Should Apple just sell its Mac computers and iPods with a two-year subscription, like AT&T does with the iPhone? Subscription plans are a great way to lock in customers. At the end of the contract, the user could keep their device, or trade up for a newer model and a new two-year contract.
There are two common issues with Apple products: usability and reliability.
Users tend to praise the usability and design features of Apple products. The company keeps tight control over its hardware, as I mentioned on 15 April 2008 in my billso.com article about the Open Computer. Mac software tends to be more reliable than Windows software because developers have to deal with a narrower range of hardware and operating systems
It’s very easy to damage or break a laptop computer, as I have mentioned in my billso.com articles of 3 March 2008 and 30 September 2006. The iPhone and iPod Touch ranges use flash memory instead of hard drives to increase their shock resistance. Hard drives aren’t the only point of failure in laptops, of course, Jacks, connectors, and power supplies are vulnerable components.
The iPhone and iPod Touch have special indicators in the headphone jacks that change color if they are dunked in water; see this article on Wired and this HardMac post for more information. I guess Apple has had enough warranty returns because users took their iPods out in the rain or the pool, or dropped them in the toilet.
Display screens are the most fragile part of a laptop computer, of course.
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