Hacker News Reader

Comment by hacker_9 | Hacker News Reader

I mean sure 'Stagnant' means that there was no growth, but it also implies that this is a bad thing, which in this case it obviously isn't. Clickbait title.

View on HN

The real story is that from now on Apple will not be reporting unit sales for their products. Next quarter and from there on there will be just the aggregated sales figure for how much physical stuff they sold with nobody knowing whether that was phones, watches, laptops or dongles.

This is their choice and their business. I don't think this is fair on the people that have helped them get to where they are by writing apps, making accessories or even writing web pages that look good on Safari.

Why would a company invest in making accessories for the iPad if they have no clue as to whether the things are selling or not? How do you make the business case to invest in such accessories if you only have anecdotal evidence as to whether the iPad is selling or not?

Third party data.

There isn't also official sales data for Android and Windows devices.

Meanwhile, Google does not reveal their unit sales or even their revenue for the various Pixel devices.

>unlike most hardware manufacturers, Google refuses to share official sales numbers for their phone. Instead, during earning reports they simply bundle the product under Alphabet's "Other Revenues", leaving us in the dark about how successful the product is.

https://android.gadgethacks.com/news/rare-moment-pixels-sale...

What word would you have used instead? "Stagnant" is technically accurate.

I don't have a dog in this fight re: spin, just playing the word game.

"consistent" for a positive spin or "steady" for more neutral. "Flat" is fairly uncharitable but also on the table.

For example, I suspect one's wife would rather know her beauty has been "consistent" over the years, rather than "stagnant", despite technically both meaning "stayed the same".

Yep, the wives of the HN userbase and their ongoing obsession with maintaining their beauty.

:eye roll:

Are you saying people(wives included) shouldn't care about their beauty? This seems like a completely unnecessary response to the comment.

No, I’m pointing out that it’s a weird sexist comment that sounds like something from a scene of Mad Men.

I would assert that the genders could be reversed, say, for a husband's handsomeness, or any other quality in any person, and the metric would apply. And of course persons could be removed altogether – that's the point – we started out talking about cell phones.

The purpose of my anecdote, and the reason I chose something with such sentiment, is to highlight the semantic difference between words by placing them in a more emotionally charged context. One likely doesn't think too hard about the praise they bestow upon their iPhone. One hopefully thinks harder about the praise they send their lover. The heightened importance of word choice in situation B makes it easier to understand situation A.

If degrading sexist tropes are your mind's first destination in in the context of this conversation, I believe you are a hammer in search of a nail.

I perfectly understood what you were trying to say. It was just awkward and stereotypical. Again, like something from Mad Men. Like we’re all married men talking about how our wives are obsessed with their beauty.

It’s a mildly anachronistic and sexist trope. I found it amusing so I left the comment. Really not a big deal, and from your closing line, I’m sure there’s zero chance of you examining your behavior or assumptions, and I’m not going to waste time arguing about it. Have a great day!

How high do you think they can go in term of prices? And do you think they will sell many £1000 smartphones in a recession? Stagnant volumes is not an imminent problem but the share price is a forward looking metric.

A $600 mass phone in 2007 was difficult to imagine. And 2008 was the recession.

Yeah, but that's the point of the market saturation. Apple (or Google for ads) achieved a phenomenal growth despite the recession because they were taking over a market. But now that the market is saturated, there won't be a growth in volume to offset difficult economic conditions.

I’d argue that £1000 phones are less affected by a recession than £400 phones

I think that classifies them as luxury products, which historically tend to be pro-cyclical.

iPhones might be a Veblen good. They could probably release a $5000 or $10,000 model and there would be a market for it. Plenty of people buy $50,000 watches.

Didn't Apple stop making the super expensive Apple watch, though?

The Apple watch is a low-status dorky, uncool watch. The iPhone is a cool, high-status phone.

Patek Philippe or nothing!

So it's a good thing that unit sales haven't risen?

is "unit sales" number the only number in the report?

Of course not. Nobody is saying that revenue is stagnant. Only iPhone sales are. It seems correct to me.

it is also correct to say unit sales are stable. using a word with negative connotation to describe a largely positive event smells bias and manipulation to me.

I think it's fine; not everything needs to keep growing forever.

Nothing physical can keep growing forever.

Except, maybe, the universe itself?

I considered that before posting, but think I'm safe: just don't ask for a rigorous proof!

Good point. The "stagnant" term is considered to be a very negative concept in capitalism.

Capitalism requires growth (or more generally, increased consumption of products/resources), so stagnation is bad by definition.

Or capitalism is bad for requiring it (externalities be damned)

Does it? There are plenty of companies with lower growth that still produce regular profits and dividends.

>lower growth

How many healthy/successful companies out there have _no_ growth? That's my point.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com