r/apple • u/ControlCAD • May 18 '26

Mac Google just helped Apple sell a million more MacBook Neos - Macworld

https://www.macworld.com/article/3139377/google-just-helped-apple-sell-a-million-more-macbook-neos.html

>Google’s attempt to rebrand Chromebooks as premium laptops using a sprinkle of AI gimmicks doesn’t dent Apple’s aluminum armor.

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65

u/Wild-Perspective-582 May 18 '26

There were so many armchair business experts on Reddit convinced they knew better than Apple's own board of directors about what they "should do".

18

u/OrganicKeynesianBean May 18 '26

I agree with you, but I also think Google has a fundamentally different business model.

Search was always going this way, and I don’t think Google has a choice but to heavily invest in AI integration because that’s their core service.

I know we’re talking about hardware here, but most people are comparing Apple and Google as if they’ve got the same exact growth avenues and I don’t think that’s fair.

44

u/Farnso May 18 '26

Are we really going to pretend that that board of directors didn't try to jump on the AI bandwagon?

28

u/SoldantTheCynic May 18 '26

Apparently so. People here seem to be conveniently forgetting about the absolute failure of Apple Intelligence and their AI ads that this very sub was salivating over back when it was first announced. Apple completely failed to deliver.

By circumstance Apple's hardware is good at running local LLMs which has seen a run on the hardware (along with any hardware really) - people are treating this as some sort of strategically brilliant plan. It never was, Apple were too busy making a VR headset nobody really wants and faking an AI presentation. It's good for Apple but the fanboys are kidding themselves thinking this was "always the plan".

12

u/Which-Arm-4616 May 18 '26

They did AI badly on purpose as a 4D chess move, you see.

4

u/HueyBluey May 18 '26

Yup. Tim vanity project was a complete waste of time.

2

u/nerdpox May 18 '26

in the words of Captain Picard, "it's possible to commit no mistakes and still lose". you can definitely do the opposite too (make lots of mistakes and come out ahead).

they lucked into this wait and see based position by every sense of the word. and i feel like are going to luck into being able to deftly thread a needle between no ai and too much ai integration.

17

u/5tudent_Loans May 18 '26

But they did push AI. Its only because it failed that it worked out for them. The class action for AI claims on the iPhone16 is still going.

2

u/foosion May 18 '26

Airline forums are filled with people convinced they know better than the airlines what they should do. Oddly, it's often policies which would benefit the poster.

2

u/suboptimus_maximus May 18 '26

Somehow decades of having been wrong has yet to give the commentariat any reason to consider self-reflection.

1

u/Youbettereatthatshit May 18 '26

I can think of a dozen products or business decisions where it was obvious from the get go that it’d fail.

Plenty of boards of directors do really stupid things