“Within the past two years, every company not named Apple has basically stopped MP3 player production,” Gideon writes. “Sure, Sony and Samsung still make gym-friendly budget options. But no one is wasting time trying to manufacture iPod touch killers anymore—that category has been conceded, and now the former Apple competitors are making iPod accessories to get a piece of the pie. They’re also making tablets.”
Gideon writes, “It’s not hard to see how this will go. Virtually every functioning tablet at CES was running Android 2.2—an OS that was not designed for tablets. Tapping the screen, using apps—it all feels like a lesser experience when compared to using an iPad. As I walked around CES, the cautionary refrain of the giant from Twin Peaks played on an endless loop in my head: “It is happening…again.” Just like the MP3 player market at the middle of last decade, every company wants a piece of the pie. Just like that market, the field, over the course of a few years, will dwindle to a small group consisting of survivors, the clear winner, and some budget options that probably should just be avoided. So far, the clear winner is the iPad.”
MacDailyNews Note: So far, so good, but now Gideon hits a snag:
Gideon continues, “Tablets are the Big Thing now, but in a year or two, the dust will settle, and most of these iPad competitors will be long gone or struggling to stay in the game. Apple is surely hard at work on the Next Best Thing, but in the interest of competition, let’s hope that some other company beats Jobs and company to it for once. The cycle of introduce, imitate, struggle to survive, and retreat can’t be doing anyone—aside from Apple—much good.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: This whole “Apple needs competition” meme fails the test of logic. Apple competes with Apple. Competition is only any good when it’s good. Gideon’s cycle’s first step: Apple’s introduction (throw out the imitation and the rest like the pigeons do the wannabe products) is doing everyone much good; everyone who’s smart enough to buy an iPhone, iPod, Mac, and/or iPad over inferior derivative product, that is.
Followers, by definition, do not lead.
Gideon’s “logic” is that of someone with a Dell Ditty gathering dust on their shelf. The only reason to “hope some other company beats Jobs and company to ‘The Next Big Thing'” is because you dislike Apple and/or Steve Jobs.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Jim – TIV” for the heads up.]
Zune was offered in a brown color. Its the same color as MS coffin for their tablet.
“…is because you dislike Apple and/or Steve Jobs.” Is not a logical reason to buy from the competition.
the problem for the others is there is no innovation. They don’t come up with one damn thing I would buy. But yet every time Apple comes up with something new I’m there
I do not want to see Apple become “too big to fail” as so many mega corporations have. Imagine how quick the government would provide M$ a bailout if they were in financial trouble. Too big to fail is not a good thing for any of us, Apple fan or not.
This whole “Apple competes with Apple” concept is flawed. MDN obviously has no concept of what competition is all about. Every company need competitors, or at some point, they will get lazy, and that includes Apple.
The article is wrong in one area though, Samsung has just come out with an iPod touch competitor.
And yet I still have “friends” (perhaps “associates” is a better word) that will defend Dell to the death.
But, but, but, I say . . . “There’s absolutely NO innovation in that company! Its mantra is ‘Buy Cheap/Sell Cheaper.’ They do nothing more for technology than that!”
“So what,” they say. “Cheap will out, eventually.” It’s still true” There are none so blind as those who WILL NOT SEE.
I don’t think their take is why you would want to buy from the competition but is why you would want some other company to beat Apple to “the next big thing”. So basically what reasons are there for NOT wanting Apple to make the next big thing again? MDN is saying the only reason you would want that is because you don’t like apple or you don’t like SJ.
Apple is fair. Even though they won the iPod war, you didn’t see them double the price for each unit, which I’m sure other would have, had they one.
@mel I don’t think they’re using “competition” in the traditional sense, as in, I dont’ think they’re saying that there are no other companies competing with apple, but just that no other company is really pushing Apple to outdo itself, Apple drives the market segment that they enter into and year after year set the bar for the competition as opposed to the competition leaping ahead and forcing Apple to play catch-up.
If there’s a flaw there, at least to me, it’s that some people think specs are the be-all-end-all of “better” so when you look at some android phones it would be easy to say, “see, those companies are forcing apple to bump their specs… that’s competition”.
At some point people will accept the fact that the Koolaid is actually Miracle Grow.
Oh I don’t mind a little competition. It doesn’t do any one any harm; more so if it adds a little competitive zing to the efforts of the market leader, Apple. I think the cycle of innovation will churn out some truly new iterations of iOS software from Cupertino.
Take the upcoming release of 4.3. They’ve added mulitouch gestures that allow you to change tasks at the swipe of many fingers which saves having to push the home button all the time.
All good stuff. I think Android brought something to the table with Honeycomb but what was heart warming to me was to see Apple’s response to it. Moving the bar ever upward.
No doubt those geeks at Google Labs will think they’ve got one over Apple but in a war where your biggest enemy is standing still they still have a lot to learn at the feet of the Ninja master, Steve Jobs.
It’s as if Schmidt threw 4 shuriken & hit the target & thinks he’s doing a good job but unbeknownst to him SJ in his Ninja costume crept in during the night and moved the target.
That’s always been Apple’s strength. Define your targets, don’t let them define you.
Nice try Moleman, but no cigar.
The observation is correct about “dislike Apple and/or Steve Jobs”. Editorials and analysts can ignore reality and then one day they are left just talking to themselves. Everyone else moved on to sources the focus on reality!
@ET
The reason some financial services companies are considered too big to fail is because their connections throughout the economy – to other banks, governments, insurance companies, etc. – are too extensive. The reason some auto companies are considered too big to fail is the sheer number of people they employ and who rely on them for pension payments.
As much as we all love Apple and their products, they are not critical to a functioning economy. They employ ~50,000 people wordwide (that’s some revenue per head!). The only casualties would be Apple’s equity investors. The government is completely divorced from bankruptcy proceeds unless the criteria in the first paragraph are met.
In short, your fears are unfounded.
@ Mel Gross:
If you had said that MOST companies need competitors,you’d be 100% correct. Companies that push themselves on their own are rare, but they do exist. This invalidates your claim. I think that Apple, in its current incarnation, is one of those companies.
True competition is good. Blatantly ripping off Apple’s ideas is not.
Maybe Apple doesn’t “need” competition, but the market does. There is, and probably will continue to be, a sizable piece of this market that simply will not accept Apple for any number of reasons. These folks need SOMETHING to buy even if it isn’t close to as good.
Let the others bring it on. It’s always fun watching a good fight.
I am pretty sure that Apple is plenty happy with their 70+% share of the PMP market. Apple doesn’t appear to have the need to kill all it’s competition as Microsoft did. Apple just needs to be the best in their own eyes. The profits will come after that.
– gws
The problem with all of these iPad competitors is that mobile devices are not like desktop PCs. You can’t just slap together some hardware (much of it low quality), install the standard non-Apple OS and have something people will buy.
The entire key to the iPhone and iPad success story is iOS, and there’s no way to get around that. You can add all the USB, HDMI, SD card ports you want, but if the OS isn’t up to the task, you’re sunk.
Android is not capable of being a tablet OS at this time. Even the first version won’t be up to par, seeing as it comes from Our Lady of the Perpetual Beta. Apple has YEARS of iOS development on its side. There’s no way Google can simple slap a few touch features into Android and have it work well.
I’m sure a lot of consumers buy non-Apple products just because they hate Steve Jobs and Apple and what they stand for. It doesn’t matter to them if they buy second-class products because they doing it based on principle. The one or two holdouts believe they can actually turn the tide, so to speak. That’s called “taking the difficult path in life”. I stuck with Apple all these years but never believed I could turn the tide. I just preferred their products. Of course, I’ve always tried to run Windows in some form or another on my Macs. I still do run a couple of Windows versions in BootCamp and Parallels Desktop just in case I need them for some application or running keygens. I’ve never hated Microsoft but I was angry that Microsoft pretty much locked Macs out of the corporations, but that may not have been entirely Microsoft’s doings.
As an Apple shareholder, I’m out for blood and would like to see Apple sweep Android and Windows into the gutter for the sole purpose of seeing Apple’s share price skyrocket and not because of hate for Android or Windows. I could say I feel some sense of pride, but basically I still prefer using Apple products because I enjoy using them.
Looking back at history, the greatest inventions and the most successful individuals/organizations all seem to follow the propositions, “You were placed on this earth to create, not to compete,” and “Learn From Others But Compete With Yourself.”
I want to know what Costco got from MS to stop selling iPods and replace them with the Zunes I saw displayed right in front of the door last week.
all through the years the wintards would deride and belittle mac users.
mac is a toy not a business tool they would say and turn around and play games on their pc…
now is the one doing the real business while the wintards toy with Me2™ products…
Apple doesn’t need competition. However, the market needs less lemming type companies who do nothing but copy their “competitors” ideas and brand them as something unique and different.
Given Apple’s amazing success, you’d think another tech company would try to follow Apple’s model of how to innovate and create quality products, instead of simply copying whatever Apple creates.
People who want to see competition mostly don’t hate Apple. Competition forces everyone to get better. The current lack of creativity on the part of so many large and well funded companies is stunning. I think Microsoft’s current problems are at least partly traceable to Balmer’s leadership. He is not an innovator. The other issue may just be that when you are competing with a genius, it is hard to look good.
@bezoar
At some point people will accept the fact that the Koolaid is actually Miracle Grow.”
That’s the most awesome quote I’ve read on this site in a loooooong time! Kudos to you or whomever came up with it.
@JPTJr
“As much as we all love Apple and their products, they are not critical to a functioning economy. They employ ~50,000 people wordwide (that’s some revenue per head!). The only casualties would be Apple’s equity investors.”
Did you read this article posted earlier today:
http://macdailynews.com/index.php/weblog/comments/28203/
Key quote,”…in the calendar year 2010 up through October, 60%-65% of the entire growth in dollars spent by US consumers went to Apple.” (emphasis added)
That’s a crazy statistic! ONE company had that much control over consumer spending growth? A-MA-ZING!
Thanks, Aldebaran. It was a rare moment of clarity….
Observer, Jay-Z, ALL companies need competition, including Apple. It’s nuts to think that Apple is that different. Remember that all of their products themselves were, or are a product of competition with other companies. There’s not a single product Apple produced, except possibly for the Newton, that didn’t come by itself. They all came as a result of Apple looking around at industries in their purview and coming up with a better product. Of those original products didn’t exist, neither would Apple’s. So from that viewpoint alone, Apple needs competition.
But even after, Apple has to have others nipping at their toes. I’ve got a fair amount of their stock, and a lot of their products, but I also see products of others, and can see advantages that they sometimes have. If competitors didn’t include c/paste and multitasking in their phones, we may never have gotten them mother.
Let’s keep rational here. No company is perfect.
Wow, what a fanboi site. I love Steve Jobs! Everything Apple makes I love.
The competition needs Apple to lead the way. Without Apple, the competition has not innovation. All they know how to do is Copy and Paste.
Apple NEEDS competition. They need competition from a company up to be at THAT level. The technology industry NEEDS companies at the level of Apple. The only reason Apple is king is because nobody steps up as “the next Apple”. Half-ass design, not caring for details, not building what the consumer needs… in a word: Laziness.
Can there be a suitable competitor in the market? Of course! But it’s not going to be any of the big ones. Not Google, for sure. Hopefully a new, small, young and innovative company will appear and provide us with amazing products.
Until then, I remain an Apple fan.
“…is because you dislike Apple and/or Steve Jobs.”
oh my…someone here really wants Apple/Jobs’ cawk.
thanks MDN for putting these pseudo-intellectuals to task. They say concepts, that they don’t understand. “Competition is good” is the biggest – if you’ve read my post the last few years, I say “is the competition good?” You have to define ‘competition’ and you have to define the benefit. A cheap chinese Apple product is good – for $50, but for 90% – 150% of the real thing = fail. Google is a follower, the freetards love the freebies, which Google provides to gather your data and to advertise to you — but Google has NEVER been known for QUALITY outside of search, or outside of blatant, half-ass Apple copies. Your opinion?
Why anyone would buy a device powered by an OS created by a sleazy advertising agency is beyond rational thinking.
The three major problems with copying Apple these days are:
(1) When your copycat product is released, it must at least match everything Apple has already achieved up to that point. That includes having something equivalent to Apple’s App Store and iTunes Store in general. It includes all the features Apple did not include in its first gen. product, but steadily adds (over time) with each new hardware and software release. It includes the features you don’t even know about in the NEXT release. The longer you wait, the higher the Mt. Apple becomes, which explains why the “MP3 player” market has been mostly surrendered to Apple.
(2) So if you can’t match Apple with your copycat product on features, you must undercut Apple on price. But with mobile products, Apple has achieve such efficiency and high volume that it is now very difficult for the competition to meaningfully beat Apple on price and still make a profit, even with less capable products. The only time they can do it is during desperation two-for-one sales to clear out unsold inventory.
(3) The only current software option for most iPad competitors is Android, which is PDA-class software upscaled to work with a larger screen. Even when a version is eventually released that is more suitable for tablets, using Android means your tablet product is mostly indistinguishable to all the other Android-based tablets out there.
Apple has a ten year head-start and honestly a lock on the music end of the deal ….
Everyone says Apple make this great wonderful product and they do – but what we fail to realize is iTunes is the backbone to the entire mobile app and now the new Apple APP Store will once again become the backbone for computers ….
Apple is so far ahead – If anyone could compete they need to start with the foundation first and that would be a central hub like iTunes and work your products from there …. Amazon did that with the books and they look to have the lion’s share of that market – but – Apple is trying and getting some of that action too …. but true readers are readers and they will take the Kindle over the iPad every time as they don’t do the other stuff, they just read – If they want to do something else they put down their book and do it, maybe even on an iPad but readers will always pick the Kindle for reading – but other than books no other company has really built the foundation first ….
Everyone tries to build the device first then do the backbone – and they fail and fail and fail ……
Long live and remain CEO both Steve(s) …..
Quote from JPTJr
“As much as we all love Apple and their products, they are not critical to a functioning economy”.
As others have pointed out you are totally wrong in the other posts as directed above, let me just add that we also don’t like to use inferior and cheaply made Shit Plastic products from other non based US companies.
Apple may be a small US company in size but it keeps allot of jobs open in manufacturing, and yes even in the US with parts and Other Professional Services.
Look for the Breakdown in one of the posts above and then think twice before believing Apple is not Critical to the Economy, If Apple where to go, the US economy would see a significant hit to its Infrastructure, With Development, Research, Engineers, Fabrication, Cpu Design (ARM) iPhone-iPod-iPad All done in house all done by Apple.
Apple Designs Products They don’t take things off the Shelf and slap them in a device like others do, — Hell The “ARM CPU” in the iPhone, – iPhone, – iPad, is designed by Apple customized Etc.
Who else has a Customized CPU and IOS to complement each other to and get 10 – 12 hours. (iPad)
As much as consumers purchase Apple products, They Contribute More then most larger companies.
I Will stick with Apple and JPTJr ,
Apple Does more then you think.
“This whole “Apple needs competition” meme fails the test of logic.”
Exactly. What they really want to say is- WTF is wrong with 99% of corporations that they can’t hire some creative designers?
@ET
Do you realize that as of Apple’s last quarterly report that Apple had about $50 billion in cash and cash equivalents. When they report next week that will be two to five billion higher.
Steve Jobs has instituted tight fiscal management since his return.
For the long forceable future you are more likely to get hit by an asteroid than see Apple fail- too big or otherwise.
Of course if you are worried about stray asteroids you could put on a tin hat to ward them off.
As for me too tablets-suck wind baby!
what i think is, Apple is pushing other companies to be there competitors (on purpose or not) . like some one already said here, Apple leads every segment they enter even thought other companies where there for years. So bottom line: Apple is creating is own competitors! Is this a crazy ideia?
Try this for non-Apple MP3 players– still plenty out there!
http://www.alibaba.com/MP3-Player_pid63710
@Attendee The funny thing about that site is that a good portion of the players (at least on the first page) are direct rip-offs of current/previous gen iPods
I like the idea that Apple needs competition, but where is the competition? There isn’t one competitor that can hope to match Apple across all its products and saleability facets (as in the ecosystem).
I like the idea but I don’t buy it.
There are people in all walks of life, from athletes to teachers to artists who need no external challenge to excel. You can simply decide that the person you most want to impress, is yourself. Yes be aware of what other players are doing, but write your own script. Apple did not enter markets in which it had competent competitors. It entered markets with a great potential audience but lacklustre players and it disrupted those markets to become the defining competitor in each space. Jobs has been back at Apple log enough to have given all his key team members Apple DNA supplements. Everyone thinks like an entrepreneur striving to make it. Jobs said it all in quoting the covers of the last edition of the Whole Earth Catalog:
Stay Hungry
Stay Foolish.
We saw strong hints of this self-driving DNA in Apple Ads featuring people who showed they could indeed Think Different.
Apple is obsessed with customer-centricity.
If your mission is to aim to please through ‘joy’ and ‘delight’ and serving quality and true value, that is the only catalyst needed.
It’s not easy being an innovator. By the time customers get their hands on today’s new release, you’ve already been beta-testing its next two replacements. That is a lonely, gutsy but exciting place to live in 24/7/365.