Is Samsung the new Apple?

[HighestOfHigh]

First off, please. You've become the bitterest queen on this Forum ever since I "turned against" M-B and got a 5er.

Lol...I could care less about what you purchase. It's just like right now...You're upset about articles that talk negative about Apple. It just seems to bother you that people praise Samsung. It annoys the hell out of you. Well that's how we feel when every Mercedes-Benz thread you post negative feedback in multiple comments.

If you want a 5 series, then that is on you. I just get sick of the constant negativity of a brand of car that I like. Surely I don't lose sleep over it, but it would be nice NOT to hear the same thing over and over.

Why you can't understand that is beyond me...

 

[K-A]

Lol...I could care less about what you purchase. It's just like right now...You're upset about articles that talk negative about Apple. It just seems to bother you that people praise Samsung. It annoys the hell out of you. Well that's how we feel when every Mercedes-Benz thread you post negative feedback in multiple comments.

If you want a 5 series, then that is on you. I just get sick of the constant negativity of a brand of car that I like. Surely I don't lose sleep over it, but it would be nice NOT to hear the same thing over and over.

Why you can't understand that is beyond me...

You're way off, this isn't about "praising Samsung". It's about you posting nonsense articles meant for unintelligent sheep (hook, line, and sinker? I truly hope not).

How you think that crap you posted holds any weight when Apple is kicking so much a$$ their balance sheet is practically starting to swallow Samsung's who's a MUCH bigger company, is beyond me.

There are a lot of Apple haters out there who are jealous of its success, its loyal following, and how its defied odds. Those are the types who post *false* analysis meant to be FUD to attempt to take the Stock down and generate the Apple-hating-sheeple parade in seeing the companies "demise". You should be smart enough to know what you posted was absolute nonsense.

 

[HighestOfHigh]

You should be smart enough to know what you posted was absolute nonsense.

Again, you're making it personal. I have posted positive and negative articles about Apple. Some of them have been from other media sources and some from yahoo. News is news.

 

[K-A]

Again, you're making it personal. I have posted positive and negative articles about Apple. Some of them have been from other media sources and some from yahoo. News is news.

The point is that what you linked was simply garbage, an opinion piece by a mere "nobody" in the grand scheme of things.

"APPLE IS DONE". C'monnnnn.

I bet everybody wants to be "DONE" if it means that they'll be doing the business Apple is doing these days.

The most hilarious part was this "group" who found that "kids think the Surface is cool". Did Microsoft pay for that hit-piece?

The Surface has been a bomb so far. Steve Balmer himself said that the response has been generally muted. I should know, I bought MSFT stock thinking the Surface would be a hit and now the stock has taken a beating because of Balmer's words about how well it's doing.... or lack thereof.

If the media did research before posting emotional driven, twisted pieces, people would be better informed, and if people did research of their own before quoting the media, they'd realize the MASSIVE amount of holes coming from said media.

 

[Monster]

If only people will listen to their own advice sometimes.

 

[-=Hot|Ice=-]

My iPhone 4S's quality is waayyy superior then my S2 ever was. Apple products also keep their re-sale value pretty darn high as well.

I still can't wait to get back to a phone that has a removable battery, and expandable memory. I'm an IT major, and Android just seems right for me.

 

[-=Hot|Ice=-]

K-A, I think when people say that Apple is 'Done' they mean in terms of innovation. They really haven't innovated jack since the 4S came out. That's two years. Wayyyy too long to be standing still when you're a business in the technology field. Especially today when electronics seem to become outdated the next day.

 

[K-A]

K-A, I think when people say that Apple is 'Done' they mean in terms of innovation. They really haven't innovated jack since the 4S came out. That's two years. Wayyyy too long to be standing still when you're a business in the technology field. Especially today when electronics seem to become outdated the next day.

Thing is, people expect Apple to innovate a whole new segment as if it's easy to do. Who else has innovated a new segment? Samsung's entire current Mobile field is just a me-too of what Apple started (iPhone, iPad, etc.). Before that, Samsung Mobile's were "me-too's" of Blackberry and Palms.

People keep saying that Apple doesn't "innovate anymore", but who does more than Apple? What has Samsung innovated so well? I have a GS3 and I can't find any innovations that my 4S didn't have. Yes, there are differences, yes the screen is bigger, it has a different OS, it has a second-rate version of SIRI ("S Voice" is such a poor attempt at Siri it's just too depressing to even use it), etc.

iPhone 5 is still an innovative phone, it has the highest screen DPI (at launch at least), is the thinnest and lightest Mobile ever, fastest, etc. IMO it's far more innovative than the GS3, which I can't seem to find any "innovations" that people seem to buy into Samsung's marketing so much to apparently see.

I mean, maybe Apple won't even invent a new segment for the marketplace, but why should they have to? Who else has? I don't get why Apple's past success is now held as some sort of curse above their heads.

Most successful companies are lucky if they can revolutionize ONCE! Apple has a handful of times in under a decade. They can just keep refining the "iProducts" that revolutionized the world and be more than fine, because nobody else is really doing otherwise themselves. Maybe you're right, and Apple won't bring any new disruptive products into the marketplace, but I don't think that speaks badly of them.

What I hope from Apple is more than one screen size. IMO if they just bring a 4.5+" iPhone into the marketplace, people would go crazy and hype up the next iPhone simply due to that. I really feel that Samsung's marketing has tricked people into thinking the "okay" GS3 is some space-age product simply because the screen is big. Also, Samsung re-proved that people love advertisable gimmicks. Ironically, Apple used to be masters of that. iPhone 5 was a little too engineering-driven, therefore not very marketable. They need a bigger screen size option, some new colors, some frills to be able to showcase in commercials. The 4S was an identically looking product to iPhone 4, but SIRI was a brilliant marketing tool.

 

[Huckfeldt]

Samsung will one day rule the phone and TV market, period. Oh wait, they already do.

 

[-=Hot|Ice=-]

Thing is, people expect Apple to innovate a whole new segment as if it's easy to do. Who else has innovated a new segment? Samsung's entire current Mobile field is just a me-too of what Apple started (iPhone, iPad, etc.). Before that, Samsung Mobile's were "me-too's" of Blackberry and Palms.

People keep saying that Apple doesn't "innovate anymore", but who does more than Apple? What has Samsung innovated so well? I have a GS3 and I can't find any innovations that my 4S didn't have. Yes, there are differences, yes the screen is bigger, it has a different OS, it has a second-rate version of SIRI ("S Voice" is such a poor attempt at Siri it's just too depressing to even use it), etc.

iPhone 5 is still an innovative phone, it has the highest screen DPI (at launch at least), is the thinnest and lightest Mobile ever, fastest, etc. IMO it's far more innovative than the GS3, which I can't seem to find any "innovations" that people seem to buy into Samsung's marketing so much to apparently see.

I mean, maybe Apple won't even invent a new segment for the marketplace, but why should they have to? Who else has? I don't get why Apple's past success is now held as some sort of curse above their heads.

Most successful companies are lucky if they can revolutionize ONCE! Apple has a handful of times in under a decade. They can just keep refining the "iProducts" that revolutionized the world and be more than fine, because nobody else is really doing otherwise themselves. Maybe you're right, and Apple won't bring any new disruptive products into the marketplace, but I don't think that speaks badly of them.

What I hope from Apple is more than one screen size. IMO if they just bring a 4.5+" iPhone into the marketplace, people would go crazy and hype up the next iPhone simply due to that. I really feel that Samsung's marketing has tricked people into thinking the "okay" GS3 is some space-age product simply because the screen is big. Also, Samsung re-proved that people love advertisable gimmicks. Ironically, Apple used to be masters of that. iPhone 5 was a little too engineering-driven, therefore not very marketable. They need a bigger screen size option, some new colors, some frills to be able to showcase in commercials. The 4S was an identically looking product to iPhone 4, but SIRI was a brilliant marketing tool.

The innovations on the GS 3 include wireless charging, NFC sharing technology, a 4.8" HD display. Taking an iPhone 4S and making the screen .5 inches bigger isn't innovating. Apple damn well knows they could of completely changed the game by adding NFC technology to the iPhone 5. They could of blew everything out of the water if they included wireless charging, but Apple got greedy. Apple had the ability to innovate with the iPhone 5. They just decided not to. That opened up space for Samsung to take a chunk of market share. You were talking about sheep earlier. People who think the iPhone 5 is actually a phone that's innovated are blinded by the Apple logo and are the sheep in this case. There is nothing special about a screen that's half an inch bigger.

 

[Monster]

They already rule the TV, display, home appliances, ssd, flash memory etc, like I have said before Samsung is a much bigger company than some people assume.

 

[Top Secret]

The innovations on the GS 3 include wireless charging, NFC sharing technology, a 4.8" HD display.

The Palm Pre had wireless charging in 2009, the Nexus S had NFC in 2010 and the GS3 has a pentile display, with a lower DPI than the iPhone 5. Hardly innovation.

 

[K-A]

The innovations on the GS 3 include wireless charging, NFC sharing technology, a 4.8" HD display. Taking an iPhone 4S and making the screen .5 inches bigger isn't innovating. Apple damn well knows they could of completely changed the game by adding NFC technology to the iPhone 5. They could of blew everything out of the water if they included wireless charging, but Apple got greedy. Apple had the ability to innovate with the iPhone 5. They just decided not to. That opened up space for Samsung to take a chunk of market share. You were talking about sheep earlier. People who think the iPhone 5 is actually a phone that's innovated are blinded by the Apple logo and are the sheep in this case. There is nothing special about a screen that's half an inch bigger.

Problem is, the "sheep" these days are "GS3 believers".

None of those things you mentioned are innovations by Samsung on the GS3.

iPhone 5 IS more innovative than the GS3, it's the lightest and thinnest phone ever. It has a higher DPI (better screen: iPhone 5 is 327 and GS3's is a mediocre 306), it's faster, it does everything fundamentally better.

So I ask again, what REAL innovations has the GS3 applied, and what is so significantly better about it than the GS2?

The GS3 is outmatched on many technical levels VS the iPhone 5, has a buggy UI, and a few gimmicks like "swipe to screen capture and tilt to zoom". Those aren't innovations. Neither is NFC (not a first on the GS3 and not an innovation), and personally I think that NFC is too "risky" for Apple to use it on one of their products as of yet. Security is a huge point for Apple. As for Wireless charging, the GS3 doesn't have that! That's what I'm saying, people just love to bash Apple because they hold them to standards they hold no one else to. The Lightning cable wasn't some "let's make a new charger for the hell of it", it was needed as the next gen of Apple devices got too ("revolutionarily") thin for the old 30 pin. Not to mention, it clicks in front or backwards, and has superior charging attributes.

Fact is, Apple has eaten Samsung's lunch when it comes to Mobile innovation, but Samsung's marketing has been so aggressively bashing Apple and touting things that aren't really innovations, that they're creating a flock of "sheep" that make what those same people accuse Apple's "fanboys" of doing as child's play.

 

[K-A]

ATT just reported a record amount of Smartphones sold were iPhone's. A staggering 84% of phones activated were iPhones.

Verizon and Sprint also noted an increase of iPhone marketshare spelling out iPhone outselling the competition. Of course, Apple just announced 48 Million iPhones sold last quarter, a record amount and a 30% increase over the "4S era" last year.
The "Galaxy S" still has some catching up to do.

 

[deity]

Samsung is not the new Apple. While Samsung seems to be more successful as of late, it hardly represents what Apple stands for. Apple is all about the aesthetic. Beyond that, it ensures that the user-experience is simple, streamlined, and organized. If my GS3 breaks, I have to send it in somewhere to get it fixed. If you live in a city with an Apple Store (which isn't too hard nowadays), you bring it in, and the Genius Bar helps you with it. The entire 'Apple' experience is just fluid. In terms of design, Samsung is still obviously going towards the practical route, and choosing plastic over more brittle materials such as glass. Although it doesn't feel or look as nice, it is supposed to be very durable and more scratch-resistant. The whole Samsung design language is much different that of Apple's.

In terms of innovation, we seriously need to do a reality check here. I felt like Facetime was one of the bigger things to happen in the mobile industry. Yes, video calling was supported by other phones back then, but with Apple's marketing and watch over the program, there was actually a user-base for face-to-face calling, and it just worked. The retina display, or rather, the lust for better screens, is probably the most important technological change ever made on a phone. I can't live with technology which isn't hi-res anymore. I just got a mbp retina, and I thank myself every day for choosing retina over the normal models. Siri also seemed like the first voice assistant which actually worked well, and had 'character' to it. Previously, they were usually really bad and could not understand very much.

Samsung did come up with the S Pen, but it's really just a piece of crap. It does nothing. It's practically a substitute for your finger, which really makes no sense, considering simply touching the screen is much more direct. The whole 'hover to get a sneak peek' thing doesn't really have useful application, and being able to take screenshots with the pen isn't all that useful either. Jotting down notes with the S Pen is equally counterproductive; the notepad is never large enough to support your large 'writing', and typing is much more simple and organized. I don't actually think the S Pen has any redeeming qualities.

Innovation must also apply to cases in which other ideas are necessary. The 'swipe-to-take-a-screenshot' is a Samsung first, but that doesn't necessarily change the mobile experience. For the iPhone, it's the home and power button at the same time. I have no problem with it right now. In fact, the whole motion of swiping your hand across the screen isn't very fluid, and seems to be a bit inconvenient to me. The way I see it is phony innovation, more like a marketing thing than anything.

S-Beam. The bump to share information feature. Well, I can download Bump (or something to that effect) on the App Store, and get that innovation on my iPhone. Not a big deal at all.

I am not sure whether or not you can call the Samsung Note 'innovation', but I suppose it's probably Samsung's best claim to that achievement. I can see why people would like such a large phone, but really, it looks goofy when you hold it up to your ear, and unless you're massive like K-A, looks really awkward in the hands.

Final note; Android as an operating system. 95% of mobile phone owners won't know the differences, nor will they care.

It's stupid sometimes. The Galaxy line of phones are hyped up JUST as much as the iPhone, and the samsheep are just as devout as any Apple fan. I find it hypocritical, really.

 

[K-A]

Innovation must also apply to cases in which other ideas are necessary. The 'swipe-to-take-a-screenshot' is a Samsung first, but that doesn't necessarily change the mobile experience. For the iPhone, it's the home and power button at the same time. I have no problem with it right now. In fact, the whole motion of swiping your hand across the screen isn't very fluid, and seems to be a bit inconvenient to me. The way I see it is phony innovation, more like a marketing thing than anything.

Great post, but I gotta point this out. The "Swipe to screenshot" thing is a joke, it is VERY annoying and more often actually just "swipes" as a normal screen gesture instead of taking a capture for me.

What Samsung did was "brainwash" their faithful in the same way their faithful have vehemently attackingly accused Apple marketing to do to their own faithful: Convince them that gimmicks stand for "innovation". Difference is, Apple's innovations actually were flat out revolutionary on the most massive scale possible (we all know how profitable the segments that "iProducts" introduced to the marketplace are now). SIRI was a huge innovation and everybody is copying its new iteration of "Voice Control", from the terribly working "S Voice" on the GS3 to the great new "Google Voice", though none of them capture the charm and personality of SIRI. SIRI just came out a year ago, and people are saying that Apple doesn't "innovate"? What has Samsung done in the last year that is near comparable with the innovation that even SIRI was?

I got the GS3, and am happy I did because I could try and find out what all the hoopla was about, what people were on about. What I found is a phone that very smartly and tactfully focuses on a "nature" approach, the gimmicky "eye reading to stay on" (which is only a frontal camera that works HORRIBLY and wastes battery, it only can see you in bright lighting, and on Android Forums about everybody has deactivated it). There are human (cheesy) whistles as sound effects, the Interface Wallpaper, etc. It ads a human element to the phone which was smartly marketed.

It's all wrapped around a very low-quality feeling device with which had a loose fitting back on mine, and a screen saturation that is wildly exaggerated (hold a GS3 next to an iPhone 5 and look at the same pic from Google Images, you'll see the GS3 look almost like a cartoon with inaccurately saturated colors, as if it's finding colors that barely exist in said pics and making them look ultra strong, not to mention you'll see pixelation compared to the crystal clear and very accurately color-reading iPhone 5 Retina Display. Screen Brightness is another story, as the GS3 is known to have a sort of muted Brightness range, where the iPhone 5 can light up a ballpark. Let's not forget to mention the *regressive technology* that we have on the GS3's screen, which uses a Pentile Display as opposed to the RGB Displays of Samsung AMOLED's of the GS2 and Note range.

At the same time, people consider the UI to be a substandard "Bloatware". People would never call anything Apple put out "bloatware", because Apple doesn't do "bloat", therefore further proving Samsung is the anti-Apple and vice versa.

Oh, and I'm not "massive". Just tall.

 

[-=Hot|Ice=-]

The Palm Pre had wireless charging in 2009, the Nexus S had NFC in 2010 and the GS3 has a pentile display, with a lower DPI than the iPhone 5. Hardly innovation.

The Nexus S was a Samsung phone. Innovation by Samsung. Fact of the matter is, Samsung is gaining market share and Apple is losing it. I bet you if the 5S has NFC technology, all the Apple fanboys will be screaming that it was a Apple innovation.

 

[K-A]

The Nexus S was a Samsung phone. Innovation by Samsung. Fact of the matter is, Samsung is gaining market share and Apple is losing it. I bet you if the 5S has NFC technology, all the Apple fanboys will be screaming that it was a Apple innovation.

NFC wasn't a Samsung innovation nor was it first used on a Samsung (it was Nokia).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Near_field_communication

Even if Samsung did innovate NFC (which they didn't), it's a spec compared to Apple's innovations, and has been around for quite some time, so Samsung would be able to be accused of "sitting still for too long" as well.

Also, iPhone is gaining market share back from not only Samsung, but the entire Android-coalition, which says a lot considering iPhone is one device line and Android is a combination of hundreds of handsets by dozens of brands who simply share a free fragmented OS.

ATT just reported that 84% of their Smartphones sold were iPhone's, a new record, and a market share gain. Verizon and Sprint also reported record iPhone sales, and iOS actually gained on the ENTIRE Android-coalition in Smartphone market share in the U.S (iOS 51% VS Android 49%), which is incredible considering we're talking 3 iPhone's VS like 300+ "Androids".

Also, don't forget Apple is launching on T-Mobile this year and a China Mobile deal is coming soon (hopefully), which will launch iPhone market share even higher.

Just imagine how much higher it would go if they also gave a larger screen size option.

 

[K-A]

Samsung just reported their numbers, and their ENTIRE hugely bloated business just posted LESS revenue and much less profit than Apple did with its concise and vastly smaller lineup of more highly "Premium" regarded products. Samsung came in at just over $52 Billion (converted to U.S Dollars) VS Apple's just over $54 Billion in Revenue. As for profit, Apple made over 100% more than Samsung with Samsung posting just over $6 Billion in profit VS Apple's over $13 Billion in profit. Apple added more straight up cash to their bank roll than Samsung made in entire profit for the entire quarter.

If that doesn't impress people, considering how massive Samsung's business is and how "small" and focused Apple's is, I don't know what to say, but take off the "iHateApple" shirt.

 

[Monster]

Samsung manufactures the chips for apple, apple also uses Samsung ssd inside the Mac books. Whatever happens in other forums are their business, there is no need to bring up terms like I sheep or android fanboys in here. If you want to prove your point about apple vs Samsung you can try your luck at proper smart phone forums. There are no apple haters or hardcore android fans in this forum, there are only intelligent and well informed members here.

 

[HighestOfHigh]

Not saying I agree with this article, but it does have some good points concerning the market.

Apple (AAPL) announced on Wednesday that it sold almost 48 million iPhones last quarter, and yet the company’s shares have been cratering ever since. How to explain this seeming paradox? Benedict Evans, a strategy consultant for Enders Analysis, gives it his best shot and essentially concludes that Apple has reached the point where it’s gotten so big that investors are understandably worried about whether it has any room to grow any further at its current margins.

“How many more people are left who can buy a $650 phone (or even a $400 one) every 24 months?” Evans asks. “Is growth almost over? This in turn leads inexorably to the much argued-over ‘cheap phone’ issue, and how margin-dilutive such a phone might be. As an investor, therefore, are you buying a company with high growth and continued high profits, slowing growth and the same high profits, or the same growth and (due to cheaper products) lower profit? It really isn’t clear. More cynically, this is a catch 22: high numbers mean saturation (bad), and low numbers mean slowing growth (bad).”

Another way of looking at this is that investors may want Apple to deliver two contradictory things: They want Apple to expand its market share by releasing a cheaper iPhone on the one hand while demanding that the company maintain its historic margins on the other. Needless to say, such a fete will be hard to achieve unless Apple somehow figures out how to make a working iPhone out of cardboard that people will buy for $120 a pop. Evans notes that this Catch-22 has led Apple to “the point where all news is bad news,” since the only way for its stock price to continue rising is to replicate its skyrocketing growth from the past several years. And since the rise of Samsung (005930) and other low-cost Android smartphone vendors has forced Apple to adhere to the laws of economic gravity again, that sort of growth doesn’t right now seem likely.

- http://bgr.com/2013/01/25/apple-market-share-margins-analysis-305349/

Cheaper phones? More options? How can Apple stay on top with so many competitors?