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A comment on Letter from Tim Cook to Apple Investors. Parent comment

Re:Letter from Tim Cook to Apple Investors by swish_bob on Thursday January 03, 2019 @10:30AM (#18815780)
OP did not say "mishandling batterygate screwed Apple's earnings", but instead pointed out that something that could have been better handled and would have cost significantly less was considered a big enough mistake to be mentioned.

OP not implying causation, they're calling something interesting out.

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Re:Letter from Tim Cook to Apple Investors by criley2 on Thursday January 03, 2019 @11:16AM (#18816180)
I fundamentally disagree with your analysis, as OP helpfully listed their entire thinking out:

    > "It went something like this:" 
    > .... 
    >- Some people decide that they'll stick with their phone a bit ?longer than they otherwise would have, reducing iPhone sales.
    >- Apple misses their earnings target, likely costing them more in value than it would have cost them to address the root issue in the first place.
OP using a list format is implying a causative link between battery issues and earnings targets. OP even suggests that their value would be safe had they simply corrected the battery issue earlier.

It's an extremely clear post they made, IMO

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Re:Letter from Tim Cook to Apple Investors by tomnipotent on Thursday January 03, 2019 @12:19PM (#18816862)
> a causative link between battery issues and earnings targets

There's is a causative link, which is why Apple included it in this report. How is it possible to miss that connection?

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Re:Letter from Tim Cook to Apple Investors by abalone on Thursday January 03, 2019 @01:26PM (#18817614)
You’re misunderstanding the thread here. OP suggested batteries, a minor factor in the report, were the primary cause in the earnings drop. For whatever reason there are people who really badly want to believe this. swish_bob countered, inaccurately, that OP did not claim causation.

Now that we all can agree swish_bob is wrong, the problem remains that OP misrepresented the primacy of the factors stated in the report.

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Re:Letter from Tim Cook to Apple Investors by tomnipotent on Thursday January 03, 2019 @02:54PM (#18818622)
> were the primary cause in the earnings drop.

No he didn't, stop making stuff up. Apple would not have bothered to mention the battery issue if it didn't have a material impact on their business.

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Re:Letter from Tim Cook to Apple Investors by mike10010100 on Friday January 04, 2019 @05:27PM (#18828305)
Yes, he literally did. Right here:

> - Some people decide that they'll stick with their phone a bit longer than they otherwise would have, reducing iPhone sales.

> - Apple misses their earnings target, likely costing them more in value than it would have cost them to address the root issue in the first place.

There's an implicit "because of this" between the two bullet points.

Again, it's painting a problem that is 5% of the issue as if it's 100%.

China was the vast majority of this decline, as the earnings reports show.

I have no earthly idea why people are ignoring this fact so badly.

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Re:Letter from Tim Cook to Apple Investors by tomnipotent on Saturday January 05, 2019 @07:45PM (#18835498)
> There's an implicit "because of this" between the two bullet points.

Not about this being the most significant factor. You've decided to infer that from the list - most of us didn't because he _explicitly_ says so in his last sentence. They also had influence over this particular issue, unlike the macroeconomics of China.

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Re:Letter from Tim Cook to Apple Investors by mike10010100 on Monday January 07, 2019 @12:00AM (#18842897)
> Not about this being the most significant factor.

It absolutely is suggested, if not implicitly then by omission.

> They also had influence over this particular issue, unlike the macroeconomics of China.

Right, but the more it's discussed, the more it feels like people don't want to talk about the slowing economy in China.

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Re:Letter from Tim Cook to Apple Investors by michaelcampbell on Thursday January 03, 2019 @02:30PM (#18818370)
> OP suggested batteries, a minor factor in the report, were the primary cause in the earnings drop.

I don't get that in the least little bit from what he wrote. Nothing in his post even references the earnings drop.

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Re:Letter from Tim Cook to Apple Investors by abalone on Thursday January 03, 2019 @03:10PM (#18818795)
> Nothing in his post even references the earnings drop.

“- Some people decide that they'll stick with their phone a bit longer...

- Apple misses their earnings target”

Direct quote.

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Re:Letter from Tim Cook to Apple Investors by mike10010100 on Friday January 04, 2019 @05:28PM (#18828316)
I feel like I'm taking crazy pills considering how many people are completely ignoring the very obvious connotation here. It's like they're willfully ignoring the Chinese market issue entirely.
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