

Apple shares fall after iPhone sales disappoint - junioreven
http://www.itworld.com/mobile-wireless/214569/apple-shares-take-hit-after-q4-earnings

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coob
Failed to meet analyst expectations, which have never been right.

Met Apple's own guidance, though. The stock is also now back up to ~$420

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joebadmo
So much cheerleading. So much schadenfreude.

I understand preferring a company's products to another, and I understand that
a brand is shorthand. I don't understand the self-identification with brand.
But then, I also don't understand the phenomenon of following/identifying with
sports teams/players.

Except brand cheerleading seems a bit weirder to me, because, well, for
example when Apple users cheer Apple profits, isn't that a financial loss for
the user that he's cheering? Why would you cheer record profits of a company
whose products you buy? I think it would make me feel like I paid too much.

What are the underlying pychological mechanisms? John Siracusa once described
the Apple community in particular as having survived a horrible dark time as a
persecuted minority, with Apple's success now being pure vindication. But
there's an implicit assumption of identification with the brand there already.
Where does that come from?

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ellyagg
When people say things like this, it sounds just a little condescending. It's
not nearly as stupid as your indifference suggests.

Humans are abstract thinkers. We like to generalize principles from our
observations. We often live our lives by these principles, so to the extent
these principles effectively predict the future and allow us to manage our
lives better, we're going to form an attachment to them. When you make another
observation of success based on the principles that you appreciate, this
reinforces part of your decision making framework. For fundamental principles,
you probably have many, many decisions bound up in their correctness. If a
principle turns out to be wrong, it will be very costly to correct all the
decisions based on the wrong principle, so it's exceptionally rational for
feeling creatures to hope for their principles to be validated by more
observations.

Apple is a company with some very public and explicit principles.

Plus, these principles make products. If you think products by a certain
company make your life a lot easier, you're going to want them to thrive. Some
people actually hold the principle that particular companies are more
innovative than others and if they didn't exist, some of the products they
like simply wouldn't exist. For example, Android exists today, and some of
those phones are pretty similar to the iPhone. But many people don't think
Android phones would exist today in anything like its current manifestation if
Apple hadn't done iPhone. This is arguable, but that's certainly beside the
point. Many, many people truly believe this, and it can't be disproved.

Identifying with sports teams depends. It's hard to believe you don't
understand that people usually follow and identify with sports team because of
instinctive tribalism. However, you can follow teams for other reason. I'm an
avid sports follower, and in general, I glom onto different teams and story
lines at the beginning of the season, and it seems to have to do with proving
to other fans my predictive abilities. Other reasons I follow certain teams is
because I believe the principles by which they're led will achieve a higher
degree of success over time, e.g., I admire the core tenets by which the Spurs
and Patriots run their organizations.

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joebadmo
Thanks for engaging me seriously, I appreciate it! I don't mean to be
condescending at all. I ask out of a genuine desire to understand the
behavior. I apologize if it came off as condescension. If anything, I've
always felt sort of handicapped or like I'm missing something that leaves me
with an inability to form these sorts of identifications.

If I'm in a tribe, it must be the one that is averse to tribalism.

The product line of reasoning I get and even agree with. I do value Apple as a
company, because I agree that they bring a lot of innovation to the table.
It's the part where users seem to tie up there identities with the company
that was confusing.

But you're saying that the brand represents a certain value system and that's
what you identify with? That's interesting. And enlightening.

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jiaaro
this article is fluff

the conclusions are probably correct (we'll find out soon), but the title is
sensationalist

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Vitaly
wtf? "fourth-quarter earnings increase of 54%" was disappointing?

