Why we will pay our smartphones more than $1000, why it’s ok for us but dangerous for Apple
There it is: last Samsung Smartphones and the iPhone 8 are around $1000. This started few weeks ago with rumors and it has been confirmed during the last Apple Keynote.
I heard a lot of people say something like that: “What?! $1000 for a phone?!! Seriously guys?!”. But let me explain why it will be a constant and, worst, why it will be more expensive the next few years.
NB: I will speak here about iPhone but I consider last Samsung Galaxy and other similar top of the line devices here.
It’s okay 😌
It’s not a phone anymore!
“A phone, an iPod and an Internet communicator.” — Steve Jobs
Yeah, “Smart-phone”, are you getting it?
It’s smart and you know it. But you forget it every day because it’s an habit to use it.
So keep that in mind: you are not going to pay a phone $1000, you are going to pay a smartphone $1000. The difference is here.
In your personal life, how many hours a day do you use your iPhone to make a call? Not many, because you are mainly using apps:
- Social, the first ones for every connected day: Facebook, Snapchat, Twitter, etc. You shared your life and your thoughts with friends and people like never before, just in your hand.
- Communication: WhatsApp, Messenger, basic SMS app, Mail. You share files, communicate and send rich messages every day, just in your hand.
- Photography and videos: use the Photo app, Instagram, apply filter, edit photos, crop and assemble them, just in your hand.
- News: you receive and consult news every day. Your Medium daily digest, last NY Times or newsfeed posts, just in your hand.
- Navigation: search for a good restaurant in Paris, analyze reviews, show the address, make a step by step navigation with Google Maps or Waze to the restaurant. All of it, just in your hand.
- Media: your Netflix favorite serie while commuting, your favorite Spotify songs with lyrics offline, just in your hand.
So tell me that it’s still a phone 😏.
It’s a special and precious tool, so take care of it!
Glass, aluminium, steel, saphir. Yes, they make money between cost and final price. But it’s not free and it is not indestructible.
Many people buy an iPhone to be like others, following hype and fashion. And few months later, they will protest against their cracked screens because their iPhones splashed on the ground. They will protest against the price because it’s too expensive and not robust enough.
Seriously: do you carry your computer or your MacBook Pro without a backpack 🎒? No.
So buy a case protection and take care of this special tool. It’s not a Nokia 3310 anymore. It’s precious like a ring 💍 in your hand, with aluminum and glass.
So, if you have the challenge to transport a glass around the world, will you transport it without protection?
It’s a good photographier
I personally use the iPhone for taking pictures every day, trips and weekends. It takes HDR, automatic and hi-res photos & videos. We are not at the level of a reflex. But seriously, it makes good ones:
So keep in mind that the price of two (with the front one) good APNs are inside your “phone”. It’s not Webcams anymore.
You don’t necessary need one and you don’t need to buy the last generation every year.
How much time a day are you using your smartphone? The average is 3 hours a day. Because you are using it all the day, it is not just an accessory. It’s your companion for every day. And by the way, be careful not to become Mobile Dependent.
But everybody doesn’t need an iPhone anyway. They want it but they don’t necessarily need it. Like Trump uses his iPhone with only one app.
So let people buy their iPhone because they really need one. And make sure you really need one. There are different types of smartphones and specifications, so you don’t have to buy the last iPhone, you can buy the less powerful if it’s okay for you.
Ask yourself: do you buy the last MacBook Pro update every year?
Did you notice that the most you pay a smartphone the most its lifetime and quality are important? An iPhone can be easily used during 4 years if you take care of it. It’s like a computer now. And people have to stop buying the last iPhone generation every year. You don’t need it. Because of that, sales of Smartphones will decrease for the next 10 years to be constant.
It has a good battery life.
People rage against their iPhone battery life.
But first, they don’t know how to improve it. Secondly, they forget how many things it can do in a day.
So close your eyes one minute. Imagine that your computer, on battery, can take hi-res pictures, make calls, navigate, connected to the 4G, share with Bluetooth, connect to Wi-Fi, receive e-mails and all stuff described before, with the size of an iPhone. Do you really think that it will last all the day, or two?
My iPhone 7 last all the day and sometimes an half once more. And I think it’s amazing. It will be improved more constantly in the next few years.
Small size = small price?
Most of people have the indirect psychological relation in their mind that because it is small, it has to cost less.
And I think it’s a generational fact for people born before and around the 1990's. Because we keep in mind that it’s still a phone, it has to cost just as a phone before. We have to realize how much powerful technology addition is shipped with an iPhone.
“But when we do the maths, the cost of components is less than the half of the final price!”
Yes, it’s true too. But I challenge you to sell it by yourself, “at the right price”, including Research & Development, packaging, shipping, prototyping, high quality factory controls, Apple Care and Apple Store high customer satisfaction, etc.
Dangerous for the market? Not sure, but for Apple yes.
A good product range but a premium model almost inaccessible
Apple and Samsung have closed the smartphone’s product range.
Now, we have a complete range of reliable products. For instance for Apple:
- iPhone SE — low end (but extremely powerful and capable: ARKit / CoreML and a 12Mpx camera)
- iPhone 6S, iPhone 7 — midrange
- iPhone 8 — top of the line
- iPhone X — very high end
Now, the problem is that the iPhoneX costs $1000 and it’s a true premium product. Apple has got used us with more accessible products the years before, prices were relevant for people : around $800.
And compared to the Galaxy S8, the iPhone X is not a killer too. Yes it’s a beautiful product but the price in comparison is exponential, like taxes in France: for the iPhone X 64Gb, $999 in US, $1387 (1159€) in France. It’s more than the French minimum salary!
Here’s the only differences between the iPhone X and the iPhone 8 Plus:
- Super Retina HD OLED / Retina HD
- 5,8" / 5,5"
- Face ID / Touch ID
- Telephoto : ƒ/2,4 vs ƒ/2,8
- TrueDepth / FaceTime HD
The differences are not all huge, but the price is. As always, new technologies for Apple, available since 3 years elsewhere, are the justifications for an extended price. But it seems that for Apple, that’s ok:
“But if you look across our product lines, you can buy an iPad today for under $300. You can buy an iPhone, depending upon which one you select, for in that same kind of ballpark. And so these are not for the rich.
We obviously wouldn’t have over a billion products that are in our active installed base if we were making them for the rich because that’s a sizable number no matter who’s looking at the numbers.”
Tim Cook - September 2017 — Fortune’s interview.
A market similar to the computer ones, with high lifetime products
Smartphone’s products range can be compared to the computer’s one. The product life too. With Smartphones over $600, you can pretend to a 3 or 4 years life duration. It’s the same for a computer and it’s a good point.
Smartphone’s market is mature now. And because it’s mature, people too. People are conscious that they don’t really need the last new iPhone. They are tired about it and they are now aware that it’s definitely an investment.
But professionals and video/photo amateurs will not, and they will continue to buy it again and again, with better miniaturized cameras. $1300 for the next one?
Brace yourselves, iPhone “Moutain Lion” is coming…
We are at the top of smartphone-technology maturity: no surprises anymore. Specially for Apple.
Leaks & poor technology evolutions. For the last 2 years of Apple Keynotes, I have noticed a lot of disappointment. However I’m a fan boy and I surprised myself to say that but it’s true, Apple has lost its charm.
This is the same for the OS system, it’s mature since iOS 9. But Apple continues to bullshit us with an Animoji feature that can be only available on the iPhone X, because of Face ID / TrueDepth. Seriously guys, Snapchat are doing this for decades, perhaps less precisely, but please don’t cheat us.
The competition is here, Apple still resists but it does not grow anymore. Android continues its fast growing. But it’s clear that finally, it’s more dangerous now for … Microsoft:
But we are weak 😞
To finish, let me describe the Keynote syndrome process.
First, the Keynote almost ended, you are angry against Apple bullshit and marketing amazing, incredible and awesome sentences:
Secondly, before the end, you’ve loved listening Jony Ive introducing the iPhone X:
Next, you see videos on TheVerge and YouTube Apple channel, about how beautiful new Apple products are:
Next, you go to an Apple Store, just to ask and convince yourself:
“Is it as good as they said?”
And you answer this:
“Yes, f***, of course it is!”
To finally say:
Be strong guys 💪🏽… Or not, it’s okay 😌.
Finally, do you really need the last iPhone for the next 3 years?
There is a lot to say about Smartphones and their capabilities or technologies which are inside them and how expensive they are. But people forget it because of a daily democratized and personal “tool”. But it’s not.
We will see more and more technology in our hands in a near future ✋🏼. New materials and designs, weights and size improvement, new chips, it will cost more than today.
But make the good decision: “Do I really need the last iPhone for the next 3 years?”.
So I hope that I opened your eyes about the price of the technology that is in your hand and how the Smartphone market is today. Perhaps you are reading this Medium post with the app on your 📱 or your … 📱X.
Thank you for reading! Clap 👏🏼 if you like it, share it if you love it and don’t hesitate to react!
Update: Still not convinced? Read this great post by Mike Rundle, “iPhone XX Futurology — Thinking about a 20th Anniversary Apple iPhone”.
