Is Apple becoming Microsoft

This is an interesting perspective, if a little longwinded. The premise being now that Apple has power, they are turning against their roots and becoming the new MS.

I guess power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Jobs - Is Apple Becoming Arrogant? (Nothing Here But Trees)

I haven't read the article, but I will say now that Apple is no longer the "underdog" they do things sometimes that I don't think is right and sometimes even might verge on abuse of their market position.

Now whether they do it purposely, do it because of Steve's ego, or unwittingly do it because they haven't come to grips yet with their market position, I don't know.

But I will say that if Apple continues down the path it's been going, it will eventually get slapped hard by the Justice Department so hopefully somebody internally in the company is on top of this.

Can you put a leash on a CEO?

Job's aggressiveness was fine when that's exactly what Apple needed to succeed and press forward in the market to make money. But now, they're going to need to transform from a "I do it how I want, when I want. I'm always right, you're always wrong", mentality to something with more finesse.

Sure, keep up the good work and do what you're doing, just when you make a mistake (iPhone 4 antenna fiasco), don't basically call your consumers idiots and tell them that they're doing something as simple as holding a cell phone wrong. I know that it's really been blown out of proportion, but when you're becoming as high profile as Apple is it starts to become more beneficial to not shoot first and ask questions later.

I'm not even referring to how they treat customers, it's worse than that in some cases. It's where they attempt to use market presence to limit choice.

The way they reportedly threatened the record labels about selling music on Amazon is a good example.

It's that type of stuff that will get them in the most trouble and makes them look the most like Microsoft.

People vote with their pocket book when Apple quits making increasing profits quarter after quarter year after year then they need to change until then I don't see it happening.

osxx said:

People vote with their pocket book when Apple quits making increasing profits quarter after quarter year after year then they need to change until then I don't see it happening.

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That's only partially true, and it isn't why Microsoft changed.

Microsoft only changed because the US an European government found them in violation of anti-trust laws.

Apple won't be forced to change by the consumer, but if they unfairly leverage their position, they'll be forced to change by the law.

No. Apple has competent executives.

The author has made a good point about possible and actual issues for developers. And that's about it. Stating that Apple's iPhone 4 is to 3GS as Microsoft Windows Vista was to its predecessor XP—the return rate being even lower for the former in Apple's case, is drivel. Note that I'm not even questioning his comparison between software and hardware.

If sending the phone to Apple in the rare case of replacing the battery is too much of a hassle, the choice is simple: buy another phone. I'm not saying that sealed-in batteries are a good thing per se, but if it considerably extends the battery life, then I don't really mind. The 3GS is my first iPhone, by the way. That's when the battery capacity was good enough for me to accept that it was non-user-replaceable. Until the release of the 3GS, there was no way I would buy an iPhone. Everyone has a choice.

I also don't understand why his 3GS would run slow on iOS 4. Mine worked perfectly as always after the upgrade. Maybe the author has a 3G and not 3GS?

I definitely agree with the author, but some of his examples are too case by case based. For example, the iPhone upgrade not working. When I upgraded from Tiger to Leopard on my mac, it ran like a dog. Instead of instantly downgrading, i backed up my files and reformatted the drive. I did this for Snow Leopard and I have no issues regarding stability. This would be a good first step if my 3GS was giving me problems.

I think what he is getting at in terms of Microsoft is too much brand diversification, and then intimidating their customers into using sub-par products. They have tried to get their hands into every sector of the tech market, while their core (Windows, Office, Exchange) suffer. Bill Gates summed this up when he envisioned every computer in the world running Microsoft software. In this world, I would have a computer with only the following software/peripherals/services:
-Windows 7
-Office 12
-Bing
-Internet Explorer
-Outlook Express
-Microsoft branded mouse/keyboard
-A Zune HD
-A Hotmail account

By comparison, Apple's ideal customer has:
-OS X (but windows or linux if you want)
-Any word processor, but if you like, Pages
-Google, Bing, Yahoo
-Safari, but Mozilla and Chrome are looking good
-an iPhone, but if you want porn, an Android
-etc...

Apple has realized that their customers don't need to be intimidated into using only their software. Microsoft hasn't.

jpepperman95 said:

In this world, I would have a computer with only the following software/peripherals/services:
-Windows 7
-Office 12
-Bing
-Internet Explorer
-Outlook Express
-Microsoft branded mouse/keyboard
-A Zune HD
-A Hotmail account

By comparison, Apple's ideal customer has:
-OS X (but windows or linux if you want)
-Any word processor, but if you like, Pages
-Google, Bing, Yahoo
-Safari, but Mozilla and Chrome are looking good
-an iPhone, but if you want porn, an Android
-etc...

Apple has realized that their customers don't need to be intimidated into using only their software. Microsoft hasn't.

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Ok now let's be fair....

Apple doesn't include any browser except Safari in OS X. You can install others, but you can also install others in Windows including Chrome and Firefox. And Microsoft, at least in Europe, gives you a choice of browsers when you intall. Apple doesn't.

Microsoft gives you a choice of search providers in IE, just like you can change from the Google default of Safari.

Apple has tied the iPod to only work with iTunes.

Apple supplies Apple-branded mice and keyboards with their Macs.

Apple includes Mail app and bundles iLife with their new Macs. They also include at least a trial of iWorks.

I mean let's be serious here, neither really is a pillar of open standards and ecosystems.

jpepperman95 said:

In this world, I would have a computer with only the following software/peripherals/services:
-Windows 7
-Office 12
-Bing
-Internet Explorer
-Outlook Express
-Microsoft branded mouse/keyboard
-A Zune HD
-A Hotmail account

By comparison, Apple's ideal customer has:
-OS X (but windows or linux if you want)
-Any word processor, but if you like, Pages
-Google, Bing, Yahoo
-Safari, but Mozilla and Chrome are looking good
-an iPhone, but if you want porn, an Android
-etc...

Apple has realized that their customers don't need to be intimidated into using only their software. Microsoft hasn't.

Click to expand...

I have a self built PC with the peripherals and specifications that I want and that are not pre picked by another company. Apart from that, this is what's in my world.

Windows 7
Chrome
Google
iTunes
iPhone
iPod
Apple aluminum keyboard
Logitech mouse
Web mail
Comcast e-mail account
1&1 e-mail account
Yahoo e-mail account

The only thing I might possibly be missing is OS X.

Kind of goes against the picture you're trying to paint.

I always figured that is what Sooper Fast! meant in your specs.

dtravis7 said:

I always figured that is what Sooper Fast! meant in your specs.

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I have MBP that I use for photo, video, and sound editing. I'd like a pro for that or at least an i7.

That and I can't mention that which shall not be named.

Didn't read the article, but here's my 2-bits on the issue:

Apple has been riding the pop-culture wave, well past their welcome. The iMac started bringing them back to life, but the iPod really shot them to stardom. They've still managed to do quite well with this, especially with the advent of the iPhone, but what we're starting to see now is the beginning of a revolution.

Apple is starting to let their products suffer a little bit. And by that, I mean they are dragging out the timeline between updates, creating hardware designs that are faulty, they don't listen to the customer base concerning desires of design, and their customer service, which has historically been the best, has seen an increase in complaints.

Add to that their head honcho. Steve Jobs, a visionary to be sure, has always pushed off the faults of their products on others, usually the developers or the customers. They have largely been overlooked for this by their loyal fan-base, however, that doesn't fly in the mainstream. That's ignoring his comments, which scare creators, that desktop computing is dead.

There's also all of the lawsuits they pursue, or have been pursued against. This creates the image, no longer of the hippy, tree-hugging computer hacker favorite, but of the evil corporate giant.

Personally, the only apple products I like are their PC line. OSX rocks my socks, and they provide a good interface. However, I do see the tide turning in a way I don't necessarily like, and apple as a company does many things I don't agree with, as does their eccentric head. I've found myself using more and more linux products in my daily life.

Jobs has become Apples own worst enemy.

He has slowly started to become a caricature of a fashion designer from Zoolander. He no longer seems to care about the functionality of what they produce as he cares more about the design and how it looks.

His disdain for buttons on the mouse turned off more than a few laptop users, my wife was one of those that hated the fact that she could do a right mouse click that she stopped using her macbook and went back to a PC... I fully expect that we shall soon see a shiny black or white slate that looks oh so sexy, It will be Jobs vision of a new computer, yet it will have no screen or buttons on it because they would interfere with the flow of the design. When a journalist asks how user are supposed to see anything on the screen which isn't there Jobs will simply say, "I will know what is on the screen so we do not need a screen to confirm what I know."

At the rate Apple is going that is where they are headed, to become some futuristic design firm that parades around useless products that look good but have no functionality because the function would get in the way of the design.

Long term I would short Apple shares, because as long as Jobs is there the company is at risk of self destructing.

Something which I don't think has been mentioned, I believe may be relevant and important to consider. Steve Jobs has always been the same man you are seeing more and more in the press today. Nothing has changed him. He has always been the visionary and has always been the business man as well. The public's perception of both Apple and Mr. Jobs is the only thing which has changed as far as I can tell.

Why might this be ? First of all, Apple has never been more popular than they are now. We are living in an age of media rich content everywhere we look, and Apple has managed to step up to each and every platform opportunity which has crossed their paths.

More people than ever are using Apple products. This has finally started to make an bigger than ever impact in the lives of your every day Joe Schmoe, and not just your tech geek crowd. Up until recently (half a decade?), Apple had to defend its self to every hater and had a very niche geek audience to help protect them.

Now however, some of those same haters have decided to lighten up, open their minds, and try the other side. There's also an abundance of newly budding average moms, dads and grandparents, as well as just new computer users whom are being subjected to media pop culture, with Apple in the forefront of it all, because they are absolute GENIUS marketing gurus!

More consumers, more goods produced, changing economic structures and more pressure can create a lot of unforeseen problems, not just 100% joy. There of course will be more complaints, customer service and relation calls etc etc.. Apple may need to hold more internal meetings in order to get to where most people's expectations already lay.

Believe me, I'm the last person who would make excuses for Jobs or Apple, or any other company whom is held in high esteem, makes billions of dollars and slags off... but you really have to look at things from every possible angle. Funny thing, a friend asked if I wanted to be an Apple "Genius" when I got back to NY... I told him that I doubt I could work for a company like Apple and left it like that since I didn't want to offend him. He asked me to expand on what I said and simply stated that "I", was likely a poor candidate. But who knows... let's see what they would pay. ;D

Doug

thomas998 said:

He no longer seems to care about the functionality of what they produce as he cares more about the design and how it looks.

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I don't agree and I would much rather deal with a company that designs and considers usability like Apple than a company who strictly builds for the utilitarian.

Apple has always been more concerned with design and usability than any other company. There's nothing new or different now. It's also why they are more expensive, because they won't compromise design and function for price.

His disdain for buttons on the mouse turned off more than a few laptop users, my wife was one of those that hated the fact that she could do a right mouse click that she stopped using her macbook and went back to a PC

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You do know you can right click on a trackpad? Two-finger tap. Pretty easy.

At the rate Apple is going that is where they are headed, to become some futuristic design firm that parades around useless products that look good but have no functionality because the function would get in the way of the design.

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You're just not happy because they're not designed how you would design them or they don't function exactly as you want. But Apple's approach is no different than it ever has been.

There is an easy solution, don't buy the product if it doesn't meet you needs.

Doug b said:

Something which I don't think has been mentioned, I believe may be relevant and important to consider. Steve Jobs has always been the same man you are seeing more and more in the press today. Nothing has changed him. He has always been the visionary and has always been the business man as well. The public's perception of both Apple and Mr. Jobs is the only thing which has changed as far as I can tell.

Click to expand...

I would have to agree with most of this. Very good point. It's easy to please a few loyalists, that are predisposed to wanting to be pleased anyhow. However, the larger Apple becomes, the more folks they have to please. These new folks are not necessarily hostile to Apple/Jobs, but they also don't have any history with the company. The new audience is increasingly made up of folks who don't share the camaraderie of having gone through the "dark times" and come out on the other side. These folks are not use to some of the decisions that Apple makes about their products. "Because Steve said so..." doesn't really fly with this crowd. They could care less about Steve and have no more faith in him than any other corporate "face". Apple is an institution to it's base audience, and it's just another electronics designer to the rest. Apple needs to adjust their corporate communications structure at some point IMHO. Maybe Apple hasn't changed, but their audience has. Sometimes the company that wants to "change everything" needs to change a bit as well.

On a side note, I saw it written somewhere that there are some who feel that Apple has increasingly become a gadget design company. It's a deliberate decision on their part. Computers are apparently not their main focus any more. Remember, they aren't Apple Computer anymore. Their items all clearly say "Designed in California by Apple. Made in China". This is fine by me in that they seem to be pretty good at designing gadgets. More income from gadgets should mean more money for OS X development, right? I guess my concern with it all is that I like Apple primarily for their stout Unix OS X. It's soft where it needs to be and tough in the bones. It seems the days when their excellent OS slides to second or third priority on thier own list are eventually coming. I will mourn that day. Windows was really cool in it's day too, and MS screwed it up pretty good with losing focus, becoming to rigid and squeezing out choice (EU anti-trust anyone?). It's now a headless joke that's losing market share slowly but steadily in most areas. Let's all hope Steve leaves or has an epiphany before those days come.

schweb said:

I don't agree and I would much rather deal with a company that designs and considers usability like Apple than a company who strictly builds for the utilitarian.

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Sorry but reality says otherwise. A cellphone needs to be designed so that someone picks it up and it works, it doesn't need to be designed in such a way that there is a right and wrong way to hold, it doesn't need to designed so that you need to wrap a condom on it so that your fingers don't foul the signal... those aren't utilitarian those are simple fundamentals that no one in his right mind would ignore.

schweb said:

Apple has always been more concerned with design and usability than any other company. There's nothing new or different now. It's also why they are more expensive, because they won't compromise design and function for price.

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That was the way they were in the beginning... but would you have ever expected them to have designed the original Macintosh so that it could only be used if the screen was precisely 24 inches from your eyes and the keyboard needed to be perpendicular to the monitor and any deviation would cause the computer to randomly drop data? I didn't think so.

And please don't give some silly claim of "they won't compromise design and function for price." As near as I can tell they completely dropped the ball on the new Iphone... I'm simply not sure if they failed to insulate the metal rim because it might have added 5 cents to the total cost of each cellphone or because it wouldn't have given Jobs the look he wanted. At any rate both design and function of ANY product is a compromise based on price.... if price was truly not an issue I'm pretty sure Apple would be selling Iphones carved from saphires with all the wires made of 24 carat gold... price is always a constraint.

schweb said:

You do know you can right click on a trackpad? Two-finger tap. Pretty easy.

Click to expand...

Yep well aware of it... of course prior to the tapping you could only get the right mouse click by holding a key down.... simple fact is a stand alone button was and is easier to do... in the pre double tap days I could do a right mouse click with 1 finger on the same hand that was using the trackpad on a windows computer, on an Apple it took two hands... and frankly not putting a right mouse button on was nothing but stubborn stupidity from Apple.

schweb said:

You're just not happy because they're not designed how you would design them or they don't function exactly as you want. But Apple's approach is no different than it ever has been.

There is an easy solution, don't buy the product if it doesn't meet you needs.

Click to expand...

You simply come across as an Apple groupie that can't face reality or someone that isn't really familiar with Apple over the years. My experience with Apple dates back to Lisa... so I'm very familiar with where they started and how they've changed, I simply see them through the eyes of a users not of a kool-aid drinking Apple groupie that sees Apple as a religion that can do no wrong.

The only thing you've said that I can agree with is the don't buy the product if it doesn't meet your needs. I only buy the products that do. That's the reason I have both Apple and non-Apple hardware in my house. I buy the products that work best for what I need... but not simply because they have an Apple logo somewhere on them.

thomas998 said:

Sorry but reality says otherwise. A cellphone needs to be designed so that someone picks it up and it works, it doesn't need to be designed in such a way that there is a right and wrong way to hold, it doesn't need to designed so that you need to wrap a condom on it so that your fingers don't foul the signal... those aren't utilitarian those are simple fundamentals that no one in his right mind would ignore.

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And until this design, that's exactly what the iPhones did. **** happens. I'm not defending Apple's response about how it's the user's response for holding the phone wrong, but how many other companies have had terrible designs or major design flaws in their products. Apple isn't the first and isn't going to be the last.

thomas998 said:

Yep well aware of it... of course prior to the tapping you could only get the right mouse click by holding a key down.... simple fact is a stand alone button was and is easier to do... in the pre double tap days I could do a right mouse click with 1 finger on the same hand that was using the trackpad on a windows computer, on an Apple it took two hands... and frankly not putting a right mouse button on was nothing but stubborn stupidity from Apple.

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And prior to the two button tap on the track pad, I was using (still am) a Logitech mouse that had two buttons. Astonishingly enough, the right button worked exactly like a right click, bringing up a context menu.

So you're just plain wrong on this. Apple may be a fan of the one button mouse and supplying it with their systems, but that doesn't mean you can't use a third party two button mouse and right click with that. People that continually point out that OS X doesn't allow a right click generally have very little knowledge about Apple computer systems.

thomas998 said:

You simply come across as an Apple groupie that can't face reality or someone that isn't really familiar with Apple over the years. My experience with Apple dates back to Lisa... so I'm very familiar with where they started and how they've changed, I simply see them through the eyes of a users not of a kool-aid drinking Apple groupie that sees Apple as a religion that can do no wrong.

The only thing you've said that I can agree with is the don't buy the product if it doesn't meet your needs. I only buy the products that do. That's the reason I have both Apple and non-Apple hardware in my house. I buy the products that work best for what I need... but not simply because they have an Apple logo somewhere on them.

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My experience with Apple dates back to the first gen Intel MBP's. I'm definitely not biased towards their company, but I can see you just don't have a very good opinion of them.