[josefresco]

Agreed, and I'm old enough to remember their (cherry-picked) performance claims in the desktop/cpu world when they had to compete with Wintel machines.

What Apple doesn't do, is release products that compete solely based on these hardware specs. Their approach is "yeah it's fast enough, but it's also beautful etc."

[laichzeit0]

Believe it or not, there is a large group of consumers that purchase technology not just based on technical merit, but aesthetics (myself included). I'm more likely to buy something that looks/feels better designed and trade off functionality just for aesthetic reasons. Much like I'd rather buy a hardcover copy of a book instead of the paperback, if the quality is sufficiently higher.

Life's too short to use ugly crap.

[seunosewa]

Unfortunately, their products are not consistently beautiful anymore, IMHO. Examples: iPhone 5s silicone case with circles, antenna lines on the back of the new iPhones. :-/