Microsoft and Apple Rumble Into Middle Age 367
Hugh Pickens writes "Bill Briggs writes on MSNBC that the two tech titans are rumbling into middle age as Microsoft marked its 35th birthday on Sunday and Apple turned 34 late last week. But while Microsoft, to some, appears a tad flabby in the middle — a Chrysler Town & Country driver with a 9 pm bedtime — Apple, in some eyes, looks sleeker and younger — a hipster in a ragtop Beemer packed with chic friends sporting mobile toys. 'The difference between the two companies is that Apple has been fearless about transformational change while Microsoft has been reluctant to leave its past behind,' says Casey Ayers, president of MegatonApps. 'Microsoft has always been loath to change and risk alienating some of its customers, but its inability to leave the past behind has left their product line bloated and dysfunctional.' On current accounting ledgers, Microsoft overshadows Apple: Microsoft's market cap is $255.75 billion; Apple's is $213.98 billion. But Apple is getting awfully big — awfully fast — in Microsoft's rearview mirror. Consider that a decade ago Microsoft's market cap was almost $590 billion and Apple's was about $16 billion. So while Apple cheered its opening weekend of iPad sales, what wish should Microsoft have made when it blew out its birthday candles Sunday? 'More than anything, Microsoft's birthday wish should be for fearless leadership,' says Ayers. 'Without someone at the top who feels an urgency to constantly innovate in meaningful ways, Microsoft will shrink and become less relevant with each birthday to come.'"
Been saying this for years. (Score:3, Interesting)
Woo hoo (Score:3, Interesting)
Sorry but that's my wife quoted as the co author of the Digitally Daunted book I am the other co author and well to have that on slashdot is CRAZY cool and I am going to waste Karma on that
Stupid Apple fanatics (Score:0, Interesting)
Bullshit. Apple's product line and GUI design has remained the same for the last 20 years, and microsoft's design principles and interface organization have changed 10 times!
Re:Not really so (Score:3, Interesting)
One thing that alienates me is that they are NOT loathe to change. They change many products so much that the training curve one a product you've already mastered is as great as if you'd bought a competetitor's product. IE, for example, has had its "internet options" in every single one of its menu items, from "File" to "Help". It's insane.
I should not have to completely relearn a program just because I upgraded to the latest version. It keeps me from upgrading until it's absolutely necessary.
Microsoft is a Dinosaur (Score:2, Interesting)
Not as much competition as you'd think... (Score:5, Interesting)
Apple has basically avoided the corporate market, which is where most of Microsoft's money is made, however much ground they are gaining in the home market. Toes are being stepped on, to be sure, but I just don't see Microsoft and Apple as being on a collision course for the most part. Given the conservative nature of the corporate market, what's much more likely is that Apple will end up as the dominant home player, at least for a while, and Microsoft will follow IBM into being solely a corporate player.
The danger to Apple is that very large enterprises always ossify, and the market they are coming to dominate in the short term -- which is basically home entertainment electronics -- is vastly more competitive and unstable than the PC market has ever been (or likely ever will be). When much of your appeal is driven by current fashion trends, you're vulnerable in a way that a vendor of business software seldom faces.
Note that I'm not saying Apple is doomed or any similar nonsense. Apple is doing very well and probably will continue to do so for some time, and Microsoft will probably continue its slow decline. What I'm saying is that Microsoft and Apple are less and less in competition with each other. Apple will probably spend a lot more time in the future competing with companies like Sony and JVC and LG than it does with Microsoft, and they'll most likely do very well, at least as long as Jobs is at the helm. After Jobs, I'm rather less sanguine about Apple's future because people like Jobs (or, for that matter, Gates) tend not to groom their successors very well.
Aquisitions (Score:2, Interesting)
Microsoft's appetite for aquisitions is part of its downfall. They are constantly distracted by taking over other companies, some of them with very little to do with their core competancy. Often these aquisitions are simply lost money because they take them over and ruin a perfectly good business. Contrast Apple who rarely do aquisitions, and when they do they've got a really really good reason for it, related to a strategic vision.
Innovation! (Score:3, Interesting)
"The difference between the two companies is that Apple has been fearless about transformational change while Microsoft has been reluctant to leave its past behind"
Lies! You (mercifully?) forget Microsoft Bob. Also, the first time I ever heard of tablet computers is when I heard Bill Gates hyping it as the next revolutionary step forward for computers at least five years ago. The issue is not so much Microsoft's boldness as its incompetency (though the fact that the media doesn't treat Gate's words as inspired prophesy like it does Jobs's probably has something to do with it, too).
Re:Steves coolaid (Score:5, Interesting)
Again, someone who doesn't understand that his priorities are not the ones of the mainstream consumer electronics user. "Hitting the right notes with the right people" is the only thing that matters, especially when the "right people" are a customer base that just about anyone would give their right arm for. Nobody except the geeks out there care about the things you complain about. The Apple systems work, you can find an application for almost anything you want to do, and the price point is not excessive for the perceived value.
Mainstream engineers with attitudes like yours have had sixty years of computing history (and forty-some odd years since the advent of the personal computer - note, I count this time since Kay's work on Dynapad and the Alto at Xerox PARC) to deliver a good user experience. They have failed. You hype systems (like Windows and Linux) which, although open, force users into the role of system administrator all too often and deliver inconsistent user experiences.
Apple, on the other hand, has succeeded. That they did so by walling the garden makes little difference to their customers. Understand that and you will understand the future. Disregard it and you'll be consigned to the dust heap of history. If you want to fight their closedness, you first have to make your open systems appealing and easy to use. Get a clue, people.
Re:Been saying this for years. (Score:2, Interesting)
It's not a matter of if Apple will pass Microsoft now, but when. Google's also making a run at it, but they've got a lot further to go.
The question is, when Apple passes Microsoft, who will become the new cool company? Remember back when Microsoft was young and hip? Now everyone hates them (okay not everyone, but it is cool to rip on them now and again). If Apple does overtake Microsoft, it seems likely the same thing will happen to them.
And, if Apple does take over the market, how hard are they going to be hit by antitrust suits? If Microsoft isn't allowed to bundle IE with Windows (in Europe) I feel like someone might take issue with Apple only letting their software be on their hardware. Maybe not, but it'll be interesting to see.
Re:Not really so (Score:3, Interesting)
"In contrast I can still use my old Win98 laptop and run the latest browsers."
You think that is progress? You think that is good?
While it is admirable on one level, it is completely worthless anecdote. I can still run ancient versions of Linux too, you don't see me bragging.
Apple has a life expectancy built into its products, and doesn't care if people are running 12 year old Operating systems. I call that smart business.
Think about it this way. Would you expect Win Vista to run on 386? How about entry level 486? Or Pentium running at 1.2 GHZ?
It is completely unreasonable, especially in this day when you can buy replacement computers (bottom edge) for under $300 ($600 Apple), with a more modern operating system.
Yes, you can spend $120 for OS X whatever upgrade to try to get it running on an old PowerPC Mac, but why?
The fact is, you have unreasonable expectations regarding life expectancy of computers. 12 years old is old. Heck even XP is 8 years old and is showing its age.
Re:Not really so (Score:4, Interesting)
Look at 10.5 which forbids an install on machines below 800 megahertz. Apple should not have forbade people with 700 or 600 MHz machines from upgrading if they so desired. Microsoft doesn't. If you want to run Win7 on a slow machine, you can - no restriction.
Remember that this very thing has been instrumental in completely ruining one of their Windows versions. Instead of giving hard limits as to where Vista can reasonably run and where it can't they gave two sets of system specs: One where the OS actually works and one where it can merely boot up. The latter one was called "Vista Capable" and lead to a lot of bad PR.
Had Microsoft declared from the start that Vista requires a 1 GHz CPU, 1 GiB or RAM and a 128 MiB GPU in order to perform adequately people would have complained about the high requirements but there wouldn't have been a media spectacle about how Vista doesn't work on machines following Microsoft's specs.
Apple doesn't do "kinda sorta works if you don't run any demanding programs", they only do "works" and "doesn't work". While this does lock people out of upgrades, it also protects Apple from exactly the kind of PR fiasco Microsoft had.
Re:Not really so (Score:3, Interesting)
I've tried to put IE7 on Windows 98. It was not possible to install it. Considering even XP needs Service Pack 2 to install IE7, I think your not being quite honest. Mozilla is irrelevant as it isn't an MS product. Ditto for Opera. If the vendor chooses to support a specific version of an OS then there is or isn't much MS could do about it either way. That said, even Mozilla has dropped support for Windows 98.
Apple isn't forcing you to run out and do anything. Your old version of Safari isn't going to stop working, and arguably, there is no requirement to go to Safari 4 that I'm aware of.
I'm assuming it isn't supported on older operating systems due to the conversion to 64 bit as well as the conversion to Intel from the PPC chips. 10.6 doesn't support PPC at all without some sort of emulation. There are probably very real reasons it doesn't install.
Re:Woo hoo (Score:3, Interesting)
Wow, you co-wrote an entire book without knowing how to use punctuation? Awesome.