There is a possibility that Apple could reshape itself as a consumer entertainment company, according to Gordon Haff, an analyst with Illuminata. In fact, he said doing so would be a smart move. Also, Apple announced that it has sold over 2 million songs in the first 16 days of the iTunes Music Store.
What Will It Take To Put Apple Back on Top?
About The Author
Eugenia Loli
Ex-programmer, ex-editor in chief at OSNews.com, now a visual artist/filmmaker.
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I’ve always said, apple can be one of the best if it concentrated on software, and loosened the coupling between its OS and its machines, the apple hardware will loose!! so what, The OS (and other software) will rule, … MS’s throne will be threatened in a couple of years, and maybe beaten!!!
I disagree…I believe all this stuff adds to the appeal of the Apple Platform itself–functional and elegant, as opposed to Windows, which is favoring the trend towards less functionality through DRM and such. I’m not going to make a comment about the elegance here, because it’s off topic.
Basically, Apple is providing a great platform to listen to music, watch videos, etc., and Windows is providing a great platform to NOT do all of that.
I am sick of people comparing Apple’s market share to Porsche’s or BMW’s. Cars are not as dependant on third parties as operating systems are. Once you buy the car, you are only dependant on a mechanic who knows how to fix your car. Once you buy a computer, you are dependant on the dozens of developers who make the programs to continue making them for your OS.
I use a Mac and I believe that OS X has a large enough user base to support a thriving developer community, unlike say BeOS. But comparing the market shares of Apple to BMW directly is stupid. They are completely different products with completely different market critical masses, and just because 2.5% is fine a car company doesn’t mean that 2.5% is fine for an operating system.
Apple’s value is not just in their software. It’s in the package deal, yes I think their hardware is somewhat overpriced. But you have to admit, getting all of the components from one source has it’s advantages. Everything has a consistent look and feel, something the PC greatly lacks. I would own a Mac if I could afford one I always say…
Life is not limited to haring music, and watching movies, for a platform to succeed, you need the general pupose base, … and u need to b attracting for developers. Apples featurs great support for Java, and easy steps to convert software, OS X supports X11 and *nix apps, which is a great plus, I know dozens of *nix developers that would want to live in OS X but they would never buy the hardware!! (I’m one of those!) so, …if all those developers live in OS X soon they will develop radical apps for OS X, soon they will switch to frameworks and Carbon, Objective C etc.
Even Microsoft hasn’t invested much into development of core PC hardware (except up till now with that glassy concpet PC, I want to say Athens but I think I got the codename wrong). NT support for other CPU platforms is not as strong as x86, and PocketPC is really the only other platform MS really supports other than x86. Anyone knows otherwise please correct me.
Unless you thinking along the lines of bringing back the clones rather than Apple competing by means of porting MacOSX to another CPU platform. Personally I agree that Apple should stick with the hardware and software integration. It reall does create less work for them rather than having to support multiple platforms which I don’t think they’ll be capable of doing.
Further more the design of their system chasis is one of their selling points if not for the technical merits. All this has been said already. So sorry for rehashing old opinions.
I am glad Apple has proprietary control over both hardware and software. The technology just works better that way. Besides, Microsoft has much more of a stranglehold on the PC platform.
They are even going to be selling their own PCs very soon – you could argue they already have with the XBox.
You can actually run more OSes on a Mac than a PC – Mac, Linux, NetBSD, BeOS, Amiga, and even Windows through Bochs. And Apple does have an Open Source base for its system.
I agree with your complaints about the car analogy. I think people use it in respone to the (IMO mistaken) belief that a computer company can’t survive unless it has 40% or 50% marketshare.
I’d like to say that it was the whole package, not just the OS (even though I really like OS X) that convinced me to buy the two iMacs for my wife and myself. There is something very elegant about those machines, running that OS. I just can’t picture one of those ugly, new HP/Compaq black and grey/silver PC’s running OS X. Makes me shudder. 🙂
Even Microsoft hasn’t invested much into development of core PC hardware (except up till now with that glassy concpet PC, I want to say Athens but I think I got the codename wrong). NT support for other CPU platforms is not as strong as x86, and PocketPC is really the only other platform MS really supports other than x86. Anyone knows otherwise please correct me.
Microsoft has had their hands in where PC hardware moves for quite a while, but the XBox is the closest they’ve come to developing a complete PC (even the most recent concept PC was done with HP, they’ve done similar things in the past iirc). They’re one of the major contributors to a number of different PC hardware specifications, including the guidelines that PC OEMs look towards when designing new PCs (guidelines which determine what hardware a new PC should come with, which lead to things like all new x86 PCs and many older PCs having USB ports by the time Win98 came out with support for them, and the eventual phase-out of the floppy drive, which has been in the specs for a few years).
As for NT support for other platforms, that pretty much is the horse & carriage problem (or chicken & egg). They supported NT quite well on 3 platforms, but the platforms didn’t take off, either because the applications weren’t there or the users weren’t there (another chicken & egg problem), and MS slowly dropped off their support of NT on those platforms.
Otherwise, short of keyboards and mice, MS has never really performed well in the hardware markets they’ve entered. In some cases the markets were usually not as big as they thought (such as set-top internet, which they seem to have renewed their marketing push for recently as they try to leverage the also-not-very-strong MSN branding). In other cases they’ve seen slower-than-expected adoption (such as the XBox and PocketPC). In any case, they’ve rarely just dropped it and moved on when it comes to hardware (unlike some of their failed software efforts which they tend to shovel under the rug as soon as they realize no one’s looking). They usually push on it until everyone thinks it’s dead, then they stand it back up, dress it in some new clothes, and put it on wheels so they can push it a little easier.
Compared to a PC, yes, Macs are really high priced. But you have to keep in mind that when you buy a new mac it has quite a lifespan. While this would be good for people who can afford a lump sum, it’s not too good for people who can’t afford to put down all that money at once and end up going with a PC
if all those developers live in OS X soon they will develop radical apps for OS X, soon they will switch to frameworks and Carbon, Objective C etc.
Why not develop with GNUStep? The unix developers (like me) who saved for a mac could port it without a problem.
Is as easy as that. If they expand to the PC, they will definitely have support of all hardware manufacturers. And with better hardware on the PC, better perfomance of OS X. They can easily sell 50% more OS X software with that jump.
You want to listen to music? Buy a stereo!
Watch movies? Get a DVD player and a nice TV/Home theatre.
Play games? XBox, PS2, Gamecube..
I mean Apple makes a couple of nice devices. The iPod sure is cool. I think they really have a future in consumer devices for people who like to spend extra ducats on the whole “package” of slick, white uber designed stuff. They need to stick with that MO and get moving. Just make portable devices, for people who like to think they are cool and sleek and hip. And wanna pay for it.
On the otherhand, they should get out of the computer market and pronto. There is nothing worse than the legions of self professed experts that Apple’s condecending lie filled marketing strategy unleashes into the world of computing. Nuff said.
They need to get serious about the XServe as well. Truth?
My proposal: Make the XServe a $5000 pretty looking faceplate you can screw on your more useful Solaris/Linux/Unix/NT based 1U server. That way the truth is “just out there”. Apple has no strategy for the damn things except for selling pretty things for people who like to spend a bundle.
Why has everybody decided they know how to run Apple best recently? Oh well I guess I could give it a shot.
http://junetech.com/story5.html
I like owning an apple because hardly any of my friends have one and they are all intrigue by the OS. But I think the mainstream will always be MS and maybe even Lunix. I think its cool being in the minority and influencing the majority. If you don’t believe it, just look at all the influence Apple has had on the pc world, even though some call it dying, but still making profit with money in the bank. I think ms wouldn’t of invested so much money in office and virtual pc if they wouldn’t of realized that there is a future in the mac plateform.
Apple is doing what Apple is capable of doing right now. But I have to admit that Jobs is doing a GREAT job of keeping people guessing and at the same time positioning the company to survive and look at future markets that will stave off any real profit loss.
As for the guy ranting about using the PC for DVD, stereo, etc., are you serious? Why mess with all that stuff when you can have a certral hub that does it all? CD Jukeboxes cost more than low-end PCs that you can rip your entire collection to and enjoy putting the stuff on “random” for non-commercial enjoyment. My 21″ monitor and 5.1 sound system is more than enough for my cramped apartment to enjoy DVD movies (when I get the chance).
I can imagine people with wide 17″ iMacs are doing the same thing.
All-in-one, and forget the clutter.
Vic
I guess the real clarification needs to be made – getting Apple back to the top of what?
I don’t think Jobs wants Macs to control 95% of the market. Well, maybe in some strange drug-induced trance. But in the real world it’s obvious that they at least they want to greatly grow their market-share.
So how do they do that? In the home front, it’s obvious. That’s what the digital hub concept is all about. I expect to see Macs tying in to more and more of the other electronics around the house. Both to give people more reasons to buy macs and to generate revenue (and profit!) themselves. I really think iPod is just the beginning. A phone that integrates with my computer (so it can use the address book, for instance) would be great. There are lots of things they could do.
But Apple seems to be trying to work their way into business as well. Probably the first step will be to get back into the creative businesses. With fast powermacs coming soon able to connect easily to xServe render farms Apple can make some inroads. It also sounds like they are working on full productivity software. They already have a powerpoint replacement (Keynote) and are rumored to be working on an Appleworks update including a lightweight database (they need something to compete with Access). The last piece of that puzzle (and one I hope they will choose to go after) is a Microsoft Project replacement. Project is everywhere in the office (at least in IT) and there needs to be a good Mac equivalent for Macs to be taken seriously in the office.
In both home and office computer sales Apple will need to cut prices if they want to up their market share. They don’t have to be as cheap as PC’s to do this, but they have to be close (as in, $2499 vs $2299 or something like that).
They don’t need to win the fight today. If they stay relevant and slowly grab some marketshare (even in a sub-market like the “home”) they can plan for the long term.
Are what we saying here is that the majority wants Apple to become the IKEA of computing?
If so, bring it on!
I think they shouldn’t port iTunes entirely…
I think that some iTunes features must be Mac only features
That would atract more “creative” ppl etc.
If i had some cash 2 spend… i would buy a Mac… =]
My opinion:
The Mac [and OS X]
Is THE platform for the next 10 years
L00k, everybody is copying it
Longh0rn with its Quartz Extreme like features
KDE…
I think that the time of THE MAC will come in [apx] 5 years…
I just don’t get why everything Apple makes has to be priced so high. I was looking to get an MP3 player. I looked around and found an iPod that was really nice, but it was almost twice as much as the Archos. I got the archos. Sure it’s a little heavier but it has more features and for half the price how could I pass it up?
I don’t understand why the iPod and every other thing Apple makes seems to be so much more expensive.
Sure you can go get an eMac now for like 799, but I can go get a comparable Athlon based system for less. If I wanted a box that would compete with a new G4 tower, I could get one for a lot less.
So I just really don’t get why Dell can sell systems for so much less. I mean Apple is the one making the hardware. Can’t they find a way to cut costs? Maybe lower prices and you’ll sell more?
I dunno. I’m not expert (obviously) but I know that when it comes to Macs, I can’t justify the price for the performance.
The only way [i think] to make Macs cheaper is to let [some] companies copy mac hardware…
The only way [i think] to make Macs cheaper is to let [some] companies copy mac hardware…
You’re speaking as a consumer not as a manufacturer. Clearly Apple has the ability to reduce prices. And clearly they have the choice as to whether to allow other companies to sell Macs. So the ball is in their court. And a simple examination of the situation would tell you that there won’t be clones any time soon.
again, x86 = stupid for Apple, clones = stupid for Apple
I just don’t get why everything Apple makes has to be priced so high. I was looking to get an MP3 player. I looked around and found an iPod that was really nice, but it was almost twice as much as the Archos. I got the archos. Sure it’s a little heavier but it has more features and for half the price how could I pass it up?
It depends on which Archos you are referring to. The one with alot more features (picture storage, video) is the same price for $20GB as a $15GB iPod. The MP3-only one (same features + radio) is $299 (vs $399 for the others).
Don’t forget that the new iPods have calender and contact info. It’s very handy. I don’t believe Archos products have that yet.
But I guess “little heavier” is subjective. Comparing to a 15GB iPod it’s 82% heavier (10.23 oz vs 5.6 oz) and 167% larger (16.331 cu in vs 6.108 cu in). Size and weight may not matter to you, but there clearly is a cost.
So I just really don’t get why Dell can sell systems for so much less. I mean Apple is the one making the hardware. Can’t they find a way to cut costs? Maybe lower prices and you’ll sell more?
I dunno. I’m not expert (obviously) but I know that when it comes to Macs, I can’t justify the price for the performance.
I bet Apple pays alot more per unit for the OS and other SW related costs than Dell. Apple probably uses HW profits to pay for research (read: writing SW) that Dell doesn’t have to do. Dell also has the benefit of better economies of scale.
And if price and benchmark performance are the only factors you use to make computer purchases, then (for the time being at least) Apple is not for you.
There are two margins involved in PC manufacture. Profit margin on the product and operating margin. Proft margin is easy: the difference in the cost to purchase and assemble the product and the price which it is sold for to resellers and consumers. Operating margin is more complex and invovles the costs of running the business: i.e. not just production costs, but employee costs, marketing costs, R&D costs, support, etc…
So, Dell only sells its boxes for a slight profit (last I checked around 9%), but they lead the industry (and even many non-tech industries) in maximizing oeprating margin (again, last I checked +20%).
Apple on the other hand maintains a higher profit margin (between 25-30% on average) while having zero operating margin. They have a large staff that develops software, they do much “non-productive” R&D, have sophisticated marketing, better support, a large focus on industrial design, cannot access the volume discounts that Dell can, etc…
In terms of profit margin, it appears Dell is doing you a favor–they pass off this margin to your savings. However, they profit just as much, if not more than, on every machine they sell as Apple. Apple isn’t being greedy–they are financing all of the benefits that come with an integrated vertical market. If Apple wanted to reduce profit margins as much as the PC industry has, they would have to give up: software development, high quality design, R&D, better support, marketing, etc…
Apple should really start selling the parts(ie mobo and processor) for you to build your own mac.
With OS X being built on unix roots, apple has made some headway in courting the geek crowd. I just returned to school to receive an MS in Comp Sci and Apple has definitely captured a significant portion of the comp sci crowd here. In almost every, discussion of “what Apple needs to do” there are numerous comments of “I would love to buy a mac but i am not going to plop $2.5K to get one”. ( I know there are cheaper alternatives but most geeks want the flexibility and expandability of a tower).
The “build your own custom box enthusiasts” in my opinion would love to build custom machines running OS X(or even Linux) using Apple hardware. I believe that this market is separate from the current market of Apple buyers. Don’t get me wrong I am not trying to suggest that this will solve all of Apples problems and greatly expand market share, but I believe that it will increase the market for Apple products.
This would not be the same as thing as supporting a clone market since Apple wouldn’t be licensing their architecture but selling the components direct to users(and potentially other resellers) to build their own boxes. Apple could be reasonably certain that each mobo/processor sale would result in a OS X sale. But even if the user decided to load linux on the box then so what. Apple still would get a sale and increase the reach of their platform.
Intel sells mobo, processor,etc why can’t Apple. I realize Apple doesn’t design their own procs, but they would could benefit by increasing the reach of the PowerPC platform that they are so solidly tied to and potentially decrease costs on their complete systems through increased volume of the individual components.
The personal computer market is diverse. One solution to increase market share is to increase the number of outlets for apple hardware.
People often erroneosly contend that the i386 platform is open. It is not open but just widely available. I don’t believe that apple needs to make their platform that available but they could benefit by loosening the reigns a bit.
Apple need to open a section of their store to component purchases and start a community site to allow users to build their own boxes.
It’s different than most of the clamoring you hear.
But there are problems with this: firstly, Apple is still a relatively small buyer of chips from Moto and IBM. Virtually every chip they buy they need to ship to Asia to have a mobo builder assemble. These mobo’s contain Apple-designed and -built controllers.
These mobos would not be cheap. Obviously, the builder could forego some components and use some cheap components, but I would bet you would still have an expensive box. This is not comparable to what Intel (the largest manufacturer of chips and mobos) can do.
However, you would have the other problem: control. Apple doesn’t want boxes without FireWire, without Airport, without Gigabit Ethernet. These hardware components aren’t just selling points–they are integral to the complete package… iPods wouldn’t be as easy to integrate. FW wouldn’t be a major solution for media apps. Rendezvous wouldn’t have the shine that it has for wireless discovery. These are elements that Apple wants to be able to say is a part of EVERY Mac.
Solving some potential customer’s financial woes is admirable but it is not inline with Apple’s vision or model.
I think you went a little too far saying that PC platform is more propietary then Apple. Not quite yet, but I do think you were right that MS wants it that way, and a good example is the Xbox.
Aside from that though, I keep reading that Apple has propietary control and is Apple designed and thats better then the design your own pc design.
Well I disagree. Open an Apple up and have a look whats in there. Hmmm we see chips from Motorola, support and decoding chips from AMD, IDE cables, PC standard ram, common off the shelf hard drives etc.
So you get what apple wants you to have, not necessarily the fastest hardware, nor the most reliable, just what happens to fit their price point / 1000 units in some deal struck months ago. I would rather be able to build up a pc from scratch, and then toss an operating system on it. At least Apple doesnt care if you change your hardware (void warranty, but its ok) once you buy the machine, or change OS if you want to.
Endnote: Run more OSes on Mac then a PC? Are you ON CRACK?
First of all, lets throw out the emulators, because thats not really running the OS. (Although it was cool that last week I was running a C-64 emulator on a emulated Mac running on emulated windows, in Linux, but thats another story).
So that leaves the MAC with NetBSD, Linux (less then a handful of free flavors and yellow dog pay linux? ouch.) and BeOS. And Macintosh.
And a PC: Linux (many flavors both pay and free), Windows, BeOS, FreeBSD, OS2, Solaris, Adrenaline, Apostle, AtheOS, BRiX, BugOS, EduOS, ErOS, Exopc, Fiasco, BSD-OS, VMS, FreeVMS, FullPliant, GEM, Gemini Nucluous, GEOS, Gemini Nucleous, GNU Hurd, GO, JxOS, L4, MenuetOS, MINIX, Nemisis, On-Time RTOS-32, OnCore, OS-C, PETROS, PIOS, Proolix, QNX, RadiOS, Roadrunner, RT MACH NTT, Sanos, SCO, Scout, Solaris, SPIN, ThrillOS, TinyOS, Unumunium, V2OS, VSTa, VxWorks, Yamit, and Unix varients.
now if they can give me a little more punch for the money, i look forward to buying several os-x based systems.
right now it’s all redhat, freebsd, xp at the apartment….but i get to service macs at work.
fired up itunes and just started browsing the music store…
no subscription!!!? that’s a huge selling point. I HATE WHEN COMPANIES TRY TO LEACH OUT OF MY CHECKING ACCOUNT EVERY MONTH.
a dollar a song is fair. for a $100 i get 100 awesome songs.
in the past $100 gets me 5 CDs with perhaps 8 good songs between them.
now if they can just get me a more powerful machine with a little bit better price….i’ll go for it.
Why does everyone think that Apple is doing badly? They have a small percentage of the overall computing market, but a very healthy share of the Luxury Computing segment. Whatever it is, you can be sure the Apple version always costs the most!
I hope Apple’s new 64-bit workstations are going to be much more expensive than the current G4 towers. Apple has enough riff-raff as it is and by going upmarket, profits will go up and Apple will be even more elite and cool.
And it would be so cool if Apple came out with a special $25K “Dalai Lama” edition of their new workstation. Each buyer of this new machine would get a free trip to Tibet to enjoy hot spiced tea with the Dalai and talk about “think different”.
You must be on crack. Macs have Virtual PC, which means that if you have a Mac, plus Virtual PC, you have a Virtual PC on a Mac. It’s so great because you can run any PC program on your Mac. And I can run Windows XP (Why would I want to?) on my Mac and since I have a 500MHz G4, I can smoke your 3.06GHz P4, because my processor is built on RISC technology, which means MHz doesn’t matter.
suse is one of the best distros around.
pay ouch?
no.
how about you get what you pay for.
anyway, yellow dog is free to download. when a new release comes out, the people who pay have first access to it.
i agree with the rest of your point, and was just picking on tangents. 😉
The article mentions flaws in citing market share figures. Apple is losing market share, but may still be gaining user base. Indeed, ecommercetimes mentioned a doubling of the total number of users (although I don’t think that has actually happened).
The argument is valid to a point. I think the longevity of Apple depends on software manufacturers’ willingness to support Apple. The article’s alternative of citing active users instead of market share doesn’t strike me as a good measure of the software company support. Apple users keep their Macs for a long time, but owners of older machines do not buy much software.
A far better measurement might be comparing sales trends over the last couple of years of a product like Photoshop on both Mac and Windows machines. If the trend moves too strongly toward Windows, then Apple would need to worry.
i agree.
but you can tell that apple is *trying* to prepare for a possible eventuallity of losing 3rd party developers, by building a stable of best of breed type software.
not sure if it’s going to work or not.
by their high quality. How can Apple expect to pump up sales growth in hardware+OS and application software if their computers do what you want them to do reliably and don’t have to be upgraded every three months and replaced every year. It’s just insane of them to offer a product that works for what users want it to do.
What they need to do is make something that doesn’t work that reliably, lower the price, promise the world, and then say you need a new video card, sound card, more memory, bigger internal hard drive, OS upgrade, application software upgrade, and on and on and on. In another year we’ll reinvent computing — for the desktop, the enterprise and beyond! So keep spending, and prepare to spend even more.
Then they’d be rolling in dough. The “downside” would be that MS wouldn’t know where to go next.
People say software vendors won’t write software for Mac if the marketshare falls too far.
This doesn’t matter.
As the marketshare falls, Apple steps in and buys these companies using their vast cash reserves. As the market is perceived as small, Apple pays these companies bottom dollar.
Pretty soon, Apple makes ALL the hardware and software.
One button to rule them all…
Because Apple is building good software that means developers must be leaving? Retarded.
Here, it is simply. In the past 2 years (during the trend from 5% to 2%) rather than see ANY developers (nevermind significant developers like Adobe, MS, or Quark) leave, Apple has seen substantial numbers of new developers attracted to the platform–Sybase, Oracle, HP, Alias, ToonBoom… Intuit has reintroduced QuickBooks after a long departure… Bias even announced that Peak is going to be OS X only in the future… AutoDesk is at least at the point where they are seriously considering bringing AuotCAD to the Mac, etc…
Not to mention….GAMES
yes, the PC still has lots and lots more games. But if you compare the situation for Mac games now to what it was five years ago it’s like night and day (hint: today is the “day”)
name one game that runs on virtual pc (solitaire and mindsweeper doesn’t count)
DJ Jedi Jeff wrote:
I bet Apple pays alot more per unit for the OS and other SW related costs than Dell. Apple probably uses HW profits to pay for research (read: writing SW) that Dell doesn’t have to do.
Which amazes me why Apple charges for SW upgrades other than the cost of a CD/DVD.
Consumers will no doubt complain when forced to pay for OSX 10.3 (especially since the OS is still in a process of refinement from its Openstep roots)
Once upon a time, the OS was free. It reads for bad advertising when some systems still run 10.1 just because their owners didn’t want to be slugged an upgrade fee.
cf gentoo PPC
The OS refinements are free for life! As for Mac specific functionality, that’s perhaps a different story. What would be nice is if Jordan H and his mates worked out a way to continually upgrade the free darwin core. – perhaps through darwinports i.e. you could still run 10.2 OSX while running the latest darwin subsystem.
This is a concern, you buy a Mac and find a few years down the track that Apple has EOL’d the hardware. (As they did with 7.5.x, 7.6 and 8.1)
A number of old macs now run netbsd/yellowdog because it’s core OS can be updated. (especially now 9.x is discontinued)
If they separated the OSX and darwin subsystems, they could discontinue OSX functionality support while maintaining a current darwin core for security updates and upgrades to 3rd party built-in packages like apache.
(There was a story a while ago about experimentally running OSX apps under a NetBSD kernel – perhaps that’s the solution when your hardware gets orphaned)
M$ makes their money from the OS; Apple needn’t. (e.g. online music service, iLife add-ons)
One accepts that you pay higher costs for Mac hardware for the Software R&D, so the software should be free, on of the benefits of buying a Mac.
A mac-head recently told me that the 12″ powerbook came with ~$AUS2K worth of free software. (the same software as on eMacs??)
– Why then can’t I buy said powerbook for $AUS2K without the OS and run yellowdog?
I am always willing to pay for significant new features. Bug fixes should be free but that’s the extent of it.
And I really doubt that Apple makes money from their OS even after all the people paying for 10.2
The issue is not about market share as a percentage. But about how much profit Apple can make.
At the moment their sales figures reveal that year on year the number of machines they are selling is in decline.
They are right on the verge of profitability. That is, if they sell more machines then they will be successfull, they will gain carry on effects that will make machines cheaper, and so sell more. But if they slow down, it will just get worse and worse.
The key issue is that they are on a cusp. They can go up or down, and right now is when the future of Apple will be decided. In fact, they are really on the negative side of the cusp, but they are being saved by returns on their invested 4 billion dollars. They really need to double their sales numbers to be healthy. That would be enough. The per system cost of all that custom software would halve, and machines could get much cheaper.
> I am always willing to pay for significant new features. Bug fixes should be free but that’s the extent of it.
Me too, but witness Windows the last few years. People had to migrate from NT4 to W2K to gain USB support.
Now given that such hardware device support is darwin functionality, it’d be a shame if Apple charged people an upgrade to OSX just to enable a hardware feature.
Let them charge upgrades for things like Aqua and improvements to the Finder, etc.
As in my previous post it’d be nice if they’d separate darwin so that one could always upgrade the open source core even if, heaven forbid, OSX was no longer supported for that hardware. e.g. NetBSD at 1.6.x will be upgradeable to 2.0.x someday… Will OSX 10.x running darwin 6.x allow you to upgrade to the 7.x code someday while still using the same version of OSX on top???
I guess it’ll get to a point where one is happy enough with the OSX experience, as a finished product. I mean if one is happy with Win2K, XP with all its eye-candy is no upgrade.
But sure enough microsoft will stop releasing service packs for 2K while still maintaining XP.
Simply ONE THING! Cheaper prices!!!!
I’ve been with Apple since 1994. I’ve had dealings with their tech and customer support in the past. They have been OUTSTANDING beyond my WILDEST DREAMS!
They once replaced a monitor that was over three months out of warranty! That’s a long story and it’s almost like a fairy tale, how great they were with me.
We’re talking next day Fed Ex stuff.
And no…….I’m not a big company or a purchaser of many Macs. I’m just a lowly single one Mac home user.
All it will take for Macs to compete is competitive pricing.
They will have to bite the bullet and take a loss for a couple of months to get a solid foothold.
I can’t tell you the untold stories I have encountered with people I know that WANT to change but won’t for TWO reasons.
Macs are too high (the monitor are a factor) and the megahertz myth. I’ve had many admit they would buy even with the megahertz problem (after I convinced them it is a myth) if they were priced like Dell.
Like I said, firehouse sale for a couple of months to up the percentage but it may start a ball rolling that would eventually be hard to ignore.
This may not make much business sense but some of the greatest move is in business, as Steve knows, go contrary to business ideals in the first place. Some of the greatest companies in history if not most did what was NOT EXPECTED!!
I don’t know if Apple will release a low-end system without a monitor (I would like to see that). But I really hope they don’t drop the ball on the 970 release in (hopefully) a few months.
Their current models of PowerMac are:
$1499 – 1 GHz G4
$1999 – dual 1.25 GHz G4
$2699 – dual 1.42 GHz G4
according to rumors we’re likely to see single 1.4, dual 1.6 and dual 1.8 in the 970’s.
So if this happens and Apple uses the same prices and just upgrades the processor/motherboard:
$1499 – 1.4 GHz 970
$1999 – dual 1.6 GHz 970
$2699 – dual 1.8 GHz 970
I think these systems would be priced fairly competitively. No guarantee Apple will do this but if they do it would be a major boost. They have a chance – I guess we’ll just have to wait a few months to see if they make the move.
Ummm…
And it would be so cool if Apple came out with a special $25K “Dalai Lama” edition of their new workstation. Each buyer of this new machine would get a free trip to Tibet to enjoy hot spiced tea with the Dalai and talk about “think different”.
Tibetans drink brick tea that is a fresh Oolong that has been taken wet and put in a container and aged. Its very musty tasting and dark and rich. They take this tea and add it to rancid yak butter with a bit of salt.
It is quite tasty. I drink it at home, but dont have any rancid butter
.
Also, the Dalai Lama would simply giggle at the prospect of someone coming to speak ‘religion’ about a product line.
He might say something like “Silly silly Americans…” and laugh some more..
Other than that, yer right on the mark: Apple users will whip out the credit card to pay handsomely for any experience that enhances their smugness and worldview that is comprised entirely of “fake authenticity”.
Ahh.. The Stockholm Syndrome yet again…
Apparently someone let the linux people out of the basement again and decided to teach the windows users how to use internet explorer…. thats all fine and dandy but why did they have to come to this thread?
Also, the Dalai Lama would simply giggle at the prospect of someone coming to speak ‘religion’ about a product line.
He would be especially surprised considering that Buddhism isn’t regarded (by him or prety much everyone else) as a “religion.” It is a philosophy that happens to be practiced by people of many different religions.
Not Steve Jobs, Steve Balmer. Put simply, Apple needs developers, developers, developers; developers, developers, developers… Apple may have a solid OS and slick hardware, but if they don’t have developer support they are going to continue to lose market share.
As a former Mac developer, I see the Mac market a little differently. From my point of view, Apple doesn’t view its developers as partners for the Mac platform but as sources of revenue. For example, in 2000, Apple offered a 5 DVD set of the Apple training courses that were presented at the 2000 WWDC to any developer for $150. It was a nice alternative for those who could not attend WWDC. The DVD set from last year’s WWDC now goes for $1500. That locks out many smaller firms, especially in this lackluster economy.
Although I am now surrounded by Linux PCs, we still have a few Macs in the house. As a consumer, I am once again feeling Apple’s inability to woo developers. Trying to find educational software for my daughter is a struggle. There are plenty of Windows titles but the few Mac titles that do exist, aren’t even Carbon compliant; they still run in MacOS Classic!
Hardware developers are even more critical, but again Apple is indifferent. Apple needs to stand up and fight for Mac support even for platform independent devices such as monitors or routers. Can an uninformed consumer walk into CompUSA, pickup a Linksys switch or a Samsung monitor and know that it is MacOS compatible? NO, the boxes in both cases only have a Windows logo; nowhere on the boxes does it say they can be used with a Mac.
To get back on top, Apple needs to start at the bottom and build a solid foundation with its development partners. Developers are the key, and Apple needs to realize that.
To get back on top, Apple needs to start at the bottom and build a solid foundation with its development partners. Developers are the key, and Apple needs to realize that.
Have you seen what great tools Apple provides the developers for free? Things like Project Builder and Interface Builder are really great tools.. You don’t get *that* for free on windows.. Or those very nice profiling tools, for quartz, memory and cpu. What about the pretty nice documentation? I only wished that they would make a special prize for student developers for the ADC-TV DVD.
As a former Mac developer, I see the Mac market a little differently. From my point of view, Apple doesn’t view its developers as partners for the Mac platform but as sources of revenue. For example, in 2000, Apple offered a 5 DVD set of the Apple training courses that were presented at the 2000 WWDC to any developer for $150. It was a nice alternative for those who could not attend WWDC. The DVD set from last year’s WWDC now goes for $1500. That locks out many smaller firms, especially in this lackluster economy.
Maybe I am just naive, but…..training courses on DVD? I’m just not impressed with this “evidence”. You may be right, but charging for training DVD’s aint it.
Just fire Steve Jobs ASAP.
be on top. Unless the can make commodity hardware (x86 compatible stuff) or put OS X on intel they will never be on top. And that’s fine by me!
I know Apple’s marketshare is only around 3% worldwide, but that’s not to bad considering that Apple doesn’t sell to big business. I’m sure most of Dells sales comes from big business. So Apple 3% really isn’t that bad. I think Apple can get up to 6-7% If they start to target different markets…like the SOHO market or get their computers into large retailers like Best Buy.
Don’t forget, for every 1 mac sold there is probably 20 PC’s sold, Apple is never going to have a huge marketshare ever again so maybe next decade (10 years from now)they might have .5 of market share but have 100 million macs in service, which is 4 times what they have now. The only way for Apple to increase market share would be for people to STOP buying pcs alltogether but since that won’t happen, the ratio of pc’s to mac gets bigger and bigger and Apple’s marketshare will get smaller.
Just fire Steve Jobs ASAP.
I say old chap, if we bring back Gil Amelio everything would be AOK!!!
Don’t forget, for every 1 mac sold there is probably 20 PC’s sold, Apple is never going to have a huge marketshare ever again so maybe next decade (10 years from now)they might have .5 of market share but have 100 million macs in service, which is 4 times what they have now. The only way for Apple to increase market share would be for people to STOP buying pcs alltogether but since that won’t happen, the ratio of pc’s to mac gets bigger and bigger and Apple’s marketshare will get smaller.
Marketshare has to do with sales. The only way for Macs to increase marketshare is to start selling more computers relative to PC manufacturers. Um, that’s what marketshare means. So if 4% of new computers sold in the US (or world, whichever market you are looking at) for a given year are Macs then their marketshare would be….*drumroll*…. 4%
What you seem to be referring to is the installed base. If the Mac has and maintains 3% marketshare and we assume that the average active lifespan of a Mac is the same as that of a PC then in 20 years the ratio of Macs to PCs will be exactly the same. So the only way for Apple’s percentage of the overall installed base to decrease is for their marketshare to go down or if the Macs end up being used for a shorter amount of time after purchase. The former remains to be seen while the latter is definitely not true.
What he is saying is: Apple could have 5,4,3,2,1,.5% of the market, but the worldwide PC market is growing. (With most of that growth going to Dell, not anyone else.)
So even if Apple’s marketshare is declining, the number of Macs they ship may in fact increase every year–20 million, 25 million, 30 million, etc…
Here is how Apple could proceed to get more than a pathetic 5 % share of personal computers :
a) lower the price of the hardware : it may be flattering to be compared to Porsche or Mercedes but if I have to pay 1,500.00$ for a 500 MHz G3, I’d rather pass up.
b) allow (once again) other companies to build clones : remember PowerComputing or Umax … their hardware were top notch. Only monopolists fear competition.
c) stop wasting money on translucid cases and toasters lookalike : I don’t need to see the bowels of my box when I’m working. Nor do I want my kids to believe that their toasts are inside my computer.