I have ranted about this many times in the past, but i feel that another such complaint is in order. Apple removed computer from its name last January. Since then, they seem to have inserted iPhone in its place. Most of Apple’s announcements since the announcement of the iPhone have been iPhone or iPod related. Is Apple loosing focus on what rebuilt it, and are we in for another bout of the mid 90’s apple?
What built Apple
Apple in the 90s was a sad figure. They suffered failure after failure. Their real turn around came with the advent of the iMac and OS X. This is what made apple a fighting force, and caused many users to switch over the years, either due to lack of a decent other operating system, or interest in apple’s new UNIX platform. Publishing houses, artists, movie studios, the like, were all huge adopters. Apple was made in the current era by its powerful, stable, and functional operating system, not by fancy mainstream consumer gadgets.
iPod
The iPod is by no means a small force in Apple’s market share acquisition. It has generated them quite a bit of revenue, and allowed them to penetrate into various markets that they would not have access to. But the iPod has always been 2nd burner to the main operating system.
Along came polly iPhone
But in January 2007, the first glimmers of Apple’s loss of focus appeared. A majority of the Macworld expo[1. Annual expo in late January, around the 28th that is hosted by Macworld Magazine. Apple always has a keynote demonstrating their biggest products throughout the year] was devoted to the iPhone, a mainstream consumer gadget that was long hypothesized about. At the time, people were excited, as this was just another area for Apple to branch out into. That faithful expo was also when Apple axed the computer
from its name. At the time, this wasn’t too big of a deal. Come later in the year, at apples WWDC[2. Worldwide developer conference. An Apple hosted event detailing in their developers, programmers, hardware makers, and other big tech business. Not mainstream consumers], almost all the show was devoted to the iPhone. Apple also announced that Leopard had been delayed till later in the year. This sparked the first response from people, but it was small, mostly grumblings about even more waiting.
iPhone iMishaps
But the iPhone was an imperfect beast. Within months of its June release, the term bricking
was commonplace for owners above a basic most level. The practice was apple and AT&T would lock down phones that had been unlocked by their owners for the installation of custom applications. Apple had no SDK, and so the suite of applications was quite limited, only to what apple provided.
Ignoring their base
Every 2008 apple convention has had between nothing and very little to do with their hardware and operating system. Almost all coverage has been devoted to iPhone, when nothing really significant happened till recently. January’s Macworld was just about how a SDK would be coming soon, but it wasn’t out yet, and some new apps that would be coming via said SDK. WWDC saw the release of a new version of the iPhone, and the SDK. But the new iPhone was still crippled, it was tied to one network, AT&T. Many people, myself included, will never use AT&T, due to shady business models. If Apple has any hope of controlling the phone marketplace the same way they control the MP3 player market, they will have to branch out. Many other services, such as Sprint and Verizon, offer similar phones for hundreds of dollars cheaper, complete with more features[3. An example is the Samsung Glyde. It has an interface similar to that of the iPhone, smaller form factor, and a slide out keyboard. Its price, with a data plan: $99]. WWDC also saw the removal of Computer from yet another apple service, .Mac
.Mac has been an apple service for quite a few years, since the iTools suite became subscription based. Although few people used it, as $99 was expensive for a toolkit that was nothing compared to what is offered by most ISPs, or even Google. Now, Apple has rebranded it Mobile Me
, complete with iPhone-esque icons and theme. At the very end of WWDC, apple casually mentioned that they would be releasing a new OS, titled Snow Leopard
, and it would only be speed improvements on Leopard. Is Apple determined to ignore what built it? Only time will tell, but so far, their practice with the iPhone has been disconcerting.
(No Ratings Yet)
Loading ...
Loading ...
User
Hate to tell you but Apple’s not going to change to do what you want. Even Microsoft can see the future - why do you think they even bothered to launch the Zune?
Apple has already stated that they are skating to where the puck is going to be, not to where the puck is now. Personal computing will become as much mobile computing as it is desktop computing. In most of the non-Western world, they’ve bypassed PCs, and gone only to cell phones. In the Western world, the PC market is saturated; in the future, desktop/laptop computers will become a niche, only used by content creators.
But everyone will have a "computer" to access and consume content, namely, iPhone and iPod. iPhone is not a cell phone in the traditional sense; Apple doesn’t care about voice calls. iPhone and iPod touch are both Internet communicators, or computers that interact with the Web (which is where content resides and is exchanged). MobileMe already has a web-based photo gallery and email; how long will it take before basic computing software (text editor, spreadsheet, database) shows up there as well? (See Apple’s emphasis on SproutCore).
Apple has diligently been working on one operating system to bridge both, and it will continue to develop OS X for both content creation computing and content consumption computing.
This Apple strategy has been clearly unfolding since the iPod. The iPod gave Apple experience in small-sized mobile computing products, huge production runs, and in large-scale marketing. The Apple Store gave Apple experience in selling products to everyone. The switch from PowerPC to Intel was made specifically for mobility, and the need for low-power chips for mobile devices. All the pieces are coming into place now.
@mark: You make many interesting points. It would be selfish for one to grumble about Apple expanding into other markets, and should be seen as a stone on their path to success.
I agree the switch to Intel was better in the long run, I have always felt this way.
My only gripe with the iPhone is its price and its carrier. The carrier will likely branch out as time goes on, and the price will likely come down.
And Apple is in the business of making money. And one way to make money is to focus on publicity. The iPhone has a lot of publicity around it. The operating system can only achieve a limited amount of publicity, usually in the geekier crowds, whereas the Phone transcends that, appealing not only to geeks, but to everyone interested in fancy devices; most people in our modern culture.
I’m a long time Mac developer–my first Mac was a "Macintosh." I attended WWDC this year and last (and the year before that and the year before that…)
First, WWDC 2007 had very little to do with the iPhone. It was mentioned that developers could create great web-based applications. There were a few sessions on creating web apps for the iPhone but that was about it. Most developers (myself included) were kvetching that there was no real SDK for developing real applications.
Second, your statement that Apple "casually mentioned that they would be releasing a new OS" at the end of this year’s WWDC is wrong. While sessions are under NDA so details can’t be given out, I don’t think it would be too wrong to mention that Snow Leopard was announced on Monday at the session titled "Mac OS X State of the Union." Furthermore, there were sessions which talked about some of the new technologies in Snow Leopard. Again, because of NDA, they weren’t plastered on Apple’s WWDC site.
Third, at this year’s WWDC, there was an iPhone track. There were a few sessions on web development, like last year, but most of them were about the iPhone’s SDK. But if you go through the list, you’ll find about 20 sessions were iPhone specific. Go through the WWDC schedule and look at the number of yellow (iPhone) sessions versus the number of Mac (blue) sessions. There were more Mac sessions than iPhone sessions. Furthermore, since the iPhone uses OS X, there were plenty of sessions that were relevant no matter which platform you were developing for: Objective-C is the same on the iPhone or the Mac. So the whole, "Apple is ignoring their developer base" is pretty much off-base.
Finally, the whole "iPhone is getting all the attention" whine. I’m sorry, but as a developer, I’m interested in developing applications, selling them, and making money doing so. I don’t really care all that much as to whether Steve Jobs is up there talking about iPhones or Macs. If Apple convinces someone to buy an iPhone, and the buyer enjoys the experience, they may consider buying a Mac. That helps me, as a developer, sell my application because Apple’s marketing has done the hard-lifting: Convincing the customer to switch platforms. Once they’ve come to the Mac, it’s much easier for me to convince them to buy my application. If they get there by purchasing an iPod or iPhone and then buying a Mac, or if they suddenly "see the light" and buy a Mac matters not a whit to me.
@Hidden: True, Apple did devote quite a bit of the WWDC space to mac. Having not attended, I can only make reports on what information is avalible through the press, via sites such as Macworld, Mac|Life, Apple.com, and others. As such, I don’t have as concrete a viewpoint, and some of my statements may be erroneous.
Also, as a developer, albeit one of much lower caliber than yourself (I only tinker around with cross platform quake3 vm code), I can understand how important it is to get a wide userbase. Most of my programming is done in spare time, but if it were my living, it is understandable.
As for convincing users to switch platforms, you are entirely right. If Apple is to take the opportunity given to it by Vista and its failure, they need all the help they can get. I still stick with my belief that Apple should broaden the iPhone to be on multiple networks, such as Verizon and Sprint. There is likely a contractual hurdle that is holding this in place.
I have always liked Apple products, through thick and thin. Sometimes i use alternatives, either because they are better (In the case of iTunes on windows), or because i have to for other reasons (why i use windows at all). Part of the way i am acting about the iPhone and other devices is out of jealousy, for the fact that i do not have one, and current financial situations prevent me from getting one.