Future of Apple?

[Mystic]

A lot of people are starting to get concerned that Steve Jobs of Apple does not look very well. No matter what anybody thinks of him he IS Apple. Apple nearly went under around 1998 when Apple had about 2% market share. I remember selling my Apple Computer because I thought Apple was finished. Without any question Jobs came back to Apple and saved the company.

Today Apple is probably 7.5% to 8.5% of the market in the USA and still growing. Apple stuff like iPods and iPhones are selling big. But there is no clear successor to Jobs and without a dynamic leader what would happen?

At one time I thought of Apple Computers as being the very best. There was a time a long time ago when anybody who seriously wanted to work on photographs, do page layout and computer illustration would consider the Mac and nothing else. Today you can do the same stuff using a Windows computer. Some people involved in computer graphics today have never used a Mac in their lives. Nevertheless Microsoft needs some competition.

 

[ToyotaNSaturn]

Apple Computer will continue to forge it's way as the "cool" item to own. As long as they keep the cool thing going, the will continue to rack up market share.

 

[Tempest]

Quote:
Without any question Jobs came back to Apple and saved the company.

I thought it was more Gates getting involved.

 

[Mystic]

Bill Gates and Microsoft did give Apple some money or invested in Apple. That happened a while back and I can't remember much of the details. Microsoft does make money by selling Microsoft Office for the Macintosh. So Microsoft probably wants to keep that going.

Years ago Microsoft also made Internet explorer for the Mac but that was dropped a long time ago. Office is the only software that Microsoft still makes for the Mac as far as I know. They probably make a lot of money from Office for the Mac so the investment in Apple probably made sense.

I don't know if Microsoft worries very much about Apple as a competitor. I think they worry more about Linux. And with over 90% market share of desktop computer O/Ss Microsoft probably does not need to worry about anybody in the near future.

 

[ToyotaNSaturn]

Microsoft gave apple $150million to keep them afloat.

Oh yes, they DO worry about Apple as a competitor. Don't dare bring your iPod onto the Redmond campus! It's frowned upon up there.

 

[Mystic]

I still wonder myself why the Europeans, Russians, Japanese, Chinese, or Indians don't develop their own operating system. But maybe it is too late for that. More competition would be a good thing in my opinion. But I really don't see anything different for at least the next several years.

Apple may indeed cut into Microsoft's market share somewhat. Perhaps Apple will be 15% in the USA sometime in the not too distant future. It is hard to say. But my best guess (unless something incredible happens) is that Microsoft will likely have at least 75% of the desktop computer O/S market well into the future.

Personally I don't see Linux achieving much in the desktop O/S market but even if a Linux O/S was really great I don't think there is any way that Linux could go from 1% to say 25% in any short period of time.

What else is there (for desktop computer O/Ss)?

I guess the bottom line is the competition against Microsoft failed a long time ago and it is way to late to make up the distance. I read somewhere that Steve Jobs of Apple was supposed to have said to Future Magazine (before he returned to Apple) that Microsoft had won the O/S war. This was supposed to be sometime in 1998 or so. I don't know if that is true or not but it is certainly the truth regardless if anybody likes it or not. Only a clearly superior O/S that offered huge advantages over Windows would have a chance today. And even if that O/S was great there would have to be great marketing for it also and great leadership on the part of people promoting it.

Steve Jobs is clearly a great leader but I don't know how much longer he will be with Apple. Apple Inc. better find somebody comparable to Jobs.

Most of the people who are the leaders in the Linux world manage to turn me off no matter how much I wanted to go with Linux years ago. They need great technology but also they need some leadership that can relate to people.

I guess it is pretty unlikely we will see some new O/S that is completely different come out of the blue. But maybe, I guess.

First computer I ever owned was a Windows 95 computer and then I went to Apple. I was mostly an Apple guy at home for many, many years (except for a brief time when I thought Apple was finished). Kind of hedging my bets right now with both a Windows computer and an iMac but kind of leaning Windows more and more. Hey, I like Vista! I need to go with one of the other someday.

 

[ConfederateTyrant]

Mac OS is what Apple has going for them. I cannot bring myself to pay the price for the laptop just for the operating system. Perhaps if they made their OS more universal, instead of paying high prices for their computers, then I'd be a user. The Mac OSx86 is a great idea, unfortunately it's not 100% compatible with a lot of things. Hopefully that will change in the future.

 

[Mystic]

Yes, Apple charges a LOT for their hardware. Their computers are good but I don't think they are that much better than a quality Windows computer. And sometimes it seems like the Windows computers actually have superior technology. On the other hand they charge only $129.00 for their O/Ss. But they come out with new versions of Mac OS X so frequently you are actually paying about the same or more compared to buying a Windows O/S.

No doubt about it Mac OS X has become a polished, really nice O/S. Although Leopard had some rough edges. Both Windows Vista and Mac OS X Leopard have their good and bad points.

Even if I was rich I probably would not buy a Mac Pro desktop. They are really expensive. On the other hand a company doing extensive computer graphics might easily find it useful to buy a computer that can run 32 GB of RAM. Assuming you could afford to buy that much RAM.

You can buy Windows laptop computers for a faction of the price of a MacBook Pro.

I think everybody would agree that Apple has some excellent, really outstanding design for a lot of their products.

The way the economy is going right now it would not surprise me if everybody cuts back on computer purchases.

I have to admit that I have a lot of emotional attachment to the Mac. But to be realistic I can do at least 90% of everything I need to do on my Windows Vista computer. In fact today it sometimes seems that Adobe comes out with software for Windows before it comes out with the same software for the Mac.

I also have some concern for what will happen with Apple after Jobs does leave. The leadership they had with the exception of Jobs did not inspire me. Ultimately it is people that makes a company go and with the wrong people even the best companies can go downhill. On the other hand for all I know Apple might be 25% to 50% of the desktop market in the USA 10 years from now.