imPRint

Is Apple Rotten at the Core?

If someone had told me in the late 90s that Apple was going to resurface and create an even stronger brand than they had created in the 80s/90s, I would have laughed them off. I was wrong.

With the introduction of the iPod in the early turn of the century, Steve Jobs again became a genius and the Apple brand is as in vogue as Jimmy Choo, Prada and Blackberry. The concept, design and upsell services are genius. iTunes is an addiction, and in my opinion, probably one of the best music catalogs in existence on the Web.

There is one problem: the iPod mini, though I have come to rely on it as my source of motivation to go out and run, is riddled with problems. So many, in fact, that Apple just announced this week that it would discontinue the mini to make way for the new Nano iPod.

First, let me tell you that I have owned my mini for about six months. In that time period, I have sent it out twice to Apple to fix for "diagnostic issues." This required me to reload the 700 songs I had stored on the device - because you know, I have a spare 4 hours every week to do that. I also had to pay $60 for a warranty. Did I mention that just two weeks after I bought my 4gig mini, they dropped the price $50 to introduce the 6gig?

Second, its a known fact that Apple has had MAJOR problems with the battery life and functionality of the mini. Even if I have charged my iPod for three days straight, there will be times I'll go out for a run, prepare to sit on a plane for six hours, etc - and the dreaded alert "low battery" will come up. There is nothing more frustrating than knowing you have charged your iPod battery only to learn that you'll have to listen to a screaming child in the seat next to you on the plane, instead of Gwen Stefani, for the next six hours.

Where am I going with this? The iPod, as much as I have bashed it, is a fantastic concept and a staple in my everyday life when its working. I've spent hundreds of dollars downloading nostalgic songs from the 80s, 90s and so on. Apple is making a mint. However, Apple hasn't bared any scars as a result of the dysfunctional iPod mini. Their answer: pretend it didn't happen and introduce something smaller and cooler, use a fun song in the commercial and people will love it. Apple is a branding genius. But, my gut tells me that if the "nano" starts to cause the same headaches that the mini did - the worm in the Apple may have been exposed.

As a disclaimer, NO technology behemoth is without its buggy products. When demand skyrockets like it did for the iPod, you make the choice to start moving product off the shelf and accommodate the demand from consumers. Its natural to focus less effort on engineering issues and more on manufacturing and shipping.

My conclusion: Branding, design and fads are one thing - but can Apple's iPod technology withstand the test of time and competition? We'll soon find out.

-AP

posted by The Ardell Group @ 3:06 PM