“Apple is the prospector, the trailblazer. Microsoft is the Borg. Apple’s technology tends to work extremely well and is intuitive. Microsoft’s works with everything, eventually. Microsoft will never, ever, ever come up with a piece of functional engineering as breathtakingly beautiful as the iMac. Still, Apple [supposedly] lost the operating system war. So it went elsewhere,” Bill Mann writes for The Motley Fool.
“Its jiujitsu moves are paying off. First and foremost, the smashing success of the iPod digital music players, where Apple has managed to introduce product lines in succession without cannibalizing itself. This was an extremely smart move, since music management has turned out to be a killer app. Apple’s iPod and iTunes have become the default as the company has exploited two elements: its design and usability prowess and a marketplace fractured with standard and interoperability issues. If you don’t know what operates with what, your default is to go with the one you know works well, and that’s the iPod,” Mann writes.
“You can see how prevalent this tool is by regarding the actions of Apple’s competition: Napster has essentially ceded the pay-per-download market to Apple by focusing its marketing on monthly subscriptions — in my opinion a strategy that is a loser, since Napster doesn’t work with, you guessed it, iPods,” Mann writes. “What the iPod has managed to do is kick-start and revive the operating system war. If your most cherished technological possession (besides the portable electronic I-Ching, of course) is your iPod, and you’re at the point of replacement for your computer, why not consider a Mac? Moreover, Microsoft has helped here with its consistently-under-viral-Spyware-and-adware bombardment Internet browser and email client. People who primarily use their computers for browsing, communications, and music management have a new low-cost, hassle-free, typically awesome product for these purposes, the Mac Mini.”
“Essentially, Apple has reinvigorated the operating system battle with Microsoft by focusing on everything but operating systems. Given its low level of penetration, it doesn’t have to take much of the market in order to make a huge difference to its bottom line,” Mann writes.
Read the full article for context here.
You can also vote for either Apple or Microsoft in The Motley Fool’s Stock Madness 2005 poll here. Microsoft currently leads Apple 66% to 34%. You know what to do.
I love the trail Apple is blazing. Great company. Great products.
Off topic
Apple has learned a few tricks from Intel and M$.
Apple is requesing 10% off wholesale prices of all iPod accessories for the right to use a “made for iPod” logo.
http://www.newratings.com/new2/beta/article_737209.html
SJ is milking the iPod for all its worth.
SJ is keeping Apple profitable. If that means leveraging the iPod like that, then that’s good business sense.
Now here’s a thought – have MS done the exact opposite with the X-Box?? For a long time the compelling reasons people give for buying a PC have been MS Office (as most people’s work and schools use it) and games. There’s no compatibility issues with Office on the Mac and to be frank, the upgrade price on the PC is little different to a new educational copy (which most home users qualify for). Meanwhile, X-box is undermining the PC as a gaming platform – the shelf space for PC games in local computer stores has plunged as that for X-box has increased. Still more than the space for Mac games – i.e. none.
Great article – except he said Jujitsu when it’s really called Makido!
tee hee!
here is my question. Gaming hardware (Playstation, XBox and Gamecube) are all sold at a loss, a huge loss as I understand it. Where money is made is the game sales. SSSOOOOO, why wouldnt one of these companies (Nintendo most likely) make a deal with Apple to make the games compatible with both the console and the computer and have 2 possible platforms for playing games instaed of just 1. I know it will never happen
Buffy: Partly because their is no dev platform for making games portable to two platforms as distinct as the two. They would have to make them twice.
And as far as the OS wars goes…Who cares? I use em both, I like em both, They both have pro’s and con’s. I actually switched full time to my G5 for about a month. But really I have no need to switch completely. And some of ther things I do my PC just does better. Other My mac does better. They are both kick ass. And I wouldnt want either to go away as their both extremely effective in all areas.
MW Served as in “thats what you just got”
KernelPanic – What exactly does your PC do better? I am just curious..
Buffy: Partly because their is no dev platform for making games portable to two platforms as distinct as the two. They would have to make them twice.
What??? Most games are written in C/C++ because there is no better language as far as game performance prowess is concerned. OpenGL is cross-platform to a wide variety of computer platforms (Mac, PC, Amiga, etc…). Making subtle changes to code will always apply, but coding a game completely twice is absurd. I can see if a game was tailored for DirectX, then that would put a wrench to the whole development situation.
I think Office, Photoshop, GoLive and of course the gaming is better on the PC side. To me Windows just seems snappier and quicker than OS X, Thats just my Opinion though.
KernelPanic
You have fun with your PC then…. These things just work better on the mac – especially Photoshop. Most of my windows friends that have switched love office better on the Mac as well.
Let me rephrase, They wouldnt have to rewrite completely, but there are significant differences in the architecture of a mac and that of a Nintendo.
Wizard. I will, And lots of it.
MW “Other” as in Others have their Opinions too, AND I RESPECT THAT.
In all the articles I’ve seen about the Mac mini, no one has mentioned schools as part of the upgrade cycle. This looks to be a market forgotten by most as new PC users rush to replace their virus-ridden PCs.
This may be the real story of the Mac mini, grab the PC switchers first, then the schools. Either way, Apple and everyone who buys one wins.
KernelPanic – you crack me up… I thought you had some program that actually worked better on the PC or something that was not available on the mac… Photshop…now thats funny
If game developers wrote code which put all machine specific code into a few files/functions (i.e. well organised), then yea, it should be possible to write portable code. The problem is, this doesn’t always provide the best performance since you often have to write “general” functions which call and map to these functions (slowing things down a bit).
By the way, DudeMac this is the 2nd time in about two days I’ve seen Amiga’s mentioned in these forums. What’s going on? amiga.org doesn’t mention any impending announcements? (to be honest, I’d love to see an amiga come out… they always had dirt cheap, but really fast hardware, and geneally made me feel (as a Mac purchaser) ripped off… of course, now with OS X and all the added niceties, it gets harder to define genuine value against such hardware.)
KernelPanic – Maybe Window is snappy, but what’s it going to be like under Aero? (seriously, this isn’t a dig… I’m really wanting to know)
http://www.winsupersite.com/showcase/longhorn_aero.asp
Damn that is an ugly interface….
Microsoft employee trick question:
Q:So how do you know if the application you wrote sucks?
A:Your boss loves it!
A Mac running OS X might just get a few “switchers” if Longhorn turns out to be dog slow on your “mom and pop’s” everyday Dell PC.
Dear “Not a Total Sucker,”
Almost ALL game developers DO write their software that way. Nearly every game is cross platform, running on some combination of XBox, Playstation, Windows, and other platforms. The platform-independent game-specific code is as separate as possible from the platform-specific framework. The platform abstraction architecture is one of any game company’s crown jewels (along with their scripting language, render engine, art toolset, etc.). The trick is to convince them that Macintosh is one of the platforms they should support. Hopefully this is becoming an easier sell with Apple’s recent market successes.
>Kernal Panic wrote: And as far as the OS wars goes…Who cares? I use em both, I like em both, They both have pro’s and con’s.
Same here. I use both and I like it that way. Some apps and plugins aren’t available for the Mac. And if you include gaming, the Mac side is seriously lacking.
That being said, I prefer working in OSX.
>Kernal Panic wrote: And as far as the OS wars goes…Who cares? I use em both, I like em both, They both have pro’s and con’s.
Same here. I use both and I like it that way. Some apps and plugins aren’t available for the Mac. And if you include gaming, the Mac side is seriously lacking.
That being said, I prefer working in OSX.
Hmm. That Aero interface looks like the one that comes with Tivo. Seriously.
The only problem I see with the educational market, OldMacDude, is that it’s very easy for a a mac mini to walk out the door. The big beige box is fairly noticable when it goes walkabout, but the mini would slip into a backpack quite nicely.
Kernel Panic:
PHOTOSHOP IS NOT BETTER ON THE WINDOWS PC!
Believe me, I have been using photoshop for over 10 years (right back to version 2 – with NO layers!) and have used it on both mac and windows.
The peformance on the windows os is crap compared to the mac.
I opened a 1gb file today on my G5 mac and it took 7 seconds to open the file.
I tried opening the same file on a top-end windows pc and the machine get up trying to open the file after 5 minutes.
Face it – windows IS NOT the OS for large and heavy grpahics intensive work – period.
Another area is video – macs do it better FACT!
Why do you think companies like Lucasfilm or ILM use macs for god sake??
Currently 44% to 56% – Apple leads (you know the rest).
Actually there was a recent article about Revenge of the Sith being rendered on Windows 64, but they do use Macs for all their animatics.
Plus Macs are the computer of choice for most of their staff (including the head effects guy John Knoll, co-creator of Photoshop!)
According to Bill Mann:
AAPL 52-week low-high: $12.61-$45.44
Might have merited a note that there was this little thing called a Stock Split in there, don’t you think? Makes all the Microsoft arguments quite a bit softer.
Hm. I’m listening to music on my toshiba m2 at work, and I empty the trash… what happens? Music stops playing while the disk is spinning. I go home and do the same on my ibook G4… what happens? Music keeps playing as if nothing happened. Supposedly a faster and better machine (1.8 Cetrino 1GB vs. 1.33 G4 1.25GB), and that’s what I get. I’m glad I have my mac.
Does anyone know of the reason why the Mac Business Unit over at Microsoft can’t make a Direct X type layer for the Mac to help with the porting of games? I read that Microsoft Japan has taken on porting some games over to the Mac. Also, why can’t they make a decent as in full version of Windows Media Player with DRM included? Apple was kind enough not to skimp on QuickTime features for Windows.
Perhaps Apple needs something along with Open GL that would support fast and furious gaming on Macs. It’s hard to believe that with the AltiVec and the various graphic cards that it should be so hard to make great games.
All that BS about giving choices. What would Microsoft loose making some of their technologies fully cross platform. They’re a software company first so they shouldn’t have such biases over hardware.
I wasnt talking PORTING games, im talking making the OS or whatever that runs the Next consoles to be made by Apple (based on OS X) since they ALL will be running on PowerPCs, and NOT make game companies PORT to mac, but be naturally compatible, basically a giving people 2 options for gaming. A Mac mini (with better grafx) rebranded as a Nintendo console. Talk about saving on development costs.
Can someone who knows tell me is there is a big difference in the way games are written for PC vs console? especially now when console games will start giving HiDef options.
RE: MACKJACK.
I have a friend who has been working on all the last 3 starwars films and I called him yesterday to confirm and he said ILM have totally gone over to macs.
He also said that he was chatting with George (lucas) earlier yesterday and he said he was viewing edits on his 17″ G4 PowerBook while chatting to him.
“Essentially, Apple has reinvigorated the operating system battle with Microsoft by focusing on everything but operating systems.”
huh?
He must be talking about marketing. The engineering effort put into the iPod pales in comparison to the engineering effort put into OSX.
That is why the halo effect is working.
There is substance behind the halo.