Apple's Business Model

[xgsjx]

I'm more a Vectrex man myself.

[ambient]

[quote name='Dan Dare' timestamp='1503655028' post='3359959']
Apple's business model? Bleed the customer white...
[/quote]

How?

My MacBook is now almost 6 years old. I got a great educational discount when I bought it, courtesy of Apple, not the shop I bought it from. I bought Logic Pro X a day after I bought the MacBook, again I got a discount for buying that. It's a fantastic bit of software that I use for several hours everyday, it has never ever crashed or frozen on me.

I've updated it a couple of times whenever an update is released, these are always free.

[project_c]

I'm no Apple fanboy but does anyone remember how expensive Logic used to be before Apple bought it from Emagic? Costs peanuts now in comparison, and the amount of stuff you get is staggering. I paid hundreds for it back in the day, and had to buy things like the sampler separately. Wasn't there a Logic Gold? The 'deluxe' version. I'm sure it cost over a grand.

Software gets updated from time to time and you have to pay for that sometimes, it's the way software works. It's not Apple, its software and the nature of technology.

I'm still running Logic 9 btw, but i'll upgrade when i need to. It's not expensive. I would love to take people who complain about the cost of music software back to the 90s and show them how music was made back then. We used to spend 10s of thousands on clunky boxes that did very little. And then they became obsolete too.

[SpondonBassed]

[quote name='Woodinblack' timestamp='1503661657' post='3360059']
I remember no such promise ever by anyone. Where does that come from?...
[/quote]

BBC science programs mainly.

[Woodinblack]

[quote name='SpondonBassed' timestamp='1503676281' post='3360266']
BBC science programs mainly.
[/quote]

The ones that also promised flying cars and jetpacks?

And that one day we would have mobile telephones that you could carry the batteries for in a backpack.

[stingrayPete1977]

I haven't purchased an Apple product since the day they automatically gave me the U2 album

[project_c]

[quote name='stingrayPete1977' timestamp='1503691949' post='3360410']
I haven't purchased an Apple product since the day they automatically gave me the U2 album
[/quote]

That was unforgivable. I can't say I've not bought their stuff since but I certainly haven't opened itunes since that day. Soiled forever.

[Beedster]

[quote name='BigRedX' timestamp='1503608466' post='3359714']
If it works as you want, there is absolutely no reason to update any computer software. If the applications you are using don't run under the next version of the operating system then [b]DON'T UPDATE IT[/b].

I still run Logic 9 under El Capitan. Both do everything In need, and therefore I see no reason to muck about with updates to either.
[/quote]

This. I still run Pro Tools 8 on Snow Leopard, and neither goes anywhere near the internet, and I still have this forum to thank for that extremely useful piece of advice when I was setting up the studio in 2010. All the hardware works just fine, and I like it that way (specifically my Mackie 1640i desk). I simply don't use any equipment that would require updating my software.

OK, I guess one day something's going to go wrong with either the computer or the desk, but frankly I find navigating the constant issues around compatibility, bugs etc with software in other areas of my life to be sufficiently tiresome to ensure that I prefer the risk of major hardware failure than the almost daily hassle of software issues (when I bought the gear in question I was on the phone constantly to Avid in an attempt to iron out issues between the three core components, the desk, Pro Tools, and the iMac. Even given I had bought all three on the basis of 'compatibility', it took almost two weeks to get them to talk to each other, a process that involved my deleting various files, loading (and on several occasions subsequently deleting) custom versions of the software etc.

But back to the OP's observation, Apple are no different to any other business, and perhaps far more customer-centred than many. They are always being bashed for the simple reason that they are a massive and successful business, but one that has to update its products at a frantic pace to keep pace. Perhaps it's a sign of my age, but I've always been an Apple fan, simply because of what they were trying to do in the 80's and 90's. Today they are in a different market - one which to an extent they themselves created and defined - and so are a different proposition I'll admit. They're a little like Nike, innovating thinkers and engineers for a niche market of passionate devotees in the 1970's turned mass-market fashion leader 20 years later. Both companies changed the world to an extent, but both face huge problems of their own design.