A note from Subband Software, former developer of MacAmp, cropped up recently: “Thanks to everyone who supported us over the years. iTunes just got to be far too big, far too free, and far too bundled with the OS.” The editorial is going on giving more examples how Apple is taking away market from the small developers by embedding such user software on OSX (e.g. iPhoto, iMovie etc). In the past we talked about it regarding the Watson application and its competition with Sherlock 3. Update: One of the two developers (the most commited one) of Chimera is thinking of dropping out: “I’m torn about what to do with Chimera. It’s obvious it will only ever be a marginal product on a even more marginal platform. AOL and Netscape have no interest in supporting it. Who aspires to be number two in an already over-commoditized space? Working my ass off for 3% just isn’t any fun any more. Safari has already won, the rest is just to see by how much.” In the meantime, Safari tops 1 million downloads.More over, Safari is not out for more than 15 days yet and it is already the No1 browser of choice among many OSX users. Now think when Apple brings Safari to stable status, add tabs and incorporate it with the OS. The rest 6 browses on OSX will have no major future (Apple’s userbase is just 2.3% leaving no major profits to the rest of the players in the “background”). Doesn’t this story sound a bit like IE, Windows and Netscape?
You can’t of course blame Apple for offering for free very nice software. But this “kind” gesture towards its users, kills many developers. And a platform, sooner or later is as good as dead when it loses its developers. Maybe this is why Apple wanted to originally charge for the 3/4 of the iLife applications? (now they only charge for the iDVD)
The way I see it, software can reap profit for only a limited time. After a while free alternatives become good enough for everyday use, and become part of a free infrastructure.
Especially open source software is driving this. If you want to keep making money, you’ll have to innovate and create something new.
I’d prefer an open infrastructure, but if some proprietary apps drive this process, I can live with that.
> After a while free alternatives become good enough for everyday use, and become part of a free infrastructure.
Yes, but people don’t download. Mozilla is still around or under 1% of the web browser market and it is almost one year out on 1.0 status (plus it runs on other platforms where it is the dominant browser e.g. unix/linux). People (not geeks like you and me who want to try out everything under the sun) don’t download software much. They just use whatever it comes with the OS, and for extra needs they just go to their software retailer to buy an office suite or something like that. People don’t want to learn new things. This is why, if something comes with the OS, an alternative but similar app won’t have much luck. At least not as much as it would have if such an app wouldn’t come with the OS.
The point here is not Apple driving the app base, because no matter how big company they are, they can’t write everything. And by angrying third party developers, who can write more than just 1 app, they are limiting their own software base, which can never be a good thing for a platform…
In system 7, they added the menu bar clock (which was in a popular piece of shareware (forgot the name). In system 7.5, they added window shading, which replaced another popular piece of shareware (forgot the name).
In system 8, they added the appearance manager, in direct competition to a piece of software called Kalidescope.
Anyways, starting with MacPaint, MacWrite, MacDraw, and Hypercard, Apple has ALWAYS had strong commitment to software on the mac.
Thank you Shm. Interesting to know.
Grow the user base. They might have nice shareware, but no one will buy a Mac because they can buy a bunch of nice shareware. Applications like iMovie and iTune really show that a Mac can be easy to handle home multimedia needs.
I wouldn’t like having to buy $300 worth of small shareware for all my needs.
well, yes they did add the appearance manager, but it didn’t compete with kalidescope, because they kept all the stuff on how to create themes for it under wraps, which was later reverse engineered but still very unstable, and kalidescope still reigned supreme. its too bad they don’t make an os x version as all the current theme managers leave something to be desired.
eugenia states: Yes, but people don’t download.
they do, safari for example, had 500,000 downloads in two days. people will download something they want. there are plenty of people who prefer audion to itunes, and there are other mp3 players out there as well, the reason macamp failed is because they charged money without offering any compelling reason to purchase the software, it did nothing better then any of the alternatives (namely audion).
sometimes you just have to evolve to survive, just as watson is doing, providing more features then sherlock is a great way to compete.
I’m sure that Apple are not setting out to hurt software developers by giving away popular software such as iTunes, rather they are trying to increase their market share by providing a platform that people want to use. Its pretty obvious that the iApps are superior than the apps that ship with XP. In the long run that will help developers of Mac software by giving them a larger market (hopefully).
One of the main reasons that people move to Apple is these applications, I think it was a smart move not to charge for them, I feel sorry for the small developers out there, but I’d like to see Apple survive (and dare I say it thrive) and iApps are a key advantage over the PC platform, making a Mac useful out of the box without the need to buy software.
Isn’t this just progress? I remember when MS put a TCP/IP stack in Win95, and that finished those third party stacks we used to use, with XP now remote control is part of the OS, I’m sure it will continue.
I think that if there was a decent web browser for the Mac, Apple would not have explored the possibility of putting one out. The same can be said for software that lets Mac users import and manage movies or pictures easily. Look at the state of syncing software for PDAs before iSync.
At anytime OmniWeb could have collaborated with KDE, now they talk of doing it after Apple has done so.
I don’t think it is a good idea that Apple is now competing with small software developers but I don’t think they have a choice especially if developers are not delivering killer software solutions for basic tasks that people want to do every day on their Macs.
I think that Apple, having become mostly oriented to the digital lifestyle, feels they *must* provide a good out-of-box experience in that regard. I also think there are other factors involved. Steve Jobs is a control freak, for one. Also, in the beginning, developers were slow to come to OS X and perhaps Apple started to panic a little.
I don’t think Apple is anti-developer. I think they feel developers have not come out with software quickly enough to fill what Apple sees as voids. For example, take KeyNote. The only other real presentation software for OS X is PowerPoint. It could be Apple was hoping someone might take a shot at that, but nobody did. It could be Apple hoped someone would put something out that bridged the gap between iMovie and Final Cut Pro, but nobody did – at least not as quickly as Apple would like. So, Apple did. Apple is trying to pull away from Microsoft too and I think they feel like they have to do most of the work themselves.
There are some 3rd party products Apple has promoted heavily or stayed out of the category, like Maya, music notation software, music mixing software science and engineering software, ftp clients, etc. iView Media Pro is arguabley a better over all media organizer than iPhoto.
in short, I think Apple believes they must do this to “keep up” and that 3rd party developers are not coming out with these type of products quickly enough. Whether that is true or not is debatable, of course.
are just three free apps Apple delivers with their Macs. Are the shareware authos out there so uninspired that they are running out of ideas what software the should develop because apple defivers three apps for free?? *LOL*
And Eugenia, by the way, you argue that most people don’t download much software and use the apps that come with the OS. Ok – but than they wouldn’t download any other software either. So that cientele isn’t a big shareware customer anyway.
In case of a missing iPhoto, they would brobably buy iView Media Pro (which is much more powerfull than iPhoto) or something like that.
Again no luck for the shareware authors.
So I don’t see the point here.
>they do, safari for example, had 500,000 downloads in two days
Yes, but these downloads came after a MASSIVE marketing standin on Macworld and a zillion sites reporting on it. This does not happen for “normal” software releases. Plus, there are 5 million OSX users according to Apple. That was only 1/10 of the user base, I am sure that the rest will use it after Apple bundle it with the OS.
There have always been bundled software with almost all OSes. Should Wordpad be removed from Windows to help shareware wordprocessors? I remember a few basic shareware WPs for Windows 3.1 that weren’t much better than Wordpad, I imagine Win95 versions were killed off by it. How about all the calculators, text editors, image viewers, solitaire games, etc. If they weren’t bundled with the OS then shareware programmers would be able to sell their versions.
What the shareware programmers need to do is make a better alternative aimed at users with different needs. Text editors are bundled with just about every OS, but there are still much more powerful alternatives available. As are file viewers, calculators and everything else. Maybe if the Mac shareware programmers made a much more powerful MP3 player with more advanced features they would still be successful, despite iTunes.
Similar concerns were voiced by the author of the popular Mac-Windows network connectivity suite DAVE around the release of OSX, since Apple had bundled their own Samba with the new OS.
User interface design is overlooked in application development. Most programmers spend all their time writing code and forget that the users experience with their application is the GUI. The GUI is often slapped on as an afterthought with no regard for design. Now it’s obviously important for the application code to be correct, but why can’t we have decent GUI’s. I think Apple is leading the way and showing developers what the Mac experience should be. All third party developers have to do is improve on the iApps.
I agree 100%. Many of the shareware apps I have tried often fail because of unusable UI design and UI functionality.
..but not when Apple does it. Do I see a bit of favoritism here?
I think it’s good that Apple is creating software for it’s OS. I like the iApps. The strategy solves a series of problems. Especially, bringing software to MacOSX. Finally, creating competition only makes the software better. May the best app win.
You can’t blame Apple for Safari – the other browsers just sucked. There was a huge demand for a simple and fast browser and Apple whipped up such a browser in no time, compared to the time competitors (Netscape, Microsoft, Opera) took to write much worse products.
As the research reports show Apple’s market share continue to shrink. Also better software is available for XP, nobody is going to spend thousands of dollars just for slow programs.
> ..but not when Apple does it. Do
> I see a bit of favoritism here?
No. If Apple had 95% market share we would be
just as concerned when they corner new markets.
Sergio, do you have a Mac or you just here to be a Troll? Perhaps better software is available for XP (although I think iTunes is very good), but thats the point – with XP you’d have to go out and buy this “better” software, with a Mac you open the box and get started. Browsing, email, Music, CD burning, Photos & DVDs, thats quite a bundle and covers the need of most people.
As for slow, you’re just quoting what you’ve read others say, Safari is faster than IE on my PC (A 2.1Ghz, 1Gb RAM, GE4Ti), and I’ve never found any of the other iApps slow.
>Safari is faster than IE on my PC
On rendering pages maybe. But try to resize and scroll its window.
I don’t see a problem with bundling. iLife is why most people buy Apple; it works out of the box. Apple does need to do something to keep developers though. Maybe bundle the latest version with the OS CDs, but charge users for the upgrade to the next level.
“On rendering pages maybe. But try to resize and scroll its window.
”
Yip, you’re dead right, but thats not something I do at every page so it doesn’t bother me much.
🙂
Not long after the Mac first appeared, Apple was criticized by developers, including Microsoft, for bundling apps like MacWrite and MacDraw for the reason that it discouraged development. Flash forward to the modern age, where Microsoft delivers 90% of the software in volume to that other platform. Other vendors are really relegated to developing vertical apps. Even the Mac is seen to be dependent on Microsoft for word processing, spreadsheet, presentation software, and internet browsing.
It seems to me that Apple had left it up to the developer community for years, and finally woke up to the fact that they failed to deliver. Small developers have written some good apps, but the large developers have utterly failed to support the Mac platform, even as they have been squeezed out of the Wintel world (eg. Corel Wordperfect, Borland).
The missed story at this year’s MacWorld was Apple’s reemergence as an application developer. It appears to me that Apple has decided to separate themselves from dependence on Microsoft as much as possible.
After the announcement of their browser and presentation software, I was reminded of the rumour of Sun and Apple working together to bring OpenOffice to the platform; and of the rumored new, more powerful Claris Works. I wouldn’t be surprised to see a new Apple branded office suite announced later this year. I predict it will be built on the open source Open Office, in much the same way Safari was built on the source of Konqueror.
“Maybe bundle the latest version with the OS CDs, but charge users for the upgrade to the next level. ”
That was Jobs plan, but he backed down at the last moment (aparently) as he thought that Apple users had had enough.
Mind you, if the updates were in the yearly OS upgrade, I’d not mind, 10.2 was certainly worth the fee, improved iApps would just make certain that I upgraded to the next OS release.
That makes no sense – Microsoft is a software company – people don’t dislike Microsoft because they make software. Apple is a platform unto itself. Apple may be over anxious about this, but they have to make sure there are apps for the platform or they’re sunk.
Eugenia, you have to speed up that Cube! The PowerLogix 800 MHz upgrade has gone down in price 😀
Finally, creating competition only makes the software better.
That is true, but are they creating competition or killing it?
Why do you think people like WinAmp more than Windows Media Player? Hint: because it’s better and less complicated. WMP is at 9.0 and is still an horrible application. Everything’S built-in but no one can figure them out! WinAmp is small, compact and to the point. It’s the best the mp3 application the win32 platform has.
On the other hand, iTunes is THE best mac mp3 player. There is nothing close to it. It’s the best there is on ANY platform. It’s even more simpler than WinAmp(MacAmp). Even the Linux folks know that. They are even making a gnome version.
So it all comes down to this: why pay for lesser?
The statement that Apple pushes out 3rd parties is misguided. No third party was going to overtake Microsoft Internet Explorer. Yet Internet Explorer was hurting Apple by being twice as slow as the PC version. Safari is the answer. Hooray that it is now number 1. I still use Internet Explorer in times when Safari shows its immaturity. But for most tasks, I use Safari – its just better – quicker – faster – sleaker in GUI.
When 3rd party developers don’t help Apple or even hurt Apple, it is in Apple’s best interest to create its own software.
Look at Final Cut Pro. Adobe creates Premiere on both the PC and Mac. This does not help Apple. Premiere on Mac was dragging in development compared to the PC version. Final Cut Pro was necessary. It is Mac Only – thus Adobe can still create Premier and profit from the PC version. Final Cut Pro is also a stimulus to Adobe to make Premiere better in order to compete with Final Cut Pro. Final Cut Pro attracts users to Mac.
Not to mention, iTunes allows you to rip MP3’s where it seems Microsoft is kissing RIAA ass and charging you for that ability.
On rendering pages maybe. But try to resize and scroll its window.
Yeah! What’s with that? I never understood why window resizing was such a problem in OS X. I have a 666 MHz powerbook with a 32 meg Radeon graphics card, and it’s still slow to resize. What makes it even more strange is the fact that they have many smooth effects that work correctly. Resizing is faster in X in Linux.
Is not going to put the survival of it’s company into the hands of shareware authors. They are also trying to provide a “full package”, not just a base to install apps on. I like where apple is going with this, it leaves them with options….
Shm: you mention some interesting, but get the details wrong.
Apple incorporated SuperClock, WindowShade and Behierarchic into System 7.5 (They didn’t put superClock into System 7). Also, they BOUGHT them, not replaced them with their own code.
Surely people should actually remember things the way they happened, if they are willing to post about them?
The reason is simple, when Microsoft do this they will often try to say that it is an integral part of the OS, do everything in their power to stop you removing it, and activly attempt to break the software that competes with them. Apple on the other hand admits that these are just apps and lets you get rid of them and replace them with 3rd party apps if you want.
Compare completely uninstalling Safari to completely uninstalling IE. The former takes two steps, the later is near impossible (according to MS).
I suspect Apple will also make a BBEdit clone, called iEdit or something…
http://apple.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=50915&cid=5096238
It’s been this way since the start of computing – the addons industry and the OS maker are competing basically. Nonetheless, bundling DOES create an unfair advantage. Life’s unfair like that. If it ticks them off, they shouldn’t be making OS addons. At least when stuff is “bundled” on Linux it’s because it’s the best (see redhat) rather than because the distro company needed a proprietary edge.
Bottom line is the integrated and functionally similar iApps (and also iCal and address book) are WAY better than any other similar package on the market – wait a minute, there is no similar package, it doesn’t even exist.
The out-of-the-box aspect of these apps is unbelievable valuable to ordinary users. Take Watson for example. Lots of people would never even know it exists. But Sherlock – just putting in the box is tremendously valuable for ordinary joes and janes (i.e. not the typical OSNEWS reader)
This is worth the Apple premium. That’s what people are paying for. THEY ARE NOT PAYING ANYMORE FOR A WINDOWING SYSTEM – MS already copied that. Linux too. If you want to charge more, you have to provide more. That’s exactly what Apple is doing.
Here’s what I think about ISVs and Apple has concluded the same I bet – a necessary evil. Typically, they do the following:
(1) charge too much for insubstantial and regular upgrades (milking the customer), taking money that could be used on Apple products;
(2) drag their asses. Look at quark. Even Adobe updated to OS X on ITS timetable. Not apple’s
(3) produce boring least common denominator apps that will run on windows and the mac. They don’t take advantage of the special hooks in the mac OS and integrated apps. Or if they do, it takes too long (see no. 2 above)
(4) constantly threaten to leave apple (MS, Intuit) or simply not write for Apple (Delorme);
(5) produce apps inferior to Apple’s. Let’s just face facts folks. iMovie rocks, iPhoto rocks, iTunes (in combination with the unbelievable iPod) rocks. Apple oozes quality. Nobody else is even coming close right now.
If you make something like a menu bar clock then you have to know that that is something a manufacturer is likely to include at some time.
Moreover, Apple does not do anything to preclude the use of third party software. Nothing prevents you from deleting Safari, iTunes, iPhoto, etc. and running something else.
Most of the browsers for sale on the mac were poor performers in either standards compliance or system integration. Apple has the power to make things like idmg’s happen and make system integration better for everyone. I think mac users used IE out of ignorance of choice as do most Windows users. This also provides an api for developers to use in their applications which is better than having a handfull of shareware producers making their own kludgy rendering engines. On the whole this is a good move. IE was undersupported, slow and not part of the system.
Compare completely uninstalling Safari to completely uninstalling IE. The former takes two steps, the later is near impossible (according to MS).
That’s hardly the fault of Microsoft. It’s not possible to eliminate IE because a truckload of apps use it and expect it to be there, quirks and all. I expect the same will become true of their WebCore framework over time, so it’s a false analogy really.
Moreover, Apple does not do anything to preclude the use of third party software. Nothing prevents you from deleting Safari, iTunes, iPhoto, etc. and running something else.
Bundling kills competition, this is a known fact. The only time it doesn’t is when the bundled products are seriously defective in ways that are obvious to the user. The iApps are mediocre feature-wise at best, but they won’t be replaced anytime soon because they aren’t actually defective, and anyway people consider it as part of the investment in the Mac, so they don’t want to throw it away, it’s like throwing away cash.
Yes, but people don’t download. Mozilla is still around or under 1% of the web browser market and it is almost one year out on 1.0 status (plus it runs on other platforms where it is the dominant browser e.g. unix/linux).
Mozilla 1.0 only came out 6 months ago (June 5th, 2002).
Just FYI.
-sean
Sean, thanks for the info, but it does not really matter if it was 1 year or 6-7 months. Read Mike Hearn’s above comment ( http://apple.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=50915&cid=5096238 ). Very well put I would say. As for the 1.0 status, well, Netscape was shipping Netscape 6 and 7 before even the Mozilla 1.0 release. Still, they are also rock bottom compared to IE.
>This is only a problem for a limited set of devleopers
Yes, but these developers do not only create a web browser or a media player. They create more stuff, take OmniGroup as an example. If they get pissed off by Apple and Safari and they drop out completely, there you go, the Mac platform lost 5 apps, not just one (and two of them are high grade ones).
Make no mistake, I do not oppsose Apple delivering user-oriented apps (and forgetting USB 2 😉
In fact, I believe that Be should have done the same! However, there is a risk by doing so. I just hope that Apple has calculated the risk good enough.
This doesn’t make a lot of sense to me. I mean if someone offers something that is BETTER and is FREE, of course your product’s gonna fail. MacAmp never had any of the features you get in iTunes, if Apple wasn’t going to deliever it, someone else would’ve. Be it free or even cheaper it’ll kill the competition. MacAmp’s never had a real reason for me to use it. I’ve downloaded it and tried it and decided iTunes is better without much of a second thought. Apple’s done nothing but make something better and cheaper, so this sounds more like whining than a real valid complaint.
Look, as systems evolve, the basic needs of the users evolve. (or vice versa). The basic need of a user was once to be able to compile a basic program. Today the basic need is to play an mp3 and to surf and search the web. (yes yes, and a lot more) The fulfillment of those basic needs always come with the operating system. (wether it is Windows, Linux or MacOSX). This is the “userfriendly” thing to do, a user doesn’t have to hunt arround the web, or go shopping for every single basic need he has.
Third party software is meant to fulfill some more advanced needs. I doubt that a graphical designer will see their needs met by iPhoto. They need specialty software, that other users don’t need. (I don’t want to pay for software like Photoshop when I’m not going to use it).
The basic needs of a user has risen. Systems evolved, basic needs evolved. So has the advanced needs of a user evolved. Third party software just needs to keep up with this. Those shareware programs will just have to raise the bar for themselves. Add more features that powerusers need in their field of work.
Basically: third party developers should stop wining, and start making their software better, and start fulfilling the now evolved advanced needs of their users. If you can’t handle evolution, then you shouldn’t be making software in the first place.
soso iTunes kicks ass =D
alot of good comments so far, so not much left to say.
I agree Apple absolutely had to take care of the browser & mission critical stuff that people actually spend too much time infront of. The developers should probably forget the iLifeStyle scene & find something else. Trouble is the other scene is the vertical market that is best served on Windows/Linux. Looks like Apple is turning into Sony, thats not all bad, nice packaging, complete, similar prices.
I do think Apple could compensate any devs it wipes out, they don’t have to, but it might encourage them to try again, otherwise they will be Windows devs sooner than later.
I was a developer from the FatMac to the 1st PPC days but not anymore. It was alot of fun & I am glad I never dealt with 16bit win3.1 crap etc. I only worked on vertical stuff that nobody else would do. I created tools for myself to make my job easier, & hoped to sell to like minded engineers. I did luck out though but not with app sales. So I’ve seen hundreds of tiny companies on the Mac side come & go.
Basically everything anybody knows about Mac programming is just junk after too few years, Apple keeps reinventing the APIs and remember before OSX, Cocoa etc there was the eternal promises of a safe OS that didn’t materialize for like forever 85-00?. So unless you are winning big already (Adobe,,,,) you were/are losing fast. Not much middleground. Anybody want to buy InsideMac dev books, I got maybe 100s of mac dev books, maybe not.
One eternal advantage Windows still seems to have is the backward compatibility developers can rely on to have their SW run forever. Maybe the .Net, Palladium stuff will end that. As a user I also appreciate being able to run my own & other SW that is aging. None of my Mac code has run on new Macs for yrs.
If only Apple could reinstate some form of loaner program, I’d really like to try out OSX-ObjC-Cocoa-Java development, but till my next ship comes in. Its not that I’d expect to create any new wonder iSW, but I missed out on the NeXT dev productivity.
I would have thought that the slick vertical markets that NeXT had in the lucrative financial markets would have followed on. As long as dev people thinks OSX development is all about GUIs & Aqua stuff, there isn’t much reason to come back.
When Jobs came back with NeXT SW, there was this vague promise that Mac apps could be developed very quickly by gluing components together. He even used to do this on stage. It looks like OSX dev is now as hard as it ever was, always more details to take care of.
enough rambling
> third party developers should stop wining, and start making their software better, and start fulfilling the now evolved advanced needs of their users.
I *just* came across this:
http://www.ttpsoftware.com/photologist.html
This is like iPhoto and it seems to be equally or maybe better in some points than iPhoto. However:
1. It costs money ($20)
2. It is not as popular as it doesn’t have a big page on apple.com and a zillion mac-heads raving about it, because they don’t know about it. People don’t necessarily know about it and the company doesn’t have the money Apple has for marketing.
3. iPhoto is bundled on OSX so there is no reason for “real life” people to start digging the net and see what the competition does and if there are alternatives. iPhoto does well enough, and it is already there, installed.
4. Most importantly: all the iApps now have connectivity between them. You can export directly from one app to the other iApp, and you can even browse one iApps’ database from another iApp! Especially this is important on iDVD and iMovie. Now, Apple here has the _advantage_ of being the developer of all these apps and having the source code to all of them, are able to INTEGRATE them. And this is something that the third parties can not do. Especially because Apple does not offer *standard* reusable objects (e.g. a standard database format for *all* the apps that require one) so you can’t interconnect one third party app with another one.
So, please don’t talk to me about fair play, and about Apple “raising the bar”. It is nice to have all these apps, speaking as a user, but it sucks a$$ if you are a developer and the system itself does not offer you the capability to do some things, while Apple can because they have the source code to all of their apps. Apple has the advantage, no matter how you see it. It is my opinion that Apple should be very careful how they use this advantage, that’s all.
I think it’s interesting to note that Apple ships OmniOutliner and OmniGraffle with some of it’s computers. Therefore, Apple must have had a reason to not ship OmniWeb – i.e. compatability, size, speed, etc. They (Apple) do show support for other companies, but only when the product that those companies create are at the high standard Apple’s products are.
In an unrelated note, I don’t know what I’d do without those two products by OmniGroup.
People DO download stuff if it’s good. Take winzip, take winamp, take flash, take acrobat reader – they’ve become almost standard in all computers. People don’t download mozilla not because they’re not nerds as some like to put it. Face it, mozilla is slow, huge and bloated and normal ursers don’t want to use two browsers at the same time so they can see IE only pages and other pages. To say “comes bundled so people won’t download” is not entirely true, specially not when talking about mozilla. The iApps… the only Apple app that came and replaced something that existed was Sherlock. The other ones are completely new or way better than what existed.
It’s not fair to compare Apple’s bundling with MS’s bundling because Apple gives you an open SDK to create around their apps, you can also uninstall them with ease. Don’t compare IE and webcore, one is a rendering engine, the other is the whole browser.
People talking about Omni being screwed by Safari should look at what they said about it. They were delighted of being freed of having to develop a rendering engine from scratch. Of course some developers do suffer from Apple going into new segments. But the majority ends up winning. Companies that depend on charging for an mp3 player or web browser are doomed to fail nowadays, things evolve. Should Apple create nothing but the OS so they don’t get in the way of small developers?! Seems silly to me, small developers have to come up with new ideas and build around what’s already there.
>Take winzip,
Which sales went down after WinXP supports now zip natively.
> take winamp,
Which sales went down after the release of the new versions of Media Player.
> take flash,
Which comes bundled with the last few windows/IE/netscape versions, plus each time you get to a page that requires it, they have a button on where to download it. Plus it took years for Flash to become such a standard. I remember Flash in 1997 up to 2000, and each time people were hitting a page with Flash they were making grimaces (even if they had it installed), just like when you are under BeOS and you are coming across an online video requiring an unsupported codec.
> take acrobat reader
Same as above. There was a need for it, and they in fact they have a monopoly on the windows land.
As for WinZip, well, it was not on my father in laws’ computer (and his sons actually use the PC and never installed it). I installed it for him. As for WinAMP, my brother didn’t have it. I installed it for him. For him, WMP was enough.
Well said.
We are not in the early 90s. The year is 2003. The market has changed. If it not have been Apple it would have been someone else using open source code.
Mozilla is very responsive on my computer, and if you install the quick launch feature it spawns new windows fast even if you don’t already have a window open.
I can pull up a new mozilla window faster than I can open a new IE window (both with the same home page).
Every “normal” user to whom I introduce mozilla to instantly thanks me. They like the pop-up blocking, they like the tabs (as soon as I teach them), etc.
You can argue as much as you like about the sales going down of this apps, the developpers made (I imagine) lots of cash with them. Our economy encourages competition, of course the big guys will pick up stuff that’s in large demand. What do you want Apple to do?! To go on and not develop apps for which there’s shareware? When you buy a car it comes with tires doesn’t it? People will only change them if there’s a good reason. Make good tires and get the car maker to incorporate them. Apple bundles stuff from other people in their OS don’t they? They at least have the decency of allowing people to use their work to create new stuff by giving you an SDK or open API. What’s next? Saying Linux is evil because it kills profits for developers? Times change, adapt to them. I myself don’t see this having a negative impact on developers on OS X( Aside from the ripoff of Watson, fortunately they kept on going).
Could be just me…
Yes.
>I can pull up a new mozilla window faster than I can open a new IE window
Yes, but this is not the case on the Macs. Safari is the fastest browser I seen on the Mac.
As for the PC, *for me and many others*, Mozilla’s XUL is slow as hell and while the problem is identified, is not fixed yet: http://www.osnews.com/img/1620/mozilla2.png
Personally, I use Safari on my Mac, IE on Windows, NetPositive on BeOS, Mozilla on Linux. The best/fastest there is for each platform.
“I *just* came across this:
http://www.ttpsoftw are.com/photologist.html
This is like iPhoto and it seems to be equally or maybe better in some points than iPhoto.”
Everybody knows that iPhoto is piece of crap and it’s not a big deal to have a better product. People would pay for whatever app it helps them get their job done. I paid $20 for Curator and I’ve never been happier. Even more people pay $80 for iView Media Pro and because it’s even more advanced app. You can’t hear those developers complaining.
But I see where you’re coming from Eugenia. Why look around when you have that already installed. In case of iPhoto everybody half-serious about their photos look around. If you have more than 500 2megapixel photos iPhoto is useless and you do look around. Same applies for iCal which is still in its infancy. In case of iTunes, iMovie or iDvd you don’t have to look around because these are great apps. Developers should concentrate on filling the gaps instead of trying to reinvent the wheel. For example I’m still yet to find decent newsreader for OSX and I’m stuck with Pan through X11. Developers if you want to be competitive search around and see what Mac users need and what would make them happy. Nobody cares about paying money then.
I agree JJ and Eugenia – good comments.
Also about NeXT vertical apps – I expected this too.
OmniWeb *still* hasn’t gotten javascript to where it supports all of .Mac. If not for that, I wonder if Safari would have been necessary. OmniGroup has a long history with NeXT.
> Mozilla is very responsive on my computer
I must disagree, in my AMD900 256MB Mozilla was a complete disaster, from .9X to recent releases it has been just unusable. I started using Phoenix and wow ! I couldn’t believe it was based on the same project, finally I was able to move from IE without damaging my surfing experience.
As for Winamp I think Eugenia wanted to say downloads rather than sales, well I actually think it’s due to the winamp3 buggy transition not to MediaPlayer and that we should compare the sales of Real which is a real competitor to MediaPlayer not winamp. Sure Real has been hurted.
As posted above when you have 3% market share and try to offer a better out of the box experience it really doesn’t make sense to say you are hurting developers introducing the iApps. The point is that the mac is a different system with different needs, just develop something different something that is needed.
However Sherlock is unfair.
Mozilla’s XUL is slow as hell and while the problem is identified, is not fixed yet: http://www.osnews.c om/img/1620/mozilla2.png
Honestly, I don’t see that…. I know it used to be dog slow, but I’m running XP now, and have a mozilla window open (1.2.1), and it seems fast and responsive (as fast as it is in IE).
On my mac I use Safari, because Mozilla on the Mac *is* slow, I agree with you there.
Okay, I tested it on a 400 MHz PII, and I agree that it is slow, but on my 800mhz it runs fine.
> Mozilla is very responsive on my computer
I must disagree
No, really, on my computer it’s very fast. The menus appear and disappear just like they should.
>The menus appear and disappear just like they should
This XUL defieciency is not present on all installations. A lot of people have problems with it, but many do not.
I *just* came across this:
http://www.ttpsoftw are.com/photologist.html
This is like iPhoto and it seems to be equally or maybe better in some points than iPhoto.
Well, it needs to be alot better. These days more and more people have digital cameras, so it makes perfect sense for an operating system to have good and decent support for it. It used to be different, that only professionals (journalists ie) used digital cameras, and bought that kind of software. An advanced need has become a basic need. That doesn’t mean that advanced needs have disappeared. It just means that they have changed, that the needs are higher now. Photologist will have to improve significantly to be able to still convince those professionals that their software will save them alot of time by providing them in their more advanced needs. “Equally” is not good enough.
It is something you should expect as a developer. Keep up with the evolving needs of your customers, or you are screwed.
A troll accuses me of being a troll? hehe. scott we all know you.
Some trolls (i.e. scott) think that Safari is faster than IE, maybe so, could be so, but just let me know if Safari can have all the DHTML scripts that IE have, which is actually what’s the most important thing in the browser market. Try to run a WYSIWYG editor in safari. Use yahoo’s WYSIWYG mail editor in safari, if you can. Opera was always faster than IE, but it doesn’t do the same. Comparing IE with Safari is like comparing a text browser with IE. Sure you can use both of them to browse the web, but in terms of the number of features which is crucial, IE is still way too strong. It is not about only the speed, it is the features, it is productivity. I can copy part of page including a table in IE, and paste it to a WYSIWYG editor in html, and it works. That’s wonderful. That’s productivity. With Apple you can’t do any of these. With apple all you will have is a nice interface.
In many ways this discussion is what the Justice Department was asked to look into with Microsoft, and to consider the possible punitive or corrective action of splitting M$ into two companies, an OS company and an applications company.
Although I agreed with the idea that the domination of the computing world by a single vendor was bad and supported the breakup of M$; it didn’t happen. The Justice Department has spoken, and decided that no action was necessary.
These are the new rules, folks. Before you say that Apple is going to hurt development on their platform by creating all the software, take a good look at the other side. Is development on Windows lacking because Microsoft sells the vast majority of the software on the platform? Not only the OS, but 90% of the word processors, 90% of the spreadsheets, 90% of the presentation software, 90% of the development software, 90% of the mail and browser software, and and ever growing percentage of the games and other apps?
So far, Apple has done an outstanding job by creating software that not only fills a void in the platform, but software that has added significantly to the platform with best of their kind solutions.
Forgot to mention Access, which pretty much killed off all the other database vendors on Windows
Maybe Mac people care less about Yahoo (I know I couldn’t care any less) than Windows people.
And, if it is important, it will get fixed when enough people click the bug button on Yahoo’s page an say that it doesn’t work right.
Concerning the other features you mentioned… you have to understand that compared to IE, Safari, and Konqueror are young, but if Safari becomes the popular browser on the mac, then these features will be implemented.
BTW, I can easily block pop-ups in Safari, can you do that in IE? I consider that the most important feature a browser can have.
Also, we’re talking about Macs here, have you ever used IE on a mac? It sucks, and it wouldn’t suprise me if people would give up Yahoo mail for something better.
Argh. Though I read my post several times, it still comes off as rambling, sorry about that.
How is it that Apple can bundle all their software with their OS and they are ‘inventive’, but when MS does it they are ‘stifling’ competition. Get the govt. out of OS developement.
I know it sounds strange but this is actually what it is.
We could say that Apple is only fuckin only 3% of the developers 🙂
Market share makes the difference, and of course the lack of freeware alternatives or mediocre/overpriced SW solutions on the mac.
However regarding MS I consider that the point is not in the SW utility but the defacto standard file format they always add; and of course a file format whichs is propietary everybody must get crazy to be compatible. This is a whole different story.
Hey, you may help me with these words; Troll, Zealot…that I wasn’t taught at English classes, they are essential to post on tech sites 😉
Apple may create open APIs so that other apps can integrate with iTunes, iPhoto. But they just did this with their own apps. You have to give it time. I do believer the address book on OS X has an API, or some kind of access. Is anyone using it? Nope, see, just what I mean. The ISVs don’t take advantage of the hooks in the OS. They are too busy creating their “crossplatform” app.
This is the exact same thing as Microsoft got in trouble over, bundled apps. But because they have an insignificant market share it’s ok for Apple. Destroying competition is no more right for Apple than it is for MS.
Sure, make any software you want. If we don’t like it, we’ll pull your license, if we do, we’ll make something like it and bundle it with our OS.
But Microsoft didn’t get in trouble. They were found guilty of unethical practices, and then given no real penalty whatsoever. (Basically they promise to not be bad anymore, and to have one of their own employees act as a watchdog to see that they live up to the promise)
I also agree with something Ernesto said, which is that M$ goes a step further than creating an application. They create proprietary formats in place of existing open standards. A good example was the new Windows Media player which the company wrote with the idea that hardware manufacturers would pay them liscensing fees, rather than using mpegs; and using a proprietary audio format in place of .mp3s
I’m sorry your education sucked so bad
What percentage of the PPC market does Apple control again?
I looked at CNET and WinZIP is still listed as their #3(half a million downloads a week off CNET alone…) download even though Windows XP includes .zip support. I don’t think WinZIP is getting harmed as much as people think. Also I rather question the statement that people don’t download things. There are plenty of people that are not all that tech saavy that download WinAMP even though WiMP can play MP3’s. WinAMP on the other hand supports far more audio formats than WiMP if one includes all of the plugins for it. The reality is that all one really needs to do to get people to download something is for it do something that the base OS cannot(file sharing programs, Acrobat, etc.) or do the job much better than the included applications with the OS. How many people really used Notepad on Windows 9x machines? Plenty of people have downloaded something else that was better suited for the task. Provided something is free or relatively cheap, is better than what is included with the OS, and doesn’t take too long to download they can compete. Opera manages to sell web browsers even though virtually every OS has one included with the install for free. Why have they succeeded? Because they offer a faster, smaller product that is highly customizable. The only shareware makers that are going under because of this just make really useless software.
I’ll agree that MS takes it that one step further. But, as a software company it is in thier best interest to make proprietary formats. I don’t think it’s a good thing, but as they are in the software business, that is one way to try to ensure future sales. It’s probably in Apple’s best interest to bundle more software with thier OS.It might get more people to buy thier hardware. They are both businesses, and as such should be looking for the best way to make profits.
I’m just saying don’t attack one company while defending another for doing the same thing.
OS X is still very young. Developers, many of them at least, have taken a wait and see posture, some waiting, some carbonizing, etc. I can understand it, that people would wait to see if the OS is going to fly or not.
So far, the most interesting things done have been the add ons, the little interface enhancements. My favorites at the Unsanity haxie, Fruit Menu and Proteron’s MaxMenus and LiteSwitch.
How can people compare Safari and IE? Safari is a just released beta, for the love of God 🙂
Also we shouldn’t forget that, you can’t do whatever you want with these software. Apple restricts your rights to use these applications. For example, you can’t use iDvd with other DVD drivers. Also an application called iCommune which lets you to share your music with others through is threatened by Apple, and the author of the program stopped distributing it. So Apple is an evil company, which doesn’t deserve your money.
It seems that you are not knowledgable about the browser and related technologies enough to make a judgement.
Yahoo example is one example out of thousands of them. You will more and more likely to bump into a technology where you can’t use safari. Microsoft is way too ahead of competition in many issues. Even trying to compare Safari with IE is somewhat awkard.
You mentioned ad blocking. IE doesn’t support that, and Microsoft can’t put that into IE. If Microsoft puts that into IE, it will get lots of enemy and web site creators will critize Microsoft for that. You have to remember that Microsoft is in a unique position when it comes to making serious decisions. Small players can do whatever they want, but Microsoft can not easily do whatever they want. You can still have ad-blocking in IE though. There are ad-blockers for IE.
Concerning the other features you mentioned… you have to understand that compared to IE, Safari, and Konqueror are young, but if Safari becomes the popular browser on the mac, then these features will be implemented.
I used IE on Macs. I didn’t see any serious problem. It is slower than Windows XP though, and it is the same for Mozilla too.
Safari is young, and it is way behind. So Apple has to work a lot to make it the popular choice, but implementing those features is not an easy task. Software engineering is hard, it takes too much time. Microsoft is good at that, and that’s why we see Microsoft dominating. They are focused on software and they do that extremely well. For Apple it seems that software comes the second. First is the hardware. Apple’s software has serious problems. Take iCal for example. It takes too much time to change the views, from Month to Week and so on.
Every computer manufacturer I’m aware of before the “PC clone” era produced application software for their own hardware, whether Radio Shack, Atari, Commodore–or for that matter, both Apple and IBM. Only the commodity nature of the Windows market means hardware manufacturers don’t have to do that–instead they can bundle “major” third-party applications. On other platforms, the major applications often came from the companies producing them–at least at first. Apple users had AppleWorks. TRS-80 users had Scripsit. Mac users had MacWrite, MacPaint, MacDraw, etc. IBM users initially had DisplayWriter. (Even in the late ’80s, IBM was actively pursuing producing a new major word processor called Signature.)
Apple doesn’t have the Windows market–doing this is damn important to them. What does every review of a Mac talk about other than woo-woo hardware style? The Apple-branded applications. Conversely, what did the reviews of BeOS not talk about? Applications. Actually, they talked about the lack of them. I’m not the only one who thought Be’s refusal to get into the application space to give developers “room” was stupid rather than gallant: there should have been a BeWrite, a BePaint, and for that matter a BeTunes, BeMix (audio production), BeMovie and a BePhoto. Sure, maybe they’d have bought them from Beatware, Adamation and Marco Nelissen–that’d have been great. Yes, it’d mean people would have to be better than that baseline–I don’t think that’d have prevented Gobe Productive from taking off, though, and if SoundPlay had been “BeTunes,” it’d have just meant everyone would be using BeTunes instead of SoundPlay.
You have to consider OS X’x biggest competitors – Windows and Linux. Both of them come bundled with everything but the kitchen sink. Now, Apple sells a fairly pricey boutique machine, and at the moment it suffers a disadvantage to the x86 platform in the processor department. They have to find ways to compensate in order to provide a decent value proposition. And delivering an underpowered machine that looks naked in comparison to it’s more inexpensive competitors wouldn’t cut it. Apple needs to make the most of every competitive advantage they can lay their hands on. That may be unfortunate for the little guys, but that’s the current commercial environment.
I expect Apple will be doing even more in the application software department in the future. It is doubtful the Mac environment will significantly gain market share unless the hardware becomes commoditized and acquires the economies of scale of the x86 platform,either by selling an unbundled OS X for x86 or allowing the manufacture of PPC Mac clones, and I think they realize that. Unfortunately, their hardware is currently their major source of revenue, pecluding that possibility. I suspect they might be trying to develop alternative revenue streams, such as software, the iPod, handhelds, etc., in order to become less reliant on hardware revenue, and thus allowing them to open their platform somewhat.
Yahoo example is one example out of thousands of them. You will more and more likely to bump into a technology where you can’t use safari. Microsoft is way too ahead of competition in many issues. Even trying to compare Safari with IE is somewhat awkard.
Sergio, I’m running into this problem on the mac using Internet Explorer. It’s nothing to do with Microsoft being way too ahead, it’s all to do with Microsoft creating their own standards and then not implementing them on other platforms. The Javascript function designMode = “on” only works on IE on a PC. No other platform is supported. If I’m wrong could someone point me to how this can be implemented on a mac.
Microsoft is never way too ahead of the competition, they are just way more powerful than the rest.
scott: with XP you’d have to go out and buy this “better” software, with a Mac you open the box and get started. Browsing, email, Music, CD burning, Photos & DVDs, thats quite a bundle and covers the need of most people.
Which is pretty amazing, except the last thing, Microsoft does exactly the same! And they are in court! Wonderful!
scott: Safari is faster than IE on my PC (A 2.1Ghz, 1Gb RAM, GE4Ti)
True, but is Safari bundled with OS X? Is there even a stable release of Safari?
mark: have utterly failed to support the Mac platform, even as they have been squeezed out of the Wintel world
Actually, WordPerfect still commands a niche in the Windows world that might even grow if Corel settles down and get some focus.
I predict it will be built on the open source Open Office, in much the same way Safari was built on the source of Konqueror.
I predict otherwise. Notice how Keynote is *not* based on OpenOffice.org? Because OpenOffice.org is far worse than Mozilla, and Apple didn’t choose Mozilla did they? They choosed KHTML.
That makes no sense – Microsoft is a software company – people don’t dislike Microsoft because they make software. Apple is a platform unto itself.
Windows is a platform unto itself. Oh, that reminds me of someone’s argument…. Kelly McSomething from osOpinion! Good grief.
Ronald: WMP is at 9.0 and is still an horrible application.
I actually like 9.0, but I find it rather… hmmm… bloated, UI sense. The UI is otherwise good for playing video. I currently (believe it or not) use RealOne instead.
James Katt: Yet Internet Explorer was hurting Apple by being twice as slow as the PC version.
Actually, their OS 9 browser was rather good, Microsoft blames it on Carbon. I guess we wouldn’t know whether this is business or technical. However, notice Apple isn’t filing antitrust suite, but instead create a Cocoa browser for themselves.
James katt: Final Cut Pro is also a stimulus to Adobe to make Premiere better in order to compete with Final Cut Pro.
Premier would recieve much harder and better competition if Apple didn’t buy Final Cut Pro and instead got it to port to Mac OS X.
Why? It would be on both platforms.
Art Vandelay: Not to mention, iTunes allows you to rip MP3’s where it seems Microsoft is kissing RIAA ass and charging you for that ability.
Actually no. Microsoft don’t see any reason to pay royalties to a competing product which in the first place isn’t as good as WMA. If Microsoft was really RIAA’s stooge, they won’t offer ripping at all (DRM only works when the content providers invoke it straight unto the medium).
anon: Compare completely uninstalling Safari to completely uninstalling IE. The former takes two steps, the later is near impossible (according to MS).
If you want to compare the both, it is very easy. Go to Program Files > Internet Explorer and delete IEXPLORER.exe. Works in the same effect as deleting Safari.
You can delete IE altogether, the same way in the future you can’t for Webcore, because of the loads of apps (inlcuding Apple’s Quicktime) that depend on it. Deleting it would leave you with no desktop, nothing. Hardly any apps would work, you may as well use Linux.
appleforever: (4) constantly threaten to leave apple (MS, Intuit)
Actually, companies like Intuit and Microsoft want Apple to focus now on moving OS 9 users to OS X, not trying to expand their markets and their lost (lack of OS X users, lack of market).
appleforever: iPhoto rocks
Compared with stuff like Picasa?
Eugenia: As for the 1.0 status, well, Netscape was shipping Netscape 6 and 7 before even the Mozilla 1.0 release. Still, they are also rock bottom compared to IE.
Simple. Bad marketing. Netscape itself looks like a ad for AOL, and some key features of Netscape is hidden, like that ad thing. In many cases too, Netscape conflicts with AOL 8. AOL should have instead merge the products rather than have two products and try to use Gecko under AOL.
Anonymous: Take winzip, take winamp, take flash, take acrobat reader – they’ve become almost standard in all computers.
Yes, on the latter two, does Windows provide any built-in altenative? And as for WinZip (which isn’t free) or WinAmp, their market share have been dwindling down a lot, but they still command a niche. But how do you build a niche in a market so small as Apple’s?
Eugenia: Which sales went down after the release of the new versions of Media Player.
Which is free in the first place.
RedHatDude: Mozilla is blah blah
So? Eugenia’s point wasn’t that Mozilla sucks but rather its low market penetration.
mark: 90% of the development software
Where exactly did you get this number… may I ask. Besides, for most Office apps, except for stuff like Visio, the market share is less than 85%. For Publisher, it is way lower than that.
mark: and and ever growing percentage of the games and other apps?
Actually, EA pretty much makes most of the games out there. Microsoft sponsors some small game companies in return for their logo to be on the box.
mark: Forgot to mention Access
Which pretty much is part of Office.
Ernesto: and of course a file format whichs is propietary everybody must get crazy to be compatible.
That’s why Sun, which argubly have the best reversed engineered filters, only hires two full time engineers for that purpose alone?
appleforever: I do believer the address book on OS X has an API, or some kind of access. Is anyone using it? Nope, see, just what I mean
How new exactly is this Address Book? You expect ISVs to support it all of the sudden?
I fully support Apple’s decission to make iApps, Safari, etc. It is their right, just the same way Microsoft should have the right in making IE and integrating into Windows. That’s what I believe. If this would chase away developers (which I doubt, only small obscure ones I guess), then it is Apple’s fault for not calculating the risks involved.
But for crying out loud, Apple is no charity! It is a company, and like every other company that wants to be profitable, it is “evil” (actually, they aren’t, but they just don’t see why they should do things that don’t benefit them).
Yes, MS does have the right to bundle whatever they want with their OS, but they also should allow OEM’s to addwhatever they want or remove whatever. I believe that was one of the points of the antitrust case agaist MS, http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/54/28889.html .
“Some trolls (i.e. scott) think that Safari is faster than IE, maybe so, could be so,”
Nope it is so, no “maybe” or “could be so”, I know because I’ev tested it as have many other Apple users. I’m not being a Troll by stating a fact that I have personally tested. You were critising iApps for being slow, but you don’t use them, so why are you criticising?
Stop calling everyone else a Troll, if you cannot make a comment without making an attack at the person making them, don’t bother. The point here is to debate the topics raised, not attack everyone you don’t agree with.
“I fully support Apple’s decission to make iApps, Safari, etc. It is their right, just the same way Microsoft should have the right in making IE and integrating into Windows. That’s what I believe. If this would chase away developers (which I doubt, only small obscure ones I guess), then it is Apple’s fault for not calculating the risks involved. ”
Rajan, you’re right, I think a point worth making is the way MS made it difficult to use other Browsers, Apple isn’t doing that, I can (and do) use and install Chimera, Omniweb, IE & Safari and use whichever I wish.
So I disagree. If I sold car tyres to Ford, and they paint it yellow with my competitor’s logo on it, I wouldn’t stop for a second to withdraw my products. Windows, as it is, a whole product. Take it or leave it. It is not a collection of products where you can say “I want this, this, this and that, but not this, this, this and that.” For that, Microsoft have Windows XP Embedded.
I have to say I’m surprised to see my comments, posted as Anonymous gone… Not even moderated down, just gone! I wasn’t even rude, just made my point. Wasn’t offtopic either considering the other posts. Nice editors around here I see. Just furthers my point that there’s Apple FUDing around here. Have a nice day!
think a point worth making is the way MS made it difficult to use other Browsers, Apple isn’t doing that, I can (and do) use and install Chimera, Omniweb, IE & Safari and use whichever I wish.
In what way? Before using Opera, I was using Netscape on Windows 98 (before I tried Linux, BTW). Did Microsoft stop me from downloading and installing it? Nope. Besides the ultra long download, I manage to install it without a problem. Now when I came back to Windows again, did I had any problem installing Opera? None at all.
The problem is when you want to uninstall IE, but why ever for? To save some MBs while breaking potentially every app I use? So what do I do? Just delete the icon on my desktop (actually, I don’t have any icons there anyway) and Quicklaunch. Microsoft didn’t say NO, you can’t, did they?
So as someone using a alternative browser, I really can say that Microsoft didn’t limit my webbrowsing experience with Opera except when MSN 7 came out (which blocked Opera on websites I haven’t even been to).
So in the same way, I can (and do) use and install Mozilla, Opera, Phoenix, K-Meleon, Fast Browser Pro, GoSuRF, WillowTree Internet Toolkit, Advanced Web Browser, EasyBrowse PLATINUM, IE & Netscape and use whichever I wish.
Think again.
http://osnews.com/comment.php?news_id=2603&limit=no#65566
http://osnews.com/comment.php?news_id=2603&limit=no#65575
The Chimera developers will probably stop working on their browser. All because of, yes, Safari of course…
http://www.macslash.org/articles/03/01/20/1245231.shtml
Thank you RajanR. Anonymous, NO ONE has deleted your comments. They are still there AFAIK.
“The Chimera developers will probably stop working on their browser. All because of, yes, Safari of course… ”
Thats a real shame, Chimera is a good browser, but I suppose its like Eugenia says, if the product shipped on the computer is good, why would people download another one. If Safari had been on my Mac when I bought it, I doubt I would have searched for another browser…well OK I would have (and so would have anyone who comes here) but the average user probably won’t.
Most average users must just stick with IE on the PC, I expect it will be the same with Safari for the Mac.
was considering charging for the iApps, there was a lot of outcry.
Now that they are still free, there is an outcry.
MS made it difficult to use other Browsers
If I am reading this correctly, Scott is referring to when MS would bully companies like Compaq (and others) and force them to break contracts with Netscape and remove the Navigator icon from the desktop or they (MS) would not deal with them. This was all brought out in the antiTrust trial if anyone ever looked over Compaq’s statements. So MS CERTAINLY made it VERY difficult to *compete* though I agree that anyone could have simply downloaded it, but as had been mentioned before, most average-Janes don’t even bother.
RedHatDude: Mozilla is blah blah
So? Eugenia’s point wasn’t that Mozilla sucks but rather its low market penetration.
Actually, the post I was replying to was about how Mozilla XUL is slow, I posted that on all of my fast boxes, mozilla is responsive, but then I learned that it’s some sort of bug that pops up on some people’s computers.
People who never considered Apple before are acting as if this is a new trend. This has existed from the very beginning, and on all platforms. For that matter, despite the grumblings over more than the past decade, Apple has a pretty good track record.
Let’s not forget:
Before Sherlock 3 was released, Apple and Karelia (mostly Karelia) had a How-To on the ADC (Internet Developer section // Web Services) detailing how to build your own Watson. Karelia forgets to mention that they basically were willing to tell the whole world how to recreate the app–if they didn’t care about that, what’s their beef with Apple doing the same?
Pinkerton sounds like he’s whining… A week before he talks about implementing Moz’s strengths to differentiate Chimera from Safari (XUL, etc..)… A few days later he’s giving up… We haven’t heard the same from Hyatt and other Chimera contributors.
It’s too bad for the iTunes competitors, but let’s not forget that SoundJam had the bulk of the market before Apple anyway. It’s difficult to be better than iTunes at this point, but variety is desirable. There is still plenty of room here for different implementations.
And while we’re trying to tally a list of companies/titles put under, why not put together a list of companies that are using Apple’s products as a platform.
There are at least 3 companies developing effects for iMovie.
There are similar plugins for iTunes.
There are tons of freeware/shareware modifications, hacks, plugins, and scripts to modify OS X or interact with the iApps. iMovie, iTunes, iPhoto, and SHerlock all have SDKs for third-party development.
A note from Subband Software, former developer of MacAmp, cropped up recently: “Thanks to everyone who supported us over the years. iTunes just got to be far too big, far too free, and far too bundled with the OS.”
So what?
It happens all the time – its called “Microsoft Windows”.
Whimps, go crying elsewhere…
> the large developers have utterly failed to support
> the Mac platform
Well, without Microsoft’s Office, Adobe’s Illustrator & PhotoShop and Quark’s XPress, the Mac platform may have disapear by now.
Sounds like large developers to me.
The two later were (one is still at least) the trackor apps makers in the dark age of Apple platform.
> A few days later he’s giving up…
> We haven’t heard the same from Hyatt
Hyatt works at Apple in, guess what, the Safari Team for month now.
Don’t hope he will work on Chimera in his free time after a whole day working on Safari code…
David was hired several months ago… He continues to blog away at Moz… Now, his blog is mostly reflecting Safari updates, but when he needed to keep his NDA’d-ass covered, he was happily contributing and reporting away at Chimera.
There is no reason why Hyatt couldn’t code for Chimera when he wasn’t on Apple’s clock.
Recent history shows that Apple has been supportive of this–with respects to Wilfredo Sanchez, Hubbard, and Hyatt.
People critique Apple’s OS usage and/or strategy, but people fail to commend them for how well they have balanced closed and open source code.