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Is Apple On the Move For Great Gains? |
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 Wow, what the hell happened? October has come and nearly gone already, leaving us with all sorts of cool new stuff from Apple. The Mac Web is collectively like a kid after Christmas who's been playing with all his or her presents and the newness of them is just starting to wear off. And even though the luster is starting to fade, it looks like Apple is positioning itself very nicely for a run at a lot more marketshare and greater profits.
Why, just look at Panther f'rinstance. There are articles left and right about how grrrrrrr-eat the latest incarnation of OS X is. And some of them aren't even from the usual Apple-cheering-section sites! It seems that (non-Mac) news sites are finally getting it that OS X is secure, user-friendly, and has a helluva lot of killer apps. (There has been some negative press about OS X, but most of that is about security holes that have been blown out of proportion by a company that is in bed with Microsoft - so much so that they fired one of their own employees for telling the truth about security holes in Windows!).
Apple is also starting to make headway with lots of business and government facilities. Pixar is supposedly switching (about time), and Apple has done a lot with OS X to make it usable by the government. It was rumored a while back that Apple had hidden login images within OS X for certain government branches. Plus, you know that Uncle Sam is ruing the day he ever shook hands with Microsoft. If you hadn't heard, the story is that mere days after the Department of Homeland Security made a deal with Microsoft, viruses were created to take advantage of a buffer overrun vulnerability in Windows. The triumvirate of viruses known as Blaster, Nachi and Sobig then proceeded to make the Department of Homeland Security look like the trainees in Police Academy (before Mahoney turned them around). Oh hey, the State Department was hit by the Welchia virus too, and unable to issue visas for a time. You bet your bippy that the U.S. government is looking for something more secure than what Microsoft has to offer.
Let's now turn our attention to hardware. Apple has solidified their product line by debuting the G4 iBook. They've also revved up the eMacs a bit, revamped the G4 PowerBook line, and last but definitely not least, introduced the PowerMac G5. In almost every case, if you try to match up a Wintel computer against one of Apple's feature for feature, the Wintel goes above Apple in price. Not to mention the style factor, plus the ability to run the world's slickest OS. And word is getting out about Apple's great hardware. Look at the G5 "Big Mac" cluster. It's now up to third overall in the world in terms of computer power, and it cost only a fraction of what the other clusters cost. And, as the folks at Virginia Tech say, they still have a bunch of tricks up their sleeve to boost the performance of the cluster as a whole. The cluster is turning a lot of heads - heads attached to bodies that are in the position to spend LOTS of money on LOTS of PowerMac G5's.
Aside from OS X, Apple has a lot going for it in the way of software. We touched on Apple's killer apps in earlier in this article, but let's look at it this way. Apple offers iMovie, iDVD, iPhoto, iCal, Safari, iTunes, and Mail FOR FREE. These are phenomally powerful programs and all have Apple's elegance and ease-of-use. No other company has anything close, not even Microsoft, and no one offers this much for free. Granted, Apple makes you buy their hardware, but the advantages to owning a Mac are growing daily.
And we're not even close to being done here! iTunes has the wonderful Music Store built-in, and now it's available on the Windows side. Some people in the Windows world have seen problems with the software, but Apple addressed that with a quick fix within days, and besides, most people have nothing but good things to say about iTMS for Winders. Even if the iPod and iTunes don't have Apple's intended effect of serving as a trojan horse to elicit defectors to the Mac, Apple should still make lots of money with iTMS. Plus, Apple now has an experienced team of Windows programmers, and I think that the odds are even money that they're right now working on their next Windows application. Will it be an 'iLife' application? Maybe, maybe not. Apple won't make any money on those, and that may not be giving people much reason to switch if they can use, say, Keynote, on their Windows box (perish the thought).
That about sums things up for where Apple is at. So where is Microsoft at right now? With their immense resources, surely they're hard at work on the next great thing, innovating like the great company they are, right!?
Well, no. (And my tongue was so firmly in cheek that it's actually poking out the other side now.)
Microsoft just handed over $200 million in a settlement with six different states. But don't worry, they'll play nice from now on, because as Microsoft's general counsel, Brad Smith, says, "We need to focus not only on resolving these lawsuits but on building more collaborative relationships with the rest of our industry and with people in government."
On top of that, Ballmer and Gates are spreading their F.U.D. like none other can spread F.U.D. - trying to quell the notion that open-source software could possibly be anywhere as good as Windows. I think the folks at As The Apple Turns said it best:
There's something to be said for an operating system beloved by legions upon legions of geeks who can find obscure bugs, load up the source code, and fix the problems themselves, without having to submit a bug report to Microsoft and wait six months for a reply. Ballmer seems to think that people would rather have some freakin' "road map" than an actual fix. But the man also shaves with a crude sharpened stone tool and occasionally eats babies, so we suppose we'll just chalk that up to cultural differences.
Never ones to mince words, were they? (And who knew that Ballmer and Bono shared eating habits?)
Anyhow, let us not forget that with Longhorn, due in 2006 or so, Microsoft is once again pillaging ideas from OS X. One of which, Quartz, has been around since the Public Beta. They've even managed to make a bad copy of Panther's brushed metal look. You would think the look and feel of an OS would be the last thing you develop, but I digress.
Summing up everything, Microsoft is a giant that might be starting to show signs of weakness. If they do in fact stumble, Apple is poised to make some great strides to catch up to the Redmond behemoth. If nothing else, watching the Apple/Microsoft struggle in the upcoming years should prove at least as enjoyable as watching Black Mama, White Mama (But for the love of god, let's just hope there's no Ballmerian equivalent to Pam Grier's shower scene ... yeeeeuuuurrrrghh!)
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October 31 2003, 8:37 AM EDT, by
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Comments:
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| Jobzzz |
10/31/03, 6:52 PM EDT |
Hehe nice summary, Mac [edited]Windows user[/edited]. So Apple's market share will go up from 3% to 3.1%. Who the [edited]naughty word[/edited] cares?
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| JACK |
10/31/03, 7:43 PM EDT |
obviously not you.
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| glasspusher |
10/31/03, 9:32 PM EDT |
Clearly, Apple is doing something right if Windoze fools feel the need to post nasty stuff here. Better keep that rear view mirror handy, M$, you're about to be blown away...
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| yeash28 |
11/1/03, 1:08 AM EDT |
who cares jobzzz? obviously you cared enough to make a post, [edited]pants-head[/edited] ! reply to that or are you too busy downloading a security patch?
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| Kurt Z. |
11/1/03, 11:00 AM EDT |
It is amazing to see how much Apple has progressed on their operating system from the pre OS X area and it is exciting to think about what it will be like by the time Longhorn releases.
Less than 6 months ago I jumped on board with the purchase of my Powerbook G4. I have never been dissapointed. It's funny how my coworkers were dismayed when I bought my powerbook to now wanting one for themselves.
As time goes on, more and more people are going to see the cool factor of the mac and just switch. Hell, even *the boss* at work bought a G5 just so he didn't have to worry much about viruses!
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| iKen |
11/2/03, 12:31 PM EDT |
Jonahan, your new avatar is scary. It's giving me nightmares!
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| Jonahan |
11/4/03, 4:47 PM EDT |
Sorry iKen, that was my Halloween avatar - and I forgot to change it. I'll try to find something a little less disturbing ... =)
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