Is Apple Getting Complacent?

by Chris Howard May 09, 2006

Whatever happened to the Applelution?

Remember the iMac? THE iMac? The Bondi Blue translucent all-in-one may have impressed some. The iMac G5/Intel all-in-one is impressive. But they are both ho-hum when compared to the iMac G4. Computers reached the pinnacle of design and usability with the iMac G4. No one, not even Apple, has been able to return to the summit of that mountain.

In early 2002, with the release of the iMac G4, Apple provided us a machine that was more than an evolution and more than a revolution. It was a machine ahead of its time. In reality, the design of the iMac G5 should have preceded the iMac G4. I wrote at the time there was only one suitable adjective for it—applelutionary. In an applelution, at least one step in the evolutionary process is jumped but at the same time, an applelution presents a revolution in how we understand a commodity, or use it.

If you think about PCs in 1982, they didn’t look much different come 2002. Whereas if you compared a 1982 Apple computer to a 2002 iMac, you’d go “Wow”. But if you showed people in 1982 what the 2002 iMac looked like, they’d be impressed but not surprised. In 1982 we expected computers of 20 years into the future to look a lot different. It took an applelution to get there though.

But is Apple still applelutionary? Certainly as far as ice skating on the Styx goes, Apple has almost started a revolution among the loyalists on several occasions, but has any product itself been up to the evolutionary and revolutionary design of the iMac G4. Has any Apple product since the iMac G4 skipped a step of the evolutionary process?

The Mac mini? Laptop with bring your own keyboard, mouse and monitor.

The iMac G4? Yawn. Laptop with the keyboard ripped out and a screen stuck in its place.

The Mighty Mouse? The what? Is anyone still using them? Mine’s gathering dust somewhere.

iPod nano? Every manufacturer’s got one of them.

In fact, the iMac G4 was so applelutionary, that not one other manufacturer was able to successfully copy it.

Is anyone applelutionary in 2006? Unless you’ve been too occupied with Hades bid for the next Winter Olympics, you’d know the answer to that question. One company is launching upon us this week its own applelution. That company of course is Nintendo with the Nintendo Wii and it’s applelutionary new controller.

Nintendo in 2006 has picked up the baton that Apple dropped—and it’s a very interesting baton at that. Time Magazine has areview of the Wii. The article says in part:

Nintendo has grasped two important notions that have eluded its competitors. The first is, Don’t listen to your customers. The hard-core gaming community is extremely vocal—they blog a lot—but if Nintendo kept listening to them, hard-core gamers would be the only audience it ever had. “[Wii] was unimaginable for them,” Iwata says. “And because it was unimaginable, they could not say that they wanted it. If you are simply listening to requests from the customer, you can satisfy their needs, but you can never surprise them. Sony and Microsoft make daily-necessity kinds of things. They have to listen to the needs of the customers and try to comply with their requests.

(Maybe Nintendo dropped the Revolution name because it knew the controller represents more, that it is an applelution.)

Is Apple listening too much to its customers? Apple has afterall given us many things various users have been clamoring for for years—a multi-button mouse; Intel inside; dual boot with Windows; flash based iPods; and iPods with video playback to name a few. Is this a dangerous path Apple walks? Is it headed down the Microsoft road where customer opinion dictates too much? Apple innovated itself through the recession, but does it now need to innovate itself through the good times?

Will Apple pick up the applelution baton again? Does Apple need another applelutionary product?

Comments

  • Luke - stop it! You’re messin with my head and confusing me smile

    I think we all do agree with that Wikipedia definition - although looking at your first post, you do seem to prefer if there’s a bit of bloodshed.wink

    Chris Howard had this to say on May 14, 2006 Posts: 1209
  • Dammit, where’s Beeblebrox!? :D

    Luke Mildenhall-Ward had this to say on May 14, 2006 Posts: 299
  • He’s off playing with his new iMac. We probably won’t see much of him now. Lucky sod! smile

    Chris Howard had this to say on May 14, 2006 Posts: 1209
  • Aye reckon that when you look at the real central essential software that we now have, there’s actually no ROOM for any more killer fist of death apps. I mean we have decentish-enough-for-people officey productivity sofware available and highly cemented in our collective consciousness, the idea that you could produce some new piece of software that is going to Revolutionise The Computing Experience for the majority or a large fraction of users is far fetched.

    Surely the real thing that Apple is trying to be focused on is providing the Killer Platform - the best collective experience for most people.

    When you think about it, the real killer apps/features are the ones that enable the platform itself. For instance, the killer thing about the Wii isn’t the control method itself, but the fact that it opens up new, varied, fun possibilities to the end user’s experience. On the desktop computing side of things, this sort of deep enabling can’t normally be achieved by single apps, however swankay they might be, but by kickass bundled software running on a kickass system.

    Coo coo ca choo, the idea that an app can come along all savioury and convince the masses to Switch is, de facto, der simplistik.

    Benji had this to say on May 14, 2006 Posts: 927
  • Oh and by the by Luke, I’m totally convinced by the Why controller too. If the word didn’t make me physically ill I’d even call it an applelution.

    Benji had this to say on May 14, 2006 Posts: 927
  • I think you’re right actually… it’s likely not possible to have a new killer app.

    But what about a killer hardware+software innovation (A la Nintendo)? I think that’s where it’s gonna happen. There are endless hardware/software combos that Apple could pull off, whereby leaping way ahead of Microsoft, where it would take years to implement a new OS capable of this new killer technology, let alone to begin considering making it a standard feature on hardware. After all… This is what Apple have been doing all along….

    Luke Mildenhall-Ward had this to say on May 14, 2006 Posts: 299
  • Yeah, there’s still room for killer devices - the iPod, the Wii.

    In computers, the “killer app” would be a new way of interacting with the computer that vastly improved both the ease of use and productivity. This is what the Wiimote is doing in the game console arena.

    And then patents have to tie things up so tightly that no one can copy it.

    For Apple, a Tablet computer that really works is one possibility.

    Chris Howard had this to say on May 14, 2006 Posts: 1209
  • Windows is a killer app… kill your computer smile

    Chris Howard had this to say on May 15, 2006 Posts: 1209
  • But what about a killer hardware+software innovation (A la Nintendo)?
    uh-huh:
    On the desktop computing side of things, this sort of deep enabling can’t normally be achieved by single apps, however swankay they might be, but by kickass bundled software running on a kickass system.

    the “killer app” would be a new way of interacting with the computer that vastly improved
    I agree that this is the most exciting possible direction for innovation over the next few years. We’re living in a post-Quicksilver world now after all. But we should be quite clear that this is really, really, impossibly, fantastically hard - if Apple can pull of such a system then they’ll be owed the loving allegiance we give them so readily.

    Benji had this to say on May 15, 2006 Posts: 927
  • pull off*

    Benji had this to say on May 15, 2006 Posts: 927
  • I agree very much in what you said about the imac g4. First time i seen the imac g4 i fell in live with the design ,It was like someone went in to the future and brought back the imac g4 to show us what computers would be like in the future.the g5 design is really nice but it does not have the wow factor the imac g4 has .I got my self the g4 imac last year on ebay it works great serves my needs i get so many comments about the design and the glass like speakers that are with it.It always gets people eye when people come to my home won’t change it for anythingi know the g5 works faster and better then the g4 but i love the design of the g4.

    roman39 had this to say on May 26, 2006 Posts: 1
  • The first time I even considered an iMac was the G5 design.

    Luke Mildenhall-Ward had this to say on May 27, 2006 Posts: 299
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