Hacker News Reader

Comment by lm28469 | Hacker News Reader

Pricing is rarely an issue. People spend stupid amount of money to show their status, if anything it's a feature

I think that's a big part of what Apple sells. And I think it also helps explain how pretty much any Apple product announcement is contentious on here. Most people buying status goods won't say, "I buy it so people think I'm more interesting and important." They instead justify purchases in conventional terms like quality. That makes objective discussion of quality fraught because they create feelings of status threat and cognitive dissonance.

Objective discussion goes out the window because rather than look at the actual features of a product people instantly start claiming Apple products are fashion statements. So we end up with dead end conversations about meaningless things like this one.

Personally, I'm happy to look at actual features. But there's no denying they are fashion statements. For Jobs, this went back a long way. Look at the way the initial Mac and the NeXT compared to the competitors of the day. I definitely got involved with the NeXT just because it looked so cool. And honestly I stayed doing NeXT development work long after a rational person would quit.

And I think that carried forward. Look at the iPod silhouette billboard ads, which were iconic. [1] Those are not about features. Those are about how fucking cool the iPod was. The iPhone was demonstrably a status symbol. [2] And this has obviously worked well for Apple. They sell under 20% of all phones, but make 2/3rds of all phone profits. Actual features are not the only thing in play here.

[1] https://www.pophistorydig.com/topics/tag/ipod-billboard-ads/

[2] e.g.: https://www.deccanchronicle.com/technology/mobiles-and-tabs/...

> Personally, I'm happy to look at actual features.

Yet here you are talking more about "Fashion" rather than actual products. So many fashion experts on HN, you'd think it was Vogue's forums.

It is possible to be happy to talk about more than one thing. If you don't want to talk about this particular subtopic, there are other threads. Instead, though, you seem eager to shut down discussion on it. You might think about why.

You've already dismissed anyone's thoughts about quality or features out of hand in your first post in this thread: -> "They instead justify purchases in conventional terms like quality."

And you have the balls to talk about shutting down conversations?

That's not "anyone". That's people who make a purchase for status-enhancing reasons. I'm also happy to discuss technical qualities of hardware, and do it often. But I like to do it with people for whom quality is what truly matters.

Is it not possible for more expensive products to be better than their less expensive alternatives? I am not saying there is a causal relation here, and I agree that to an extent Apple sometimes just throws out something mediocre (like this appears to be; I won't be buying this since it doesn't seem like a good value), but I think your statement is quite dismissive towards Apple as a whole and a bit snide toward users to claim they are only buying it for the status.

I think you should take that comment as "some people buy Apple just for status". Because yes, many buy it for the quality.

But I also guess the headphones rather aim for the status-oriented crowd.

I don't think I said any of the things you are objecting to.

My point wasn't that status goods are worse. A Louis Vuitton purse is objectively a good purse. But people don't buy a Louis Vuitton purse because they've done a careful study of purse quality and just happened to end up with an LV one.

My point was that with status goods, it's hard to have an objective conversation about quality, because people invested in the status part of it generally won't talk about it in those terms. If you say, "Gosh, $3450 seems like a lot for a small bag," [1], they won't say, "Yes, but it makes me look important". They'll talk about how well made the bag is, how long it lasts, etc. They in effect become suddenly and specifically irrational. And if you push, they can get defensive. They might, for example, imagine you said a bunch of things you didn't actually say. Or accuse you of being dismissive and snide.

[1] https://us.louisvuitton.com/eng-us/products/bella-mahina-nvp...

They don’t get “irrational”, they just lie. Most lies happen semi-subconsciously.

I guess I say irrational here because it's not just that they say a false thing. It's that they have a lot of trouble understanding when you say a true thing, or try to reason about the topic.

Eh, I feel the opposite. My Bose headphones are starting to wear out, and have always been kind of finicky in pairing and getting disconnected. It's worth it to me to pay the $200 more to get newer headphones that in all likelihood sound noticeably better, have spatial audio, and hopefully have no trouble connecting to and switching between Apple devices.

The one thing holding me back actually is, based on the reaction I'm seeing so far, wondering if there will be a negative stigma to these or if they'll attract a lot of attention. Like the google glass years ago where everyone noticed it immediately and thought you were a douchebag for wearing it.

Bingo. They have a very distinctive look. You buy these and people can tell from across the street that you’re wearing “those $500 apple headphones”.

If you think of apple as a tech company, their products seem absurdly priced. If you think of apple as a company that makes luxury goods that happen to be powered by computers, they make perfect sense.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com