Whiners
So, Apple drops the price of the iPhone by $200, and what’s the biggest blogspheric reaction? Whining from people that “oh my god, this technology device went down in price after I bought it.” The amount of incredulous shock demonstrated is awe inspiring. Apparently, all these dyed-in-the-wool early-adopters have never before had a price go down after they bought their fancy new gee-gaw, or had some spec revised upward for the same price. Apparently, they expected it to appreciate in value, or something.
Seriously, people, get a grip. You bought a very expensive, flashy new toy that you likely didn’t need, no matter how pretty it was. You wanted to be the k-rad k00l kid on the block, and it cost you $599. Now it costs others less money. That is how technology works, people. Now, some people are whining that maybe giving $100 credits to people who bought the phones months ago is simply “not enough”:
Is it really the right thing? Not in the classic sense, because unlike the 14-day-returnees, you aren’t getting cash back. It’s a sop, really — albeit an admittedly good-natured one — since the $100 you get back is only good for another Apple product.
Excuse me, but what other company has ever offered a rebate to people after they paid for the regular price of the product because they later, perhaps several months later, dropped the price? Prices go down, sometimes because that’s the “plan,” and sometimes because volume allows it to go down. For example, when the Nissan 350Z first came out, many dealers had “popularity fees” of $5,000 tacked onto the sticker price. Plenty of people paid it. Nobody had to pay it, they could have bought something else.
Nobody held a gun to anyone’s head and said “you must buy an iPhone the day it is released.” Nobody made anyone pay $599. You didn’t have to buy it. If you didn’t know that the price was going to go down, or the specs revised upward, within 6 months, you’ve either been living in a cave, or you’re an idiot. Mostly, I think you’re just a whiner. If you couldn’t afford it when it was $599, why did you buy it? You obviously thought it was “worth it.”
You can always wait… and wait… and wait… and wait… and wait…
This entry was posted at 9:05 pm on 6 September 2007 and is filed under Technology. You can follow any responses to this entry through the post-specific RSS 2.0 feed.
Patrick:
No, the “stop your whining” side is correct. If it wasn’t worth it for you to buy at $600, you shouldn’t have bought it! Apple is setting a stupid precedent here.
sporter:
I believe it was worth it. Was I mildly upset with a price drop that quickly? Sure. Did I demand blood? No.
But I understand where the outcry is coming from. It’s coming from those who’ve never played the early adopter game. It’s coming from a lot of people who are buying their first Apple product and were under the impression the iPhone would follow the normal Apple product lifecycle.
Sure, that assumption was wrong. But they can still be angry about it. Making demands is out of bounds, but being upset and angry is a normal, rational reaction.
I think the reason the press latched on so hard to the story was because they also had hyped the device beyond measure and were shocked in it’s rapid price drop.
Pouge puts it well:
“Well, yes, that IS what happens in technology. Today’s iPod holds 32 times as much music as the first one (and does a lot more), but costs $50 less.
But it took six years to get from there to here, not 10 weeks.”
I think my biggest problem is that people don’t hold anyone else to this kind of standard. Dell, for example, constantly is changing prices. Wallmart even puts it in their ads, and yet nobody goes in 45 days later demanding they be given money back. That’s the part about it that I find amusing, and pathetic.
They can be angry, but it doesn’t make it sane, or right. You can believe in the tooth faerie, but that doesn’t make one pop into existence.
I am planning to buy an iPhone but only because I plan to develop a web app for it. For me it is a business decision that makes me money. I think it’s a very cool device, but I also think that the hysteria around its popular early adoption is a bit bizarre.
I had mixed feelings about the price drop. On the one hand I am quite happy to save a couple of hundred dollars. On the other hand my reaction was to ask why Apple did that? I mean, they should be able to sell a ton of iPhones at the original price this holiday season, right?
I wonder if they shouldn’t have just kept the price and sweetened the pot by adding some nice free goodie to the iPhone packaging, like maybe a bluetooth headset or a $50 iTunes card. People would have responded really well to that I think.
Did they cut their price just to strike fear into the competition? Maybe Nokia is in a frenzy wondering how Apple can maintain the new product pace they do AND cut prices so aggressively. I dunno.
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(Full disclosure, I bought an iPhone on launch day)
I agree that not expecting the price to go down is ludicrous, I’ve been an early adopter for a long time. But never have I had the price drop, with no new features, so quickly after launch. I was upset, but didn’t expect anything from Apple. My wife was more upset, because she had never been an early adopter before. And I think that’s the largest rub. Apple really hit across a lot of demographics and customers they don’t normally have and aren’t used to this whole crazy early adopter thing. That’s where a lot of backlash is coming from. They got burned with their first interaction with Apple. That’s not good for repeat business going forward.
I do think your car analogy is flawed though. The dealers putting that markup on the car are putting that right on the sticker. If I had seen a “popularity markup” sticker on the iPhone for $200, I would have certainly waited for the popularity to wind down.
I love my iPhone and my wife loves hers. It was worth $600 on the day I bought it and it’s still worth it today, even though Apple charges less. But I think the extremes of both sides ( ” I got robbed ” and ” Stop your whining ” ) are both wrong. There’s something in the middle that’s right.