Weekly reading 24: Hagiography

Oct 25, 2020

It’s a short week, but I learned a new word this week and make it the title. This post is also crossposted at my substack site, where you can subscribe every new post through email.

Standing committee meeting; Taiwan; Poverty alleviation; Xi Jinping hagiography - sinocism:

Tianjin Party Secretary Li Hongzhong continues to take the initiative in hagiographical flattering of Xi Jinping. The Tianjin propaganda department made a documentary “Advancing into to a New Era” and since August the government has organized group watching sessions for Tianjin cadres.

It’s talking about this:

为把我委学习贯彻习近平新时代中国特色社会主义思想不断引向深入，开展好“四史”学习教育，9月4日我委党组理论学习中心组召开扩大会议，集中观看纪录片《奋进新时代》，重温党的十八大以来以习近平同志为核心的党中央团结带领全党全军全国各族人民奋进新时代的辉煌历程，接受思想教育和精神洗礼。

Chinese government is probably one of the few governments that really like to study a documentary or a video in a meeting together, and “洗礼” (baptizing) is probably the most noble and elegant way of saying brainwash.

Finally not a great photo op work - look at how people are captured in the photo staring at their phones instead of the video:

Group watching session

Thoughts and Observations on Apple’s ‘Hi, Speed’ iPhone 12 Event - daringfireball:

Here’s a matrix with the new lineup, organized the way I think makes the most sense. […]

                     64 GB   128 GB  256 GB  512 GB
iPhone 12 Pro Max        —   $1,100  $1,200  $1,400
iPhone 12 Pro            —    1,000   1,100   1,300
iPhone 12              830      880     980       —
iPhone 12 Mini         730      780     880       —
iPhone 11              600      650     750       —
iPhone XR              500      550       —       —
iPhone SE              400      450     550       —
 Δ from 128 GB         -50        —    +100    +300

I think it’s useful to include last year’s prices for the then-new iPhone 11 lineup for comparison:

                     64 GB   128 GB  256 GB  512 GB
(2019) 11 Pro Max   $1,100        —  $1,250  $1,450
(2019) 11 Pro        1,000        —   1,150   1,350
(2019) iPhone 11       700      750     850       —

This is a great way to get a direct view of 2020 iPhone lineup that just announced, and its comparison with that in 2019.

The first impression is how big and complex the lineup has become - iPhone used to have only one option, now it’s 7, multiplying 4 options of storage and even removing greyed out options you still get 20 different iPhones. Adding together several Apple Watches, several iPads, and quite a few laptops, the Apple who believes in simplicity has long gone: the new throned Apple focuses on ecosystem and recurring service revenue, meaning it tries to do 2 things - (1). reach as many people as possible; (2). have each Apple user pay more and more overtime.

Just look at what a massive product lineup this is even on its official website:

The current Apple CEO Tim Cook is known to be the supply chain guy, which explains why the lineup can be this huge. Roughly Apple has gone through 3 stages since iPod was released: the product era with Steve Jobs, the aesthetic era with John Ive, and then the supply chain era is what we are having now. Do we expect more Apple branded product categories, like scooter, vacuum, or router? That sounds more and more like xiaomi, which probably is not a good thing.

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