mac world enjoys more provocative work, and his latest work not only takes issue with the iPhone 16’s camera control button, but also the action button in front of it.
These particular views aside, they argue that the iPhone’s fixed (ish) annual update cycle forces Apple to launch new phones before they actually have enough features.
button gate
This site’s Mahmoud Itani is clearly not a fan of hardware buttons.
To me, the camera control button feels like an accessibility feature designed for one-handed shooters, rather than an attractive addition that mainstream users will adopt. Simply put, it causes a lot of problems and solves nothing in the process […]
Like the camera control buttons, the action buttons (first introduced on the iPhone 15 Pro) also feel like unnecessary changes made to look like a reimagined device. […] Apple could have upgraded the existing double-backtap feature to allow users to assign a wider variety of tasks. It could have served the same purpose without requiring any hardware changes.
I morning I’m a fan of both action buttons and camera controls, but I think the latter needs some UI work, but I won’t get into that specific discussion here.
Should Apple stop annual fixed iPhone updates?
But Itani’s broader suggestion is that Apple should stop updating the iPhone every year.
The annual iPhone upgrade cycle is draining Apple. As we’ve shown, companies sometimes make poor decisions in the name of radical change. Otherwise, users won’t care as much about the upgrade as they did with the iterative iPhone 13 Pro. But what if there was a third route?
He suggests a two-year cycle instead, but some argue for an ad-hoc approach to launching new iPhones when there’s a reason to do so.
Neither approach is likely to be financially sustainable. Although Apple’s product lineup is growing very slowly and its revenue from services is increasing, the fact remains that the iPhone brings in about half of the company’s revenue.
Annual updates do play an important role in driving sales, so it’s hard to imagine the board agreeing to turn off the faucet even partially. In fact, Apple’s chip designers suggested last year that the Mac would likely join the annual update party, and that appears to be the case.
what is your view? Do you like annual iPhone updates? Do you want to see Apple slow down to a biennial pace, or do you want to see the company abandon fixed update cycles altogether and only release new models when it can offer something interesting? Should I release it?
Please take our survey and share your thoughts in the comments.
Image: Apple
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