Apple stock is down 40% from its high at the end of December — aren’t you glad you don’t take your investment advice from a blogger? I am.
Nonetheless I still find the company fascinating. It has, like it or not, a 21st century approach to marketing that few have successfully copied. This article does a good job, I think, of explaining it. Stimulating reading for anyone who has to market products — or ideas — even on a much smaller scale. Here’s one brief excerpt:
When you walk into the Moscone Center for an Apple product launch, the posters outside tout current Apple products. The advertising on passing taxis and buses are familiar Apple themes. The nearby Apple store still promotes the current bestsellers. The Apple Web site is still business as usual.
But as soon as the keynote presentation ends and people file out of the building, everything is new: The advertising on the buses and cabs has miraculously changed to trumpet the new product. The Apple Stores are stocked and ready to sell the New Thing. Apple employees are wearing T-shirts emblazoned with the new message. The Apple Web site is ready with new information and images. New TV ads showing the just-introduced product are already spreading the news.
Like many things in life, Apple is a confusing option for me. They make the best stuff, period. I love my iPod, I was an early MacBook adopter, I love Leopard and I’m about to buy Aperture.
I hate its DRM and the fact that you can’t put plain old MP3s on the iPod. And when I upgrade hardware, I always do it myself, because they charge such a markup for things like RAM.
Still, I imagine the stock is still a decent buy – when the iPhone moves to new carriers the demand will again be significant, and who know what other goodies it has in store.
I have had thousands of mp3s on my iPods.
My MP3s always get converted when I put em in iTunes. What am I doing wrong?
I started to explain Ave, but decided I honestly don’t know. I always imported from CD into mp3 192 until the past week when I have been experimenting with Apple Lossless.
Existing mp3 files have always imported into iTunes in mp3 format. Maybe that was because I had my import CD format set to be mp3, but I’m guessing.
Open iTunes
Go to Edit/ Preferences
Click on Advanced Tab
Click on Importing Tab
Bottom Section: first option is Import Using… select MP3 encoding from list