Apple CEO Steve Jobs on Yahoo music, iPod, cellphones, ‘Halo Effect,’ viruses and more

The Wall Street Journal’s D: All Things Digital conference got underway Sunday night with Apple CEO Steve Jobs giving a sneak preview of a forthcoming version of iTunes, the software for buying and managing digital-music files, that could boost the popularity of podcasting. (See related articles below).

“Addressing a range of other Apple-related issues in a give-and-take with Wall Street Journal columnists and conference hosts Walter S. Mossberg and Kara Swisher, Mr. Jobs expressed doubt about the prospect of cellphone-service providers making substantial inroads into Apple’s dominant market share of digital-music players. Mr. Jobs said downloading music from cellphone-service providers would be ‘a lousy buying experience’ likely to be two or three times as expensive as Apple’s 99-cent downloads, adding that ‘it’s hard to see their customers as that stupid,'” Jason Fry reports for The Wall Street Journal.

“Mr. Jobs also cast doubt on Yahoo Inc.’s announcement of a $60-per-year music subscription plan, saying that price point was ‘substantially’ below Yahoo’s costs and would be raised. Mr. Jobs then claimed Apple employees had a betting pool on when Yahoo would raise the $5-a-month rate, with Mr. Jobs putting his money on five months,” Fry reports.

“Mr. Jobs proclaimed himself a solid believer in the ‘halo effect’ of iPod sales fueling Mac sales, pointing to strong growth in recent quarters. Asked when Apple would reach a 10% market share – up from the low single digits — he said he didn’t know. But he added that ‘it’s possible … if people learn about our products, many of them choose them,'” Fry reports.

“On the subject of viruses and security holes in the Mac operating system, Mr. Jobs refused to crow about Apple’s lack of incidents in comparison with Microsoft Corp.’s Windows operating system, noting that since all PC makers face the security challenge, machines shouldn’t be marketed that way. ‘One thing you never want to do in dealing with security and viruses is be cavalier,’ he said,” Fry reports. “Mr. Jobs was mindful of the presence in the audience of his longtime rival, Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates. At one point, he polled the audience to see how many had iPods. Seeing quite a bit of upraised hands, he peered into the crowd and asked, ‘Bill, do you have your hand up?'”

Full article here.

Related MacDailyNews articles:
Apple CEO Steve Jobs demos iTunes 4.9, due within 60 days, includes podcast support – May 23, 2005
Apple CEO Steve Jobs to speak at Wall Street Journal’s ‘D3: All Things Digital’ conference next week – May 16, 2005

30 Comments

    1. Steve jobs had everything against adobe flash and his comments really hurt our industry. Now may he eat his words on security and may his closed mindedness haunt him as his share price plummet

  1. “Mr. Jobs refused to crow about Apple’s lack of incidents in comparison with Microsoft Corp.’s Windows operating system, noting that since all PC makers face the security challenge, machines shouldn’t be marketed that way. ‘One thing you never want to do in dealing with security and viruses is be cavalier,’ he said,”

    MDN could learn a lot from this statement.

  2. “he peered into the crowd and asked, ‘Bill, do you have your hand up?'”

    HA HA HA HA HA HA!
    That was awesome!

    Bill’s face must have been red as a beet.

  3. stanthemoron,

    MDN merely corrects those who say “Mac OS X has viruses.” Kudos to MDN for being a watchdog!

    What about Apple themselves, is this not crowing? Jobs should take his own advice before you scream at MDN:

    “Mac OS X delivers the highest level of security through the adoption of industry standards, open software development and wise architectural decisions. Combined, this intelligent design prevents the swarms of viruses and spyware that plague PCs these days… All that spam on the Internet these days gets sent by ‘owned’ boxes, usually Windows-based home computers… The Mac OS X administrator account, unlike the Windows admin account, disables access to the core funtions of the operating system. Many people find that Windows-based PCs are unusable unless they use the admin account, which exposes their PCs to attack.”

    http://www.apple.com/macosx/features/security/

  4. MDN is right to trumpet the lack of Mac viruses/spyware. If groups like MDN didn’t make a big deal of it, NO ONE in the Windows world would know about it. Steve’s also right to play it coy on this issue, since at the first OS X virus he would have to eat his words.
    Everyone is playing their roles properly here…

  5. I think it would be just fine for Jobs to crow about Mac’s lack of viruses. And if/when the day ever comes that the Mac does get a true virus, the score will no longer be 0 to 97,000, it will be 1 to 97,000. Still gives him bragging rights.

  6. Last I checked, MDN reported news and weren’t employed by Apple. So if they wish to trumpet the fact that there continue to be ZERO viruses for OS X, more power to them. The only ones that complain are jealous Winblows users anyway that would rather not be reminded of the junk bloatware that they use…

  7. Oh well here we go again. Steve has a go at Bill. Or is the other way around? Hold onto your egos. Over to you Bill.

    This is so much like a tennis match my neck is beginning to hurt.

  8. I just wanna know how many folks who were sitting NEXT to or NEAR Bill had their hands up – and if they currently work for M$, will they be working there tomorrow? ” width=”19″ height=”19″ alt=”cool hmm” style=”border:0;” />

  9. Its a real head scratcher……..not noting the advantage osX has virus wise in advertising is ………….dumb?

    Also, “if people learn about our products, many of them choose them”……..well, yeah, so how about some mainstream advertising?

  10. iPod envy… ” width=”19″ height=”19″ alt=”LOL” style=”border:0;” />

    When Steve Jobs discusses “All things digital” he’s
    coming from a broad knowledge base of both hardware and
    software development. This is his forte.

    The digital age makes perfect sense to him and his
    viewpoint is highly regarded.

    I really get a kick out of the constant references to
    Apple’s low market share. The bulk of Apple’s business
    comes from niche markets that aren’t mainstream. How
    many corporations want the computer on thier employees
    desk to be bigger than the corporation itself? Apple
    could be a scary proposition for any company to take on.

    Apple may never have the kind of market share investors
    hope for, but they’ll always have plenty of satisfied
    customers regardless of what’s swimming in the
    mainstream. ” width=”19″ height=”19″ alt=”cool smile” style=”border:0;” />

    CTg

  11. mdn is like the brown-nosing, ignorant lackey that is always last to know what the boss (steve Jobs) is really thinking.
    Jobs knows that viruses aren´t a selling point. If it was everyone would have already switched.
    i´ve got a mac and a pc. viruses are not a problem.
    Speed is more of a problem…for the mac.

    And where is that soko worm virus was supposed to bring all pc to their knees today????????

  12. hobbes said:
    [I]The only thing MDN does is making believe everybody that mac users are complete and utter morons.[/I]

    You were attempting to communicate: All MDN does is make you believe all mac users are complete and utter morons.

    Moron.

  13. Joe..

    Bragging about not having viruses is stupid.. it hurts the rest of us because it begs virus writers to start finding novel ways to F-up the OS.

    Thank you Steve for not being a 5-year old when it comes to advertising..

    Joe.. GET IT? SJ’s been saying this for a while now.

    Generally speaking, if you don’t get how Apple Stores (15mins of 80% of US pop) ‘advertise’ Macs then I can’t help you with the advertising question.. you’ll have to see it for yourself.

  14. When Jobs asked that, apparently Bill reluctantly held up his hand.. and was holding a stack of thousand dollar bills..

    No wait.. Bill just hollered “Windows Media rules.. you suck steve!” and ran out the Emergency Exit.. lmfao

  15. ” width=”19″ height=”19″ alt=”gulp” style=”border:0;” />

    I’d say digital rights are the foremost concern to the
    digital industry. Once they’ve got that nailed down…
    everything will become painfully clear.

    <:snake:>|<:snake:>

    CT

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.