadget. Join the system to your Mac, launch iTunes, and flac to mp3 converter choose the system in iTunes's supply listing on the left. Click on the Apps tab and scroll all the way down to the File Sharing part. Click on the app you want to use, and drag your music information into the paperwork checklist to the fitting (or click the Add button to choose the files via the Finder). Your information will transfer immediately, and it's best to be capable to play them via your selected app on your iOS gadget. (They will not seem in the standard Music app.) Alternatively, you may stash information in Dropbox after which choose to open them in an app similar to VLC, though you must obtain and open each monitor individually. Flac is a lossless audio compression format versus mp3 which affords lossy " compression. It affords prime quality audio, however it isn't one of the vital generally supported audio format, in contrast to the mp3 format. There are still many gadgets that just don't support flac information. If you have such a tool, you will want to make use of a extra universal format equivalent to mp3. Right here we can be speaking about 5 of such great audio participant apps for Android phones that help FLAC. While there are paid apps accessible with a ton of features, we've got centered on free apps additionally that provide almost similar functionality. However, even earlier than we begin, we have to understand what's FLAC and why is it relevant. Here is collection of FLAC Mac Converters to your information. 1). FLAC is a lossless format however you can't play it on sure audio players like iPod. Boxoft FLAC to MP3 Converter will enable you to to batch convert FLAC files to plain MP3 format information, that are a lot smaller and have better support among audio applications and hardware players. I was questioning if it is worth ripping them once more to FLAC. I wouldn't have the upgraded sound system (my only remorse with the automobile), so would I be able to tell the difference? I do not take into account myself a pure audiophile, but I do appreciate an excellent sound.
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Think of the unique uncompressed audio file as an individual. A piece of the top (excessive frequency) and bottom (low frequency) is chopped off when a file is compressed. Many of the hearable frequencies reside within the particular person's coronary heart, but without the head and the feet, you won't be capable of hear the music because it was originally supposed to sound. FLAC or ALAC recordsdata work by cutting out the unused high and low frequencies. These information give you the whole particular person, and simply erase the sky above and ground below. Once you convert FLAC to MP3, you end up shedding beneficial high's and low's. You cut out essential particulars and deprive your self of full quality richness. The difference between a high quality MP3 (320kbps) and a FLAC file is subtle, but an experienced music listener can hear it immediately. iTunes is one of the hottest method to master your music assortment on both Mac and Windows. It comes with so many features to complement your life. However it is selective meaning it does not simply settle for something imported to it, for instance, it refuses to play FLAC information, either ripped in an audio CD or sent by associates. So many people can not help however ask Can iTunes play FLAC" or Does iTunes play FLAC". Sadly, Apple's software program and units, like iTunes, QuickTime, iPad, iPhone, iPod, don't help FLAC format. Just surrender? No. You can still play FLAC in iTunes by converting FLAC to iTunes appropriate format at first, then import FLAC to iTunes. FLAC first emerged in 2001 as an open-supply various to different lossless codecs emerging at the time. These included Apple Lossless (ALAC), Microsoft's WAV (Waveform Audio Format) and WMA Lossless. However these competitive formats do have their disadvantages. Whereas ALAC has a loyal following amongst iPod and iPhone customers, it hasn't seen much uptake exterior of Apple products. The WAV format can also be standard, and it's suitable with iOS devices, but its greatest issues are that file sizes are very giant, and it could possibly't retain "tag" data - artist, album identify, lyrics, and so forth - in the best way the other codecs can. FLAC, alternatively, not solely helps tags but is also compatible with most music gamers. Apple is the only actual holdout right here, for while there was speak in 2017 of hardware assist in both the iPhone eight and X nothing has materialized. However, there are easy workarounds for iOS and Mac users. Apart from the above talked about options, you'll not discover another options for FLAC to MP3 conversion. It is a simple software program that solely lets you batch convert FLAC to MP3. Once you've launched the very best FLAC to MP3 converter mac, you can start audio change by moving FLAC recordsdata into the program. On the other hand, you can click on the Media Brower button at the prime-right corner to decide on FLAC information. So if absolute fidelity to the unique is necessary, users could need to each convert to an iTunes-appropriate format like ALAC or AAC PLUS hold the unique excessive-decision FLAC file to be used with different units resembling PONO Gamers or software. TunesKit DRM Audio Converter ( DRM Audio Converter for Mac ) is likely one of the best FLAC converters thanks to its sturdy capability to transform not only FLAC audio to MP3, but also another special audio recordsdata, similar to DRM-protected Apple Music, iTunes M4P songs, Audible AA, AAX audiobooks to frequent MP3, AAC, WAV, and so on. It lets you set audio quality, including codec, audio channel, bit price, sample rate, and others based on different necessities. Besides, it could possibly hold the ID3 tags of the unique information for you, comparable to title, album, cowl, artist, and so forth.
Do not forget to decide on a folder the place the program ought to save your new songs. By default, they will go to My music folder in your C drive. Free Lossless Audio Codec, or FLAC for brief, is an audio compression technique. It is a lossless compression type meaning that the compression takes place without data being discarded. FLAC is an open source codec. FLAC is a format that is beneficial to those backing up a CD assortment as a result of the sound high quality will stay excessive, whereas MP3 compression will result in a deterioration compared to the original.
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Converters that you have to pay for are greatest suited for long-time period conversions, twiddling with sound modifying, and coping with unusual codecs. If you work in sound enhancing or have a critical music interest, it could be worthwhile to pay for one thing like Xilisoft's converter. It handles pretty much each audio file out there as well as a number of video recordsdata, and has customization options beyond anything we have mentioned to this point. We're speaking about adding in new audio results, converting in audio segments in addition to batches, specifying exact dimension for output information, and rather more. It is conversion at a complete different level.
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kdulgar-blog · 4 years
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Churchill Club Top 10 Tech Trends Debate
I just got back from the Churchill Club’s 13th Annual Top 10 Tech Trends Debate (site).
Curt Carlson, CEO of SRI, presented their trends from the podium, which are meant to be “provocative, plausible, debatable, and that it will be clear within the next 1-3 years whether or not they will actually become trends.”
Then the panelists debated them. Speaking is Aneesh Chopra, CTO of the U.S., and smirking to his left is Paul Saffo, and then Ajay Senkut from Clarium, then me.
Here are SRI’s 2011 Top 10 Tech Trends [and my votes]:
Trend 1. Age Before Beauty. Technology is designed for—and disproportionately used by—the young. But the young are getting fewer. The big market will be older people. The aging generation has grown up with, and is comfortable with, most technology—but not with today’s latest technology products. Technology product designers will discover the Baby Boomer’s technology comfort zone and will leverage it in the design of new devices. One example today is the Jitterbug cell phone with a large keypad for easy dialing and powerful speakers for clear sound. The trend is for Baby Boomers to dictate the technology products of the future.
[I voted YES, it’s an important and underserved market, but for tech products, they are not the early adopters. The key issue is age-inspired entrepreneurship. How can we get the entrepreneurial mind focused on this important market?]
Trend 2. The Doctor Is In. Some of our political leaders say that we have "the best medical care system in the world". Think what it must be like in the rest of the world! There are many problems, but one is the high cost of delivering expert advice. With the development of practical virtual personal assistants, powered by artificial intelligence and pervasive low-cost sensors, “the doctor will be in”—online—for people around the world. Instead of the current Web paradigm: “fill out this form, and we’ll show you information about what might be ailing you”, this will be true diagnosis—supporting, and in some cases replacing—human medical practitioners. We were sending X-rays to India to be read; now India is connecting to doctors here for diagnosis in India. We see the idea in websites that now offer online videoconference interaction with a doctor. The next step is automation. The trend is toward complete automation: a combination of artificial intelligence, the Internet, and very low-cost medical instrumentation to provide high-quality diagnostics and advice—including answering patient questions—online to a worldwide audience.
[NO. Most doctor check-ups and diagnoses will still need to be conducted in-person (blood tests, physical exams, etc). Sensor technology can’t completely replace human medical practitioners in the near future. Once we have the physical interface (people for now), then the networking and AI capabilities can engage, bringing specialist reactions to locally collected data. The real near-term trend in point-of-care is the adoption of iPads/phones connected to cloud services like ePocrates and Athenahealth and soon EMRs.]
Trend 3. Made for Me. Manufacturing is undergoing a revolution. It is becoming technically and economically possible to create products that are unique to the specific needs of individuals. For example, a cell phone that has only the hardware you need to support the features you want—making it lighter, thinner, more efficient, much cheaper, and easier to use. This level of customization is being made possible by converging technical advances: new 3D printing technology is well documented, and networked micro-robotics is following. 3D printing now includes applications in jewelry, industrial design, and dentistry. While all of us may not be good product designers, we have different needs, and we know what we want. The trend is toward practical, one-off production of physical goods in widely distributed micro-factories: the ultimate customization of products. The trend is toward practical, one-off production of physical goods in widely distributed micro-factories: the ultimate customization of products.
[NO. Personalization is happening just fine at the software level. The UI skins and app code is changeable at zero incremental cost. Code permeates outward into the various vessels we build for it. The iPhone. Soon, the car (e.g. Tesla Sedan). Even the electrical circuits (when using an FPGA). This will extend naturally to biological code, with DNA synthesis costs plummeting (but that will likely stay centralized in BioFabs for the next 3 years. When it comes to building custom physical things, the cost and design challenges relegate it to prototyping, tinkering and hacks. Too many people have a difficult time in 3D content creation. The problem is the 2D interfaces of mouse and screen. Perhaps a multitouch interface to digital clay could help, where the polygons snap to fit after the form is molded by hand.]
Trend 4. Pay Me Now. Information about our personal behavior and characteristics is exploited regularly for commercial purposes, often returning little or no value to us, and sometimes without our knowledge. This knowledge is becoming a key asset and a major competitive advantage for the companies that gather it. Think of your supermarket club card. These knowledge-gatherers will need to get smarter and more aggressive in convincing us to share our information with them and not with their competitors. If TV advertisers could know who the viewers are, the value of the commercials would go up enormously. The trend is technology and business models based on attracting consumers to share large amounts of information exclusively with service providers.
[YES, but it’s nothing new. Amazon makes more on merchandising than product sales margin. And, certain companies are getting better and better at acquiring customer information and personalizing offerings specifically to these customers. RichRelevance provides this for ecommerce (driving 25% of all e-commerce on Black Friday). Across all those vendors, the average lift from personalizing the shopping experience: 15% increase in overall sales and 8% increase in long-term profitability. But, simply being explicit and transparent to the consumer about the source of the data can increase the effectiveness of targeted programs by up to 100% (e.g., saying “Because you bought this product and other consumers who bought it also bought this other product" yielded a 100% increase in product recommendation effectiveness in numerous A/B tests). Social graph is incredibly valuable as a marketing tool.]
Trend 5. Rosie, At Last. We’ve been waiting a long time for robots to live in and run our homes, like Rosie in the Jetsons’ household. It’s happening a little now: robots are finally starting to leave the manufacturing floor and enter people’s homes, offices, and highways. Robots can climb walls, fly, and run. We all know the Roomba for cleaning floors—and now there’s the Verro for your pool. Real-time vision and other sensors, and affordable precise manipulation, are enabling robots to assist in our care, drive our cars, and protect our homes and property. We need to broaden our view of robots and the forms they will take—think of a self-loading robot-compliant dishwasher or a self-protecting house. The trend is robots becoming embedded in our environments, and taking advantage of the cloud, to understand and fulfill our needs.
[NO. Not in 3 years. Wanting it badly does not make it so. But I just love that Google RoboCar. Robots are not leaving the factory floor – that’s where the opportunity for newer robots and even humanoid robots will begin. There is plenty of factory work still to be automated. Rodney Brooks of MIT thinks they can be cheaper than the cheapest outsourced labor. So the robots are coming, to the factory and the roads to start, and then the home.]
Trend 6. Social, Really. The rise of social networks is well documented, but they’re not really social networks. They’re a mix of friends, strangers, organizations, hucksters—it’s more like walking through a rowdy crowd in Times Square at night with a group of friends. There is a growing need for social networks that reflect the fundamental nature of human relationships: known identities, mutual trust, controlled levels of intimacy, and boundaries of shared information. The trend is the rise of true social networks, designed to maintain real, respectful relationships online.
[YES. The ambient intimacy of Facebook is leading to some startling statistics on fB evidence reuse by divorce lawyers (80%) and employment rejections (70%). There are differing approaches to solve this problem: Altly’s alternative networks with partioning and control, Jildy’s better filtering and auto-segmentation, and Path’s 50 friend limit.]
Trend 7. In-Your-Face Augmented Reality. With ever-cheaper computation and advances in computer vision technology, augmented reality is becoming practical, even in mobile devices. We will move beyond expensive telepresence environments and virtual reality games to fully immersive environments—in the office, on the factory floor, in medical care facilities, and in new entertainment venues. I once did an experiment where a person came into a room and sat down at a desk against a large, 3D, high-definition TV display. The projected image showed a room with a similar desk up against the screen. The person would put on 3D glasses, and then a projected person would enter and sit down at the other table. After talking for 5 to 10 minutes, the projected person would stand up and put their hand out. Most of the time, the first person would also stand up and put their hand into the screen—they had quickly adapted and forgotten that the other person was not in the room. Augmented reality will become indistinguishable from reality. The trend is an enchanted world— The trend is hyper-resolution augmented reality and hyper-accurate artificial people and objects that fundamentally enhance people’s experience of the world.
[NO, lenticular screens are too expensive and 3D glasses are a pain in the cortex. Augmented reality with iPhones is great, and pragmatic, but not a top 10 trend IMHO]
Trend 8. Engineering by Biologists. Biologists and engineers are different kinds of people—unless they are working on synthetic biology. We know about genetically engineered foods and creatures, such as gold fish in multiple other colors. Next we’ll have biologically engineered circuits and devices. Evolution has created adaptive processing and system resiliency that is much more advanced than anything we’ve been able to design. We are learning how to tap into that natural expertise, designing devices using the mechanisms of biology. We have already seen simple biological circuits in the laboratory. The trend is practical, engineered artifacts, devices, and computers based on biology rather than just on silicon.
[YES, and NO because it was so badly mangled as a trend. For the next few years, these approaches will be used for fuels and chemicals and materials processing because they lend themselves to a 3D fluid medium. Then 2D self-assembling monolayers. And eventually chips , starting with memory and sensor arrays long before heterogeneous logic. And processes of biology will be an inspiration throughout (evolution, self-assembly, etc.). Having made predictions along these themes for about a decade now, the wording of this one frustrated me]
Trend 9. ‘Tis a Gift to be Simple. Cyber attacks are ever more frequent and effective. Most attacks exploit holes that are inevitable given the complexity of the software products we use every day. Cyber researchers really understand this. To avoid these vulnerabilities, some cyber researchers are beginning to use only simple infrastructure and applications that are throwbacks to the computing world of two decades ago. As simplicity is shown to be an effective approach for avoiding attack, it will become the guiding principle of software design. The trend is cyber defense through widespread adoption of simple, low-feature software for consumers and businesses.
[No. I understand the advantages of being open, and of heterogencity of code (to avoid monoculture collapse), but we have long ago left the domain of simple. Yes, Internet transport protocols won via simplicity. The presentation layer, not so much. If you want dumb pipes, you need smart edges, and smart edges can be hacked. Graham Spencer gave a great talk at SFI: the trend towards transport simplicity (e.g. dumb pipes) and "intelligence in the edges" led to mixing code and data, which in turn led to all kinds of XSS-like attacks. Drive-by downloading (enabled by XSS) is the most popular vehicle for delivering malware these days.]
Trend 10. Reverse Innovation. Mobile communication is proliferating at an astonishing rate in developing countries as price-points drop and wireless infrastructure improves. As developing countries leapfrog the need for physical infrastructure and brokers, using mobile apps to conduct micro-scale business and to improve quality of life, they are innovating new applications. The developing world is quickly becoming the largest market we’ve ever seen—for mobile computing and much more. The trend is for developing countries to turn around the flow of innovation: Silicon Valley will begin to learn more from them about innovative applications than they need to learn from us about the underlying technology.
[YES, globalization is a megatrend still in the making. The mobile markets are clearly China, India and Korea, with app layer innovation increasingly originating there. Not completely of course, but we have a lot to learn from the early-adopter economies.]
Posted by jurvetson on 2011-05-26 05:36:16
Tagged: , Churchill , Club , Top , 10 , Tech , Trends , Debate , SRI , Curt Carlson , Paul Saffo , Aneesh Chopra
The post Churchill Club Top 10 Tech Trends Debate appeared first on Good Info.
0 notes
smartwebhostingblog · 5 years
Text
Apple Has A New iPad Problem
New Post has been published on http://cloudwebhostingproviders.com/2019/04/01/apple-has-a-new-ipad-problem/
Apple Has A New iPad Problem
With the amount of press surrounding Apple’s (NASDAQ: AAPL) services business, some analysts seem to be forgetting that today, right now, the company gets 87% of its revenue from products. In the future, services may outstrip products, but products will still be a gateway. One product that doesn’t seem to get much press is the company’s iPad business. With the iPhone business on shaky ground, Apple really can’t afford for its iPad or Mac business to struggle as well. Last quarter, iPad and Mac made up just over 19% of Apple’s total revenue. Unfortunately, Apple’s most recent iPad announcements could spell trouble for both businesses.
The tablet market is shrinking… wait its growing… actually we don’t know
The tablet business seems to have reached a point where analysts can’t figure out if customers want these devices or not. A study from Statista suggests the following bleak picture:
Year
2018
2019
2022
2023
Tablets Sold
150.3m
136.8m*
134.1m*
122.1m*
(Source: Statista tablet market *projections)
Users are being told that tablet demand will decline as users choose to buy laptops, Chromebooks, and hybrid devices. On the one hand, Apple has a stranglehold on tablet operating systems. On the other hand, it doesn’t do much good to own a market that is falling apart.
There is just one problem… the market may not be falling apart after all. As quickly as you can find a study that says tablet sales will decline, you can find another that suggests tablets will return to growth. According to Frost & Sullivan, the tablet market will grow at a compound annual growth rate of 1.6% through the year 2024. Though this doesn’t sound like fast growth, by 2024, it would mean 187 million units worldwide.
(Source: iOS Worldwide Tablet market share)
This second study suggests tablets will gain new capabilities and cannibalize laptop sales. Assuming that iOS continues to hold its 74% worldwide market share, by 2024, the company would sell about 138 million of these devices. To give investors an idea of what this growth would look like, during 2018, the company sold roughly 43 million tablets.
In the last four quarters, the average revenue per iPad has hovered around $430. At 138 million devices, this would generate about $15 billion in quarterly revenue. Last quarter, Apple generated $6.7 billion from the sale of iPads. More than doubling its iPad revenue in the next five years, is something investors would be more than happy to accept.
If this were the end of the story
It seems like every time Apple begins to solve a problem it ends up creating another. The first example is the iPhone X. It seems obvious in hindsight, that users who bought the iPhone X were those who waited through the iPhone 6, 7, and 8, for a different form factor. Priced at $999, this premium device seemed to answer a question of demand for something different. Apple mistakenly assumed that everyone would pay $1,000 for a phone, and rolled out the iPhone XS, and iPhone XS Max. The company eventually made the iPhone XR available at $749. In the meantime, Apple witnessed slower iPhone demand than expected and is still trying to make up lost ground.
A second mistake was the timing of the introduction of the iPad Mini. The original iPad was released in April of 2010. Over the next two plus years, others introduced smaller tablets while Apple introduced the iPad 2 and even the iPad 3. With users salivating over the Retina display on the iPad 3, in November 2012, Apple introduced the iPad Mini… without the Retina display. In fact, it took until a year later when the Mini finally gained a Retina display of its own.
Unfortunately, Apple seems to have again created a problem just as it began to solve another. Over the course of 2018, Apple’s iPad sales momentum deteriorated significantly.
Quarter
Q1 2018
Q2 2018
Q3 2018
Q4 2018
iPad Revenue Growth
+7.3%
+5.1%
-6%
-14.6%
(Source: AAPL quarterly results Q1 ’18 – Q2 ’18 – Q3 ’18 – Q4 ’18)
It’s really no surprise this slowdown occurred, given Apple’s iPad release schedule. The iPad from March of 2017, was a step up in performance, but not transformative. June 2017’s introduction of slightly different iPad Pro devices didn’t give users a reason to rush out and upgrade. Users had to wait for the iPad Pro 3rd generation, and the elimination of the home button, to get a change worth noticing. Since the devices weren’t released until the fourth quarter was already one-third over, it’s not surprising that results suffered.
Buyers seemed impressed by the advance of the iPad Pro lineup, because iPad revenue jumped more than 13% in the first quarter of 2019. If Apple left its lineup alone for another quarter or two, iPad results might have continued to improve, but unfortunately that’s not the end of the story.
Letting the Air out of iPad results
The introduction of the newest iPad Air and the revised iPad Mini is a confusing choice on multiple fronts. First, the iPad Mini hasn’t seen a refresh since 2015. Second, the iPad Air hasn’t been a name used since 2014. It’s almost like Apple forgot it sold these devices in the first place.
Device
Price
Screen
Weight
Storage
Processor
Other
iPad Air 2019
$499
10.5”
1 lbs
64 GB
A12 Bionic – M12 coprocessor
Touch ID – Lightning connector
iPad Mini 2019
$399
7.9”
0.66 lbs
64 GB
A12 Bionic – M12 coprocessor
Tough ID – Lightning connector
(Source: Apple iPad Air and iPad Mini pages)
If these devices were standalone products, the company’s results would likely be amazing. The problem is Apple now gives users a lower-priced choice, that may cut into the average selling price that just started to recover.
Quarter
Q1 2018
Q2 2018
Q3 2018
Q4 2018
Q1 2019
iPad Average Selling Price
$446.97
$450.55
$405.17
$422.68
*$507.57 to $511.45
(Source: AAPL quarterly earnings – *ARPU for Q1 is derived from Apple selling 13.1 to 13.2 million iPads in the first quarter the last two years. Taking the $6.7 billion in iPad sales and dividing by 13.1 or 13.2 million yields the range of $507.57 to $511.45)
(Source: iPad Air page)
On the iPad Air side of things, buyers who are faced with either the iPad Air or one of the iPad Pro models have a relatively simple choice. For $300 to $500 more, they can get a Pro device with a faster processor and a somewhat better screen to form factor, or they can just get the iPad Air. In short, the iPad Air is such a good device, with such impressive specs, that it will likely make buyers wonder why they would waste $300 or more on an iPad Pro.
In addition, if users are considering a MacBook 12”, the pricing between the iPad Air becomes astoundingly challenging. The MacBook is $1,299 to start and has a screen with 226 pixels per inch (PPI). The device weighs 2 pounds and comes with 256 GB of storage. Instead of spending $1,299, a buyer could opt for an iPad Air with the Smart Keyboard. A 256 GB iPad Air costs $649, the Smart Keyboard runs $159 for a total cost of $808.
Though the iPad Air runs a different operating system, the Files app moves the device a little closer to the Mac. What’s more, the iPad Air is half the weight without the keyboard, supports Apple Pencil, and has a higher ppi at 264. This is a case where spending almost $500 less gives the user a little less screen, but is that enough to justify the huge cost difference? Probably not.
Where the iPad Mini is concerned, it’s possible that some users will opt for the Mini at $399 instead of the slower processor and bigger screen iPad at $329. However, it’s equally possible that some buyers who would have bought the Air at $499, will decide to save the $100 and cut weight by going with the Mini. The bottom line is Apple revived two products from multiple years ago, just in time to potentially cut the gains in iPad ARPU that just started.
Today versus tomorrow
A significant number of articles are being written about what Apple will look like tomorrow. The company’s services business is being talked about as though its growth is guaranteed. It’s possible services will overtake products, but that is a long road indeed. To be clear, I own Apple stock, I plan on holding onto my shares. I do think that services will be a growth driver for a long time.
However, Apple has shown it’s not infallible in releasing major products. The iPhone XR was released after the XS, yet based on demand, the situation should have been reversed. Apple made a strong move redesigning the iPad Pro lineup with their beautifully stretched screens, USB-C charging, and keyboard and pencil support. Users had a choice between spending $329 on the cheaper iPad or $799 or more for an iPad Pro. The ARPU seems to have moved up significantly on the strength of Pro sales.
Though the iPad Air and iPad Mini are designed to drive demand for iPad sales, the pricing may put a squeeze on ARPU again. In addition, Apple made the new iPad Air so capable, that some buyers may choose to opt for the Air over certain MacBook models. The company has been successfully pushing the price point for the MacBook up to drive higher revenue usually on relatively tepid unit growth. If the redesigned Air with its keyboard support steals MacBook sales, Apple’s overall revenue could suffer significantly from the massive difference in pricing.
Apple is constantly attempting to improve its hardware options to appeal to many users. At the present time, the lineup between the iPad Mini, iPad Air, iPad Pro, and MacBook has gotten a bit convoluted. Apple is hoping that users will stay in their lane and buy what it wants them to. Unfortunately, Apple may have just caused its own iPad problem.
Disclosure: I am/we are long AAPL. I wrote this article myself, and it expresses my own opinions. I am not receiving compensation for it (other than from Seeking Alpha). I have no business relationship with any company whose stock is mentioned in this article.
0 notes
Apple Has A New iPad Problem
New Post has been published on http://cloudwebhostingproviders.com/2019/04/01/apple-has-a-new-ipad-problem/
Apple Has A New iPad Problem
With the amount of press surrounding Apple’s (NASDAQ: AAPL) services business, some analysts seem to be forgetting that today, right now, the company gets 87% of its revenue from products. In the future, services may outstrip products, but products will still be a gateway. One product that doesn’t seem to get much press is the company’s iPad business. With the iPhone business on shaky ground, Apple really can’t afford for its iPad or Mac business to struggle as well. Last quarter, iPad and Mac made up just over 19% of Apple’s total revenue. Unfortunately, Apple’s most recent iPad announcements could spell trouble for both businesses.
The tablet market is shrinking… wait its growing… actually we don’t know
The tablet business seems to have reached a point where analysts can’t figure out if customers want these devices or not. A study from Statista suggests the following bleak picture:
Year
2018
2019
2022
2023
Tablets Sold
150.3m
136.8m*
134.1m*
122.1m*
(Source: Statista tablet market *projections)
Users are being told that tablet demand will decline as users choose to buy laptops, Chromebooks, and hybrid devices. On the one hand, Apple has a stranglehold on tablet operating systems. On the other hand, it doesn’t do much good to own a market that is falling apart.
There is just one problem… the market may not be falling apart after all. As quickly as you can find a study that says tablet sales will decline, you can find another that suggests tablets will return to growth. According to Frost & Sullivan, the tablet market will grow at a compound annual growth rate of 1.6% through the year 2024. Though this doesn’t sound like fast growth, by 2024, it would mean 187 million units worldwide.
(Source: iOS Worldwide Tablet market share)
This second study suggests tablets will gain new capabilities and cannibalize laptop sales. Assuming that iOS continues to hold its 74% worldwide market share, by 2024, the company would sell about 138 million of these devices. To give investors an idea of what this growth would look like, during 2018, the company sold roughly 43 million tablets.
In the last four quarters, the average revenue per iPad has hovered around $430. At 138 million devices, this would generate about $15 billion in quarterly revenue. Last quarter, Apple generated $6.7 billion from the sale of iPads. More than doubling its iPad revenue in the next five years, is something investors would be more than happy to accept.
If this were the end of the story
It seems like every time Apple begins to solve a problem it ends up creating another. The first example is the iPhone X. It seems obvious in hindsight, that users who bought the iPhone X were those who waited through the iPhone 6, 7, and 8, for a different form factor. Priced at $999, this premium device seemed to answer a question of demand for something different. Apple mistakenly assumed that everyone would pay $1,000 for a phone, and rolled out the iPhone XS, and iPhone XS Max. The company eventually made the iPhone XR available at $749. In the meantime, Apple witnessed slower iPhone demand than expected and is still trying to make up lost ground.
A second mistake was the timing of the introduction of the iPad Mini. The original iPad was released in April of 2010. Over the next two plus years, others introduced smaller tablets while Apple introduced the iPad 2 and even the iPad 3. With users salivating over the Retina display on the iPad 3, in November 2012, Apple introduced the iPad Mini… without the Retina display. In fact, it took until a year later when the Mini finally gained a Retina display of its own.
Unfortunately, Apple seems to have again created a problem just as it began to solve another. Over the course of 2018, Apple’s iPad sales momentum deteriorated significantly.
Quarter
Q1 2018
Q2 2018
Q3 2018
Q4 2018
iPad Revenue Growth
+7.3%
+5.1%
-6%
-14.6%
(Source: AAPL quarterly results Q1 ’18 – Q2 ’18 – Q3 ’18 – Q4 ’18)
It’s really no surprise this slowdown occurred, given Apple’s iPad release schedule. The iPad from March of 2017, was a step up in performance, but not transformative. June 2017’s introduction of slightly different iPad Pro devices didn’t give users a reason to rush out and upgrade. Users had to wait for the iPad Pro 3rd generation, and the elimination of the home button, to get a change worth noticing. Since the devices weren’t released until the fourth quarter was already one-third over, it’s not surprising that results suffered.
Buyers seemed impressed by the advance of the iPad Pro lineup, because iPad revenue jumped more than 13% in the first quarter of 2019. If Apple left its lineup alone for another quarter or two, iPad results might have continued to improve, but unfortunately that’s not the end of the story.
Letting the Air out of iPad results
The introduction of the newest iPad Air and the revised iPad Mini is a confusing choice on multiple fronts. First, the iPad Mini hasn’t seen a refresh since 2015. Second, the iPad Air hasn’t been a name used since 2014. It’s almost like Apple forgot it sold these devices in the first place.
Device
Price
Screen
Weight
Storage
Processor
Other
iPad Air 2019
$499
10.5”
1 lbs
64 GB
A12 Bionic – M12 coprocessor
Touch ID – Lightning connector
iPad Mini 2019
$399
7.9”
0.66 lbs
64 GB
A12 Bionic – M12 coprocessor
Tough ID – Lightning connector
(Source: Apple iPad Air and iPad Mini pages)
If these devices were standalone products, the company’s results would likely be amazing. The problem is Apple now gives users a lower-priced choice, that may cut into the average selling price that just started to recover.
Quarter
Q1 2018
Q2 2018
Q3 2018
Q4 2018
Q1 2019
iPad Average Selling Price
$446.97
$450.55
$405.17
$422.68
*$507.57 to $511.45
(Source: AAPL quarterly earnings – *ARPU for Q1 is derived from Apple selling 13.1 to 13.2 million iPads in the first quarter the last two years. Taking the $6.7 billion in iPad sales and dividing by 13.1 or 13.2 million yields the range of $507.57 to $511.45)
(Source: iPad Air page)
On the iPad Air side of things, buyers who are faced with either the iPad Air or one of the iPad Pro models have a relatively simple choice. For $300 to $500 more, they can get a Pro device with a faster processor and a somewhat better screen to form factor, or they can just get the iPad Air. In short, the iPad Air is such a good device, with such impressive specs, that it will likely make buyers wonder why they would waste $300 or more on an iPad Pro.
In addition, if users are considering a MacBook 12”, the pricing between the iPad Air becomes astoundingly challenging. The MacBook is $1,299 to start and has a screen with 226 pixels per inch (PPI). The device weighs 2 pounds and comes with 256 GB of storage. Instead of spending $1,299, a buyer could opt for an iPad Air with the Smart Keyboard. A 256 GB iPad Air costs $649, the Smart Keyboard runs $159 for a total cost of $808.
Though the iPad Air runs a different operating system, the Files app moves the device a little closer to the Mac. What’s more, the iPad Air is half the weight without the keyboard, supports Apple Pencil, and has a higher ppi at 264. This is a case where spending almost $500 less gives the user a little less screen, but is that enough to justify the huge cost difference? Probably not.
Where the iPad Mini is concerned, it’s possible that some users will opt for the Mini at $399 instead of the slower processor and bigger screen iPad at $329. However, it’s equally possible that some buyers who would have bought the Air at $499, will decide to save the $100 and cut weight by going with the Mini. The bottom line is Apple revived two products from multiple years ago, just in time to potentially cut the gains in iPad ARPU that just started.
Today versus tomorrow
A significant number of articles are being written about what Apple will look like tomorrow. The company’s services business is being talked about as though its growth is guaranteed. It’s possible services will overtake products, but that is a long road indeed. To be clear, I own Apple stock, I plan on holding onto my shares. I do think that services will be a growth driver for a long time.
However, Apple has shown it’s not infallible in releasing major products. The iPhone XR was released after the XS, yet based on demand, the situation should have been reversed. Apple made a strong move redesigning the iPad Pro lineup with their beautifully stretched screens, USB-C charging, and keyboard and pencil support. Users had a choice between spending $329 on the cheaper iPad or $799 or more for an iPad Pro. The ARPU seems to have moved up significantly on the strength of Pro sales.
Though the iPad Air and iPad Mini are designed to drive demand for iPad sales, the pricing may put a squeeze on ARPU again. In addition, Apple made the new iPad Air so capable, that some buyers may choose to opt for the Air over certain MacBook models. The company has been successfully pushing the price point for the MacBook up to drive higher revenue usually on relatively tepid unit growth. If the redesigned Air with its keyboard support steals MacBook sales, Apple’s overall revenue could suffer significantly from the massive difference in pricing.
Apple is constantly attempting to improve its hardware options to appeal to many users. At the present time, the lineup between the iPad Mini, iPad Air, iPad Pro, and MacBook has gotten a bit convoluted. Apple is hoping that users will stay in their lane and buy what it wants them to. Unfortunately, Apple may have just caused its own iPad problem.
Disclosure: I am/we are long AAPL. I wrote this article myself, and it expresses my own opinions. I am not receiving compensation for it (other than from Seeking Alpha). I have no business relationship with any company whose stock is mentioned in this article.
0 notes
lazilysillyprince · 5 years
Text
Apple Has A New iPad Problem
New Post has been published on http://cloudwebhostingproviders.com/2019/04/01/apple-has-a-new-ipad-problem/
Apple Has A New iPad Problem
With the amount of press surrounding Apple’s (NASDAQ: AAPL) services business, some analysts seem to be forgetting that today, right now, the company gets 87% of its revenue from products. In the future, services may outstrip products, but products will still be a gateway. One product that doesn’t seem to get much press is the company’s iPad business. With the iPhone business on shaky ground, Apple really can’t afford for its iPad or Mac business to struggle as well. Last quarter, iPad and Mac made up just over 19% of Apple’s total revenue. Unfortunately, Apple’s most recent iPad announcements could spell trouble for both businesses.
The tablet market is shrinking… wait its growing… actually we don’t know
The tablet business seems to have reached a point where analysts can’t figure out if customers want these devices or not. A study from Statista suggests the following bleak picture:
Year
2018
2019
2022
2023
Tablets Sold
150.3m
136.8m*
134.1m*
122.1m*
(Source: Statista tablet market *projections)
Users are being told that tablet demand will decline as users choose to buy laptops, Chromebooks, and hybrid devices. On the one hand, Apple has a stranglehold on tablet operating systems. On the other hand, it doesn’t do much good to own a market that is falling apart.
There is just one problem… the market may not be falling apart after all. As quickly as you can find a study that says tablet sales will decline, you can find another that suggests tablets will return to growth. According to Frost & Sullivan, the tablet market will grow at a compound annual growth rate of 1.6% through the year 2024. Though this doesn’t sound like fast growth, by 2024, it would mean 187 million units worldwide.
(Source: iOS Worldwide Tablet market share)
This second study suggests tablets will gain new capabilities and cannibalize laptop sales. Assuming that iOS continues to hold its 74% worldwide market share, by 2024, the company would sell about 138 million of these devices. To give investors an idea of what this growth would look like, during 2018, the company sold roughly 43 million tablets.
In the last four quarters, the average revenue per iPad has hovered around $430. At 138 million devices, this would generate about $15 billion in quarterly revenue. Last quarter, Apple generated $6.7 billion from the sale of iPads. More than doubling its iPad revenue in the next five years, is something investors would be more than happy to accept.
If this were the end of the story
It seems like every time Apple begins to solve a problem it ends up creating another. The first example is the iPhone X. It seems obvious in hindsight, that users who bought the iPhone X were those who waited through the iPhone 6, 7, and 8, for a different form factor. Priced at $999, this premium device seemed to answer a question of demand for something different. Apple mistakenly assumed that everyone would pay $1,000 for a phone, and rolled out the iPhone XS, and iPhone XS Max. The company eventually made the iPhone XR available at $749. In the meantime, Apple witnessed slower iPhone demand than expected and is still trying to make up lost ground.
A second mistake was the timing of the introduction of the iPad Mini. The original iPad was released in April of 2010. Over the next two plus years, others introduced smaller tablets while Apple introduced the iPad 2 and even the iPad 3. With users salivating over the Retina display on the iPad 3, in November 2012, Apple introduced the iPad Mini… without the Retina display. In fact, it took until a year later when the Mini finally gained a Retina display of its own.
Unfortunately, Apple seems to have again created a problem just as it began to solve another. Over the course of 2018, Apple’s iPad sales momentum deteriorated significantly.
Quarter
Q1 2018
Q2 2018
Q3 2018
Q4 2018
iPad Revenue Growth
+7.3%
+5.1%
-6%
-14.6%
(Source: AAPL quarterly results Q1 ’18 – Q2 ’18 – Q3 ’18 – Q4 ’18)
It’s really no surprise this slowdown occurred, given Apple’s iPad release schedule. The iPad from March of 2017, was a step up in performance, but not transformative. June 2017’s introduction of slightly different iPad Pro devices didn’t give users a reason to rush out and upgrade. Users had to wait for the iPad Pro 3rd generation, and the elimination of the home button, to get a change worth noticing. Since the devices weren’t released until the fourth quarter was already one-third over, it’s not surprising that results suffered.
Buyers seemed impressed by the advance of the iPad Pro lineup, because iPad revenue jumped more than 13% in the first quarter of 2019. If Apple left its lineup alone for another quarter or two, iPad results might have continued to improve, but unfortunately that’s not the end of the story.
Letting the Air out of iPad results
The introduction of the newest iPad Air and the revised iPad Mini is a confusing choice on multiple fronts. First, the iPad Mini hasn’t seen a refresh since 2015. Second, the iPad Air hasn’t been a name used since 2014. It’s almost like Apple forgot it sold these devices in the first place.
Device
Price
Screen
Weight
Storage
Processor
Other
iPad Air 2019
$499
10.5”
1 lbs
64 GB
A12 Bionic – M12 coprocessor
Touch ID – Lightning connector
iPad Mini 2019
$399
7.9”
0.66 lbs
64 GB
A12 Bionic – M12 coprocessor
Tough ID – Lightning connector
(Source: Apple iPad Air and iPad Mini pages)
If these devices were standalone products, the company’s results would likely be amazing. The problem is Apple now gives users a lower-priced choice, that may cut into the average selling price that just started to recover.
Quarter
Q1 2018
Q2 2018
Q3 2018
Q4 2018
Q1 2019
iPad Average Selling Price
$446.97
$450.55
$405.17
$422.68
*$507.57 to $511.45
(Source: AAPL quarterly earnings – *ARPU for Q1 is derived from Apple selling 13.1 to 13.2 million iPads in the first quarter the last two years. Taking the $6.7 billion in iPad sales and dividing by 13.1 or 13.2 million yields the range of $507.57 to $511.45)
(Source: iPad Air page)
On the iPad Air side of things, buyers who are faced with either the iPad Air or one of the iPad Pro models have a relatively simple choice. For $300 to $500 more, they can get a Pro device with a faster processor and a somewhat better screen to form factor, or they can just get the iPad Air. In short, the iPad Air is such a good device, with such impressive specs, that it will likely make buyers wonder why they would waste $300 or more on an iPad Pro.
In addition, if users are considering a MacBook 12”, the pricing between the iPad Air becomes astoundingly challenging. The MacBook is $1,299 to start and has a screen with 226 pixels per inch (PPI). The device weighs 2 pounds and comes with 256 GB of storage. Instead of spending $1,299, a buyer could opt for an iPad Air with the Smart Keyboard. A 256 GB iPad Air costs $649, the Smart Keyboard runs $159 for a total cost of $808.
Though the iPad Air runs a different operating system, the Files app moves the device a little closer to the Mac. What’s more, the iPad Air is half the weight without the keyboard, supports Apple Pencil, and has a higher ppi at 264. This is a case where spending almost $500 less gives the user a little less screen, but is that enough to justify the huge cost difference? Probably not.
Where the iPad Mini is concerned, it’s possible that some users will opt for the Mini at $399 instead of the slower processor and bigger screen iPad at $329. However, it’s equally possible that some buyers who would have bought the Air at $499, will decide to save the $100 and cut weight by going with the Mini. The bottom line is Apple revived two products from multiple years ago, just in time to potentially cut the gains in iPad ARPU that just started.
Today versus tomorrow
A significant number of articles are being written about what Apple will look like tomorrow. The company’s services business is being talked about as though its growth is guaranteed. It’s possible services will overtake products, but that is a long road indeed. To be clear, I own Apple stock, I plan on holding onto my shares. I do think that services will be a growth driver for a long time.
However, Apple has shown it’s not infallible in releasing major products. The iPhone XR was released after the XS, yet based on demand, the situation should have been reversed. Apple made a strong move redesigning the iPad Pro lineup with their beautifully stretched screens, USB-C charging, and keyboard and pencil support. Users had a choice between spending $329 on the cheaper iPad or $799 or more for an iPad Pro. The ARPU seems to have moved up significantly on the strength of Pro sales.
Though the iPad Air and iPad Mini are designed to drive demand for iPad sales, the pricing may put a squeeze on ARPU again. In addition, Apple made the new iPad Air so capable, that some buyers may choose to opt for the Air over certain MacBook models. The company has been successfully pushing the price point for the MacBook up to drive higher revenue usually on relatively tepid unit growth. If the redesigned Air with its keyboard support steals MacBook sales, Apple’s overall revenue could suffer significantly from the massive difference in pricing.
Apple is constantly attempting to improve its hardware options to appeal to many users. At the present time, the lineup between the iPad Mini, iPad Air, iPad Pro, and MacBook has gotten a bit convoluted. Apple is hoping that users will stay in their lane and buy what it wants them to. Unfortunately, Apple may have just caused its own iPad problem.
Disclosure: I am/we are long AAPL. I wrote this article myself, and it expresses my own opinions. I am not receiving compensation for it (other than from Seeking Alpha). I have no business relationship with any company whose stock is mentioned in this article.
0 notes
hostingnewsfeed · 5 years
Text
Apple Has A New iPad Problem
New Post has been published on http://cloudwebhostingproviders.com/2019/04/01/apple-has-a-new-ipad-problem/
Apple Has A New iPad Problem
With the amount of press surrounding Apple’s (NASDAQ: AAPL) services business, some analysts seem to be forgetting that today, right now, the company gets 87% of its revenue from products. In the future, services may outstrip products, but products will still be a gateway. One product that doesn’t seem to get much press is the company’s iPad business. With the iPhone business on shaky ground, Apple really can’t afford for its iPad or Mac business to struggle as well. Last quarter, iPad and Mac made up just over 19% of Apple’s total revenue. Unfortunately, Apple’s most recent iPad announcements could spell trouble for both businesses.
The tablet market is shrinking… wait its growing… actually we don’t know
The tablet business seems to have reached a point where analysts can’t figure out if customers want these devices or not. A study from Statista suggests the following bleak picture:
Year
2018
2019
2022
2023
Tablets Sold
150.3m
136.8m*
134.1m*
122.1m*
(Source: Statista tablet market *projections)
Users are being told that tablet demand will decline as users choose to buy laptops, Chromebooks, and hybrid devices. On the one hand, Apple has a stranglehold on tablet operating systems. On the other hand, it doesn’t do much good to own a market that is falling apart.
There is just one problem… the market may not be falling apart after all. As quickly as you can find a study that says tablet sales will decline, you can find another that suggests tablets will return to growth. According to Frost & Sullivan, the tablet market will grow at a compound annual growth rate of 1.6% through the year 2024. Though this doesn’t sound like fast growth, by 2024, it would mean 187 million units worldwide.
(Source: iOS Worldwide Tablet market share)
This second study suggests tablets will gain new capabilities and cannibalize laptop sales. Assuming that iOS continues to hold its 74% worldwide market share, by 2024, the company would sell about 138 million of these devices. To give investors an idea of what this growth would look like, during 2018, the company sold roughly 43 million tablets.
In the last four quarters, the average revenue per iPad has hovered around $430. At 138 million devices, this would generate about $15 billion in quarterly revenue. Last quarter, Apple generated $6.7 billion from the sale of iPads. More than doubling its iPad revenue in the next five years, is something investors would be more than happy to accept.
If this were the end of the story
It seems like every time Apple begins to solve a problem it ends up creating another. The first example is the iPhone X. It seems obvious in hindsight, that users who bought the iPhone X were those who waited through the iPhone 6, 7, and 8, for a different form factor. Priced at $999, this premium device seemed to answer a question of demand for something different. Apple mistakenly assumed that everyone would pay $1,000 for a phone, and rolled out the iPhone XS, and iPhone XS Max. The company eventually made the iPhone XR available at $749. In the meantime, Apple witnessed slower iPhone demand than expected and is still trying to make up lost ground.
A second mistake was the timing of the introduction of the iPad Mini. The original iPad was released in April of 2010. Over the next two plus years, others introduced smaller tablets while Apple introduced the iPad 2 and even the iPad 3. With users salivating over the Retina display on the iPad 3, in November 2012, Apple introduced the iPad Mini… without the Retina display. In fact, it took until a year later when the Mini finally gained a Retina display of its own.
Unfortunately, Apple seems to have again created a problem just as it began to solve another. Over the course of 2018, Apple’s iPad sales momentum deteriorated significantly.
Quarter
Q1 2018
Q2 2018
Q3 2018
Q4 2018
iPad Revenue Growth
+7.3%
+5.1%
-6%
-14.6%
(Source: AAPL quarterly results Q1 ’18 – Q2 ’18 – Q3 ’18 – Q4 ’18)
It’s really no surprise this slowdown occurred, given Apple’s iPad release schedule. The iPad from March of 2017, was a step up in performance, but not transformative. June 2017’s introduction of slightly different iPad Pro devices didn’t give users a reason to rush out and upgrade. Users had to wait for the iPad Pro 3rd generation, and the elimination of the home button, to get a change worth noticing. Since the devices weren’t released until the fourth quarter was already one-third over, it’s not surprising that results suffered.
Buyers seemed impressed by the advance of the iPad Pro lineup, because iPad revenue jumped more than 13% in the first quarter of 2019. If Apple left its lineup alone for another quarter or two, iPad results might have continued to improve, but unfortunately that’s not the end of the story.
Letting the Air out of iPad results
The introduction of the newest iPad Air and the revised iPad Mini is a confusing choice on multiple fronts. First, the iPad Mini hasn’t seen a refresh since 2015. Second, the iPad Air hasn’t been a name used since 2014. It’s almost like Apple forgot it sold these devices in the first place.
Device
Price
Screen
Weight
Storage
Processor
Other
iPad Air 2019
$499
10.5”
1 lbs
64 GB
A12 Bionic – M12 coprocessor
Touch ID – Lightning connector
iPad Mini 2019
$399
7.9”
0.66 lbs
64 GB
A12 Bionic – M12 coprocessor
Tough ID – Lightning connector
(Source: Apple iPad Air and iPad Mini pages)
If these devices were standalone products, the company’s results would likely be amazing. The problem is Apple now gives users a lower-priced choice, that may cut into the average selling price that just started to recover.
Quarter
Q1 2018
Q2 2018
Q3 2018
Q4 2018
Q1 2019
iPad Average Selling Price
$446.97
$450.55
$405.17
$422.68
*$507.57 to $511.45
(Source: AAPL quarterly earnings – *ARPU for Q1 is derived from Apple selling 13.1 to 13.2 million iPads in the first quarter the last two years. Taking the $6.7 billion in iPad sales and dividing by 13.1 or 13.2 million yields the range of $507.57 to $511.45)
(Source: iPad Air page)
On the iPad Air side of things, buyers who are faced with either the iPad Air or one of the iPad Pro models have a relatively simple choice. For $300 to $500 more, they can get a Pro device with a faster processor and a somewhat better screen to form factor, or they can just get the iPad Air. In short, the iPad Air is such a good device, with such impressive specs, that it will likely make buyers wonder why they would waste $300 or more on an iPad Pro.
In addition, if users are considering a MacBook 12”, the pricing between the iPad Air becomes astoundingly challenging. The MacBook is $1,299 to start and has a screen with 226 pixels per inch (PPI). The device weighs 2 pounds and comes with 256 GB of storage. Instead of spending $1,299, a buyer could opt for an iPad Air with the Smart Keyboard. A 256 GB iPad Air costs $649, the Smart Keyboard runs $159 for a total cost of $808.
Though the iPad Air runs a different operating system, the Files app moves the device a little closer to the Mac. What’s more, the iPad Air is half the weight without the keyboard, supports Apple Pencil, and has a higher ppi at 264. This is a case where spending almost $500 less gives the user a little less screen, but is that enough to justify the huge cost difference? Probably not.
Where the iPad Mini is concerned, it’s possible that some users will opt for the Mini at $399 instead of the slower processor and bigger screen iPad at $329. However, it’s equally possible that some buyers who would have bought the Air at $499, will decide to save the $100 and cut weight by going with the Mini. The bottom line is Apple revived two products from multiple years ago, just in time to potentially cut the gains in iPad ARPU that just started.
Today versus tomorrow
A significant number of articles are being written about what Apple will look like tomorrow. The company’s services business is being talked about as though its growth is guaranteed. It’s possible services will overtake products, but that is a long road indeed. To be clear, I own Apple stock, I plan on holding onto my shares. I do think that services will be a growth driver for a long time.
However, Apple has shown it’s not infallible in releasing major products. The iPhone XR was released after the XS, yet based on demand, the situation should have been reversed. Apple made a strong move redesigning the iPad Pro lineup with their beautifully stretched screens, USB-C charging, and keyboard and pencil support. Users had a choice between spending $329 on the cheaper iPad or $799 or more for an iPad Pro. The ARPU seems to have moved up significantly on the strength of Pro sales.
Though the iPad Air and iPad Mini are designed to drive demand for iPad sales, the pricing may put a squeeze on ARPU again. In addition, Apple made the new iPad Air so capable, that some buyers may choose to opt for the Air over certain MacBook models. The company has been successfully pushing the price point for the MacBook up to drive higher revenue usually on relatively tepid unit growth. If the redesigned Air with its keyboard support steals MacBook sales, Apple’s overall revenue could suffer significantly from the massive difference in pricing.
Apple is constantly attempting to improve its hardware options to appeal to many users. At the present time, the lineup between the iPad Mini, iPad Air, iPad Pro, and MacBook has gotten a bit convoluted. Apple is hoping that users will stay in their lane and buy what it wants them to. Unfortunately, Apple may have just caused its own iPad problem.
Disclosure: I am/we are long AAPL. I wrote this article myself, and it expresses my own opinions. I am not receiving compensation for it (other than from Seeking Alpha). I have no business relationship with any company whose stock is mentioned in this article.
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jannafernando-blog · 7 years
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Individual report 
3d printing 
 Chuck Hull (Charles W. Hull; born May 12, 1939) is the co-founder, executive vice president and chief technology officer of 3D Systems. He is the inventor of the solid imaging process known as stereolithography (3D Printing), the first commercial rapid prototyping technology, and the STL file format. He is named on more than 60 U.S. patents as well as other patents around the world in the fields of ion optics and rapid prototyping. He was inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame in 2014.  
What is a 3D printer? 
 3D printers are a new generation of machines that can make everyday things. They’re remarkable because they can produce different kinds of objects, in different materials, all from the same machine. A 3D printer can make pretty much anything from ceramic cups to plastic toys, metal machine parts, stoneware vases, fancy chocolate cakes or even (one day soon) human body parts. They replace traditional factory production lines with a single machine, just like home inkjet printers replaced bottles of ink, a printing press, hot metal type and a drying rack. 
 Why is it called printing?
 If you look closely (with a microscope) at a page of text from your home printer, you’ll see the letters don’t just stain the paper, they’re actually sitting slightly on top of the surface of the page. In theory, if you printed over that same page a few thousand times, eventually the ink would build up enough layers on top of each other to create a solid 3D model of each letter. That idea of building a physical form out of tiny layers is how the first 3D printers worked.
 How do 3D printers work?
 You start by designing a 3D object on an ordinary home PC, connect it to a 3D printer, press ‘print’ and then sit back and watch. The process is a bit like making a loaf of sliced bread, but in reverse. Imagine baking each individual slice of bread and then gluing them together into a whole loaf (as opposed to making a whole loaf and then slicing it, like a baker does). That’s basically what a 3D printer does. The 3D printing process turns a whole object into thousands of tiny little slices, then makes it from the bottom-up, slice by slice. Those tiny layers stick together to form a solid object. Each layer can be very complex, meaning 3D printers can create moving parts like hinges and wheels as part of the same object. You could print a whole bike - handlebars, saddle, frame, wheels, brakes, pedals and chain - ready assembled, without using any tools. It’s just a question of leaving gaps in the right places. 
  What are the opportunities? 
 Have you ever broken something, only to find it’s no longer sold and you can’t replace it? 3D printing means you can simply print a new one. That world, where you can make almost anything at home, is very different from the one we live in today. It’s a world that doesn’t need lorries to deliver goods or warehouses to store them in, where nothing is ever out of stock and where there is less waste, packaging and pollution. It’s also a world where everyday items are made to measure, to your requirements. That means furniture made to fit your home, shoes made to fit your feet, door handles made to fit your hand, meals printed to your tastes at the touch of a button. Even medicines, bones, organs and skin made to treat your injuries. You can get some of those things now if you’re wealthy, but 3D printing brings affordable, bespoke manufacturing to the masses. If that sounds like pure fantasy, try googling “personalised 3D printed products” and see for yourself. After all, the notion of doing your supermarket shopping on an iPad was like something out of Star Trek 20 years ago.
 What are the limitations?
 Although buying a 3D printer is much cheaper than setting up a factory, the cost per item you produce is higher, so the economics of 3D printing don’t stack-up against traditional mass production yet. It also can’t match the smooth finish of industrial machines, nor offer the variety of materials or range of sizes available through industrial processes. But, like so many household technologies, the prices will come down and 3D printer capabilities will improve over time.
 Is it the next big thing? 
 Yes, if you’re a product designer or engineer, but for most people, no. Like all new technologies, the industry hype is a few years ahead of the consumer reality. It’s an emerging technology which means, like home computers or mobile phones, most people will remain sceptical about needing one until everyone has got one… and then we’ll all wonder how we ever managed without them. 
 Advantages: 
 Customization –
. This one of advantage that you may do everything design that you what use of raw materials .
 Affordability – 
The initial cost for setting up a 3d printing facility is definitely high; however, it is much cheaper compared to labor costs and manufacturing costs while using the conventional way. Adding to it, is the fact that the cost of producing or manufacturing products using 3d printing technology is equal for small-scale and mass manufacturing.
Storage –
 Traditional manufacturing produces additional products that you probably know you will eventually need thus storage problems arise. However, 3d printing technology, products can be “printed” when needed thus excess products are eliminated and no storage cost is required.
 Employment Opportunities –
 The widespread use of 3d printing technology will definitely increase the demand for engineers who are needed to design and build these printers. Technicians who are skilled at troubleshooting and maintenance and Designers to design blueprints for products and more jobs will be created. 
 Health Care – 
With the advancement of technology, a customizable human body parts and organs can now be manufactured this technology is termed as Bioprinting. Although right now this is still experimental, the potential is huge. This breakthrough will not only address the shortage of organ donors, but also organ rejection since the organs that are built will consist of the patient’s unique characters and DNA.
Disadvantages 
 Decrease in Manufacturing Jobs – 
The decrease in manufacturing jobs will greatly affect the economy of countries that rely on a large number of low skill jobs.
 Limited Size – 
The size of objects created with 3d printers is currently limited however, in the near future; large items such as architectural structures can be created using 3d printing.
 Limited Raw Materials – 
Traditional manufacturing of products has an enormous range of raw materials that can be used. Presently 3d printers can work up to approximately 100 different raw materials and creating products that uses more raw materials are still under development. 
 Violation of Copyrights –
 The biggest disadvantage of 3d printing is Counterfeiting. Anyone who gets a hold of a blueprint will be able to counterfeit products easily. It will become more common and tracing the source of the counterfeited items will be nearly impossible. Many copyright holders will have a hard time protecting their rights and businesses producing unique products will suffer.
 Production of Dangerous Items –
 With 3d printers, plastic knives, guns and any other hazardous objects can be created. It makes easier for terrorists and criminals bring a weapon without being detected.
Thingiverse 
is a website dedicated to the sharing of user-created digital design files. Providing primarily open source hardware designs licensed under the GNU General Public License or Creative Commons licenses, users choose the type of user license they wish to attach to the designs they share. Short review
3D printing/printer (short review)
Charles hull thanks of this founder of 3D printer because of him we can design lots of thing or lots of design that we wanted to do 
this is one of emerging technologies that i want to share to us because in simple printers have become much better because of the different things they can do, such as home appliances or damaged items that are not replaced will have the chance to do something again but to change and improve every technology we have. We should be responsible for it and we need to learn to have the limit.. and to look at technology like 3D-PRINTER because of it  easy to find a donor of body parts because of this technology and also save time and spend time to our family . for new  technologies we can learn To appreciate it because it will become part of our lives. And we will have to decide or depend on how good or bad we are to use it
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seanmeverett · 7 years
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Comparing Entertainment Streaming Services
Who wins: Apple, Amazon, Spotify, Netflix, HBO Go or all-in-one Playster?
I. Setting the Stage
This is the second half of a two-part review of Playster’s entertainment service. In Part I, we dug deep into Playster’s product and content offering across streaming movies, music, games, and books. We also noted the rarity of the free headphones and tablet that came with a full $25/month subscription.
In this Part II, we compare Playster to its competition — some that bundle many of the same services together, and some that only offer one standalone service, like music.
This won’t be a ticky-tacky feature by boring feature comparison of the various services. You can find plenty of that on the internet. And in reality it doesn’t help you make a decision.
Rather, what this analysis is about is walking the reader through the decision-making process by starting high-level, and then drilling in where it matters. Then figuring out the decision points, and making them. Finally we will whittle a list of 9 services down to a single critical question that you will need to answer for yourself.
It’s different, but we feel that’s where all the value is.
II. High-Level Competitive Assessment
The first thing we did to compare the services was, as you might have guessed, list out the first brands that came to mind for each of music, movies, games, and books.
For books, you might think Amazon, since they have such a long-standing history of selling books online. For movies, likely Netflix since they are closing in on nearly 100 million subscribers globally, or maybe HBO Now since we grew up with it. Music is a bit more competitive in the average consumer’s mind. Spotify, of course, and then there’s the newcomer Apple Music after its Beats acquistion. It wasn’t just for the headphones.
But gaming is more difficult. Which service do you subscribe to in order to play an unlimited amount of video games? There’s the Apple App store and Google Play store, but you still have to pay for individual apps. Steem is more about giving you the ability to play games on your computer, but doesn’t let you subscribe Netflix style. There’s Gamefly, which lets you subscribe to rent both movies and games, one or two physical disks at a time. And now NVIDIA is riding its AI GPU wave of success into the “Netflix of Gaming” business with its Shield set-top box product and a GEFORCE Now subscription. But your average, casual gamer has no clue this box even exists.
So how does our high-level comparison shake out for the services that have things bundled? Something like this:
Once you put it on a page, the first thing you notice is how few real competitors there are for a totally bundled solution across all entertainment for the casual consumer.
You’re really only looking at Google, Apple, Amazon, and Playster. The other big names just focus on one thing. Which is funny because, at least for movies and music, the technology is basically the same. You’re streaming bits across a CDN.
The real magic in each of these businesses, of course, is the rights deals. Without the rights to the high-value content, you won’t attract anyone to your service.
But before we get into that, let’s zoom in one layer deeper and understand how much this is going to cost me. Because if it’s too expensive, it’s a non-starter.
III. Price Comparison
Instead of comparing the monthly cost between services, we decided to level-set it across a year. This helps normalize the cost of the headphones and tablet that you get included in the Combo Box from Playster.
Note: Playster requires that you pay a full 12 months to get the hardware for free. You can’t just sign up for a month, get the headphones and tablet, then cancel. However, they do not require that you pay for all 12 months up-front. You only need to the $24.95 monthly fee. If you do cancel, they will charge you an early termination fee to offset the cost of the hardware that you didn’t end up paying for as part of the monthly fee. This seems more than fair and reasonable from our perspective.
We’ve used the same analysis chart from above, only this time we’ve filled it in with the details of what we believe a reasonable person would use on average per month. We then added it all up across a full year, ordering the most expensive service on the left and the cheapest on the right.
Because Playster is the only company to bundle a tablet and headphones, we had to take a best guess as to similar hardware a consumer might choose in the same price range and ecosystem. For example, we imagine an Amazon-loyal person might choose Amazon’s tablet, the Fire. Or, if you’re an all-Apple ecosystem person, you’d likely get the iPad mini 2, which is the cheapest tablet they offer. Google only had one tablet, the Pixel C, for sale so we went with that.
We did the same with headphones. You might be surprised to find out two very interesting things:
Amazon makes “basic” products, including $15 on-ear headphones.
Beats makes an entry-level on-ear headphone for only $99.
Wow, how about Google and Apple at the high end? They’re nearly an entire order of magnitude more expensive. How is an average citizen supposed to afford that, especially if it’s for your kids? It’s untenable. Two kids at about a grand each and you’re looking at $2,000 per year, which doesn’t even include the smart phone bill and cellular service or WiFi on top of it to stream all of this data.
Call Apple and Google Tier 1 priced services.
Playster, however, is much closer to Amazon, it seems. And now that we see them side-by-side like this, they seem to have similar sorts of brand aesthetics. The price is very close. It’s entertainment, but utilitarian in that it gets out of your way and doesn’t try to be overly playful or too buttoned-up. Get in, get your content, and get on with your day.
Call Amazon and Playster Tier 2 priced services.
That then leaves the more focused services, which we’ll call Tier 3. Funny enough, if you’re paying attention to the total cost, these Tier 3 priced services are nearly as expensive as the bundled approaches, which seems silly on the surface. If you created your own bundle of these across the different content types, you’re going to be paying 2x to 3x more than the Tier 2 bundle.
Looking just at price alone, it makes absolutely no sense to use a single service or the not-really-bundled services of Apple and Google. That leaves only Playster and Amazon as real contenders if price is your main consideration and you’re happy with an 80/20 rule of content. Sure, with those two you might miss a few songs or movies, but if it’s for your kids, maybe it doesn’t matter as much.
Next, we need to zoom in another level deeper of granularity to unpack why someone would subscribe to one of these services over the other, or subscribe to multiple services.
IV. All-In-One Versus Build Your Own Bundle
Now that we know our likely decision if it was based solely on price (Amazon or Playster), we need to consider the implications of what type of content you want. The majority of people watch movies and listen to music, likely more than playing games or reading books. So that’s where we’ll start.
Say you just wanted a movie subscription and a music subscription. You’d start with maybe Netflix and HBO Now, as they’re familiar, to get the most well-rounded content offering. Right there, you’re at $300 per year.
Add in a music streaming service. Spotify has about 40 million subscribers to Apple Music’s 20 million, but Apple is growing faster and has a much larger ecosystem and install base. In addition, Apple is getting into original video content and there have been various rumors about Apple making a large media acquisition to round out their Apple TV service. We’ve written previously about trying to value music streaming services, which is a good place to go from a financial valuation standpoint.
If you’re just joining the music streaming revolution, then it’s likely you’re only going to choose one provider. If you figure Spotify and Apple Music have a similar content library, then we suggest Apple’s version simply because they have the massive cash pile and global customer base to make more improvements, faster, in return for our $10 per month.
Adding up the movies, TV shows, and music streaming services, we’re looking at $420 per year so far. We still need books and gaming. If we’re choosing Apple for music, then maybe we look to their iPhone/iPad family for reading and gaming as well. That, of course, requires we pay individually for a book we want, a game or app we want.
This is the route I’ve personally taken. Buy individual movies from iTunes where new releases aren’t included in Netflix, HBO Now. I buy a book every so often, listen to music rarely (but still subscribe to Apple Music). I don’t buy games or apps, unless it’s work related. I also own an Apple TV.
So the approach I’ve taken is the build-your-own-bundle maneuver. Unfortunately, it’s cost me a pretty penny. An iPhone 7, a 13" MacBook Pro with TouchBar, an Apple TV, Netflix, Internet, and HBO Now means I’m paying thousands of dollars every year.
So, if you’re like me, you’ll probably design your own bundle. But I’m not a normal consumer. I’m a professional.
If you’re a normal consumer, or a family with kids who want to have a bit of their own independence, we recommend going the bundled approach. Amazon or Playster and then if you don’t find something you’re looking for, you can buy it on a one-off basis. Buy that hardcover book or DVD in physical form, or just purchase the digital version through one of the various app stores while enjoying the cheaper price.
And that really only leaves two options: Amazon & Playster.
V. Content Comparison & The Ultimate Question
Let’s begin with a refresh of Playster’s list of content partners. As you can see from the below, it’s pretty well rounded, especially for music, movies, and books.
Amazon says they have 2 million songs so the music side is likely a wash. They also describe their video service as “thousands of movies and TV shows” plus their own original content. Looking at the selection of titles featured on both of their movie homepages might be the best way to compare the content.
Here’s Playster (first) and Amazon (second) side-by-side:
You’ll notice a completely different title list. Amazon is showing off their most high-value content titles, of course, while Playster is showing off their algorithm for ranking and recommending titles. Neither tell you how big their library is. Amazon shows more of the blockbuster Hollywood titles from the past, but the library likely isn’t that consistent or deep with this.
Meanwhile, Playster is showing the real “average” titles that I would expect to find exactly in their service. So I like Playster’s transparency here. It’s hard to make a judgement for anyone in this regard because movies are so personal, much like music, so you’re going to have to judge for yourself. But I would think Amazon has a few high-end titles than Playster, but otherwise are pretty close to each other.
And the other aspect to understand is you can always just go to Apple TV and rent a movie you want for $3.99. so I wouldn’t get too caught up on individual titles.
The books, and games, to me are secondary to movies and music.
If you’re a voracious reader and it’s all you care about, Playster has a mountainous library of titles that should cover most of your needs. And again, you can always go one-off if need be. But the truth is, if you’re already reading that much, it’s highly likely you have an Amazon Kindle and have been plugging away for years. So maybe you’re looking for something to give you music and movies and here we find ourselves again. Amazon is likely to give you a larger books library due to their decades of selling books online.
For gaming, Amazon offers access to Twitch, but that’s not really gaming in the way you’re thinking about it. Twitch lets you watch other people play games. While Playster lets you play games. So Playster wins in this regard.
Our best recommendation is to browse and preview Playster’s service for yourself before ever signing up to see if it meets your content needs.
Finally, the thing that Amazon has on Playster when you subscribe to their Prime service is free shipping on eCommerce items, but they don’t give you a tablet nor a pair of headphones. And truth be told, we’ve chosen the most low-end hardware we could from Amazon to see how cheap we could get it.
The decision for you, then, ultimately comes down to one simple question:
Do you value a tablet and headphones more than free shipping from Amazon?
If so, then Playster is your only choice. If not, go with Amazon.
— Sean
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Review of Soylent’s Coffiest
Comparing Entertainment Streaming Services was originally published in Humanizing Tech on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.
from Stories by Sean Everett on Medium http://ift.tt/2mFxtTD
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addcrazy-blog · 7 years
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New Post has been published on Add Crazy
New Post has been published on https://addcrazy.com/unfastened-amazon-alexa-app-for-mac-and-ios-devices/
Unfastened Amazon Alexa app for Mac and iOS devices
Amazon’s Alexa device has proven to be pretty popular with many home users, and some already built-and it to be a better voice assistant than Apple’s Siri. Now there may be an app built-intention to will let you use Amazon’s Alexa built integrated iOS device or Mac.
IOS: Get the Free Reverb app for Amazon’s Alexa
Reverb for iOS is a Free app that lets you use Alexa everywhere. Right here’s the legit description from the iOS App Shop:
Reverb built-in you to built-interaction with Alexa from anywhere. Thru Alexa, Reverb answers questions, reports site visitors and climate, offers data integrated on neighborhood bus built integrated, presents sports activities built-in and schedules, and extra us built integrated the Alexa Voice Provider.
Reverb now uses Alexa v2, which provides a guide for timers, alarms, lengthy form audio, audiobooks, and more.
It could additionally integrate with clever devices which are well suited with Alexa, built-in integrated lights integrated, switches, and thermostats compatible Samsung SmartThintegratedgs, WeMo, Philips Hue, and others.
Alexa is constantly built-integrated new capabilities, plus hundreds of competencies like 1-800-plant life, Animal Sounds, and extra
Reverb does now not assist song because of Alexa does not permit the use of Amazon music built-in apps. Handiest hardware implementations are allowed to play Amazon music.
Currently, the iOS model of Reverb for Amazon Alexa has a 4.five megastar built-in, so truly integrated users seem to be embrace built-ing it on their iPhones, iPads, and iPod touch gadgets.
Mac: Get the Free Reverb app for Amazon’s Alexa
And don’t worry if you want to apply Alexa to your integrated Mac, there’s a Mac version of Reverb, for that as properly. Here’s the authentic description from the Mac App Save:
Reverb built-in you to integrated with Alexa from anywhere. Thru Alexa, Reverb solutions questions reviews traffic and climate, gives built-info on nearby integrated, affords sports activities built-in and schedules, and greater built-in the Alexa Voice Provider.
Reverb now makes use of Alexa v2, which provides assist for timers, alarms, long form audio, audiobooks, and greater.
It is able to additionally built integrated with clever devices which are well matched with Alexa, built-includes built-ing, switches, and thermostats well suited Samsung SmartThbuilt-ings, WeMo, Philips Hue, and others.
Reverb for the Mac additionally appears to be built-integrated its customers, it has a 4 superstar built-in integrated built-in Mac App Store as I write this post.
Apple can’t be glad approximately Amazon’s Alexa voice assistant on the Mac and iOS gadgets
I’m built-instead surprised to see the Reverb for Amazon Alexa app to be had for iOS and the Mac. I’m sure Apple can’t be satisfied that one built integrated Siri’s largest competition has quietly made its debut on Apple’s platforms.
However, Apple built integrated figures that an obscure third birthday party app probably isn’t built-ing to challenge Siri integrated any sizable way. Otherwise, the company may have tried to ban the app from built-integrated withbuiltintegrated Mac and iOS App Shops.
I’m no longer partial to Siri (or some other voice assistant for that count number) because it built integrated seems to paintings right for me. I’ve determbuiltintegrated it’s quicker to built-integrated or faucet than it’s far to rely on Siri for built-ing, so I’ve it grew to become off on my iOS devices and on my Mac.
How to Without problems Enable Emoji Icons built-in iOS tool
The built integrated integrated: a photograph is well worth 1000 words ranks genu built integrated with Apple’s built-in built integrated, iOS devices. Many iPod touch and iPhone proprietors use their gadgets each day to communicate with buddies and own family. What if I tell you that you can built-innately send greater than just textual content built for your textual content messages? And satisfactory integrate built-in is, all iOS gadgets have emoji icons 7fd5144c552f19a3546408d3b9cfb251. You’ll built-in How to Permit them integrated this text.
Emoji icons are cute little pics that represents built-insomethbuiltintegrated integrated our each day lives. You could, built-in alternative “I love you” with a simple emoji icon that represents a coronary heart. it is normally used and supported built-in integrated maximum cell phones built-in-Japan.
built-in emoji to your integrated iOS tool is simple, however now not for the integrated of coronary heart. One of the most effective strategies is to first jailbreak your device. The term jailbreak itself may sound a little built-intimidatintegratedg, however, it is a technique built-in you adjust your tool’s mac built integrated software to do what it turned built integrated no longer built intended to do. And as soon as it’s miles jailbroken, you could then Allow emoji thru an easy put built integrated.
Some other method to Enable emoji icons on your tool would be to use a simple software enabler. These software programs are Easily built-line integrated integrated App Store. easy look for emoji and you may built-inbuilt integrated few. As a remember of personal choice, I like to move the software enabler approach, as this doesn’t require that I jailbreak my device.
When you Permit emoji for your iOS tool, it Handiest requires some simple steps to configure it. most software enablers will built integrated what to do built-in their manuals, so I’m able to no longer cross integrated detail Right here.
nicely, there you have it – the simplest method to Allow emoji for your iOS tool, be it the iPod touch, iPhone 3G, iPhone 3GS or maybe the new iPhone 4. They’re all supported.
Calendar App for Mac Customers
It adds directly to the ease in case you keep things as organized as viable. This facilitates in keeping a balance among your private and expert existence. Flexibits is simply the proper solution so that it will allow you in coping with all of the sports. The Calendar app for $14.99 has managed to offer a time supervisor to Mac Customers who’ve trouble in managing daily obligations. Moreover, this app works together with your calendar too and also you need now not leave out-out on appointments or schedules which might be defined on your very own calendar. You could download this app from the Mac App store.
Smooth Setup
Fantastical is all approximately imparting the fine ever calendar provider to its Users. It’s far compact in layout and has a Smooth to apply interface. Additionally, it consists of the set up of your own calendar and works along with it. It’s far able to integrate the services among packages and highlighting the objects for Clean schedule show.
It is simple to installation this software initially. When you try to launch it you’ll want to furnish permission for getting access to your internet group. It also asks for consumer permission for the automated launch of the software as quickly as you log on your system. You’ll be capable of getting an outline of the complete month along with an entire list of events under the calendar. You may edit the list thru desired menu by using the equipment icon. This allows you specify the advent of events in a list. You can pick out to view a number of activities or greater at a given time or set a concern that consists of the name or due date of the occasion.
Language Input options
Fantastical is simpler to access due to the fact its’ icon is there on the Menu bar itself. You could additionally press Ctrl+Alternative+ space. It is easy to feature new icons via coming into an event inside the text box placed at the top of the calendar. if you want to search for items then You could utilize the occasion area box. This may help in looking through the whole calendar database for the required occasion. You can kind of an event the usage of colloquial language as properly. This event might be saved in File event. As quickly as you type in to search for the occasion it will fetch the exact result. You could also upload alarms, notes or enter names of those who are attending the occasion.
The satisfactory feature of Fantastical is that it integrates your touch list out of your Mac. Whenever you input the call of a person in an event, id will pop up. That is beneficial even as sending out invites to specific contacts for an occasion.
Profitable Device
It’s far hard to toggle between creating two entries in the calendar. You may opt for a slider manipulate in event facts to effortlessly switch between creating activities. occasion statistics have extraordinary fields like, from and to dates, all-day occasion, invitation list, notes, calendar preference, and alarm. Different Option of Reminder facts allows in setting the priority of an event primarily based on its significance. For instance, a crucial occasion like attending an essential occasion can be set as high. The satisfactory component is that You could without problems find an event for the day with the aid of clicking on the dot below the date. it’s going to also monitor the listing of the occasion for the day. if you want to peer extra information or edit an object, double-click the occasion. This can monitor all the info including the date and time of the event.
In the case of a wrong calendar entry, You can o to Edit occasion and delete it. You may be requested to delete it from the calendar earlier than deleting it from the calendar.
End
Fantastical appears to be the best and the maximum Easy to apply Alternative. However, there are a few drawbacks on this app. You may locate it hard to delete occasions. Any other thing is which you can not create activities that arise on a month-to-month or quarterly foundation. Nevertheless, It’s far a Device worth using for organizing your responsibilities with the minimal problem and Clean to create controls.
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Review: The AirPods area unit fine wireless headphones for a particular style of person
If you are method into Apple, your EarPods work, and you have got expendable money, welcome. When we reviewed the iPhone seven in Gregorian calendar month, we tend to conjointly have to be compelled to pay it slow with a combine of the flowery new wireless AirPods. At the time, the “final” versions were slated to ship in precisely a couple of weeks, however the planned late October unleash was delayed with no reason or time estimate given. AirPods didn’t truly begin shipping till earlier this month, and quantities were restricted enough that shipping times quickly slipped to January and Gregorian calendar month.
Apple doesn’t sometimes wish to announce things early, and it doesn’t wish to miss its own deadlines publically, however it conjointly required to own a daring statement concerning the wireless future to travel together with the iPhone 7’s missing electro-acoustic transducer jack. however the issues with the AirPods, whether or not they were wireless problems or producing bottlenecks, were apparently severe enough for the temporal arrangement to slide.
Apple sent America a final production version of the AirPods in exchange for the non-final version we tend to tested before. the corporate wouldn’t tell America what the variations were, though, and everything from the packaging to the markings on the hardware to the pairing method and audio quality is seemingly identical. therewith in mind, we’ve revisited and dilated our original impressions—but final hardware hasn't modified those impressions dramatically.
Unpacking and mistreatment the AirPods
The AirPods are available tiny|alittle|atiny low} cardboard box with a USB-A to Lightning cable however no separate power adapter—another small speedbump on the road to USB-C. It’s simple to miss the very fact that there’s a cable within the box the least bit, hidden because it is underneath the box’s white cardboard insert.
The headphones themselves are available atiny low shiny white flip-top case paying homage to a floss dispenser or a igniter, and also the case's end is identical stylish to the one Apple uses for the Apple Pencil. Clearly shiny white-and-silver is that the method forward for Apple’s sensible accessories, when the Macs and iPhones they hook up with stick with metal or shiny black. The case conjointly is a mobile wireless charger for the buds themselves, and there’s atiny low feminine Lightning instrumentation at rock bottom to charge it up. There’s an almost invisible button on the rear of the case for pairing—the W1 chip plus iCloud can create it in order that several consumers ne'er ought to use it, however you’ll ought to press it with the AirPods within to combine it with any traditional Bluetooth devices, and it’s useful if things come back mismatched.
A small indicator light-weight between the 2 AirPods within the charger case tells you once the buds area unit charged and once they still would like a lot of time—green suggests that charged, orange suggests that charging. the sunshine also will gently pulse white whereas the case is in pairing mode.
On AN iPhone, pairing is accomplished by flipping open the highest of the case close to your phone—this works precisely the same method notwithstanding whether or not you’re mistreatment AN iPhone five or AN iPhone seven, that is pretty cool. Hit "Connect" on your phone, and you’re able to go. After that, you'll check your AirPods’ battery level within the Batteries gizmo, otherwise you will flip the highest of the case close to your phone to create a custom battery standing sheet for each the AirPods and also the case. Take one among the AirPods out of the case whereas this sheet is visible, and it will show you the battery level for every individual AirPod rather than the battery level for each directly. For no obvious technical reason, neither the pairing nor the battery standing sheet work on iPads or iPod Touches.
Apple says that the AirPods themselves will offer up to 5 hours of battery life on one charge, that the battery case will charge them enough to urge you up to a complete of twenty four hours, which pop dead AirPods into the battery case for quarter-hour can yield concerning 3 hours of battery life. this can be Apple’s normal answer to questions about longevity with its Bluetooth accessories: charging the Magic Mouse a pair of with the port on rock bottom, the Apple Pencil that juts awkwardly out of rock bottom of your iPad, or the AirPods may be annoying, however in a very pinch you don’t ought to charge them for long to urge you the maximum amount power as you wish to complete doing no matter you’re doing. It’s a compromise, for sure, however it’s habitable.
Charged AirPods sitting in their case can slowly drain the case battery over time. fully unattended, the case discharges at the speed of 10-or-so % each day. You won’t ought to charge daily, however once each 2 or 3 days could be a affordable estimate.
The AirPods area unit formed specifically like Apple’s normal EarPods, thus if you hate the method the wired earbuds feel or if they physically don’t slot in your ears, you won’t like these either. however the sound quality is perceptibly higher than the three.5mm or Lightning AirPods. particularly, the bass is clearer and louder, that is usually the most important issue with low cost or weak speakers and headphones. And you'll attribute the development to the limited cutout on the rear of the headphones.
In regular EarPods, this cutout is simply a little slit. In AirPods, it’s larger with its own very little speaker grille. place your fingers over that cutout on the AirPods whereas music is enjoying, and you’ll hear the bass tones change state entirely. thus AirPods could also be costly, however a minimum of you’ll get AN audio-quality upgrade if you spring for them.
The standard EarPods work simply fine in my ears, thus i used to be ne'er upset concerning the AirPods separation even though i used to be running or tilting my head around. In fact, while not a cable shove them or obtaining caught on things, the headphones truly feel lighter and fewer vulnerable to setting out than the quality EarPods do. whether or not i used to be cookery or doing chores round the house or going for a jog, I ne'er had any downside with AirPods escaping.
My main downside is that the controls on the AirPods area unit rather more limiting than those on the wired earbuds. the quality receiver comes with atiny low nub on the wire that controls volume and may play and pause playback, however it’s conjointly capable of tons a lot of if you recognize the way to use it. you'll skip tracks and return to previous tracks, alter Siri, scrub forward and backward in audio, use it as an overseas trigger to snap photos, and answer or finish calls. The AirPods can’t even do volume changes, and if you wish them to be ready to play and pause music, you’ll either ought to get within the habit of removing one from your ear (at that purpose the AirPods stop enjoying automatically) or put off double-tap-for-Siri in favor of double-tap-to-play/pause.
To replace these lost functions, Apple turns to Siri, that is a lot of practical in some ways—you will arouse directions, check AirPod or iPhone battery standing, raise concerning the weather, and every one the opposite stuff you'll do with Siri. however it’s not continually acceptable or doable to use voice controls for everything. What if you wish to regulate the amount however you’re already on a call? What if you’re on a train while not web property and can’t reach Siri? What if you simply don’t like rebuke your phone or if you like the moment feedback of a button to the delayed (and doubtless misinterpreted) feedback of voice controls? As I’ve used the AirPods longer and switched back and forth between the AirPods and EarPods, this has become the factor I’ve likable the smallest amount.
On high of all that, the initial swift, unforgiving web reaction to the AirPods still resonates, and that i don’t love having small white straws jabbing 2 inches out of my ears even though I do principally just like the method they sound and work. It’s not a retardant if I’m sitting at my table or wandering round the house, however after you go outside in them you are doing feel like there’s a large white shiny arrow pointed at you that everybody will see. currently that they’re setting out to get around into the wild, the sensation could disappear as they become a lot of normalized. I found the same factor to be true of the Apple Watch, that felt ostentatious initially however felt less conspicuous because the sight of them became a lot of common.
If you are doing hate the planning of Apple’s headphones, the W1-equipped Beats models ought to offer you an equivalent pairing expertise in a very totally different package. Otherwise, it’s Bluetooth or bust.
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