And like with the iPad, Apple doesn't make a profit from selling hardware, but hooking you up on a fantasy of a digital life, they only ever tease technologically, but never really deliver. At some point, you will always find yourself held back by artificial and practical limitations (at least if you desire to actually use the hardware as advertised), with the false promise of yet another Apple gadget finally making you whole. They don't make profit from producing either tablets, or smart watches, but the sunken cost fallacy in their ultimately crippling ecosystem.
If Apple made a profit by selling standalone devices, I could respect this argument. But especially with the iPad and its fully capable processing power to replace a general purpose computing device, it's easy to see how their business "ingenuity" is set up.
As someone, who fell for it twice, I think frustration and sadness about yet another competitor dropping out is absolutely warranted and relatable.
> And like with the iPad, Apple doesn't make a profit from selling hardware…
Incorrect, Apple makes money selling devices (except potentially Apple Vision, in the short term), which have an average gross margin of ~35%. Average gross margin across all products is ~45%.
You wrote, "If Apple made a profit by selling standalone devices, I could respect this argument", so I thought you'd find it useful to know that they do.
They don't sell standalone devices. They are all heavily dependent from and integrated into the Apple ecosystem. Try using an Apple Watch without an iPhone. Ever tried to share files between a non Apple device and your iPad?
I am well aware they make and sell hardware. But it's all locked down to some extent.
For sure — other than the Mac, Apple is no longer a general-purpose computer company. I'm content with that, but I'm glad there are choices for people who aren't.
The comment you responded to is about profit, not market penetration.
You can get a lot of market penetration by having a series of companies spin up, ultimately fail to become profitable, and collapse. Especially with a market that's incredibly price conscious.
To have a profit in a specific country there have to be enough people with iDevices to start with.
Like US is basically Apple takes it all, the rest of the world there are country where only rich kids get iDevices, those country apps companies care about the whole population.
