Hellooooooo Otterites!

You get two Wobert Wednesday posts from me today. Had to respond to Brother Martin’s tech post. Great stuff as always, Marty.

He’s right about my and Frannie’s fascination with the Apple ecosystem of late. I will note right up front that it’s the ecosystem and the integration that I am enjoying. I bought an iPad a couple of years back so I could have something more portable to take with me and for drawing. I didn’t have a Surface anymore, and the creative apps on the iPad are more numerous. Also, though I could use full-blown versions of Photoshop, etc. on a Surface, the iPad creative apps are much less expensive. You can pay for the software or the hardware I guess.

I still own a PC. In fact, I have a Dell laptop AND a killer desktop I just upgraded since the old one was dying. It was over 10 years old; I think. I lost track of when I bought it. Note that. TEN YEARS. Take that and stick it Apple fan bois. Any computer will last 10 years if you take care of it. Since I did the upgrades, I have a desktop that is now my primary Windows machine instead of being relegated to being a server. It’s fast enough and robust enough to game on even. Which means I may be selling the Dell. I don’t need two laptops to take around plus the iPad.

You see I also have a 15 inch 2015 MacBook Pro. I found once I started with the iPad, and my middle daughter-spawn had a MacBook Air that I was dealing with, that I wanted to add one to the mix. Partially to be aware of anything she might need, partially because I am indeed a tech nerd. I’m less rabid about the Mac vs. PC thing than I was in my yute.

My next Apple purchase was the Apple Watch last year. I was reading about it and it just seemed to be a way better option than my Samsung watch, and it is. I find it’s a smoother flow between devices and works better for me. NB: Samsung could learn a thing or two about how contactless pay works. My Apple watch works way better than the Samsung watch did. With the watch though, you almost have to have the phone. I was thinking about it, primarily because of the integration and cross-device usage of certain features.

So, I ended up with an iPhone 12 Pro Max. Go big or go home I say. Now, none of these devices is really that much different from their Windows or Android counterparts. They really aren’t. And each have their benefits. I sometimes miss the pen on my Samsung Note for instance. Why Apple doesn’t put out an iPhone that uses the Apple Pencil is beyond me. Windows and Android devices are more open and customizable than their Apple counterparts too. The reason I have a 2015 MacBook Pro is because it’s the last one that you can upgrade yourself. I put in a 2TB drive and upgraded the RAM to 16GB. I also bought the laptop used for a steal as well.

Again though, it all works pretty much the same way. Though I still get annoyed at the way Apple does its interface sometimes. The keyboard shortcuts being different trips me up as I move back and forth, but those are minor thing. There’s very little you can’t find on all the ecosystems. The one thing I wanted that was woefully behind on Windows and non-existent on Android was Scrivener, the best writing app I’ve found. Now it’s up to date on Windows, but still nowhere to be seen on Android.

Before anyone thinks I’ve gone raving Apple fan boi… I like the ecosystem. That’s where it stops. Not the company. I think as a company, Apple is an unmitigated Ass. As Marty pointed out, their margins are astronomical. They charge an incredible premium on everything. They could sell far more, I believe if they cut their margins from 40% to 20%. Yeah, they really have margins that high and higher on some things apparently. Or as Marty pointed out, move that manufacturing back to the US. There’s no reason it’s not possible, especially with today’s level of automation. Workers make more here, WAY MORE, than they do in China, but you don’t need 10,000 to run a chip factory or assemble a laptop.

The amount of cash they routinely sit on is obscene. I’m all for profits and having money to invest, but Apple just keeps growing their pile. They aren’t really reinvesting it. If nothing else, they should be distributing a good chunk of it back to shareholders and workers.

I believe they’re sinfully taking advantage of what is effectively slave labor in China to make those profits and hoard that cash. Yeah, I’ve contributed to that. I admit it. However, so are all the other tech companies. You can’t buy tech that doesn’t do this. Apple just happens to screw the consumer more than most with the higher end prices. That’s why I bought a used MacBook. The watch and phone I have will be kept for as long as I can. The next iPhone I get will have to be a really compelling device for me to buy. Add Pencil support? I’m probably there. Beyond that, I’m good for a while. Same with the iPad I have.

While I am very impressed with the new M1 and successor chips from Apple, I have no plans to shell out all that cash for one of them. Maybe in a few years, I’ll find one used at a price I like. For now, I can enjoy the ecosystem without it. Because, again… it’s the integration that caught my attention. If Microsoft and Android could achieve the same level of integration across devices, I’d probably be right back to that side of the fence with no problem or concerns.