Apple relevance

As I read this comment on Paul Thurrot's Internet Nexus, I had to shake my head.

There are real numbers that support Vista's success, and then there's anecdotal info ("the percentage of online Macs running Apple’s operating system has climbed from the long-flat 3 per cent to 5.6 per cent") that, um, doesn't really prove much at all. You can decide which is more relevant, of course.

I have been a leading proponent for a little reality when it comes to talking about Apple and numbers.  However, you cannot measure Apple's influence or relevance by pure numbers.

The list of technologies that Apple has brought to market cover the back of one of my old tee-shirts, and Apple is still going strong years after that shirt was old.

I actually think a measure of Apple's relevance is that they managed to sell around 1.5 million computers last quarter in spite of shedding the name computer from the company and having pretty well ignored their sales force as is their tradition.

The fact that Apple could sell that many computers and have that many loyal users while focusing almost no resources on computer sales tells me two things.

One is that the products are so good (even with some well documented hiccups recently) that people will buy the products.

The second is that most people just don't care enough about their computing experience to do anything about the pain and agony that they face.

I was in the office yesterday with a fellow Realtor® who wanted to send me a Word document.  She started telling me the problems she is having with her computer.  She had mistakenly installed the full version of Norton Utilities during a renewal.  It had slowed her computer to a crawl.

She had our support person backup her data, reformat the drive, and do an install with the proper Norton.  For some reason it didn't help.  Just sending me two documents was more than her computer could handle.  She only got one sent and when she did, she asked me to open it and read her a phone number since opening it was so difficult on her own computer.  I had to resist the temptation to tell her to visit my new website to see what a well oiled Mac can do.

This is what people put up with because of the fear of trying a new platform and because Apple has chosen to advertise their computers only with a campaign that insults the platform that people have been using for years.

If Apple (and they don't) really wanted to sell a lot more computers, they could put some serious resources into making certain that people interested in switching to Macs had a comfortable path that didn't require them bellying up to the Genius Bar.

Still the influence of Apple far outweighs its tiny market share.

Just because you sell a lot of something, doesn't mean any product isn't the best.  In fact the opposite is often the case.   The fewer you sell, the more often you are to see small sales.  Of course it would be an interesting debate as to whether the iPod is an exception to that rule or proves it.

I would seriously doubt that anyone in technology thinks Apple is irrelevant or even less relevant than Microsoft.

Comments

[Jim]

I think that it's easy to argue that Apple is pretty irrelevant actually. Imagine if Apple were to dissolve as a company tomorrow. Sure, it would be tough for designers and creatives to make a transition to Windows...but they could do it. Imagine if Microsoft would disappear. I could not manage my enterprise environment without and MS OS on my desk. The back office tools that I need to use to manage my enviroment just do not exist on any other platform. Millions of Windows developers would have to learn new tools just to keep businesses running. It would be a nightmare.

[Louis Wheeler]

Jim, it's hard to call Apple irrelevant when the only kind of innovation that Microsoft does is to copy Apple. All you are saying is that when Apple has 5 percent worldwide market share, then its disappearance would be just a ripple. But, Apple won't be staying at 5 percent of the market.

Will Apple take over from Microsoft? No way! Why? Because Apple doesn't want most of MS's market. There is no space for innovation or panache in front ends for mainframes or point of sale devices. Microsoft won't be in that market five years from now-- linux will.

What Apple wants is the most profitable portion of the computing market. That is in the Consumer market. I'm sure that Apple would be content with the top twenty five percent of the Desktop and Laptop markets and leave Microsoft and Linux to fight over the rest.

Is Apple headed that way? Yes, it has a yearly growth rate of 26% when the market is almost flat. It might take Apple a decade or more to get there. But, Irrelevant? Get real.

Yo, Jim...

Microsoft has puchased a lot of MoM or enterprise management tools, and companies like HP have developed many great tools as well.

If MS died, I don't think you would suffer the nightmare you think, but instead it would finally open corporate drones and braindead MS/IT folks into considering the best options on merit instead of just buying MS because it's MS. Some of that day has already started to dawn, thankfully.

And it's not all about being pro-Mac, it's about giving everything a fair shake on it's merits alone and not just going MS because everyone does it or they buy their way into your product portfolio.

[Tom B]

"Imagine if Microsoft would disappear."

You be up and running in minutes. NeoOffice. Firefox-- no problem.

[Jim]

I use HP Operations Manager and it's fat client only runs on Windows. They make nothing for OS X. Non of HPs management tools work on OS X or are very helpful on OS X. I manage 12 OS X servers and about 200 clients and I have both a Mac and PC at my desk. What HP operations software are you running on OS X? Apple will also and has not up until this point invested in a building a great enterprise support group. I'm sure David can comment on that. And with regard to the 'brain dead corporate drones' what's you point? I built an OS X enterprise within my company, I manage both OS X and Windows networks and it's much easier on the windows side of the house.

@Tom - it's much more than NeoOffice and Firefox. I'm not talking of desktop apps. I'm talking about SAN management tools (not XSAN, please...)operations management tools, procurement systems, HR software, payroll processing, etc, etc,

I'm not a MS fanboy, I'm just trying to bring my view of the world. It's just not as simple as one may think.

[ocracokewaves]

Jim is absolutely right on the point of Apple being unwilling to build a real enterprise support group.

In private emails from many corporate managers, I have heard the message loud and clear that enterprises have been unable to get Apple to provide either the information they need or the support they require.

I would not hold my breath for Apple to become a viable enterprise partner.

http://viewfromthemountain.typepad.com/applepeels/2006/03/lingering_regre.html

Still for those of us in the creative space, Apple is very relevant.

I also believe Apple can at least offer the enterprise some security through diversity though I am now willing to admit that it would likely raise costs due to supporting dual platforms.

Of course the biggest cost would be the hassle of an enterprise trying to deal with Apple which really doesn't have the programs or people to handle enterprises.

[Massif]

It'd be pretty easy to argue that MS is more relevant than apple, from the simple point of view that it doesn't matter what you invent most technologies don't become mainstream until MS adopts them.

Whether that's good or bad depends on your opinion of Microsoft's ability to implement something.

Which doesn't say that apple is irrelevant.