“I laugh every time I read about a new ‘iPod killer’ thingamajig in the news… Every time these wannabes put out another press release on Business Wire, I think about all the profits their advertising agencies will be making, launching the new players around the world. And now Microsoft is getting into the game with Zune,” Angus Wong writes for About This Particular Macintosh (ATPM).
Wong writes, “But aping the iPod is not the biggest game in town. I’m seeing people trying to replicate Apple’s success in hardware design and operating system design. These are, by and large, the same people who were clueless about the original iMac. (‘Why would anyone want a computer in a specific color?’) Now we see Dell and other PC OEMs burn midnight oil churning out ‘cool looking’ PCs from third-world factories. Meanwhile, Microsoft is ‘improving’ the user experience with Vista, which as usual tries to look like the Mac OS on the surface. Us experienced users will know that beauty is more than pixel-deep and, like almost all of Microsoft’s applications, once you start trying to use the damned thing, you’ll likely trip on the crazy arrangement of functions, icons, and ‘features’ that seemingly only Microsoft can so badly mangle. I continue to be surprised that a company with the resources and talent that Microsoft has is able to produce such lousy products. Even startups, or solitary shareware authors (not to mention unpaid open source gurus) produce far better software than the largest computer company on Earth.”
Wong writes, “I suspect the ‘cancer’ that pervades Microsoft is not that there aren’t intelligent people working within its organizational bowels. I’m sure Microsoft hires excellent people. So I can only conclude the problem lies with the design philosophy of the company. Looking back, this shouldn’t be surprising. A company that, instead of innovating, used strong arm tactics in the market to push its wares, probably finds it easier to just add a feature to a product in the quickest way possible, than to think carefully how best to add that feature, so as not to slow down release. Revenue is generated through upgrades, so the more versions people buy, the better it is for the bottom line.”
Wong writes, “I bring this up because I see Apple headed that way. Not in the same godawful execution as Microsoft, but because I foresee astounding success with Apple. True character is revealed in how you live your life after you win the lottery. Google’s tried to articulate a ‘no-evil’ stance which has already been compromised. Linux tries hard, and is still trying. Now it’s time to see how our favorite computer company faces up to its destiny.”
Full article here.
Well, so far, with the iPod, Apple has handled success very well (stock option irregularities excluded). They have continued to push the envelope in terms of useful features and miniature device sizes. The difference between a 3G iPod and a 5G iPod is quite remarkable as are the differences between successive Mac OS X versions. It will be extremely interesting to see how Apple faces up to its destiny. Do you think Apple will Think Different™?
The author forgot Microsoft’s buying of other companies for things it does not own, such as iView, Bungie, etc. Microsoft does use strong arm tacits, but it also just buys other companies.
The other problem with Microsoft is that is continues to try to support software 10+ years old. Talk to a Window’s user. They don’t understand why they can’t run a program they bought in 1994 on their current computer. There is the problem. If you want to get your operating system into the modern era, you have to dump the old stuff at some point. Apple realized this with OS 9 to OS X transition. Yeah, it was painful, but look at where we are now.
From the Urban Dictionary:
1.ipod killer
A term that cannot be properly defined because the term does not really exist.
Clem: Yo, check this new mp3 player out. It’s definitely the new iPod killer.
Karl: Yeah, that must be the reason why there is no such thing and 80% of mp3 users are iPod you stupid mother [bleep].
I work at Apple’s Austin offices and I can tell you it’s as farked up there as any corporation is. Same corporate bullshit politics as everywhere. Cold and impersonal. They do not think different, except for not having a dress code.
I’ll be leaving to start my own business in 2 months. Goodbye Apple!
“True character is revealed in how you live your life after you win the lottery”
I would LOVE to have my true character tested.
Tom…
“I’ll be leaving to start my own business in 2 months. Goodbye Apple!”
I hear there’s going to be a BIG market in making accesories for the zune mp3 player MS is putting out. Maybe you should start your business there? :-p
Tom Strong, you sound cynical enough to be contributing to that unhappy place. Could there be some truth in that?
Apple is different enough if enough ways to be different.
I too heard from an aquaintance I met in a bar a few years back (he worked in the Cupertino offices,) that Apple is not as “different,” as people may think. The Cupertino headquarters are a completely corporate environment. They don’t necessarily treat employees poorly, but they aren’t a “great” company to work for either.. They have average benefits, average pay and expect a lot of overtime.
Tom, as a past employer of 27 in the electronics repair (communciations) and Linux software development fields, I’d suggest you have an attitude check done right away. It’s quite possible that the problem isn’t Apple, but you.
You can find out by trying to get your old job back in six months. If the problem was Apple, they’ll take you back. On the other hand, if the problem was you…
So there’s a job opening at Apple ?
A MOMENT ON MICROSOFT AND ZUNE – THE BIG PROBLEM
The biggest issue with Microsoft’s Zune and approach to the market is that MS is zigging when the market will be zagging…
The next year is the last big iPod year. After that the market is destinted to divert it’s energy into cell phones, and home entertainment hubs.
How better to decide when to change the markets direction than Apple?
First:
Zune will launch around the same time Apple launches entirely new iPod nano’s (and a modest iPod video storage update), but more than likely, an iPod/Phone gadet, that will catch the market by surprize.
This new Apple phone and Virtual Carrier service is quite likely to become “the gift” this Christmas (considering the PS III will be out of many’s price point reach).
Recap of the first move:
MS will be blowing major dollars in an attempt to get some traction in the MP3 space by eating it’s own (Napster and the rest), while Apple will have changed the game by focusing the consumer market the market to it’s dazling new phone. Reality distortion field need not apply.
Secondly:
Just when MS thinks it can redouble it’s efforts for Zune in an open and quite marketing post-Christmas season, MWSF ’07 will see the launch of the iPod video (the “real” iPod video). Zune will not be able to match this device in price point or feature set, or desire by the consumer – period.
Recap of the second move:
MS is hit again by a new iPod video at MWSF, that may sport 720p for TV hookup and playback – A HD movie catalog and HD DVD player in your pocket! Yes, it downsamples for stnd TV’s.
Third:
While MS continues to blow through it’s marketing budget faster that one could burn money with a truck loaded with gas, momentum will have been all but lost for Zune. The Zune/MS media license world will be flounding – big time.
Come the fall ’07 Apple will deliver it’s new “eMac” (entertainment Mac) which should fall right into the 150+ million iPod/iPhone/Mac users living rooms quite seamlessly.
Apple is just another corrupt USA corp. The stock options scandal should put a few of them in jail. Crooks.
Eric,
You do realize that Apple got OSX by buying NeXT right?
I think they bought software that became itunes and iphoto too. Did they buy Logic Pro and Shake?
I’m sure Microsoft hires excellent people.
Indeed, and many now work for Apple. Looks like excellent people can’t stay long time in that corporate model. After a while you wonder in how many more ways your talent could be wasted at Microsoft and you go elsewhere.
Been there, done that.
Cheers
People have to realise that the only iPod “killer” can be Apple itself. This applies to pretty much any product that has captured a market the way the iPod has.
Look at Winblows. We have to be honest that it is being killed by Micro$oft. OSX is the best thing since sliced bread but if M$ had manged to keep Winblows on track OSX market share would just have continued to steadily decline.
Apple lost all the market share they did years ago by themselves and not because anyone came up with a better product.
Sony are now trying to replicate this by killing PS with absurd pricing.
The onus is on Apple to keep the iPod fresh and exciting.
Don’t forget the ILLEGAL MONOPOLY also helped immensely in eroding Mac market share. Windows market share increased even as the product remained essentially terrible.
Jerry T, I think you missed Final Cut Pro, which they also purchased.
But what you failed to notice was that all of these products, FCP, Shake, Logic, OSX, iTunes, etc. All have been substantially improved by Apple both in features and in usability.
MS can add features, but name me something that they improved the interface or usability on? Can you name even 1 product?
That is because M$ management is so utterly blind, Mr. Wong. There is no clue bat large enough to educate them. They are a cargo cult, named after the people of the stone age culture of Micronesia, who saw C-47 cargo planes in World War 2 bringing in valuable cargo from the sky. They put on faux ear protectors and waved faux landing signals, just looking like the real objects used by the ground landing crews. They though that was what caused the delivery of manna from heaven.
Apple understands and respects customers in ways that arrogant whip cracker managers do not and can not. It is not in the latter’s DNA. Sometimes I think the PC software is designed to be a computer game, so modal that only patient geeks will figure it out, e.g.; you must put down the sword before you can pick up the key kind of crap. Duh!
The do not get it. They never will.
Jerry T asked, “Did they buy Logic Pro and Shake?”
In the case of Logic, yes, they bought Emagic. Emagic were formerly C-Lab, who created Notator on the Atari and went on to develop it into Logic for PC and Mac. (I am old enough to have used all these.) My understanding is, in buying the company for a product they needed, they bought not only the software but the great team that had created and developed it. Better than buying up rival companies with the intention of letting their product wither and die – though killing Logic on the PC platform was arguably not nice.
Jerry, funny thing is that Macromedia, the original owner of Final Cut Pro, did nothing with it and was looking for a buyer…
Geez, there’s sure a lot of finger pointing going on in this thread, wow.
I appreciate the questiont that the article poses, its a very good one, and it can only be rhetorical until Macs get a share of the pc market that is considered significant. My personal stand on this, as yet rhetorical question, is that, I don’t want Apple to replace MS in market share size for the very reasons stipulated in the article, (along with a few of my own). I want to see Apple go along ways toward splitting the market down the middle, but my underlying motivation is that I want to see more diversity in the pc os market place over all. Living in this wasteland of two or three consumer viable OSes is abysmal. For technology-improvement purposes, as well as cost/quality issues, we need real competition in the OS realm more than we need any other single thing – period. That’s the way capitalism is supposed to work, and does work when given a chance. Apple’s tenacity in the face of not really being real competition for MS (at least not up until now), has been beyond admirable, and I am a longtime Macintosh user and promoter, personally and corporately.
But I have to be honest and say that, I do what I can to push Apple because I believe that MS has got to go (or at least be brought to a more “normal” market share), for the sake of the technology and the consumer, both enterprise and private. I absolutely love the Mac, but I have to beleive that there are some really brainy and inovative people out there that have great ideas for things like user interface, optimal use of multicore cpu technology, integration of tiny, small, and large computing systems for the enterprise user and the private user, and etc. and etc. But none of these intellectual resources will waste their time trying to create and bring to market new ideas when the market is all shored up by one monolith.
Oh, and on the evil corporation thing – Whining about MS or Apple’s or Ford’s, or anyone elses internal business practices is a waste of time because in order to be successful you’re going to have to work for one, or be one. If you’re going to be one then please try not to repeat the sins of the one’s that you’re complaining about – But I doubt that you can avoid all of them… But please try.
The guy makes some interesting points.
My own take is that Windows was never a creation of Microsoft, so they never felt proud enough of it to do it jstice. It is in fact an amalgam of other peoples’ ideas and sometimes others’ products, all mixed together in a stew that has become so large and so complex it is impossible to do anything with it. VISTA by mid-2007? I doubt.
Isn’t it obvious? Awarding a few shady stock options is a sure sign of success.
Twilightmoon-
Did I fail to notice that Apple made them better?
Now how do you know that by my post? I didn’t make a statement like that; in fact I didn’t make a statement at all, I only posed a question. Well two questions.
It’s good to know that some of you walk through life seeing only what you want and not what is really in front of you.
You must be a tech analyst.