Hah!! You're right... and only 1/2 JK. But there's something to be said for creating a fake demand/hype... e.g., Cabbage Patch Kids, Tickle Me Elmo, iPhone. And that Box!! What a beautiful Box it is... my son won't take it off his desk! It works, though, for marketing; how many people on this forum -- who are already Vegas fans -- complained about getting their update in a cheesy envelope?

"They seem to think that good products sell themselves." You're right. How old is that mindset? That went out the window with the VHS/Beta war.

But the primary point I was making is this: the iPhone does have all those fancy marketing strategies, but the main reason (IMHO) it sells is the attractive interface and amazing simplicity of all its functions. People have complained about the attractive interface of Vegas (which could easily be made more customizable in an upcoming upgrade), but doesn't Vegas at least have the simplicity?

It could be the "iPhone of NLE's"... IF they wanted it to be.

...charge twice as much as it's worth

Apparently not.... :O)

(Considering that they have just beat all records for mobile phone sales, by definition it must have been worth the money to a lot of people. Perhaps you mean it wasn't worth that much to you?)t

It appears that all other mobile phone manufacturers have tried mightily to come up with a phone that is as good overall, but failed.

Nokia N95 for example is outstanding in several areas and has a much better camera than the iPhone, but overall it doesn't reach the same altitude.

...and then have half as much stock available than what is needed to meet the demand.

I didn't see any news about a stock shortage this time, they had millions of phones ready for pickup. Perhaps you are thinking of their new online registration system getting totally overloaded most of the first day?

Apple sure knows how to design nice packaging. I'm fairly jaded (I've got design awards for computer products and am quite picky), but I was wowed by the packaging for my Mac Pro. No waste, no fluff, just sheer beauty in a simple, clean design (just like the guts of the computer).

One would expect Sony, with its focus on great product design over the past decades, to match this across the board, but this doesn't seem to have happened as far as what I have seen.

Of course, when you run out of battery in the middle of a call, and then reach for that spare battery ... oh wait, you can't do that.

(Considering that they have just beat all records for mobile phone sales, by definition it must have been worth the money to a lot of people. Perhaps you mean it wasn't worth that much to you?)

The only thing that proves is that there are a lot of foolish people in the world. There's not a single reasonable data plan available from the carrier that offers the iPhone in Canada, yet people are still stampeding over eachother to get one just 'cuz it's the latest gadget. It certainly isn't because it's worth the money.

hhm.... i'm the only one here who's ANNOYED at the iphone (and apple) ads? They say "you're an idiot, buy us & you won't be!". :(

EDIT: Sony marketed the PS3 like Apple does. Nintendo did a fraction of the marketing & sold millions more Wii's. Doesn't matter how you market it if you don't know who you're marketing too.

Not only can you not replace the battery with a spare, you can't replace the battery at all. That requires sending the phone back to Apple for service. What a crock!

My brother travels throughout the U.S. extensively and most of the folks on his production crew have iPhones. He's on Verizon and is usually the only one that has cell service. People are asking to use his phone all the time. He just got a new LG "DARE" phone and it's extremely cool, plus you can change the battery!

People keep giving me iPods (not iPhone, but iPod). They are gorgeous, and the interface is fantastic. However, when the battery goes, you basically have to throw the thing in the trash (I have several shuffles and a Nano; my son has the hard disk version). I know the big ones can be refurbished with a new battery. I actually had to take one apart to salvage it after it was put through the wash -- actually got it to work again for awhile -- so I know what it takes to replace the battery. Even in the big units, it is PAINFUL. I would guess that the economics of changing batteries in the shuffle or nano are not good.

So, if you don't mind filling up landfills, purchase the iPod -- and the iPhone.

I also have a Creative MP3 player and a no-name Tawainese player. You just copy your songs from Explorer and start listening. By contrast, every time I connect to the STUPID iTunes, it wants to erase all the songs (which it has done several times) even after I have turned off the automatic updating. On one of my shuffles, it now refuses to let me even see the songs (on five different computers), even though my other two shuffles connect just fine.

So, in summary: Fantastic industrial design and great navigation tools in both the iPhone and iPod, but the lack of battery replacement makes them so anti-green as to almost be criminal, and the straight-jacket mentality in the horrible iTunes program makes them almost unusable.

At least that's how it is for me ...

The DARE is a pretty cool phone, has one of the better cameras and a few innovative features that no one else has. But no wifi, and I think the touch is actually pressure sensitive, so you have to lean in to it. You can't browse flash sites. The iphone pinch feature for zooming is pretty cool. Not sure if the blackberry 9500 thunder will have that. I'll just hang on to my crappy cell phone for a while.

The reactions above validate my initial post about the iPhone: "it's not a better product." But look what slick marketing and a simple interface can do. And relating this to Vegas, Sony could do even better: a very good product with a simple interface. The price range and simplicity have a huge untapped market: People who want to get footage from point A to point B looking great but without having to take college courses to learn the NLE.

A book called "Bang" describes how the marketers hired by AFLAC were trying to figure out a way to market this unusual niche of an insurance company... your average "Joe" doesn't care about supplemental insurance. AFLAC was spending $40 million/year on advertising, but no one had ever heard of them, and these advertising funds were nothing compared to the other much larger insurance companies. A few days before their deadline, one of the guys on the marketing team was picking up lunch, kept saying the name "AFLAC" over and over again, and realized he sounded like a duck. He came back in and wrote the 1st AFLAC spot in 5 minutes. The rest is history.

Any excuse for why this NLE isn't hitting the market better is BS. Vegas is a good product. It has some warts, but it's a good product.

The reactions above validate my initial post about the iPhone: "it's not a better product."

Umm, so which other phone provides a web browsing experience that is even half as good?

Answer: none, it doesn't exist.

And when it comes to the number of useable apps, it also lacks competition.

It doesn't have the best camera by a wide margin (the Nokia N95 takes that throne), and it doesn't have MMS (which is probably on its way out anyway, Apple says to just send an e-mail with a photo attachment which I think actually makes sense), and there are a couple of other things for fault finders to use to justify not owning one.

But for some (not all) people, it truly is a better product, and that by a wide margin.

Battery replacement on the iPods is $9.95 (from independent companies), and I expect we'll see this for the iPhone as well (unless people just get an Applecare warranty extension to 3 years and get a new battery for free if this should be needed).

Not as convenient as just buying a replacement, guessing they prioritized compact size over convenience.

Verizon has wider coverage than AT&T currently, but weren't prepared to sign with Apple on the terms offered, so AT&T won and they've been hauling in the moola ever since. Good old capitalism at work. Pros and cons, but one kind of freedom.

Re iPods, If all one needs is an MP3 data file player, then there are certainly less expensive products.

People have all kinds of misperceptions about iPods. like "they can only play DRM-protected files" (even those may be copied to 5 devices..., and regular unprotected MP3s are fine, as are lossless formats).

As far as the iTunes experience, I know a lot of people with iPods but not one who has JM's problems.

For me personally, iTunes is a key reason to own an iPod, as it is a great central repository for (often free) professional audio and video tutorials, in addition to the huge availability of music and commercial video programs that have been popular enough to sell billions of songs and huge numbers of videos, apparently without major hassle with the iPod sync.

I'm glad there are choices, but I can't see other than that the success of iPods/iTunes is very well deserved.

FACT: Verizon rules in the wireless phone world. Anyone who can't admit that is a Macophant.

People who want to get footage from point A to point B looking great but without having to take college courses to learn the NLE.
This is going a bit off-topic, but I believe there's a lot of people out there who don't want to spend a lot of time messing with technology. (Like how everyone doesn't read legalese before signing it, doesn't read EULAs, etc.) Sometimes, I am definitely one of these people (I barely know how to use my cell phone; forget about the iPhone).

It would be nice if software (and computers) in general were made more intuitive and that the NLEs didn't give you as much rope to hang yourself in. e.g. In Final Cut Pro, it's not obvious that nested sequences are actually a copy of your sequences and not a reference to your existing sequences. In Vegas, you have things like the video preview without FX, color space conversions + compositing gamma making filters behave unintuitively, etc. etc. All the NLEs tend to have some areas which make it easy to shoot yourself in the foot with.

iMovie comes very close. (I haven't really tried the new version.) There is nothing like it on the PC.
The old version of iMovie that I used was really easy to get into (you never needed to read the manual); unfortunately, it was extremely buggy above 150 cuts.

While I don't personally need a NLE that is easier to use (since I'm comfortable with Vegas now), I know there are a lot of people out there who just want a NLE they can quickly pick up.

As far as the iTunes experience, I know a lot of people with iPods but not one who has JM's problems.

iPod songs get deleted #1


iPod songs get deleted #2

iPod songs get deleted #3

That's just from the first page of a Google search.

Those three posts from 2005 thru Winter 2006 only talk about Shuffles (the matchbook-sized display-less cheapest iPods).

One of the posts talks about about how Apple chose to provide only 1-way sync from iTunes to iPod Shuffles.

Apple says this is by design, and not a bug. Perhaps it has something to do with the $49 price tag?

I do not have this problem on my regular (with display) iPod, and haven't heard it from anyone else.

"What does that mean? Hype it to death before release, put it in a very fancy box, charge twice as much as it's worth and then have half as much stock available than what is needed to meet the demand?"

LOL.

Frankly, I avoid ANYTHING with an Apple on it! I just HATE companies that fix it so you have to buy THEIR attachments, and dance THEIR way.

My kids didn't even ask for MP3 players at Christmas, but I bought them Samsung's for no other reason that to thumb my nose at the ipod.

I would be GREATLY sadden and embarrassed if Sony ever took the cheesy road that Apple is on in their advertising campaigns.... as you say... hyping to death something that costs twice as much with 1/2 the capability of other cheaper machines.

You have to send the iphone back to get the battery changed???? What a pile of.....