Monday, September 10, 2007

Damage control


Surprise! (well, not so much, really). Five days after the unexpected price reduction of its new star product (by the way, did we really think that calling it "the God-Phone" would do good to Steve Jobs' ego?), Apple annouced that it sold its millionth Iphone. Doing so, it beat its own estimates.


The Apple-unusual price reduction has been much discussed, and David Pogue, from the NYT, had a good analysis on his blog. Two things really struck me about the decision:

- The ire of customers who had already bought an iphone was very personal: many, especially in the vocal sphere of tech bloggers, expressed their disappointment and their feeling of having been "de-moted" from the highly regarded status of early adopters to that of, well, Apple uncritical followers, to be polite. The $100 apparently did some good to appease these status-worshipping customers.


- Apple's decision to cut the price of its product and Steve Jobs' ongoing discussions about digital music and video pricing seem to go hand and hand. They signal a new (or renewed) vulnerability of Apple in its industry.


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