“It broke Mike’s Viglione’s heart to see that old Macintosh abandoned on the street like that. Who would do such a thing, he wondered? He grabbed the computer and took it home. He dusted it off and gave it new life. The Apple joined a happy little computer family made up of three Mac Classics, four Powermacs, a dual G4 Desktop, a G4 Powerbook and a charming little iPod. Viglione doesn’t use them all. He just likes having them around. He says he doesn’t ‘have the heart to throw away the classics.’ Hey, it’s a Mac thing – PC folk just wouldn’t understand,” Christopher Hutsul reports for The Toronto Star.
Hutsul reports, “Because the Macintosh, which celebrated it 20th anniversary in January, has endeared itself to a community of computers users in an almost spiritual way. Two decades after Steve Jobs unveiled the first Mac, people like Viglione – and me – get downright emotional about our Macs. Ever heard of new Mac smell?”
“‘For the people who are dedicated enthusiasts, I think they see their computers almost as pets,’ says Viglione, who sells Apple products by day at a computer store. ‘As a Mac user, your computer takes on a personality. You treat it with a human-like quality.’ You don’t often hear people talking about their consumer electronics this passionately. But Macintosh has been able to separate itself from the herd since the beginning,” Hutsul reports.
“Now this isn’t about whether Mac is the better computer. Depending on how you slice it, Macintosh has been both the best and the worst of the computer market. Even with the recent successes of the iPod and the coveted Titanium Powerbook series, some estimate that only 3 per cent of the market does its computing on Apple machines,” Hutsul reports.
[MacDailyNews Note: 3% is the current quarterly market share, not the installed base. Hutsul should have reported “only 10 percent of the market does its computing on Apple machines.” It’s knowledge that can be gathered, but for some reason most in the media never seem to be able to do their research. Here’s an exception: “Naysayers have been calling for Apple’s demise for years. But Apple not only has survived but thrived, it seems, at least partially by the sheer force of Jobs’ will and his ability to maintain the ferocious loyalty of Apple’s users, who still account for 10% of the world’s computer users, while its sales usually account for about 3% to 5% of the world global PC market,” Arik Hesseldahl, Forbes.com, June 2, 2003. (source)/a>
“Dissidents would argue that in terms of pricing, the high-end Macs cost up to 50 per cent more than a similarly equipped PC (though I’d counter that by suggesting the price gap is erased by the fact Mac users seem to hold on to their computers for about twice as long as PC users, thereby spending the same amount),” Hutsul reports.
Full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: A good article that repeats the same mistake many reporters make. Macs last longer than Windows PCs. If Mac users replace their Mac every 4 years and PC users replace their every 1.5 years, what does that do to quarterly market share numbers? Not to mention, what does that do to landfills? The important number to analysts, marketeers, software developers, and others should be how many people out of 100 use a Mac? The answer is closer to 10 people out of 100 or 10 percent. Not 3 percent. We get tired of having to point this put, but we’ll never stop doing so until the “3 percent myth” is destroyed.
Obviously, Apple needs to address the current market share numbers or their percentage of all computer users who use a Mac will erode over time.
Should we, or Apple, really care about market share? So long as Apple remain a profitable company then we all win (providing that they don’t hike up their profit margin on sales in order to generate said profit!).
People have different tastes and, more importantly to some, different budgets. That is why we consumers have choices from which pen we write with to which car we drive. Yes, if Apple kit cost the same as regular PC kit then there’d be lot more of their kit flying off the shelves. But that isn’t the Apple way any more than it is, say, Mercedes. Personally I bought the following last year from Apple: iPod 30GB, PowerBook 12″, AirPort Extreme Card and Apple Bluetooth Mouse. I could’ve saved money, and in some cases gotten more features, but I *wanted* these things rather than the other products in the market place. However, the last year was the most (by far) I’ve spent on Apple kit in many years.
I tend not to believe this 10% installed base. If you look at google zeitgeist you’ll see that only 3% of the hits come from Macs. While this isn’t very scientific it challenges the 10% estimate.
The 3% number is valid for the analysts and wall street guys. They are concerned about how much money Apple is making, which is tied to how many computers they sell this month. 10% is probably a more important number for developers who are concerned with how many copies of their titles will be sold.
Of course, neither number indicates that Apple is going out of buisiness any time soon.
Google Zeitgeist would be inaccurate, Anonymous. Not all browsers and OS’s can be indentified correctly by Google. If you add the 4% they claim as “other” to Mac (much of the unidentified 4% most likely is Mac), you’d get 7% – which is at least closer to the true 10% than 3%.
“…only 3 per cent of the market does its computing on Apple machines,” Hutsul reported.
Patently wrong. It is important that this myth is refuted routinely. Thanks, MDN!
If you want to bust a myth try finding some facts. The Forbes article MDN uses as a “source” states the 10% figure without attribution. Is it hard to reference the “study” that came up with this number?
Same with the “If Mac users replace their Mac every 4 years and PC users replace their every 1.5 years” idea. Yeah IF.
In my small world of a few hundred computers I know of, corporate, business, and private, I think 3% would seem high. Of course others will have other personal views, and I bet in some settings mac laptops are quite popular, since they compete on price like no other part of Apple’s line.
It’s almost depressing that this group jumps on such flimsy reporting and gives it creedence. If you want to feel good about yourself, go give a homeless guy a burger.
As Steve Jobs has said…..market share is NOT important. Making profit is. And that is their main focus right now. As he has said before…he is grateful for the 25 million customers that Apple has had because they are the best 25 million customers.
“at least partially by the sheer force of Jobs’ will and his ability to maintain the ferocious loyalty of Apple’s users”
I’ve never bought a Mac because of Jobs “sheer force of will”. I buy the best computer.
I’ve always been skeptical about the 10% number. It’s like the “megahertz myth”: it has theoretical merit, but seems insignificant in the real world. Macs were way slower than PCs, so Mac pundits touted the “megahertz myth”. Now Apples biggest problem has been solved with the G5, so MDN is pushing the “3 percent myth”. I’m skeptical.
I wouldn’t be surpised if the installed base is higher than 3%, but where does “10%” come from. Was there a study? A survey? A calculation that can be explained to a layman like me?
250 million PCs in world (most of dumb terminals stripped out of this figure, but not all, becuase they don’t really count in this equation) that people actually are using. 25 million Macs in use. 250/25=10.
Listen, we know that the 3% number is not correct as far as total number of people using macs goes. But we have to recognize there is no real way to find out what the real installed base is, so the only numbers we can go on are sales. And the Macs gets a small slice of the sales pie. The Mac community is beginning to look silly when it constantly says “no it isn’t” every time a sales % is quoted. It comes across as sophomoric.
I mean, I still have a PC sitting behind me that I never use. So technically I’m also part of the Windows installed user base. Which means the numbers are going to overlap. So they’re kind of pointless.
What should be touted much more prevalently is the life expectancy of Macs vs. PCs. This number would be quite bit easier to nail down and would be great PR for Apple. My father continues to be amazed that my 2 years old TiBook is still working as good as it is. Hell, it’s even faster now than when I got it, thanks to Panther. This is something Windows users in general have a lot of trouble comprehending.
“‘Dissidents would argue that in terms of pricing, the high-end Macs cost up to 50 per cent more than a similarly equipped PC (though I’d counter that by suggesting the price gap is erased by the fact Mac users seem to hold on to their computers for about twice as long as PC users, thereby spending the same amount),’ Hutsel reports.”
I’d argue that high-end Macs cost about the same as similarly equipped PC’s. Its the low-end Macs that cost twice as much.
Thers is no such thing as a “similarly equipped PC” compared to a high-end Mac. PCs do not have the world-beater G5 CPU. In fact, there are no “similarly equipped PCs” to any Macs since no PC can run the world’s most advanced operating system. PCs are stuck with Windows or not-yet-ready-for-primetime Linux or some other wannabe Mac. When you get right down to it all other OS and PC makers are trying to give users the Mac experience at a cut-rate price. So far they’ve failed miserably.
Take a deep breath Georgie. By similarly equipped, I’m referring to dual Xeon processors running 3.0ghz. Similar in performance. And dual Opterons actually perform much better than either the Xeon or G5. Hopefully, the new G5’s will catch up to the performance of the Opterons.
And XP isn’t THAT bad. Its a far cry from the 95/98 days. I still prefer my Macs though. And OS X is still better.
And if Apple could give the Mac experience at a cut rate price, most of these PC companies would be out of business.
I tend to think that the 3% number is true. I mean, out of a college classroom of about 40 students, I was the only one who used a Mac. So, that equates to 2.5 per 100 students.
And I think that market share IS important. Computer sales for Apple have been flat for the last couple of years, most of their growth has been in software (IE iLife, OS X, Keynote, etc…) and in peripherals such as the wonderful iPod.
Jeff S. “And if Apple could give the Mac experience at a cut rate price, most of these PC companies would be out of business.”
I don’t think that is so true. eMacs cost $800 brand new and they are well equipped. It is a matter of so much more than price NOW. At one time that is what it was about. But now it is perception, integration, knowledge, fear, ect, ect. If Apple gave eMacs away businesses would not take them. Some would, but large Fortune 500 companies would not. It is a shame to say that, but Apple has a huge (if not impossible) battle for corporate America. And that is even if they feel like going after it.
Jayplus said, “I tend to think that the 3% number is true. I mean, out of a college classroom of about 40 students. . .”
Is that a statistics class you are taking? An anecdotal sampling of one out of 40 is incredibly meaningless. When you’ve passed logic and statistics come back and share. I appreciate your enthusiasm but I’m really tired of generalizations and anecdotal evidence. I just read an anti-Mac diatribe that PROVED that Macs are dead because this guy’s three friends work on 3D animations on a PC. Strong logic, right?
Well, i’m a fervently happy Mac user. I don’t give a crap about Apple’s market share. Who cares if the rest of the world doesn’t get it? Why is everyone always in such a huff? Screw ’em all to the wall and keep on truckin’.
as long as Apple is profitable and putting out such excellent quality products, why waste air arguing over the ridiculous numbers? That’s such a ridiculous waste of time. Let’s enjoy our Macs and, if people switch, hey, that’s GREAT – Welcome aboard! If not, so what? They’re just losing out on the most seamless and efficient platform out there. Their loss.
Remember. Even if Apple’s market share is only 3% (a misleading figure for a number of reasons), it is the top 3%.
Do we know if the 3% sales numbers are for all markets, including enterprise? If so, then of course Macs will show low numbers. But if we’re talking about the computer people use when they have a choice, we’d have to eliminate the corporate sales, since the vast majority of users don’t have any input on which computer sits on their desk.
And with regard to the Google numbers, a lot of that is at-work surfing, where the Mac-user may be forced into using a Wintel box.
Lastly, the PC cost figures (Mac 50% more) usually don’t pan out when you compare like quality (tier 1 vendor) and like components. I just did this yesterday to see if the Macs we were buying were more expensive than comparable Dell’s. The Dell’s were slightly more expensive (~$50).
If you’re one of the lucky ones, enjoy your Mac.
Steve.
Drinking upstream from the herd since 1990.
Well said, Matthew! Apple’s pricing is not so bad at all. That whole argument is — generally — an outdated one. Go to Dell and package up their cheapest unit and see how much it costs to walk out the door with a functional system. I just did, and here’s the results. The main thing was to open Word and Excel on both systems — and I didn’t even bother to equal the Dell’s specs up to the eMac like XP Pro and a Firewire port (but I did opt up to a keyboard with volume controls and an optical mouse):
Dimension 2400 Celeron.
Intel� Celeron� Processor at 2.4GHz with 400MHz front side bus
Microsoft� Windows� XP Home Edition, 128MB Shared DDR SDRAM, Dell� Enhanced Multimedia Keyboard, Dell� Optical USB Mouse, Microsoft� Office Basic Edition 2003, Norton Antivirus� 2003 12-month subscription upgrade (sorry, but proper AV is required on a Windows PC), 40GB Ultra ATA/100, Combo Drive, 17″ .27dp monitor, Integrated Intel� 3D Extreme Graphics (analog VGA, shared main memory), Stereo Speakers, 10/100 Ethernet, basic warranty, no media app upgrades.
Total cost: $797.00
The base eMac, with a digital 17″ .255 dot pitch CRT connection, running on a 4X AGP with 32Mb dedicated memory (versus Intel’s shared and integrated memory), plus the Firewire port, Appleworks (R/W Word & Excel for Mac and Windows), same drive, RAM and optical, all ready to go…
for $799.00.
Gosh, I guess Macs ARE more expensive than PCs…
I wish I could find the article posted about two months ago. The article stated that Macintosh laptops account for about 16% of all laptops stolen.
The 3% versus 10% battle of facts should continue, but another important fact is that more HUMAN BEINGS ie. consumers use these Macs.
Maybe 50% of PC’s are sitting in government offices, businesses, schools, etc.
They are not being used to buy mp3’s, organize photos, nor are they loaded up with extra software and hardware. Like most consumer PC’s.
So using raw numbers to extrapolate sales of, say, mp3’s from Napster will inevitably be off. There isn’t a music buying person owning that PC. It’s sitting in a bank somewhere. But the majority of those Mac owners are often creatives and/or people who actively buy music, use iPhoto, and are consumers of iPods, software, hardware, etc.
I’m astonished how this obvious fact is so overlooked by the ‘experts’ or representatives of large corporations… “Well… PC’s have 95% of the market and Macs only have 3%”
In my opinion, the Mac probably has 20% – 30% of the actual music buying potential of computer owners. Meanwhile, the remainder of the PC owners are still downloading illegal mp3’s.
So the people at Napster scratch their heads and wonder why their numbers aren’t better. And it’s really not that complicated.
david vesey
As the old saying goes “figures don’t lie, but liars figure”. The whole market share numbers game means very little, except maybe to some analyst or marketing rep. The decline from 5% to 3% is deceptive in that, at the time Apple held a 5% market share there were fewer total PC’s in the market. Today at 3%, I’ll bet there are more Macs owned by users than their were five to ten years ago. Think about it, how many more of your friends and family own a computer today as opposed to, say, five years ago. Remember, marketshare equals the total number of personal computers sold, divided by the total number of computers your company sells. Apple could be selling record numbers of Macs and still be losing marketshare. Got to go with Steve Jobs on this one, look at the company financials.