How Apple sells their products

The recent release of the iPad has generated a lot of discussion regarding the 'want vs need' factor of Apple products, and lead me to want to explain Apple's marketing model that has proven to be quite successful over these years.

Step 1. Apple releases a new, 'absolutely revolutionary' product.

Step 2. Despite the launch of the product being a success, people begin to protest missing features, and generally whine about what they thought they were getting. However, this doesn't stop them from buying the product.

Step 3. Steve Jobs, the CEO of Apple, addresses the 'concerns' of the customers by explaining why those 'missing features' are useless.

Step 4. A year goes by, and Apple makes an official announcement for a product that will change the technology we know and love forever.

Step 5. Apple releases the new version of their product, which now includes the previously missing 'useless features', and calls the device 'revolutionary'.

Here is an image depicting these steps.

This is an on-going cycle, and unfortunately one that most people are not aware of. Once the new 'revolutionary' product is released, it makes the previous versions obsolete, and therefore people feel compelled to upgrade to the latest version of the device. But I guess most of us are guilty of suckling on Apple's teet.

Richard Dawkins vs Pope Benedict XVI

Atheist campaigner Richard Dawkins is planning to have the Pope arrested during his visit to Britain "for crimes against humanity". Richard Dawkins, along with atheist author Christopher Hitchens, believe they can apply the same legal principle used to arrest the late Chilean dictator, Augusto Pinochet, when he visited Britain in 1998.

The Pope has recently been struck with a new wave of controversy over a letter he signed in 1985, arguing that "the good of the universal church" should come first before defrocking an American priest who committed sex offenses against two boys.

This doesn't come as a surprise to me, and is definitely not the first time the church has 'excused' or 'protected' priests involved in sexual offenses. The church needs to realize that they are not above the law, and anyone, disregarding their status in society, should be punished for the crime according to the appropriate laws. It's sickening to think that these kinds of acts go unnoticed and unpunished.