The geek chic experience
Wales Business — By Adam Higgitt on June 30, 2010 7:00 am
Queuing in Brighton for the iPhone 4
WALK into any mobile phone shop in Wales today and you will be able to pick up a truly outstanding smart mobile phone. The Samsung Galaxy S is brand new, and has launched to rave reviews. It has a wonderfully bright and crisp 4 inch screen based on the very latest display technology. It runs the latest release of the cutting edge and acclaimed Google Android operating system, giving access to over 35,000 downloadable apps. It contains a camera, satellite navigation, MP3 player and much else besides. For a contract starting from around £25 per month you can get this market-leading piece of portable technology for nothing. So why did tens of thousands of people spend up to several hours each last week to pay up as much as £320 for a new Apple iPhone, with much the same specifications and much the same mobile contract terms?
This is what Apple likes to call “the experience”, a quality that elevates its products beyond a paper comparison, which leaves consumers begging for more, and which builds in a margin far beyond that of its competitors. Apple’s share of the mobile phone market is tiny but its share of the profits from that market is substantial.
Apple’s ability to create a buzz around its product launches is looked upon enviously by rivals, and with growing resentment by consumer technology journalists and bloggers weary of fighting for scraps of solid information amid the rumour. A cottage industry has sprung up in which the commodity is rumour about Cupertino, the Californian city in which Apple is based. Every titbit, from suspiciously large orders for new screens from the Far East, to mundane product refresh details are devoured instantly and go globally viral within minutes. For the iPhone 4, and despite a major incident in which a prototype was left in a bar, the rumour mill has been spinning fast enough to feed the five thousand. Come the launch and subsequent release no detail was spared by those covering the events. Unboxing – the art of filming a new product being removed from its packaging and turned on the first time – is a staple feature of the gadget blog. But never before has there been a liveblog of the unboxing, featuring such penetrating insights as “cellophane off – now for the box tabs”. For the iPhone launch, we got one.
In such a climate, you might think that no major new Apple product can live up to the many expectations heaped upon its finely milled aluminium and glass frame. Yet, somehow, Apple’s products nearly always seem to delight rather than disappoint. The expectation hill gets steeper, and yet like some Sisyphus of the technology world, Apple always seems to get the boulder to the top.
The iPhone 4, tipped as arguably the first full-scale replacement to 2007′s 2G effort was a bigger boulder than most. The hardware advances are substantial enough, if not revolutionary: a faster chip, better battery life, a superior camera (including HD video) and a screen that most reckon establishes a new standard – all in a smaller frame. But on the software side the new iPhone is a crawl forward: the ability to multi-task (something most other smartphones feature as standard) and to organise apps into folders are its highlights. Apple’s launch strapline (“this changes everything. Again”) seems hard to justify when much of what was familiar remains so.
Yet still they queued, paying handsomely for an unreviewed product and tying themselves to a two-year contract in most cases. And when the reviews came in they nearly all placed the new iPhone at the top of the smartie tree. Cupertino had the most successful product launch in its history and the presumptuous likes of Google were once more placed relegated to the also-ran box.
So why? For some Apple still stands as the antithesis of “Wintel”, the ugly agglomeration of Microsoft and Intel and all that is bad about personal computing: complex, modular, corporate, bland. Apple’s appeal is that of the creative, the free spirit, the rebellious, the straightforward. But this is surely an image that resonates to only a few who remember Apple’s time as a boutique manufacturer. To everyone else, it is synonymous with the iPod, a product with such powerful brand awareness that, like the biro and hoover, it denotes an entire product class. The mass-market audience neither know of Steve Jobs, nor pay any attention to his theatrical product launch keynotes.
Much attention focuses on Apple’s visual gimmicks; screens that suggest gravity and bounce as you scroll to the bottom, pages that gratifyingly retreat so that others can come forward, album covers the blur past as you search for music. These are important and create a more compelling and human user experience. But, as Apple showed when launching its latest computer operating system “Snow Leopard” last year, it can follow others here; Snow Leopard arguably borrows visually from the hated Windows Vista. The integrated nature of the Apple offering is also cited and Apple itself plays heavily on this, arguing that their products “just work”, in contrast to cranky, clunky Windows-based systems. Yet as even an Apple PR would admit, Cupertino’s products are far from immune to crashing, hanging and disagreeing with various bits of software – as anyone who has installed the new iPhone operating system on an old iPhone 3G can now attest.
Apple has forged its place because it has genuinely pushed back the boundaries of user interface. The iPod’s scroll wheel transformed the MP3 player. The iPhone’s “multitouch” screen abolished the clumsy stylus and invented one-handed touch screen smart phone operation. And in areas where it did not lead it has often innovated; the App Store gave birth to the iPhone as a whole new platform and is now being reverse engineered into televisions, not to mention all of Apple’s smartphone competitors. iTunes made legal download services viable and desirable. The iPad made the tablet PC a real proposition. Microsoft makes light of Apple’s innovation, and Google suggests malice in Cupertino’s closed-source approach to development, but neither should underestimate the depths of advances in mass-market man-machine interfaces it has achieved.
But the re-birth of Apple has also been partly serendipitous, coming at a time when demands for greater control of information and mobility have come together and intensified sharply. The device that can put into the palm of your hand the ability to manipulate disparate social interaction and the vast expanses of the media-rich web has gained a special place in our lives, and with the iPhone Apple has simply pulled off this trick better than most. The inverted definition of the word “geek” has tracked this cultural phenomenon; once used to describe the friendless obsessive, it has become a term of endearment and even admiration. The apotheosis of this “geek chic” is the Apple Fanboy, someone both cool and brainy, both successful and socially responsible. The search for this combination, as much as any desire for classic industrial design or cutting-edge usability, drove people to queue for a new mobile phone last week, and will keep the Apple “experience” fresh for iPhone 5 in 2012.
Tags: Apple, Mobile phones, technology
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6 Comments
I don’t know why I hate Apple so much, maybe it’s a sectarian thing, based on a long worship of the impact Microsoft has had on the world.
Maybe because their products are so expensive.
Maybe because they have a *****-like (deleted on legal advice) approach to sharing their technology (no support for Flash – Veto on Apps – control of each step of the iTunes process)
Maybe it’s because it makes everyone into an evangelist – and I’m basically miserable.
Dunno. Don’t care. Don’t like.
National institution Stephen Fry – who has done more than most in the UK to popularise both the legitimacy of intellectual endeavour and the importance of conserving endangered wildlife – blots his cred copybook by his blind, slavish promotion of all things Apple. (OK: his friendship with Charles Windsor and his alleged enthusiasm for foxhunting aren’t exactly endearing, either.) Fry’s passion seems to be founded on the lauded user interface experience noted by Adam.
His enthusiasm for Apple stuff even extends to participating in their launch of the iPad (one can only assume it was geeky excitement that inspired his involvement – it’s not like he needs an appearance fee).
I’m tired of friends newly converted to iPhone thrusting their handset in my face to show me their latest must-see app. That said, I have to admit I’m more ambivalent about Apple’s cachet than David. I share his resentment of Jobs’s iconic status. But I acknowledge the force of Adam’s observation about Apple users’ perceived “‘geek chic’ … someone both cool and brainy, both successful and socially responsible”.
[signed: a CrackBerry user - though the iPod's handy on the train...]
It maybe worth remarking that when Apple launched an Apple Distinguished Educator programme, two of the first three in the UK worked in Wales. As an educator I liked planning teaching and learning with Apple products because there were so many things I didn’t have to worry about that got in the way of what I wanted my students to engage with. Things were consistent, worked on a plug and play basis, they didn’t do things in a way that were unexpected, were open and transparent….
In exchange for that you had to accept there was an Apple way of doing things. If you veered away from their user interface guidelines you would breach the consistency rules… which is one reason why apps need approval and why some are rejected. It remains cool because of the user experience – damage that and you lose the magic.
I currently have a rather naff two year old smart phone from a northern European manufacturer. I am about to upgrade. The question I ask my self is this “Do I buy from a company that wants to sell me hardware and good software that runs on it or do I buy from a company that wants to put advertising onto my phone?”
Martin – I agree about the protection of the user experience – that’s really important for Apple, and the extent they go to protecting that is extreme. One example I’ve heard is that the reason the battery cannot be changed in the iPhone (or the iPod) is that engineering a removable cover to allow access to the battery would spoil the feel of the device in the hand.
There’s something about this uncompromising position that’s great.
It’s a well-told story, but when Steve Jobs was just a kid running a tiny Apple, he wanted to bring in a heavyweight CEO to delivery his ambition. So he found the bloke who was running Pepsi (John Scully) and lobbied / persuaded / cajoled him for months.
Eventually, Jobs said to Scully “What do want to do for the rest of your life – Sell fizzy water, or come with me and change the world ?”
The huge irony of that today is that it’s Bill Gates (Jobs’ lifetime nemesis) who has gone on to make a massive difference to issues of Malaria, Aids and poverty, using Microsoft’s profit for good.
Owning Apple products isn’t about the marketing or the geek chic. I have a 3GS (16GB) running iOS4, (its white by the way).
Apple are more than just good marketing although they do that better than most, it is all about the UI, and the user experience. its integrated and as seamless as its possible to be with the constraints of wifi signal and network. even within the M4 corridor the 3G signal isn’t great, go north and any phone struggles, to be honest all the apps and fancy features count for nothing if you cant get a signal, perhaps the networks need to do a bit of catching up, can’t be the phone at fault.
It does make me wonder what will happen with the the switch to digital radio, wont there be huge areas of Wales with no radio at all, just as well I own an ipod then. (thats a limited edition 16GB red one ). had to buy that as its got that new genius thing on it. still use my ipod classic but obviously don’t take that out in public any more.
Note to Blackberry users, to get the full iphone screen experience hold two Blacbberrys together. For extra street cred type the following into the signature line on your emails,
sent from my iphone
That way no one will know you bought the wrong phone
I you’ll allow me to post a link – language makes it NSFW but tells you more about us iphone users
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FL7yD-0pqZg&feature=related
As background for this article I spoke to James Holland, Editor of ElectricPig.co.uk (if you haven’t read it you should, it’s excellent). His observations about Apple are worth printing in full:
“Apple is a master of media manipulation. The more it gags its suppliers, hardware partners and employees, the more intrigue grows about exactly what it’s working on, both among readers and journalists. Everyone loves a good mystery, and second-guessing Apple is the tech equivalent of a never-ending whodunnit.
Cupertino knows that, of course. It’s created a self-perpetuating publicity machine by virtue of absolute silence. It’s a smart move, and one which amplifies their official messages enormously. But there’s a downside too.
When Apple leaks, it has huge ramifications. Its share price takes a rollercoaster ride, and investors get twitchy. Steve Jobs has claimed that Apple isn’t a ship that “leaks from the top,” but because of his security obsession every word from his mouth is over-analysed, and usually misinterpreted, generally leading to confusion or at the least, uncertainty.
For a journalist, it’s a blessing and a curse. Huge reader interest in Apple tidbits are a traffic boon, but no respectable writer enjoys working from hearsay, rumour or supposition. For our part, we present Electricpig readers with as balanced an opinion as we can, making clear what’s fact and what’s rumour.
It’s a tricky balance, and when speculation surrounds the minutiae of a new component or feature, sometimes tiresome. But we couldn’t grind the Apple rumour mill if readers weren’t interested, so we do the best we can to meet demand, while throwing in a dose of reality with it.”