Comment Re:Not bad? Try really bad (Score 1) 147
It's not about market share.
Yes it is. Market share does matter. It matters tremendously. It matters to software vendors, it matters to shareholders (well, maybe all of them except you), it matters to Microsoft, and it matters to Apple. If Apple went from selling 5 million to 10 million computers in a year, but their market share dropped from 10% to 3% in that same year, Microsoft would rejoice, and Apple would not. However, if Apple's market share increased from 3% to 10%, Microsoft would immediately begin their unholy crusade to drive Apple into the ground. Or at least back down to their safe corner of the market where they are unthreatening and largely harmless, like where they're at now. Market share is everything. Apple is probably starting to introduce new applications at a price point the average user can afford (Final Cut Express, Keynote, iLife) partly to diversify their revenue base so they don't have to depend so much on hardware sales. This will free them up to reduce their margins on new machines while not hurting their overall profitability because as a percentage the importance of hardware will decline somewhat.
Doubtless this will fail to convince you, but I did a quick Google search and came up with this article right away. Granted it's from 2001, but it clearly says Apple's retail stores are part of its drive to increase market share. Hell, it even quotes Steve Jobs saying as much. "5 down, 95 to go" I believe the slogan is.
A personal finance program, a la Quicken? You bet there's a strong market for that; you'll sell millions of copies to Mac owners.
I used Quicken on the Mac, and it lacks lots of features that the Windows version has (particularly in the online area), and is horribly buggy. I use Dreamweaver extensively on a PC at work and on a Mac at home, and the Mac version is buggier. You will doubtless deny this, but even if it is not the case, as the PC share of Dreamweaver users increases, Macromedia will shift more of their focus to the PC market. Yes, many core Dreamweaver users use it on a Mac, and the absolute numbers of Mac users may increase, but as a proportion they are declining. Which version came out first, the PC or the Mac? And as you correctly point out it is especially true for games. Almost all of the games come out for PCs first, and many never make it to the Mac. If they do, they simply do not get the performance tweaks, game balancing adjustments, etc. the PC version gets because even if they sell millions of titles to Mac users, it still only ads up to a tiny fraction of their total sales. Corporate managers notice that, and they go where the money is.
Stop and think about what you're saying. See, everything is percentages. Companies choose to support platforms or not based on the percentage of their total revenue they can gain from it. So many more applications are available for Windows only because the percentage of Windows users is so much larger than the percentage of Mac users. Even if there are 5 billion Mac users, why waste your money when there are 95 billion people you can nab in one shot? I can't believe I have to explain this. The large number in absolute terms of Mac users only means that the Mac platform is not ignored entirely. It does not mean it gets an equal seat at the table with the Windows version of the product in the vast majority of cases (not every app, but most). I can see the (admittedly oversimplified) conversation in the boardroom now. "Bob, our PC user base has increased from 75% to 93% over the last 3 years. As a result, our revenue generated from the PC section similarly increased from 75% to 93%. However, while the Mac user base plummeted as a percentage, in absolute terms they increased somewhat." Now, as a result of this conversation, do you believe this company will:
a.) shift development effort from the Windows version to the Mac version
b.) keep everything equal
c.) shift development effort from the Mac version to the Windows version as their user base moves in that direction.
I will leave answering this question as an excercise to the reader.
I don't mean to be insulting, but if you can't understand this you are simply not trying. I guarantee you that Steve Jobs and every other business owner and middle manager in the world understands this. And as far as Oracle and Sybase are concerned, if Apple fails to make a dent in terms of market share in the server space that support won't last. Right now their server OS is creating a bit of a critical mass and gaining some excitement, but we'll see if it lasts.
Now, at the end of the day you could say that Apple is like Rolex or Mercedes or whatever, and that they're content selling their products to the tiny segment of the market that can afford them. But I don't believe this is what Apple wants to do. Their market share has slipped almost every quarter consistently for years. They cannot afford to allow that trend to continue. They are getting pushed out of the education market, and they are getting pushed out of the high end graphics and audio market. I believe they want this to stop. I believe that they want their Mercedes to sit in the same dealer's lot as the Pinto and sell.
I will finish my involvement in this thread with one final point. At my job, one by one each Unix developer bought Macs, including myself. We sucked it up and paid the price because it was worth it to have a very usable, graphically appealing, non-Microsoft & Unix-based OS and access to commercial apps. But there are still some people who haven't made the move, and they've done it because they don't want to spend the money. This is Apple's prime market because they know what a good computer is and they have the money to spend. It's a tired argument that's been beaten to death (isn't that how this thread started?), but they look at what you can buy on a PC and what you can buy on a Mac, and they can't justify buying the Mac. It's not like they want to buy the PC, but they just can't bring themselves to cross that threshold and spend what seems to be too much money on too little computer. Since PCs are 95% of the market, they define what customers expect when they shop for a computer. People expect fast performance for very low prices. Apple is beginning to realise this through interviews with PC users that come into their stores. It's opening their eyes on what the customers they're trying to attract are looking for in a computer. Apple is adjusting itself accordingly.
Yes it is. Market share does matter. It matters tremendously. It matters to software vendors, it matters to shareholders (well, maybe all of them except you), it matters to Microsoft, and it matters to Apple. If Apple went from selling 5 million to 10 million computers in a year, but their market share dropped from 10% to 3% in that same year, Microsoft would rejoice, and Apple would not. However, if Apple's market share increased from 3% to 10%, Microsoft would immediately begin their unholy crusade to drive Apple into the ground. Or at least back down to their safe corner of the market where they are unthreatening and largely harmless, like where they're at now. Market share is everything. Apple is probably starting to introduce new applications at a price point the average user can afford (Final Cut Express, Keynote, iLife) partly to diversify their revenue base so they don't have to depend so much on hardware sales. This will free them up to reduce their margins on new machines while not hurting their overall profitability because as a percentage the importance of hardware will decline somewhat.
Doubtless this will fail to convince you, but I did a quick Google search and came up with this article right away. Granted it's from 2001, but it clearly says Apple's retail stores are part of its drive to increase market share. Hell, it even quotes Steve Jobs saying as much. "5 down, 95 to go" I believe the slogan is.
A personal finance program, a la Quicken? You bet there's a strong market for that; you'll sell millions of copies to Mac owners.
I used Quicken on the Mac, and it lacks lots of features that the Windows version has (particularly in the online area), and is horribly buggy. I use Dreamweaver extensively on a PC at work and on a Mac at home, and the Mac version is buggier. You will doubtless deny this, but even if it is not the case, as the PC share of Dreamweaver users increases, Macromedia will shift more of their focus to the PC market. Yes, many core Dreamweaver users use it on a Mac, and the absolute numbers of Mac users may increase, but as a proportion they are declining. Which version came out first, the PC or the Mac? And as you correctly point out it is especially true for games. Almost all of the games come out for PCs first, and many never make it to the Mac. If they do, they simply do not get the performance tweaks, game balancing adjustments, etc. the PC version gets because even if they sell millions of titles to Mac users, it still only ads up to a tiny fraction of their total sales. Corporate managers notice that, and they go where the money is.
Stop and think about what you're saying. See, everything is percentages. Companies choose to support platforms or not based on the percentage of their total revenue they can gain from it. So many more applications are available for Windows only because the percentage of Windows users is so much larger than the percentage of Mac users. Even if there are 5 billion Mac users, why waste your money when there are 95 billion people you can nab in one shot? I can't believe I have to explain this. The large number in absolute terms of Mac users only means that the Mac platform is not ignored entirely. It does not mean it gets an equal seat at the table with the Windows version of the product in the vast majority of cases (not every app, but most). I can see the (admittedly oversimplified) conversation in the boardroom now. "Bob, our PC user base has increased from 75% to 93% over the last 3 years. As a result, our revenue generated from the PC section similarly increased from 75% to 93%. However, while the Mac user base plummeted as a percentage, in absolute terms they increased somewhat." Now, as a result of this conversation, do you believe this company will:
a.) shift development effort from the Windows version to the Mac version
b.) keep everything equal
c.) shift development effort from the Mac version to the Windows version as their user base moves in that direction.
I will leave answering this question as an excercise to the reader.
I don't mean to be insulting, but if you can't understand this you are simply not trying. I guarantee you that Steve Jobs and every other business owner and middle manager in the world understands this. And as far as Oracle and Sybase are concerned, if Apple fails to make a dent in terms of market share in the server space that support won't last. Right now their server OS is creating a bit of a critical mass and gaining some excitement, but we'll see if it lasts.
Now, at the end of the day you could say that Apple is like Rolex or Mercedes or whatever, and that they're content selling their products to the tiny segment of the market that can afford them. But I don't believe this is what Apple wants to do. Their market share has slipped almost every quarter consistently for years. They cannot afford to allow that trend to continue. They are getting pushed out of the education market, and they are getting pushed out of the high end graphics and audio market. I believe they want this to stop. I believe that they want their Mercedes to sit in the same dealer's lot as the Pinto and sell.
I will finish my involvement in this thread with one final point. At my job, one by one each Unix developer bought Macs, including myself. We sucked it up and paid the price because it was worth it to have a very usable, graphically appealing, non-Microsoft & Unix-based OS and access to commercial apps. But there are still some people who haven't made the move, and they've done it because they don't want to spend the money. This is Apple's prime market because they know what a good computer is and they have the money to spend. It's a tired argument that's been beaten to death (isn't that how this thread started?), but they look at what you can buy on a PC and what you can buy on a Mac, and they can't justify buying the Mac. It's not like they want to buy the PC, but they just can't bring themselves to cross that threshold and spend what seems to be too much money on too little computer. Since PCs are 95% of the market, they define what customers expect when they shop for a computer. People expect fast performance for very low prices. Apple is beginning to realise this through interviews with PC users that come into their stores. It's opening their eyes on what the customers they're trying to attract are looking for in a computer. Apple is adjusting itself accordingly.
