Chris Seibold's Profile

Oh, if you have any problems you can mail me at chris@applematters.com I'm happy to help out. I still remember a little bit from one of the books I wrote.

Thanks or the compliment Greg. Actually mocking one up and dragging it around left me with a lot of questions. Your math seems correct but Apple has never seem to grasp the idea that tech costs come down and they can make up the difference elsewhere. Maybe Apple is thinking ahead with the slate but I doubt it. I know there are rumors that Apple has already lined up developers and publishers for the device but I am a bit skeptical. My checks have revealed no certainty in the publishing world. I suspect that if Apple doesn't think the company can get 30% margins on the thing they wouldn't be making it. Besides, has apple ever come out with a product that left people thinking "Wow, that is surprisingly cheap"?

"Really?" Yes, really. The reason people will believe the message is because they already hate Verizon. This just gives something else to latch onto. People go with a cell phone company because they "have" to have a cell phone, they still detest the companies. "You think if Microsoft made an ad accusing Apple of monopolistic practices, people would “buy into that” just because they see it in a commercial?" Since Apple isn't already hated, people see Apple stuff as a luxury, it probably wouldn't work. Not that it wouldn't be honest. But since when was the point of advertising being honest?

"Neither of us knows what went on back then. We don’t know if it was IBM’s mistake in not asking for an exclusive license, because they trusted too much in the BIOS being copy writable. You are assuming that Bill Gates had a grand diabolical, innovative, plan. That is, he negotiated his contract with IBM, in the midst of great positional weakness, so that five years later he could take advantage of IBM’s mistake regarding Compaq. This was an event which no one could imagine back then. You are applying hindsight to derive an absurd conclusion." Actually it is pretty well known. Here's the quick run down of what happened: IBM was looking for a system for it's personal computer. Everyone in the know was sure it would be QDOS. Then there was some weirdness, when IBM went to talk to the folks about QDOS they refused to sign a confidentiality agreement. IBM's second choice was Microsoft. Problem was that Microsoft didn't have what IBM was looking for. So Microsoft talked to the QDOS folks and reached an agreement. They had to change the product a bit. Microsoft then had what it needed to sell to IBM. And here is where it is interesting. IBM asked Microsoft what the price was for the software. Microsoft said it would rather license than sell the software. IBM, perfectly willing to buy the software, was also perfectly willing to license the software. IBM's position was that the profits were in the hardware. So IBM went with the licensing scheme. It made a lot of sense at the time but Microsoft saw the future more clearly than IBM did. Which is weird, I started out defending Apple as an innovative company and now I'm defending Microsoft. BTW, the fate of OS/2 was likely sealed by Microsoft tactics. And don't forget when everyone says Apple licensed too late, they are dead wrong. Apple licensed too cheap. The company traded a license to the look and feel of Mac OS for a promise to make Mac software. And Apple traded it to Microsoft.

I am pretty certain I mentioned microsft's innovation in the article... "A great example of this type of innovation is Windows. The original Windows should have been called Tiles both because the windows didn't overlap and Tiles rhymed with Piles which could be short for Piles of s.... and that is what the first version of Windows actually was. A lot of companies give up when a first attempt fails. Not Microsoft. Billy G and the crew just kept chugging along until they had a serviceable program. The innovative thing about the program? Nothing, the Mac could do more (at first), but Windows ran on generic PC hardware. Pretty innovative when you consider that every other company was trying to push hardware. Not sexy, but Microsoft did okay. And not only did Microsoft do okay there is a non-trivial argument to be made that Microsoft's innovation took computing to the masses."

I'll try to dig up the article that inspired this for you Beeb. It was an article wherein it was opined that Apple didn't innovate at all, merely stole the ideas of others and went on to big success. The thing that struck me about the piece was the comments that sincerely agreed with the article. I'm down with the idea that Apple gets too much credit for innovation, there are people who will tell you that, I dunno, multitasking didn't exist until OS X or something, but the notion that Apple doesn't innovate because Apple didn't invent the concept of a touchscreen cell phone seems to be a bit labored to me. Urban Bard's example with the loom pretty much sums up my whole point in a few sentences. Which means Urban Bard's comment was better than my whole article. Curse you Urban Bard!

"One of Jobs’s biggest mistakes was targeting IBM instead of Microsoft in the mid-80’s and not going after the enterprise market enough (also, Macs were too expensive). That strategic error has relegated the Mac to minority status in computing." This article was written with an eye towards stuff after Steve's return. I'd say you're right, the biggest mistake (so far) Steve made was thinking that he was competing against IBM (hardware) instead of competing against software. The price of Macs was more the fault of Sculley than Steve. The app store is a completely different issue. It is both the best and worst thing Apple has ever done. I don't see a mass exodus to Android coming though I don't see that as a bad thing if it happened.

Hi Greg, Half the point of the list was to point out that the failures of Apple since the return of Steve weren't all that big. The other half was to point out that Steve Jobs is not magic. Everyone thinks that Steve creates hits with force of personality but that just isn't true. The products actually have to be pretty damn good. It isn't enough that Apple loves them. Why the hell wasn't the apple tv on the list? What am I thinking?