Re: Apple's Spat With Google Is Getting Personal

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

Begin forwarded message:

From: Gene Spafford <spaf () cerias purdue edu>
Date: March 14, 2010 11:06:44 PM EDT
To: dave () farber net
Cc: "ip" <ip () v2 listbox com>
Subject: For [IP]: Apple's Spat With Google Is Getting Personal

> > Steve's obsession with control and monopoly was wrong then, and it's wrong now.    It's wrong for the public, and it 
> > WILL prove to be wrong for Apple.

I keep seeing statements like this, and yet Apple stock is soaring, their percentage of the desktop market has been 
increasing, the iPhone continues to be a major player, the iPod and iTunes are iconic, and preorders of the tablet have 
been incredible for a product that few people have actually touched.  

Windows is saddled with huge amounts of cruft to support all sorts of oddball add-ons and one-off peripherals. Support 
and compatibility are nightmares and that is possibly part of the reason that Windows has been saddled with so much 
malware over the years.   The availability of bare hardware has led to nightmares with piracy and related support 
issues.  The Apple approach to the controlled platform has a great many advantages for production of integrated, tested 
software.   Yeah, it annoys the people who want to tinker with the software themselves, but that is a minority of the 
potential market.  if the goal is to sell a substantial number of high-quality products that people love, and then 
innovate new ones, then Apple's strategy isn't too bad at all.  

What is likely key to Apple's future success will be if they listen to customer concerns and address enough of them: if 
Apple makes the changes there will be little push by the customers to be able to do it themselves.

So, I wouldn't be so quick to write off Apple based on their strategy.      And that's not even considering the 
increasing diversification that involves different customers and different expectations.  I suspect Apple is going to 
be a going concern for some time to come.

--spaf




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