Apple's Extraordinary Edge 22 comments
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Apple’s (AAPL) recent announcement of “The world’s thinnest notebook. MacBook Air.” got me thinking. Where are we headed in the world of computing? What is Apple really doing here?
For the moment, it looks like the future of computing, as defined by Apple, has two basic elements: beautiful objects and the Internet.
Apple creates the most irresistible computing objects - you want to have them, hold them, play with them, and show them to your friends. The desire that Apple’s objects create in the minds of customers is undeniable.
Apart from their industrial design, Apple’s computing objects have gorgeous GUIs. And the compute engines under the hood serve the common goal of creating delicious access to the Internet. The days of differentiation through applications are long gone. The Internet is the application.
As long as you build a robust operating system - one that does not leave itself open to attack from the enemies of the manufacturer of the beautiful objects - customers are happy.
What about Microsoft? (MSFT) Vista has a polished and attractive new face, but it rides on an operating system that is full of security holes and plagued with viruses. As a result, Mom’s and Dad’s tech support is forced to work full time to keep home software defense systems at peak alert status. How can that be good for business?
On the Linux front, desktop Linux is still for geeks and hobbiests (I count myself among them). You can build yourself a wonderfully powerful desktop for $300, or buy a very cheap Linux laptop from Zonbu, but the community is waiting for stable releases of the latest GUIs from KDE and GNOME. Still no competition for Apple.
Google’s (GOOG) mobile phone effort, Android, a Linux based platform and rapid application development platform could change the game, but only if it fosters beautiful objects on par with Apple’s iPhone.
In the end, Apple has an extraordinary edge. Though the strategy may not be explicitly stated, the results are easily interpreted…and stellar.
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This article has 22 comments:
Vista? I don't need it. Why upgrade when I am happy with what I've got now?
Apple? No thanks, I am an independent thinker.
Linux? Yuck.
So the application is not the differentiator it is the differentiator; that is what you wrote.
Apple has an extraordinary edge?
How does the internet give apple an edge? That's like saying electricity gives Apple an edge. The hardware Apple is selling is slowly becoming a commodity, where's Apple's advantage?
@Marcel: Back in late 2004, many said iPod would be a commodity; not a defensible business. Over 3 years and 100 million iPods later, maybe it's commoditization is beginning. But Apple's already moving away from the classic iPod; we see it in iPod touch, and actually, we've seen it from the beginning - it was always called an iPod, not an iMusic. So back to PCs: Windows PCs are definitely a commodity, but as Callahan says, Apple's advantage is OS X, objects of desire, Apple Stores with Genius Bars working on OS X mostly for "free", and its brand. By the way, OS X is on all its future-looking products - iPod touch, iPhone, AppleTV, and Mac. This synergy will lead to agility and speed in getting its software innovations out to its whole family of products; something no other company has this, not Microsoft, Nokia, Sandisk.
A perfect example of the fully empty arguments that microsoft opponents offer. This tells me the debate is already lost and MSFT has won.
I like Windows because of the freedom it gives me. When using Windows, you just upgrade the components whether hardware or software you want to upgrade, no corporate leader makes a decision and forces me to buy something. I can be a follower at certain situations, but never to a corporate leader.
The office application suite I am using (Office 2000), I bought it 9 years ago. Over the years, Microsoft have come up with newer and updated office suites, but I haven't spent a single penny on them since I am happy with the office app I have. I started using it with Windows NT, then with 2000. Now, I am using it with XP.
Same thing with Vista. When Microsoft came up with a newer and better OS, Vista, I yawned at it. Hey, the last time my XP crahsed after years of using it, ... Well, it has never crashed. Sorry, Microsoft. You did a pretty darn good job with XP. When I buy a new computer, I will try Vista.
If any corporate guy wants my money, he'd better give dang good reason for it. I'm no Apple guy.
LOL, that only works with the silly guy who wrote this column.
This might've been true with XP, but not with Vista. Time to update your thinking, friend. Cause you are simply WRONG.
You can go to any store and get standard RAM for a Mac, or standard Hard Drives.
"Hey, the last time my XP crahsed after years of using it, "
XP itself doesn't crash so much, but I waste LOTS of time in XP every day waiting for application crashes to play out. I see a lots of the hourglass.
"In 10 years, Apple's world domination will be just around the corner, just like it was 10 years ago."
It's very frustrating, but progress is being made. The "Apple is doomed" crowd is quieter than it used to be. And here is the situation: OS X gets better all the time; Windows seems to never change much. Vista: Still insecure; performance still poor; UI still poor; slower than XP. The thing that keeps the undead corpse known as MSFT alive are the Enterprise dudes who make their living fixing all the Windows problems that arise every day. Guess what? Some of them are retiring. More will retire over time.
Some standards wars play out over decades. The standard for analog color TV took several decades to resolve, and this one could take longer, because 20 years ago, businesses foolishly invested heavily in DOS-- wiki the "productivity paradox"-- they spent lots of money on PC's and got very minimal returns on their investment because PC's have such high TCO.
It would be funny if it were'nt pathetic and a huge drag on our economic productivity. Consider the people who trash the iPhone because, unlike the Blackberry, it doesn't "natively" support Outlook -- an Email system totally despised by those of us that use it (like me) and decades obsolete in terms of its architecture.
For those of you who think Apple is so much more secure than Windows, you'll be happy to note that Apple beat Windows 10-1 ..in critical vulnerabilities in 2007
news.zdnet.co.uk/secur...
Somehow people still think it's 1995
MS makes plenty of mistakes but what they don't do is try to lock me into paying extra for the hardware(like $1800 instead of $600 for a laptop that will do just as well) and using their services with my MP3 player. How hard is it to store a song as an actual file so I can just copy off instead of indexing it?
I hate that crap when Sony does it and I don't like it any better with Apple. Apple may have convinced millions of idiots an MP3 player is somehow happiness but not me. The $50 one sounds just as good. Don't even get me started on why I can't change my own #$%# battery.
And to Thomas Barta: 'a large eco-system of peripherals and software' - what drugs do you take?
www.roughlydrafted.com.../
You sound like the stylish kind of guy who is content to wear his black socks with his brown dress shoes while wearing his old burmuda shorts on a summer's day. I believe you when you way you're just as happy with a $600 laptop as you would be with an $1100 Macbook (if you're going to compare "cheap PC laptop" to a Mac laptop, at least choose the "cheap Mac laptop" for your comparison). Enjoy your stripped down, no-power Vista OS on that cheap PC laptop while you're at it. I'm surprised you gave up your old Sony Walkman cassette player for a modern MP3 player. Your discount $50 pink Zune probably matches your wardrobe.
I'm glad that you're a vocal PC-head. You're the best kind of advertisement for Apple products that Apple could only hope to buy.
Indipendent as 95% of the world ??? LOL that's a Joke right
that guy is a woman
P.S. Sometimes my socks don't match, but my boss has never noticed.
The market speaks for itself: there are lots of people, like the appropriately-named Blah, who are quite content with beige rectangular boxes (and horrid clothing, to use my example). But to compare that ugly piece of crud (my description) to an iMac and say "they are equal" demonstrates the difference between the two customer types. I gag when I see a PC; not one has any sense of style. I'd never allow one in my house. I feel the same about OSX vs. Vista. You may disagree. Fine. But that's my way of explaining the differences that this article alludes to.
If you're content to drag files around to play music, then by all means, a cheap, hard-to-use music player will suit you just fine. That's where the mp3 business was in 2001. But if you want to manage your music with a sense of elegance and style, Apple offers it to you via iTunes. I didn't say Blah was wrong in this regard, only that he isn't an Apple customer and as such had nothing constructive to offer about this piece. I believe he used the term "idiot" to describe me and my ilk. He opened the floodgates, not me.
However, Blah clearly doesn't know what he's talking about in regards to Macs either, when he drags out this old hit piece from ZD-Net, written by a former ballet dancer. Even the "report" cited in the ZD-Net article said “PLEASE NOTE: The statistics provided should NOT be used to compare the overall security of products against one another." Just more fluff from the Microsoft camp trying desperately to defend its rapidly crumbling empire.
i see nothing that is rapidly crumbing. I do see that microsoft created a world that did not exist before and initially created a mess [example: windows directory being every developers free for all with no published best practices], and Microsoft is now cleaning up its mess. I also see its rivals focusing on the prior messes.
I don't buy computers or mp3 players for style, I buy them so I can do what I want, when I want getting the best quality for the dollar. They are all commodities. But please be happy and pay extra to get that style so you eagerly crave.
What does annoy me is the great double standard and hype.
Leopard was completely broken out of the gate and few wrote about it. Apple puts out a laptop that doesn't have a removable battery and everyone calls it wonderful.
Everyone including the Linux followers have been calling Microsoft's end and yet it's still here. People complain about MS for things that no longer exist as though Windows 95 was still their premier product line. Their last quarter wasn't bad either...
OOPS, [example: windows REGISTRY being every developers free for all with no published best practices]