getbretweir
Banned
Totally agree. I love my G4 so much, but it'll probably be the last phone that costs $600+ that I'll own.
I could be wrong, but I don't think Apple can charge $600+ for an iPhone for much longer if Android phones drop in price. They can't rely on their Die-hard fans for much longer IMHO.
it'll be interesting to see how Apple evolves over the next few years. I knew (and put my money where my mouth is) that the iPhone 6 was gonna be huge. it's a major upgrade and the larger display plus fingerprint sensor made them billions. I also new they'd be in trouble after that. I don't think their biggest threat comes from Android, I think their biggest threat comes from themselves.
They're absolutely brilliant at brand loyalty and customer retention, probably better than any company other than the NFL (I live in the US). They're customers have grown accustomed to two year upgrades, and they offer such slight upgrades that they make sure every two years something significant, some must have feature will appear. The 6 was huge cause a lot of people didn't wait a year, and the people that were going on 3 years with their iPhone took the bait.
now it's back to that cycle, but the problem is there's not any new technology that's gonna be a game changer, certainty not USB-C or for them, wireless charging. they already made the larger display. what else is there? the only thing I can see is front speakers, and huge improvement to micro audio (been reading about it ... it's amazing) maybe WiFi charging but even that won't rival the 6.
so back to my original point, the reason their biggest threat doesn't come from Android, but themselves, is that there's not a big enough reason to upgrade every 2 years. idk if you live in the US, but Verizon recently did away with subsidized phones, so that'll have an affect as well. it's basically the same thing with android, the same thing that happened to TVs, desktops, laptops, tablets and now phones.
So removable battery, plastic, glass, price, storage ... doesn't matter. Things eventually plateau and we're almost at that point.