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- AirPods

- Apple Watch

- AirTag

Those are a few that come to mind. All do multi-billions in revenue per year.

None of those are the best product in their category, and all are only huge sellers because Apple anti-competitively privileges them in its ecosystem.

What’s better than AirPods and AirTags? I want them

The parent poster is saying (and I agree) that Airpods and Airtags are only superior because Apple anti-competitively privileges their integration with iPhones. It's not that they are better at the hardware level by itself.

And since iPhones form the largest single company's device network in the rich countries, that is a pretty big advantage.

Surely it's less of an advantage in rich countries because naturally less theft occurs?

Bad take. Each of these offered novel user experience improvements at launch. Yes they leveraged ecosystem (and yes I agree ecosystem lock-in does move devices) but thats also exactly what unlocked the better UX.

In your other thread you mentioned people don't necessarily want iPhones but they buy them to not be excluded from iMessage. I think you vastly underestimate how much regular people want low-bullshit tech experiences and are willing to pay for that.

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