# How much would you pay?



## ksagomonyants (Apr 27, 2013)

Hi guys! Well, I was reading about this auction which offers you to have a cup of coffee with Tim Cook at Apple headquarters. It's 17 days left and the current bid is already over $600k. https://www.charitybuzz.com/auctions/rfkcenter/catalog_items/337478

So, I was wondering how much would you pay to talk to the Canon Chairman or someone who's is directly in charge of development of Canon photo gear? Enjoy the rest of your weekend!


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## neuroanatomist (Apr 27, 2013)

Depends - would the cup of coffee (or tea, as the case may be) include an NDA and disclosure of upcoming plans? Somehow I doubt Tim Cook will divulge the details of the iPhone 6 or the forthcoming iWatch and iToaster...


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## RLPhoto (Apr 28, 2013)

I would pay exactly .23 cents.


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## alexanderferdinand (Apr 28, 2013)

They are allowed to invite me.
Rumors (!) said, they are well paid for their visionary decisions and leadership.....


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## RGF (Apr 28, 2013)

Not really interested interesting in meeting a canon Exec socially.

If I could get the inside scope (via an NDA) that would be interesting. Of course, my lips would need to be sown shut. :-X


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## robbymack (Apr 28, 2013)

Interesting. Cook hasn't really proven himself (at least to me) to be a terribly effective leader in the wake of Jobs death. Now Jobs was definitely a visionary, if also a huge @sshole from time to time, but he seemed to get the best out of his people and they either loved him or hated him for it. Cook seems almost like a place holder until apple can invent the iSteve. Personally I'd rather meet Warren Buffet or michael Bloomberg (buffet also auctions off his time for a charity each year if I remember).


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## nda (Apr 28, 2013)

Why pay money to see a loser, the leader and visionary is gone the fall of apple has begun :'(


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## distant.star (Apr 28, 2013)

.
If I saw the Canon bigwig stranded outside my house in a blizzard, I'd shelter him for only $50,000 per day. I'm sure he would understand and agree with my pricing.

He would have to pay more to use my photo equipment while he was here, and anytime I took a picture he would be required to remove my lens cap and hold it.


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## michi (Apr 28, 2013)

I wouldn't pay a penny to meet any of these people. I don't see what I have to gain from them.


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## jdramirez (Apr 28, 2013)

$50 maybe... and I'm hesitant to do even that...


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## Artifex (Apr 28, 2013)

About as much as a coffee is worth.


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## jdramirez (Apr 28, 2013)

Artifex said:


> About as much as a coffee is worth.



If they serve a nice lunch... yeah I could see paying a little more... especially if there is an open bar or drinks are included. 

"Yes... I will take the salmon and a bottle of Johnny Walker Blue."


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## Sella174 (Apr 29, 2013)

Depends on the coffee ...


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## Artifex (Apr 29, 2013)

jdramirez said:


> Artifex said:
> 
> 
> > About as much as a coffee is worth.
> ...



+1 (although I would actually prefer some filet mignon and a Cognac!)


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## jdramirez (Apr 29, 2013)

Artifex said:


> jdramirez said:
> 
> 
> > Artifex said:
> ...


I tried cognac a decade ago and decided it wasn't for me. One scotch, one bourbon, one beer.


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## risc32 (Apr 29, 2013)

personally I wouldn't pay much but I'm really in no position to put forth anything i might learn from him anyway. besides, he's no Jobs, so.... 

this does reminds me of a thought i had a while back. we have a pretty good community here, in size and exp. I was wondering if we could in fact get a Canon person on here for a little Q&A or something of the sort. I'm sure many people would find it interesting and good for Canon PR. Maybe they could shed some incite on some of the ongoing debates here. stuff like that. I'm not expecting them to tell us what canon's roadmap is, but i'm sure we could come up with reasonable questions.


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## Mt Spokane Photography (Apr 29, 2013)

In 1983, I had lunch with Eastern Airlines CEO and former Astronaut Frank Borman and the Board of Directors at the Miami headquarters. My advice did not keep them from going under  .

On the way home, from Miami, we were at the airport and the flight was late. We had to catch a connection in Atlanta and the Eastern boarding agent told all passengers to stay in Miami because they would not hold the flight in Atlanta. That included about 50. One of the Board members was flying with us, and called the dispatch center directly to find out why they would not hold a flight for 50 passengers. He was told that the flight was being held, and they were waiting for us.

It did not come as a big surprise when they shut down.

I doubt if a coffee with a Canon VP would have any more effect than my lunch with Eastern. ;D


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## ITshooter (Apr 29, 2013)

nda said:


> Why pay money to see a loser, the leader and visionary is gone the fall of apple has begun :'(



Sorry for the rant, but as someone who follows technology closer than most, I'm annoyed that it's suddenly become trendy to hate on Apple. Maybe this is karma, since Cupertino has had the "cool" advantage for quite some time. But even if you take a pretty harsh look at Apple, the facts simply don't support descriptions such as "user."

Apple's profits in the most recent quarter were higher than those of Microsoft and Google _combined._ The company's stock has taken a beating, but this is driven more by hedge fund managers and the market's generally knee-jerk, reactionary attitude to tech stocks. Don't forget: Wall Street has been routinely stupid when it comes to Apple--e.g. massively and undeniably undervaluing the stock during the recession, despite Cupertino's outstanding results during the same period.

Yes, the company has failed to release a new, groundbreaking product in a while. Yes, Android has gained market share. Yes, there is more competition now from Windows 8, and with the launch of Intel's Haswell and Bay Trail processors, that competition will only grow fiercer, especially in the vital mini-tablet market, which the iPad Mini currently owns. 

But no one innovates non-stop, and we have to at least see how Tim Cook handles the company's next big product launch before we declare his tenure a failure. 

Look at the competition. Android has basically caught up to iOS in terms of functionality but it hasn't meaningfully surpassed it. Yes, yes, Android fans, I know your preferred platform can do things that iOS can't-- but a lot of this so-called differentiation doesn't matter outside of niche use cases, and Apple's security model is substantially superior. There's a reason that 90% of smartphones in the enterprise are still iPhones. 

Apple's been in a period of R&D and quiet acquisitions. If WWDC brings something new on the software front (and that's the rumor), a lot of the naysayers could change their tune. And even if WWDC doesn't bring anything exciting, Apple still isn't sunk. A WWDC flop would mean Cupertino is in for a summer of Wall Street skepticism--but even in this scenario, the Fall will be the true "make or break" moment for Cook's leadership. That's when new products are going to show up. Will they be iterative--e.g. a new iPad Mini with Retina Display? Or will they knock something out of the park--e.g. launch a killer TV or wearable tech product, or a version of Siri that takes voice recognition tech to the next level. Will they finally remember the Mac Pro? Will iOS and OS X continue to merge in useful ways? None of these questions is insignificant to Apple's future. 

Android has just leveled the playing field for _current_ tech, but if Apple gets TV, wearable technology, or any of the next-gen stuff right, it could open up new, multi-billion dollar revenue streams on top of the PC, mobile, and software businesses that Apple already owns. And you can bet that any of these next-gen platforms will loop into iOS. Ecosystems are the drivers of the new device landscape, not hardware-- and it's waaaaaay premature to say Apple has lost its footing in this race.

Here's some more evidence: Android's market share is primarily due to low-cost smartphones in emerging markets, a tactic Apple hasn't yet tried, and which it is soon expected to embrace. The rest of Android's success has a lot to do with Samsung, and if you haven't noticed that Samsung layers _a lot_ of proprietary software on top of Google's open-source foundation, take a minute to think about that. Does Samsung have the makings of its own OS? I think so. And Facebook's Android-flavored "Home" product seems like the beginning of an OS too. If any of these Android-friendly companies fragment off of the main Android ecosystem (something Google is discouraging with its recent app update revisions), Android won't be in hot shape. 

Could Apple be on the way down? Sure. Would I pay half a million dollars for lunch with Tim Cook? No. For work, I talk to C-level executives from competing companies all the time, and they never get baited into saying anything interesting. 

But still-- the Apple backlash that's emerged over the last few months is befuddling. Should the company do something to freshen up iOS? Probably. But saying that the products are a little stagnant is a far cry from writing off the company's leadership and prospects. Maybe Apple is headed the way of Dell, HP and Microsoft-- the first two of which were once tech ultra-players who have since fallen on hard times, and the third of which is somewhat unfairly maligned (still enormously profitable) but poised to lose the de facto monopoly it's enjoyed for the last decade. 

But iOS still has a lot of potential, as I described above, and Macs have weathered the downturn in PC sales far better than any Windows machines. That alone puts Apple in decent shape, and with at least two potentially huge revenue streams allegedly in the wings, it's hard to claim the company has reached moribund status.


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## cayenne (Apr 29, 2013)

robbymack said:


> Interesting. Cook hasn't really proven himself (at least to me) to be a terribly effective leader in the wake of Jobs death. Now Jobs was definitely a visionary, if also a huge @sshole from time to time, but he seemed to get the best out of his people and they either loved him or hated him for it. Cook seems almost like a place holder until apple can invent the iSteve. Personally I'd rather meet Warren Buffet or michael Bloomberg (buffet also auctions off his time for a charity each year if I remember).



I'd like to meet Keith Richards...I'd like to learn from him how to be bulletproof, and seemingly survive almost anything.


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## Don Haines (Apr 29, 2013)

I'd pay $1.80..... and if answers to questions were not forthcoming I wouldn't share my TimBits... I'd also make sure he saw the Nikon lens cap on my lens and I would ask why Canon does not make a lens cap that you can put on or remove with the lens hood in place...


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## SonomaTim (Apr 30, 2013)

Don, you may want to look at these Canon lens caps... http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/899351-REG/canon_6318b001_lens_cap_for_77mm.html

As far as coffee with Tim Cook goes...not interested. 

...and the Canon chief? ...depends on the charity, but probably not more than $100.


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## sanj (May 8, 2013)

distant.star said:


> .
> If I saw the Canon bigwig stranded outside my house in a blizzard, I'd shelter him for only $50,000 per day. I'm sure he would understand and agree with my pricing.
> 
> He would have to pay more to use my photo equipment while he was here, and anytime I took a picture he would be required to remove my lens cap and hold it.



Hahahahahahah. Funny...!!


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