Apple Expands 10% Bonus When Adding Funds to Apple ID to More Countries Through December 24

Seems like a good way to get a cash advance and prop up an unexpectedly bad quarter.

Under GAAP accounting rules they can't book it as revenue until a purchase is made from the funds, so it has nothing to do with propping up the quarter (other than that people will be more apt to buy something once the funds are in their account!)

my country doesn't get squat again. thanks apple

Seems like a good way to get a cash advance and prop up an unexpectedly bad quarter.

If it's as it looks and the iPhone era is past its peak, Apple might need to speed up their plans for its successor as a flagship product and driver of growth.

It's clear that that is wearables. Apple Watch, AirPods and the yet unannounced Augmented Reality Glasses.

Now, in its 4th generation, the Apple Watch is at the point where the iPhone 4 was, on the verge of explosive growth and becoming ubiquitous. It's easy to forget but the iPhone was, prior to that, an expensive niche product. Tech enthusiasts bought it, but your regular person on the street got by just fine with a flip phone. With the iPhone 3GS, it had started to creep into regular use and by iPhone 4, everyone started to want one. That's where the Apple Watch 4 is at. I'm seeing it everywhere, even on friends who are definitely not considered techies.

Wearables grew 60% this year. When was the last time the iPhone grew that much? Yep, back around the Phone 4 and the 4s. Yet, wearables revenue is still 20 times smaller than the iPhone and so that's where Apple will have plenty of room to grow over the next decade. Given that they introduced a series of next generation iPhones with major changes and sales are flat or dying, I believe we'll see an earlier than expected push for the next generation of Apple products beyond the iPhone.

If Apple wasn't planning on introducing the Apple Glasses yet until 2020, as has been rumoured, I bet that's going to get pushed up and we'll see them at WWDC in 2019. Look for a big focus on Apple Watch in 2019.

Out of interest, what $200 piece of software were you looking to purchase from the Mac App Store, but chose not to as you didn’t save $20?

None, I'd load 200€ on the account to get 20-30€ free, I'm going to spend it eventually.

my country doesn't get squat again. thanks apple

Same here. Instead, we have the stupid trade in deal.
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Out of interest, what $200 piece of software were you looking to purchase from the Mac App Store, but chose not to as you didn’t save $20?

iCloud storage is the best use of the iTunes credit.

Seems like a good way to get a cash advance and prop up an unexpectedly bad quarter.

If it's as it looks and the iPhone era is past its peak, Apple might need to speed up their plans for its successor as a flagship product and driver of growth.

It's clear that that is wearables. Apple Watch, AirPods and the yet unannounced Augmented Reality Glasses.

Now, in its 4th generation, the Apple Watch is at the point where the iPhone 4 was, on the verge of explosive growth and becoming ubiquitous. It's easy to forget but the iPhone was, prior to that, an expensive niche product. Tech enthusiasts bought it, but your regular person on the street got by just fine with a flip phone. With the iPhone 3GS, it had started to creep into regular use and by iPhone 4, everyone started to want one. That's where the Apple Watch 4 is at. I'm seeing it everywhere, even on friends who are definitely not considered techies.

Wearables grew 60% this year. When was the last time the iPhone grew that much? Yep, back around the Phone 4 and the 4s. Yet, wearables revenue is still 20 times smaller than the iPhone and so that's where Apple will have plenty of room to grow over the next decade. Given that they introduced a series of next generation iPhones with major changes and sales are flat or dying, I believe we'll see an earlier than expected push for the next generation of Apple products beyond the iPhone.

If Apple wasn't planning on introducing the Apple Glasses yet until 2020, as has been rumoured, I bet that's going to get pushed up and we'll see them at WWDC in 2019. Look for a big focus on Apple Watch in 2019.

I agree with everything you're saying in sentiment and principle, but I don't know that it's reasonable to presume that the glasses (or whatever form their next big ticket development takes) can be pushed up a full year (again, hinging on the assumption of a move from a June 2010 WWDC to a June 2019 WWDC). That would more than halve the remaining r&d, tooling and production time. What would the product have to sacrifice to get there? Plus, I think Apple has a lot more groundwork to go in conveying its focus on privacy/user rights to the broader public (I agree with the broader points made in https://9to5mac.com/2018/12/19/apple-privacy/) before people are cool wearing an on-by-default camera on their head in numbers much greater than google glass pulled.

Keep in mind that there have been up to 20% off on iTunes gift card deals floating around, so if you need money in your iTunes account there are bigger discounts to be had.

I loaded up at 15-20% off and should be good for all of next year now. And best of all, all those little Apple charges don't clutter up my credit card bills. If you regularly buy services through Apple, like Netflix, or have an iCloud storage plan, or Apple Music and such, these deals are like free money.

It’s actually a 15% bonus here in Germany and can be applied up to 300 €.

Why only some countries??
I don't understand this strategy at all

I agree with everything you're saying in sentiment and principle, but I don't know that it's reasonable to presume that the glasses (or whatever form their next big ticket development takes) can be pushed up a full year (again, hinging on the assumption of a move from a June 2010 WWDC to a June 2019 WWDC). That would more than halve the remaining r&d, tooling and production time. What would the product have to sacrifice to get there? Plus, I think Apple has a lot more groundwork to go in conveying its focus on privacy/user rights to the broader public (I agree with the broader points made in https://9to5mac.com/2018/12/19/apple-privacy/) before people are cool wearing an on-by-default camera on their head in numbers much greater than google glass pulled.

Apple has always released new products with strategic timing, even if they could have been ready earlier. No doubt that there’s a near complete 2020 iPhone in a lab at Apple Park, with just adjustments made in the final months before the production deadline.

Even if Apple Glasses were ready last year, Apple wouldn’t have released them because they would have stolen news headlines from the iPhone X, on which Apple depends to meet its revenue goals.

If the iPhone is indeed struggling and it is now past its peak (and it looks like it is), you can bet that there are serious discussions going on at Apple on shifting gears to the next big money maker.

If the Glasses can be made ready for a Q4 2019 release by removing some of the advanced features they wanted to launch it with, then maybe it gets launched early without those features. Or maybe it shifts some of those features to a paired iPhone and is sold strictly as an iPhone accessory to help sell iPhones.

There is a good reason to believe that Apple has already done this, in that the Apple Watch itself was launched a year early. It was underpowered, way too slow for what they wanted it to do, and overall felt like a beta product.

At the very least, I expect the Apple Watch Series 5 and AirPods 2 to get a centre stage treatment at WWDC or the September event this year. The company’s future literally depends on that succession going off smoothly.