« Pac-Man Bike Lights | Main | Mighty Mouse Easter Egg »
March 25, 2006
Was Apple Right All Along?
During the late 80's when Apple's future seemed dire and its attempt at becoming a more diversified company failed, many people claimed it was proof that the Microsoft way was right all along. Apple's vertical integration seemed to limit the company in what it could do. On the other hand, Microsoft was everywhere and wanted to make it easy for it to work on everything. Fast forward nearly 20 years later and the tables are turning; the resounding sound of what could be beginning decline of Microsoft was the recently announced of yet ANOTHER delay in Microsoft's long awaited Vista Operating System.
Vista was supposed to launch this 4th quarter, right in time for the holidays. All those brand new shiny PC's would have had Vista on them instead of XP. Microsoft's promises of usability, stability, and deep integration with entertainment and every extension of it, have now all been dashed. Instead people will get XP with service pack 2 pre-installed.
This gives Apple an opportunity it hasn't had in years if ever. This holiday season Apple will have a slurry of new products, (with more we've yet heard of), all running under OS X, all working together to create a seamless application of live, work, and play. It would seem Apple's vertical approach to the market was correct all along. The future is not about a PC and its operating system. True penetration means to make headway into the living room, into the workplace - unifying it all with those on the go. The experience is clean, simple, and fully integrated. Apple has slowly been doing this since the first OS X five years ago. Meanwhile, Microsoft has yet to release a full barrage of products that work as well together - software and hardware. The company is so large and its products are so scaled apart that it's clear; Microsoft is fragmented. The products they release are no longer innovative. In fact, it didn't surprise me at all to hear that many developers working with beta versions of Vista have all said, "it kinda looks like OS X." Again rumors fly Microsoft is just copying Apple.
They need help and fast. Window's Vista needs to go back to the drawing board, build from the ground up and address all the issues they have; place a legacy capability layer on top like Apple did during its transition from Classic to OS X. What's really sad is by the time Window's ships Vista (sometime next year), Apple's OS X 10.5 will be out. Will Microsoft again further delay Vista to play catch up? If so, it seems to me they will forever chase wild cats - namely the Cheetah, Puma, Jaguar, Panther, Tiger, and Leopard.
Posted by tranism at 10:26 PM | Permalink