> but honestly the world has evolved in such a convenient way that Apple just has to wait it out. People use Whatsapp and other stuff, and their major US market keeps gravitating to iphone.
Regarding your post:
> Your snark seems to be rooted in that as well.
You either want one of the main driving the answers or not, bring it up with US teenagers who have to react to this social pressure much more consequentially than the rest of us
> Then I have to question. Who is being influenced culturally by the US preference for iPhone?
I'm not sure how much the "US preference" plays in this, but in my country, the iPhone is the aspirational device. Apple hardware is, generally speaking.
OP definitely needs a more nuanced assessment of the US market, but its hard to ignore the influence it has on non-US consumers.
> Every second teenager is carrying iPhone - are you sure? [Citation needed]
There is 70 millions of iPhone sold in last 4 years in US.
If you include other high-end phones it makes teenager/adults to carry half the year of work in Pakistan and year of work in Madagascar.
> How is Apple able to stay relevant among younger people and convince them to buy iPhones when Android phones are just as capable and look just as good?
There is quite an element of peer pressure for young people to display status through having new and expensive technology (which I believe is one strong reason the design of smartphones are rev'd every year, so that people can tell at a glance whether you have the latest device), and add upon it Apple's cultural cachet to be the "cool/in" brand, it's often hard for young people to resist the pressure. This has led to issues such as "blue bubble versus green bubble" where young people on Apple devices exclude those on Android device based on not wanting to see an out-of-place color in their text message window.
How do you figure? Apple announced it for October and released it in October. If you make the assumption that they wanted to release it in June or July, it's at most 3 or 4 months "late".
> If you stretch this chart back another 6 months you'll see a considerable sag in iPhone sales as the 4S waiting game began.
I'm pretty sure that iPhone 4 sales didn't slow down prior to the 4S's release. Not much anyway. Do you have anything to back up that claim?
> Android, due to it's constant upgrade stream, doesn't suffer from this cycle. Let's take a look at some yearly charts before we call this race...
I agree. Let's go further. Why does it always have to be a race? If you look at the big picture instead of the versus battle portrayed by the media then Android and iOS are together leading the industry. And next in line is Windows Phone which consistently gets great reviews.
It's not all rainbows and unicorns. iOS suffers somewhat from being so locked down, but there are advantages to that as well. Android benefits from the immense range of devices that run it, but that also contributes to devices not getting upgrades. Windows Phone is not growing as quickly as many agree that it should based on its merit.
But overall everyone is doing well and customers are happy. Nobody is losing except some of the old dogs like Blackberry.
> [I] have lost all excitement I used to have about that. Same goes for some of my family.
I actually think this is a part of the problem. We watched essentially a completely new product category invented in front of our eyes and watched it mature. The lowest hanging fruit were picked years ago (by 2012, in fact![1]). Android caught up to iPhone in a very serious way. What's left to do?
I feel like both platforms are in a state where they're 'innovating' just for the sake of it, for marketing, because people still expect the giant leaps that we had in the earlier years. Everyone knows this (Apple made a whole ad about 'not much has changed'[2]).
> Isn't this more to do with demographics of an average iPhone user rather than iPhone as a platform? One might argue that both are related but using this as a reason seems kind of superfluous.
Of course they are related. Why does the iPhone have this specific demographic, if not for the platform?
> Why do we have to rehash a decade-old conversation on every single iPhone/iOS Apple story?
Because people are mad - still, and baffled - still, that Apple is successful and prosperous despite not catering to the niche needs of your average HN commenter.
For some reason it's incredibly controversial to even imply that the iPhone is just a better product. You will rile up fanboys who are quick to let you know about reparability, battery life, screen resolution and RAM. If more teens are buying iPhones, it's not because it's better, it's because they are being bullied into it.
> This reads as a contradiction to me, as I've stated.
In the first statement I was making a comment on the U.S., where iPhone is most popular, in the second I was making a comment on globally, because you brought it up. Both statements are true.
> The most likely reason is that Apple has become utterly boring when it comes to innovation. I recently purchased an iPhone 15, coming from the iPhone 13, I can honestly not say what has changed or improved
Is there some law of nature that allows humans to achieve a rate of technological advancement that is beyond what “bores” you?
> Their parents are giving into their demands for *an iPhone due to social pressures entirely originated by Apple's monopolistic behavior (iMessage green bubbles).
First of all, we don't have that problem here in europe. People just use cross-platform messengers.
Secondly, I don't understand why a company should be forced to bring its service to a platform it doesn't care about. Apple supports the default carrier messaging standards (SMS/MMS). It's not Apple's fault that they suck. In fact Apple explicitely created iMessage because SMS/MMS were absolutely terrible.
If RCS is considered a standard (is it?), then Apple should absolutely support it and apparently they plan to do so. Seems fine to me.
While I personally don't use iMessage I'd prefer it if the service was available everywhere, but I don't see why Apple should be forced to support other platforms. Just because iMessage is popular? Imagine a world where WhatsApp was either an iOS- or Android-exclusive app. Should they be forced to develop for a platform they don't care about too? What about popular iOS-exclusive apps like Things? What about Garageband or Logic? Or Super Mario games on Nintendo?
> It's because Apple uses a lock-in strategy, where once on an Apple platform it is painful to get off. Most of the smart Apple iPhone users I know actually use Google apps and Google's infrastructure and other third-party tools on their iPhones, so if they want to move to an Android phone they can move almost seamlessly.
...what? Sentence 1, "once on Apple it's painful to get off." The very next sentence, the author says that most iPhone people he knows could move to Android almost seamlessly. That doesn't sound like it's that painful to get off.
Look, if you're going to contradict yourself, fine, just... put a few sentences in between first.
> On the other hand Facebook actually does have a near monopoly on social networking with no viable competitor at all.
Which should be broken up and Facebook forced to re-introduce federation (their Messenger long ago offered XMPP), but that is a different question.
> Why do you care about Apple at all, when you can just buy an Android phone?
Actually I am an Android owner, who is a bit unhappy with Apple locking down their ecosystem so hard that a migration (in both directions) is next to impossible.
> Just based on iPhone sales it doesn’t look like many people actually care, but those who do, boy are they vocal about it.
Hmm... You mean how iPhone sales have platued in the 3 years since this change was introduced or do you mean how 2016, the year they got rid of the headphone jack, was the first year in the history of the iPhone where sales decreased? I am not really seeing your point. (These numbers are primarily due to changes in the broader market)
I have lived with no headphone jack and done the dance with Bluetooth dongles and wireless headphones. Even if you avoid the pairing issues, battery is consistently an issue. Making sure that the various dongles are charged when you need them is adding unnecesary cognitive load.
> Even in my imagination, Android installed base is still growing at nearly 2X of that of the iPhone. Apparently, most people don't care for whatever you're saying they should care about
I remember seeing a chart awhile ago which showed that while Android's market share is getting larger than the iPhone's, it isn't actually taking away any share from the iPhone but instead from RIM, Windows phones, and feature phones. (just did some googling and found the link):
What I think this means is that the people aren't moving away from their iPhones, but instead people who don't have a smart phone to begin with are more likely to pick an Android phone instead of an iPhone.
Maybe it's due to things like finger lag, or how great the camera / video is, or maybe for completely non-technological reasons , i.e. cost, or even as simple as which phones are available on their carriers, which I honestly think it could be it as I have heard that where I live (Australia) the iPhone has one of the largest market shares in the world (4.5 million iPhones with a population of 22 million), and I think is one of the only places which place no restrictions on which carriers can stock the iPhone.
In all fairness, it is early days yet and I think once the smart phone market has reached saturation we might start to see a different story play out between the competing OSes.
> but honestly the world has evolved in such a convenient way that Apple just has to wait it out. People use Whatsapp and other stuff, and their major US market keeps gravitating to iphone.
Regarding your post:
> Your snark seems to be rooted in that as well.
You either want one of the main driving the answers or not, bring it up with US teenagers who have to react to this social pressure much more consequentially than the rest of us
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