Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2018/03/27/apple-doesnt-give-a-shit-abo.html
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The previous lowest-cost device that supported the Apple Pencil was $649.
This new device is $329.
They’ve also introduced a new suite of educational software and new education initiatives.
This is a terrible, uninformed post with a clickbait headline.
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I mean, sure, but it’s not Apple’s job (or any tech company’s, really) to care about your kids. Any more than it’s Blue Bird’s job to care about your kids when they sell buses to school districts. That’s the job of parents, school boards, and government officials.
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“What? Sorry I wasn’t paying attention, I was busy playing with the new device apple gave me”
-School Board
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I’m really confused? A business wants to sell a product so they can make money?
And to do that, they make the best possible product they can that maximimized their profits? And sometimes they have to become experts in a new product space in order to get access to this market space? And sometimes in the process end up finding that they can do some things better???
I’m confused.
I’ll say this, I managed a large university operation in my past. Part of my portfolio was running computer labs…I spent about the same on business class computers for either the Mac or PC. HOWEVER, I was able to staff my techs with a quarter of the people for the Mac labs as I did the PC labs. I don’t know how things have changed in the last decade, but you know what? 1FTE vs. 4 FTEs? Saved a hell of a lot of money.
I’m sure things are different now, but someone was doing something better than the other side at the time. Anyone in tech knows this, and it is a revolving door of figuring out what is best. Learning environments are even more specialized than the business world…and much less understood by bigger businesses. A lot of the solutions we were given were just complete and utter shit by techies that had absolutely no clue about learning spaces.
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I don’t disagree with you about the headline, but for a school, there isn’t too much difference between $649 and $329 when your tech budget is $0.
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apple has always had a presence in education, and while you may say it’s just all about profit, i think it’s also because they actually DO care about kids. other companies couldn’t be bothered to cater to schools before, precisely because it “wasn’t profitable” to do so.
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Apple doesn’t give a shit about your child’s education. But then, neither does any other tech company: they only care about what they can sell to schools and parents.
But you were able to get “Apple” in an inflammatory headline though, so… yay?
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other companies couldn’t be bothered to cater to schools before, precisely because it “wasn’t profitable” to do so.
I might be more inclined to say that other companies couldn’t be bothered once, and schools have been trapped by vendor lock-in ever since, but it’s not like I’ve been following purchasing trends very carefully.
yeah, also possible. but it’s true that apple has been pro-education and has had school programs from the very beginning of their history.
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In that case, there isn’t really much difference between a $299 iPad (since that’s the edu price) and a $99 Chromebook either. The more important question, I think, is what the utility of the machines is. If a $99 Chromebook doesn’t meet the needs of educators, but a $299 iPad or a $349 desktop does, filling classrooms with $99 Chromebooks is just a waste of all that money anyway.
I also don’t trust Google’s assurances that it’s keeping its panopticon away from students using its software for school, while Apple has been beating the privacy drum loud and long for years now.
Honestly, prior to Google’s Chrome OS invasion, most schools were locked into Windows running on years-old hand-me-down hardware, and had been for decades now - there’s a ton of educational software that only runs on Windows, and Dell will still sell schools shitty outdated desktops for super cheap any day of the week. Ars’s article on the new iPads noted that Apple’s share of the education market is currently 17%.
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Google doesn’t care about educating kids. They care about maintaining Scrooge McDuck-levels of cash in their coffers – just like any other business. Don’t buy into the hype.
FTFY.
The difference being that you and your kids are Google products, not customers. Facebook seems to be tanking all the Cambridge Analytica hate, while everyone forgets that Android permitted their app to scrape everything.
I’m starting to think I’d rather pay to be an Apple customer with my privacy intact than use the “free” system the snoops are paying for.
How about you?
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Also, this isn’t how schools buy tech. They are usually negotiating large block purchases and I guarantee they get more than $50/unit off. This particular deal is pitched at personal use, though with a discount for enrolled students. Apple has done this for as long as I can remember. I really don’t understand the outrage here.
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iPads, chromebooks, computers in general – they do not improve education.
In fact, they almost invariably get in the way of education. Ask any 15 year old playing Fortnite instead of listening to the teacher.
Educational software in general is a scam.
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Here is Apple’s easily-findable institutional pricing list which offers very fair discounts for institutions.
https://images.apple.com/education/pricelists/pdfs/US-EDUCATION-INSTITUTION-Price-List-1-25-2018.pdf
In fact, looking at CNET it’s clear that the discount apples to the pencil, as well. This article is rubbish.
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This, at a time when when parents are running crowdsourcing campaigns for classroom supplies and to keep schools heated during the cold months of the year.
Not all schools are like that. I’m guessing Apple doesn’t expect to sell their hardware to schools that can’t afford the basics.
In the public school system my daughters are in, every kid from sixth grade on either has to bring their own laptop computer or the school will issue them one for the year for $70. The laptops they issue are from Lenovo’s Thinkpad series and they are terrible. I think they cost a bit more than $400 (although that might be a bit out of date).
Apple’s plan doesn’t seem that outrageous to me.
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Yes, absolutely, 100%. My kids were issued iPads this year and they are just loaded with crap spyware scraping their info. Of course, I could choose to opt them out (like I did two years ago), but it’s kind of pointless because the district had already uploaded all of their info to a non-encrypted third party portal. The Apple device with encryption by default is the most secure segment of their tech chain.
And not one piece of useful or innovative education software. Nothing.
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I do not see the point of issuing kids with iPads, I really don’t. What are they for? How is the presence of an internet-connected distraction machine in the classroom in any way a good thing? Using a computer (preferably one that has a keyboard and lets you code on it) on your own is an absolute boon to education, especially if your teacher can be integrated into the experience, but for that a desktop would serve just as well, or any halfway reasonable laptop.
I may be old-fashioned, but as far as I can tell, all you need to learn is a good textbook, a pencil, a notebook, and a teacher. And you can get away without the latter two if the book’s good enough and the margins are wide enough. 
If you have money to burn, why not use them to decrease the student-to-teacher ration.
This isn’t me being nostalgic for The Old Ways, either. Concentrating on a long dry lecture first thing in the morning is hard enough without a magic slab with ten thousand ways of distracting you. I’d scarce put monks in such a situation, let alone kids.
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Man this article is hot garbage.
They’re a business… they’re NEED to make a profit. We can put that point to bed as (hopefully) anyone with an ounce of education understands that.
They’re selling a product to schools… you don’t think they care to make it attractive by gearing it towards the customers?
You lost me at “at a time when parents are running crowd-sourcing campaigns for classroom supplies.”. That level of generalization screams ignorance.
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I agree, up to your third point. It’s not a generalization to call education in the US, to use your term, hot garbage. It’s great that people are donating to GoFundMe pages, but why the fuck do they need to exist in the first place. Schools across the country are moving to 4 day weeks, cutting transportation, cutting any and all extracurricular activities, relying on donations or teachers to supply school supplies, etc… It’s not Apple’s fault per-say, but it is the fault of the government and voters for not reeling in companies like Apple and its executives. The middle and lower class have been fleeced.
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