I’m with you all the way- I admire adbusters and what they are trying to accomplish- to get people to see the world clearly- without corporate symbolism clouding their thoughts and decisions – many great posters/pictures as you say- reminds me somewhat of the line from Fight Club when the main character- Tyler Durden’s alter ego- in his thoughts says-

“what kind of dining room set best defines me as a person”

pretty poignant line I thought – sums up modern culture and consumerism in one simple line

Damn. Lost my my reply when I hit refresh. I also have to pop off the keys on this laptop. Too much food under there. Shouldn’t post when not fully awake.

Looked at roughlydrafted.oom and think it only looks objective to those who think Steve walks on water. Gizmodo and Engadget are pretty easy on Apple generally. Hell, they had 3 guys live blogging the event. Don’t think they’ve ever done that at a Microsoft event.

In any case, I’m not talking about techinical merits, but financials. The question isn’t whether the iPhone(s) will do well, it’s whether they will pull in enough money to justify a pretty lofty multiple in a bear market. It depends a lot on the economy. Apple’s fortunes and stock price are affected by the overall market and by the economy. If this is a bear market rally and prices drop back to the neighborhood of the March lows, Apple’s price will follow as they did then. There is competition with spiffy new phones with better displays, ATT’s hamhanded treatment of current users and failure to support all the features, and competition from new models that have even nicer looking displays. There is also how much the low priced version will cannibalize sales of the high priced version. And finally, there is just the overall economy where people will either be unwilling or unable to get an expensive new phone.

And this doesn’t even take into account a decline in overall sales of computers.

I just think there are too many bullets to dodge. We shall see.

They are only lowering the price on the old phone and I would expect margins on the new phone to be at least as good as before, if not better. Mike, Engadget and Gizmodo are always biased against Apple and are two of the sites that usually get it wrong. Read Daniel Dilger of roughly drafted if you want a more balanced review. Ahab… many substitutes at 1/3 the cost is not a new thing, and yet they still have sold millions. Same as ipod. They have been calling for the death of that thing since it came out, yet they are still selling 10-12 million per quarter, and more at Christmas.

I love the symbolism in Adbusters’ photos. One picture showed what appeared to be Jesus being crucified on the mount. But, when you turn it upside down, you realize it’s a crucifix disposed on top of a garbage heap. (Forget how they managed that photo trick.) I read it as “Jesus sacrificed himself for us and *this* is what we did…??” (But, other interpretations might work, too.)

(FD: that was just an example. I’m not religious.)

http://executivesuite.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/06/08/the-apple-hype-machine/

As someone on another blog said, there is a danger to Apple of this perception:

“In some ways Apple has painted themselves in a corner, being too afraid to break compatibility by innovate in hardware, leaving iPhone owners with a 2004 screen resolution, and meaning the additions they do end up adding appear trivial and unnecessary. At the same time the differentiation in software they have added create clearly arbitrary barriers (e.g. no A2DP for 1st gen iPhone owners, no voice dialling for iPhone 3G owners) and expose them as simply milking the franchise for as much as its worth.”

The Pre is the next big thing, but is unproven. Plenty more new models coming out over the next few months. Some, from HTC, are pretty interesting and and are headed to ATT. Wonder how ATT will handle the conflict. We’ll see how it shakes out.

http://tech.yahoo.com/news/ap/20090608/ap_on_hi_te/us_tec_apple

From $600 to $99 in two years.

“Every $100 you move down in consumer electronics brings in a lot more customers,” he said. “Ninety-nine dollars is a psychological price point, so that’s a real barrier to move through. It becomes something people can afford — it becomes an affordable luxury.”

those new phones better be real cool

high tech stuff- reminds of the solar dryer for $29.99- when you get the package inside is a clothesline and clothes pins

http://gizmodo.com/5015395/apple-introduces-iphone-3g-videoconferencing-kit-zomg