That's including R&D, which for a company that is relatively young is to be expected. GM1 is net positive though, and when people say 'X loses money on each item sold' they are typically talking about GM1, not about margins including R&D. This is important because the second depends very much on the number of items sold which one can not know until the run is over or a substantial number of years have passed. It's safe to say the VW beetle had it's R&D paid back fairly early on and that Tesla will take a bit longer (especially for their niche products) because there are simply fewer units to do the pay-back on. Even so, there is a fairly good reason to believe they will be OK on the Model S in the long run, will be about break even on the X and hopefully will end up making money on the Model 3 if they can deliver it in large enough numbers. Also important: the Model 3 R&D was to some extent paid for by the gross margins of the Model S, if not for that they would have had to receive even more outside capital.
a $300 ipad is still technology for the privileged. come back with $20 tech that the majority of underprivileged can actually afford, then you (apple) can boast about making tech ubiquitous. Until then, nothing they have made in the last 5 years has been significant.
He’s quite aggressive, but he does have a point. Apple doesn’t serve at all the bottom 20% of the world. Maybe, maybe it does so through the second hand market, which doesn’t really count cause every other manufacturer also has it.
You could argue that by pushing the high end the low end is also pulled up slowly. Still doesn’t seem like a great argument.
Why is the very first piece of criticism on something like this that Apple doesn't serve the bottom 20%? I can make that argument about tons of things unfairly. For example, does Toyota serve the bottom 20% of the world? Does Hacker News? Does Tesla?
Why don't the middle 50% deserve a great experience or progress? There is A LOT of progress to be made in education in the first world. There is so much low hanging fruit.
Did iPhone serve the bottom 20% of the market when it was released? No. Did it subsequently change the quality of life for the bottom 20% as it ushered in the smartphone era? Undoubtedly. Will this particular announcement do the same? Probably not, but who knows. Does it need to in order for iPad to be successful? No.
Look at it this way, if a $300 iPad is easy to administer, easy to manage, easy to get children to use, easy to clean, easy to handle, useful for teachers and students, and extremely reliable - that is a huge win compared to the status quo because it will convince schools that implementing and integrating technology is both a worthwhile and easy endeavor.
Can Google do something similar with Chromebooks? Sure. Is it a different approach from Apple? Yes. Are both approaches worthwhile? Probably yes, let’s see what happens.
I feel like there’s a fundamental pragmatism missing in the OP’s snap judgement and that results in something short-sighted and irrelevant. Ultimately s/he has a point but not a useful one and there are far far more useful critiques for us to be talking about.
> Why don't the middle 50% deserve a great experience or progress? There is A LOT of progress to be made in education in the first world. There is so much low hanging fruit.
Why do they deserve better devices than the poor ? This is why poor people are poor. Because rich people "deserve" great experience, great progress, great opportunities, which is another way of saying, of course, that the poor do not.
> Look at it this way, if a $300 iPad is easy to administer, easy to manage, easy to get children to use, easy to clean, easy to handle, useful for teachers and students, and extremely reliable - that is a huge win compared to the status quo because it will convince schools that implementing and integrating technology is both a worthwhile and easy endeavor.
So what you're saying is, it's a great tool for learning and bettering yourself ... and the poor have no rights to it. (I was very poor as a child, and lots of people, especially in my classroom, felt this way about things like nice books/clothes/sports gear (as opposed to secondhand), later computers, and gameboy/consoles/... thanks, people making this argument really made one feel good)
> Can Google do something similar with Chromebooks? Sure. Is it a different approach from Apple? Yes. Are both approaches worthwhile? Probably yes, let’s see what happens.
I don't know if you've been watching chromebooks but they've also become systematically more expensive, especially the google supported ones. Windows 10 devices are the only thing left that has decent cheap options available (cheap meaning < $200 and usable).
Also none of the Google devices work, frankly at all, without a constant internet connection. That's $20/kid/month on top of the basic cost for the android/chromebook device.
Devices like Datawind's Ubislate tablets are addressing precisely the 6 billion. Around 2012 they were on the news first $35 USD tablets.
I don't work for them, but recently picked up a couple of tablets try out, they are surprisingly capable devices, and appear to be in ongoing development:
While not about Apple, that did make me think of something interesting. Why doesn't Amazon aggressively go after the education market? They have the Fire devices, the cloud infrastructure, the Kindle infrastructure for text books, etc. They could partner with Microsoft for the software and office 365.
I mAde a similar comment on the video link last week. The good news is that the NTSB is extremely good at human factors stuff - google Cockpit Resource Management for a fascinating trip down the aviation safety rabbit hole.
Why? If it is not proven the driver was negligent why fire this individual? Presumably this individual has a lot of experience and domain knowledge in testing self driving cars so replacing them with someone else may not be an improvement.
If they did make a mistake that got someone killed that could change things but I would hope we wait to find out if the driver was actually at fault.
I don't think Uber's safety drivers have any domain knowledge. The law says you need bodies in seats so Uber is paying as little as possible to put bodies in seats. They aren't engineers or professional (as in stunt/trick/etc) drivers.
I’m not sure stunt or trick drivers are the best choice anyway but you make a good point. Do we know this individual’s qualifications or are we just guessing at Uber’s standards?
Some sources mention a three-week training course. [0] It certainly costs some money to put an employee through such a course, but Uber have the deep pockets here. I'm not saying Ms. Vasquez should be fired before an investigation is complete, and she may be exonerated entirely, but presumably any investigation will take at least three weeks?
Well they were in a self driving car working for Uber in the capacity of self driving car test driver so they have more experience than me or anyone I know. But that’s only a presumption as I said.
Cambridge analytica is an investment of Robert Mercer. Mercer also donates to the Trump campaign. Steve Bannon headed the CA operation to collect user data from social media for the sole purpose of "gaming" the electorate system (ALL confirmed by the Canadian CA whistleblower). Kushner hired CA to work for the Trump campaign. CA admitted (on tape) they broke election laws and actively obstruct justice by not keeping evidence (paper trail). They also admitted they ran the "entire digital campaign" for Trump Campaign. Board of CA quickly suspends CEO as of today.
Mark currently getting away as an accomplice to the murder of our democracy.
I've posted a quote from this article below that details how Obama's 2012 campaign did practically the same thing Cambridge Analytica is being accused of. [1]
So data mining Facebook has being going on for a while, except that the MSM and Silicon Valley supported it because it favored Obama.
The use of analytics does not make it practically the same thing. The same couple articles about the Obama campaign keep getting posted on all the CA post that hit the front page even after they're shown to be different.
This will blow over, Facebook is far too entrenched and without serious competition. Some people will use Facebook less and replace it with Whatsapp and Instagram, but Zuckerberg has that base covered
Facebook is entrenched because the culture allows it, but I sense a major kumbaya moment for Baby Boomers, Gen X, and Millenials that could upend this culture. Finally, the younger generations can see in practice why many of their elders were intuitively resistant to social media.
> younger generations can see in practice why many of their elders were intuitively resistant to social media.
The idea that "their elders" were "intuitively resistant" because they understood the decade-later implication of algorithmic user profiling being weaponized to undermine public thought and democracy is.... generous.
They didn't understand computers or why anyone would give a shit about seeing your lunch. Both fair. But let's not repaint them as wise prophets of some future data apocalypse.
The real kumbaya moment you're talking about is both self-deprecating and metacognitive: "I am not so much an individual as one of fewer-than-you'd-think archetypes, and my beliefs about the world are malleable based on cute pictures placed in front of me for pennies. I should take time out of every day of my life and spend it working to double check that the things i think are true, and the people I hate are the thing I think they are. Whole organizations of much smarter people than I will abuse me at every chance they get to take as much money from me as they possibly can. Most things that feel good on the internet are designed to turn me, somehow, into money."
This is a painful, stark realization that lots of people never get to. Whole industries rely on people never coming to the realization that all of us are "basic bitches" and not anomalously unique or intelligent.
I'd love to believe you that there is a multi-generational awakening to the idea that people are herdable animals, but don't bet the farm.
> The idea that "their elders" were "intuitively resistant" because they understood the decade-later implication of algorithmic user profiling being weaponized to undermine public thought and democracy is.... generous.
Intuition doesn't require explicit understanding. Many of my elders certainly had the instinctive sense that we're oversharing and that it will, somehow or another, bite us in the behind. And many of my peers assumed they were paranoid.
Anecdotally, I'm in my early 20s and none of my friends post to Facebook at all any more -- it is essentially just a messaging app that happens to have your real name in it and a large userbase. I deleted my account and haven't noticed a lick of difference -- in fact, a couple of my friends living far away called me on my phone to ask if I'd deleted my Facebook and tell me that they've deleted theirs as well. Since I did this a couple of months ago I've gotten a lot more texts and calls from acquaintances and friends I used to only interact with in group chats.
So basically if you're feeling trapped by Facebook's social network, remember that it is in fact possible (and often superior) to interact socially outside of Facebook. The tide may be turning.
Of course this is a generalization, but I disagree with you. Older generations didn't trust social media companies with their private details because they felt it was too creepy and intimate. The younger generations thought they were paranoid or behind the times.
The counterargument you propose is invalid because it would be DECADES until >90% of the entire current automotive market is converted to fully autonomous. MEANING cars currently on the road either being retrofitted or completely removed from road and replaced by an AV.
So we are all in a lose-lose. I'm anticipating severe backlash from Congress this week, if not today.
because it does not require handing over control to the car to get a good test. the cars can simply record their decision making process and immediately flag all exceptions, which includes hitting anything. It would be very interesting to see all exceptions because it is to be expected all these systems must fail.
we don't need active testing on our streets. automakers would have dared to test ABS or "safety" systems in such a manner for the simple reason of liability.
