Don Tennant finds it striking that the IT visionaries who foresee a decline in Microsoft’s dominance due to threats like Linux and Google never mention Apple Computer.
“Long before Linux became a thorn in Microsoft’s side, Apple was a full-fledged pain in the company’s you-know-what… Microsoft had to deal with the abhorrence of being perceived as a technology follower, playing catch-up to the operating-system strides that Apple was making. That the best technology doesn’t always win is a truth of life to which Microsoft owes much of its success, and Apple’s technology never really bruised much more than the egos of Microsoft’s executives. Still, it’s interesting that Apple has become so completely marginalized in some quarters that it’s no longer even part of the discussion of a future world order in which Microsoft is seen as less dominant,” Tennant writes for Computerworld.
“I’m no IT futurist, but trust me, you need to include Apple in the discussion… The best technology may not always win. But it’s not going to go away, either,” Tennant writes.
Full article here.
Related MacDailyNews articles:
TrustedReviews: ‘The Mac mini is a master stroke by Apple’ – March 01, 2005
Apple iMac G5, Mac mini models hold top 5 spots on Amazon’s Desktop Computer Top Sellers list – March 01, 2005
PC World gives Apple’s Mac mini 4 out of 5 stars – February 26, 2005
Apple Mac mini ‘perfect for computer user who wants to leave the tyranny of Window and viruses’ – February 26, 2005
Apple’s Mac mini might well convince Windows users to switch to Mac OS X – February 22, 2005
Chicago Sun-Times: ‘Apple’s Mac Mini is a device of the most cunningly crafted evil’ – February 18, 2005
CNET Executive Editor switches to Mac and he ‘ain’t ever going back’ to Windows – February 17, 2005
Tom’s Hardware: Apple Mac mini’s size, design, attractive price sets it apart – February 16, 2005
Apple’s Mac mini is a convincing shot across Bill Gates’ bow – February 15, 2005
Apple’s Mac is not doomed to small market share forever; the ‘Ignorance Lag’ is ending – February 11, 2005
Apple’s Mac mini makes using a Mac more affordable and more attractive than ever to Windows users – February 08, 2005
Washington Times: ‘Mac mini raises the bar for what a good, low-price computer can and should do’ – February 08, 2005
Apple Mac mini, iMac G5 models hold 5 of top 6 spots in Amazon’s Desktop Computer Top Sellers list – February 08, 2005
New Mac mini helps Apple get its secret weapon – creative software – in front of Windows users – February 08, 2005
The Seattle Times: Apple’s new Mac mini is ‘tiny, beautiful and dirt cheap’ – February 05, 2005
BusinessWeek: Apple’s Mac mini comes with elegant, stable Mac OS X and very good software – February 03, 2005
Apple’s Mac mini is an attractive option to Windows-based PCs – February 02, 2005
Computerworld: Apple Computer ‘has a hit on its hands with the new Mac Mini’ – February 01, 2005
Apple’s Mac mini offers relief from Windows viruses and malware – January 30, 2005
Associated Press: With Apple’s Mac mini ‘you could abandon Windows altogether’ – January 27, 2005
CBS News: Grab a new Apple Mac mini ‘and kiss the old Wintel machine goodbye’ – January 27, 2005
AnandTech reviews Apple’s Mac mini: ‘tempting Windows users everywhere’ – January 26, 2005
Keep those cards and letters coming!
The next round will be the inevitable Longhorn – Tiger comparisons, Apple as Redmond’s R&D facility.
damn. when Computerworld starts talking like this, PHB can be swayed.
Concidering that they were a mainstay of “beleagured” apple not but a few years ago – to saying things like “near-bulletproof security”, “compelling account of how a growing number of your peers are using Apple’s technology in corporate environments outside of traditional Mac strongholds” is, well… shocking.
at least to me.
-the other steve jobs
For microsoft’s sake I hope Longhorn has some amazing under the hood advancements, cause the screen shots make it look worse than XP
Microsoft is being squeezed, Linux one side, Mac OS on the other. Linux is cheaper and more customisable than Windows but still needs a savvy administrator, Apple/Mac OS is more expensive (than Linux) and less customisable but works out of the box.
Linux and Mac OS are working to improve their areas of weakness and eating in to the middle ground that Microsoft occupies. This has been going on for years and has advanced to the point that in some circles the Mac is now recognised as a competant server OS, in other circles Linux is considered a viable desktop OS.
Google is a new element, all that cash to burn, what to do with it. Microsoft looks weak now so there’s a market opportunity. Don’t write off the other OSs out there, OS/2 and BeOS still have fans and could make comebacks.
Windows is dead already, Microsoft near death, it’s the .doc and .xls formats that are the battleground now.
Here’s a related story, Microsoft Loses Key Windows Architect to Google
http://www.microsoft-watch.com/article2/0,1995,1772125,00.asp
DanK:
Thanks for the link. They don’t seem to have Avalon under control yet, do they?
Oh. Wait. Avalon isn’t in the first release, is it?
A question I often ask myself of Microsoft: “People actually buy this stuff?”
There’s a story over at Slashdot about the Unix world fracturing itself, thus leaving Wintel as “the last man standing.” The author marginalized OS X, too.
OSS Unix: Dividing and Conquering Itself
—
“followed” as in “followed in Apple’s footsteps.
This is no longer the 1980’s. Despite M$’s best efforts, the computing world has become more interoperable, thus providing viable alternatives to M$ products. Computers are also increasingly becoming part of the modern lifestyle (audio, video, shopping, etc.), and M$ Office is not necessarily a driver in that consumer market.
It is the exact same interface with a new gradient and a giant, space taking clock-dock. silly
“Microsoft has already defied the odds once by staying a dominant player as the computer industry made a major technological transition in the late 1990s from the PC era to the Internet era,” says Thomas Malone, a professor at MIT’s Sloan School of Management.
They simply kept offering an OS that wasn’t designed for networking, ignoring the security implications, and hoping we (and the hackers) wouldn’t catch on. Well, everyone has now caught on and they are in deep sewage.
Microsoft defied the odds in the 1990s and became a dominant player only because of illegal tactics, of which they were found guilty in court. Let’s not forget about that. If Dubya didn’t win in 2000, Microshit would have been broken up by now.
“If Dubya didn’t win in 2000, Microshit would have been broken up by now.”
Suuuuure. What kind of stupid statement is that?
“OS/2 and BeOS still have fans and could make comebacks”
Don’t forget Amiga and Atari ST!
Dream on man, if Microsoft is dead, then OS/2 and BeOS have already been reincarnated. They ain’t coming ‘back’, they may never fully go away, like Amiga and just like Atari ST, I’m sure there are still some enthusiasts out there who refuse to let go, but nobody would bother pouring the millions of dollars in development costs and marketing to bring them up to speed to compete with today’s operating systems. If they were open source, maybe they would have a chance, but IBM has already nailed the OS/2 coffin shut and Palm doesn’t show any aspirations of wanting to enter the desktop OS wars when they are having a hard enough time winning the handheld/smartphone OS wars. Palm owns the BeOS IP.
I see the war coming down to (in no particular order):
Linux
SunOS
Mac OS X
Windows
But if the Enterprise continues to move it’s applications towards web based apps, it may not matter which one you are running on. Here’s to hoping web developers wake up one day and smell the Sun compliant Java…
“If Dubya didn’t win in 2000, Microshit would have been broken up by now.”
Suuuuure. What kind of stupid statement is that?
Well I suppose you could always tell us.
My guess is Solaris will be the next to go. Linux is taking away Solaris’ markets one by one, and with the Java Desktop Sun are already heading down the path to becoming a Linux vendor themselves.
Microsoft’s biggest problem with Apple isn’t the steadily increasing sales. Apple’s constant pushing of the envelope is leaving MS behind, and the Linux people are playing catch up quicker than Redmond can. Unless Microsoft can start to come up with some serious innovations, Linux is going to be getting the sort of “Better than Windows” press that Apple have been getting since the release of Panther.
I can’t quite see Microsoft going the same way as Novell just yet, but the legacy vendor tag is beginning to become a possibility.
P.S. I managed to create a sentence containing both “Microsoft” and “Innovation”. Who’d have thought it possible?
“Windows is dead already, Microsoft near death, it’s the .doc and .xls formats that are the battleground now.”
I agree that Microsoft’s dominance hinges on their control of the formats, but I disagree vehemently that they’re “near death”. A company of this size, with their resources, with their financial know-how and their penchant for playing hardball, simply doesn’t evaporate overnight. They can afford to flounder around lose money for years before they’d be compelled to fold up the tents.
Dubya is pro big corporations above all else. Dubya’s Dept. of Justice abandoned what the Clinton DoJ was trying to do with MS. They rolled over for MS. It’s public record.
How far would the DoJ have gone if allowed to continue, and the candidate with the most votes had actually been elected in 2000?
We’ll never know.
The articles at ComputerWorld shows the Mac as a promising server platform. Oracle on board really is great news (and I’m an Oracle dev myself)
More and more articles like this are being written, which is great, but is it enough to sway IT and CEO’s to switch or at least add a few Mac’s?? I don’t know.
I tried to get an iMac for media work at my last job a couple of years back, and they turned me down (despite all they wanting to do was burning DVDs, make movies, scan things etc) Having a G4 at home, I knew what it could do – the PC they got was pretty awful, and the software was awful too. iLife back then was good enough for what they wanted – but the PC software stank – the included DVD software crashed, and required updating, which in turn required product registration.
Then I asked them to consider XServes and Macs 18 months ago during a big computer replacement… still no go. Mac’s were as competitive back then as they are today, although a large PC vendor gave us a great price for the PCs. So, they went PC/Microsoft all the way. It didn’t help the project lead was an MS bigot, and even said to me once that the Linux cost of ownership was much the same as Windows, something I still find hard to believe… I think more likely he was not knowledgable enough in Linux, and felt “safer” with Microsoft products.
And that safety with PCs and Windows is probably the main reason companies won’t change, or even add a Mac. I really hope this changes.
And now Microsoft is once again having to catch up to Apple’s strides in it’s latest operating system OSX. So far they have fallen behind big time and no change for the near future is in sight as delay after delay to what once was there new operating system Longhorn. That has now bit the dust and now they will be lucky to update XP with the new name of Longhorn but no new features.
Apple has always been the inovator while the rest just follow with a different name and brag how the supposedly created it.
Apple, Sony, Google, Linux, (and whoever else wants to participate) should form an alliance and crush the evil empire.
IT professionals are by in large IGNORANT of anything outside of their narrow minded view of reality.
They will never perceive Apple as a threat to MS, simply because they have never bothered to EDUCATE themselves about the advantages of OS X and the Mac hardware systems.
Those who have, are quick to marginalize Apple due to fear that if the company’s products were adopted on larger scale, the need for many of these Windows repair men would disappear and they would be out of a job.
Anyone-
Please in a reasonable non-flaming way tell me how Microsoft is playing catch-up with Panther. I use both and they both seem to do the same things and in pretty much the same way (of course not every function is the same). Our XP machines don’t crash or freeze anymore than our X ones do. They’re ugly as hell though.
But since XP was out before Panther, how is it a copy? Some of the great features of Panther, like, faxing, fast user switching, mail(OE) and built in zip functions have been in windows since crappy ME. X certainly did a good job making them elegant. I hate that stupid “Fisher Price” XP look. And XP can’t touch Font Book.
Jerry T ;
They can’ttell you, they’ll be beheaded at the mercy of their Cupertino Captive..I agree with you..saying Xp is a copy is just stupido. I’ve seen both X and XP do some really bizarre things..I use em both, I enjoy them both..FSCK them if they hate you for that.
:rolleyes: – I get PAID either way…running mac or windows..they both have problems. But you’re perfect so we wont bother to tell YOU anything.
“Apple has always been the inovator while the rest just follow with a different name and brag how the supposedly created it.” – John
John, get you head out of yo butt dude. Apple didnt “innovate” Unix, Darwin, or really anything else. They just have a more simplistic, classy way of building apps. Thats the only innovation..
If the service you receive here is below your standards, then please, lower your standards.
Heliarch-
Back-off now. Everyone knows that Apple “innovated” Dashulator, I mean Kanfabuboard. Well what ever they call it it’s innovation ;-0
No one else ever thought that one up!