All that angst over marketshare

Daniel Robinson makes the same point I made earlier. Anyone who thinks that Vista will not sell given the current state of enterprise IT investments is deluded.

Of course, this comes with a backdrop of an ongoing tussle between fan camps over marketshare. SwitchToMac claims 24% year over year growth in response to a market research firm’s analysis that Mac OS share is down .03%.

Some thoughts:
1. I think its a testament to Apple that they have been able to sustain or make moderate gains despite being marginalized by the PC market.
2. If the marketshare is broken up by enterprise and consumer market, I think the numbers will be dramatically different. Why does this matter? Because Apple is clearly focusing on the consumer market and it has made inroads in mindshare due to iPods.
3. I firmly believe that if Apple continues to make fantastically innovative products that the adoption will increase among consumers and will have a spillover effect on the enterprise.

Stories that write themselves

HP Sponsors ‘Privacy Innovation’ Award

Nominees are currently being accepted for the fourth annual HP/IAPP Privacy Innovation award, which Hewlett-Packard gives in conjunction with the Maine-based International Association of Privacy Professionals.

Death Knell

David Pogue and Mac 360 take a look back at the prognostications made in the 1990s by the tech punditocracy. Choice cuts:

Early in 1996, Fortune Magazine wrote, ”By the time you read this story, the quirky cult company… will end its wild ride as an independent enterprise.”

CTO Nathan Myhrvold said, ”The NeXT purchase is too little too late. Apple is already dead.”

LOL!

Fortune, 2/19/1996: “Apple’s erratic performance has given it the reputation on Wall Street of a stock a long-term investor would probably avoid.”

Wired, “101 Ways to Save Apple,” 6/97: “1. Admit it. You’re out of the hardware game.”

Doh! In ten years, maybe Pogue will link to these:

Guardian, October 24, 2004:

When Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates spoke at the launch of Plays For Sure in Los Angeles last week, he showed a range of players including Creative Labs, Dell, iRiver and Samsung models. The Plays For Sure website also highlights the fact that consumers have a choice of download services, such as Napster, MusicNow, MusicMatch and Wal-Mart, not just MSN Music.

Apple still has time to license its system, and make companies such as Virgin friends rather than foes. If it doesn’t, it is probably just a matter of time before Microsoft’s system has enough support to become the de facto standard, just like Windows.

Guardian, September 13, 2006:

Make no mistake, these are going to be difficult times for Apple. Jobs’s resuscitation of the company after it nearly collapsed, is one of the great corporate turnarounds of US business history. But gratitude also belongs to history. From now on, Apple faces stiff competition on all fronts.

No one should ever write off Apple’s amazing ability to reinvent itself. But this time it is leading from the rear. Shareholders may have to console themselves with the fact that Apple is now a much more balanced company than it used to be, firing on a number of cylinders including computers, music and video and is no longer a one-product company. But its high-flying days may be taking a vacation.

CNet interview of Kevin Rollins, CEO Dell. January 18, 2005.

Do you resent the amount of publicity Apple gets given its market share?
Apple’s created a niche. If you look at the grand scheme of things, this quarter we are supposed to achieve something like $13.5 billion in revenue. Apple’s in the $2.4 billion (region), so the size and scale is not even in the same league. But what they do they do very well, and they’ve had great success with the iPod. It’s interesting: The iPod has been out for three years, and it’s only this past year it’s become a raging success.

Well, those things that become fads rage, and then they drop off. When I was growing up there was a product made by Sony called the Sony Walkman–a rage, everyone had to have one. Well, you don’t hear about the Walkman anymore. I believe that one-product wonders come and go. You have to have sustainable business models, sustainable strategy. But don’t read that as any sort of disparagement of Apple. They’ve done a nice job.

One hit wonder? Dude, you got zuned!

The Observer, September 10, 2006:

Analysts warn that the iPod has passed its peak. From its launch five years ago its sales graph showed a consistent upward curve, culminating in a period around last Christmas that saw a record 14 million sold. But sales fell to 8.5 million in the following quarter, and down to 8.1 million in the most recent three-month period. Wall Street is reportedly starting to worry that the bubble will burst.

“Wall Street” also thinks that Google is a $2,000 per share stock and they celebrated TheGlobe.com, CommerceOne, Pets.com, and Webvan. BTW, MacDailyNews slap-down of Smith is a good read.

Alive and still skeptical

Someone outed the Skeptic! Mike Arrington has his own Q&A:

Given that he’s an exec at a high profile startup, should he have thought twice before writing a blog that attacks and riducules other startups, sometimes unfairly?
Yes.

Did he exercise good judgement and think about the best interests of his company when he did this?
No.

Should Will he be fired?
???

My guess is that this will blow over, and that we’ll see somewhat more measured and thoughtful posts on dead2.0 in the future. Freedom to say what you want is a good thing – but it’s also nice to see who it is that’s saying it.

Dave Winer wants the name revealed so the skeptic can take responsibility for his commentary.

I hope the skeptic remains anonymous especially if it allows him (or her) the freedom of being, well, a cynic and a skeptic. There are more than enough sycophants and yes men on the web – if anonymity is the price of expending a little truth (“or cheap shot”), I am all for it. Stay strong skeptic.

Dell to be delisted?

There was a LOT of noise last month when Apple was sent a delisting notice. Let’s see what the blogosphere thinks of todays announcement that Dell faces a similar situation.

Fyi, Blackfriars called it first.

Played for dead

Now that Microsoft has decided to compete directly with iPod, it has made the next obvious step. Zuning its partners. Slashdot links to a Microsoft update to Windows Media Player 11.0 Beta 2 for Windows XP (!) release notes:

According to their website, WMP11 ‘does not permit you to back up your media usage rights (previously known as licenses).’ Worse, if you rip your own CDs and the ‘Copy protect music’ option is turned on, WMP11 will require you to ‘connect to a Microsoft Web page that explains how to restore your rights a limited number of times.’”

Meanwhile Engadget finds a Wal-mart price list for Zune:

By the time we got to the Zune’s product page, the pricing info had been removed, but it can still be spotted in the MP3 player category listing at a lean $284 flat.

Engadget also speculates on why Microsoft seemed flummoxed by Apple’s iPod pricing announcement last week:

Rumors still abound as to why we still don’t have a solid figure from Microsoft on pricing. Some believe it has something to do with the “bombshell” of Apple’s recent iPod price drop, so Wal-Mart potentially be off the mark with this $284 of theirs, but we’ll give their soon-to-be-fired database lackey the benefit of the doubt.

Another loss leader a la XBOX? But, what exactly, if anything, is it leading to? I’ll leave it to Roughly Drafted to nicely summarize. My favorites:

1. Start Small by competing against Creative in 2001.
1. Pick a fashionable color that is not turd brown.
3. Pick a new name
8. Stop churning out nerd crap and sell products widely marketable to a broad audience.
10. Ditch this whole Apple copycat plan and follow the Microsoft path to success: Find a big dumb company trying to make a half-assed entry into the consumer market, then use their resources to establish your own software as a platform, and just when they realized you’ve cleaned them out, drop them like a hot potato and run with your success.

Oh wait. That’s what Apple just did to you! It looks like you’ve become the IBM of the mid-80s. Good luck with the whole OS/2, I mean WMA thing, and well, I can’t say you’ll be missed, but the world will be a better place without you around anyway.

Socially immobile markets

WSJ reports that venture firms are still funding social networking sites. Geoff Wang of Redpoint Ventures suggests:

“Social networking is probably overfunded if you’re going afer MySpace. … But it hasn’t reached its potential if you are thinking about it as a function of what people are going to use [to communicate] online.”

Of course the main reason for excessive capital flowing into this area is on page 1:

Social-networking site Facebook is in serious talks to sell itself to Yahoo for an amount that could approach $1 billion after having held separate discussions with Microsoft and Viacom.

And it looks like Yahoo is negotiating in good trust with, from all appearances, a punk:

“At one point in the Yahoo negotiations, the talks extended into the weekend, says a person familiar with the matter. Mr. Zuckerberg, this account continues, said he couldn’t take part because his girlfriend was in town. Others pointed out they were closing in on a billion-dollar deal. Mr. Zuckerberg said it didn’t matter: his cellphone would be off, this person says.”

I was watching CNBC and the anchor chimed in with a reminder about punks from an earlier era, the founders of TheGlobe.com.

In addition TechCrunch reports that YouTube wants to be bought out, but will not settle for anything less than $1.5 billion. And there are some who think an Apple-YouTube merger is a great idea. Not! There are many things that have been said about Steve Jobs, but I don’t think the term “schmuck” applies.

The Deal reports:

Forty-nine Web 2.0 companies raised a combined $262.28 million in venture capital in the first half of this year. That eclipses the $199.14 million in venture capital that 52 startups raised in all of 2005, according to VentureOne. Among the largest Web 2.0 deals this year are Facebook, which received a $25 million second round, and Zimbra, which received a $14.5 million later round.

Let’s just hope all this isn’t just additional revenue for eBay. Via Techcrunch:

Download! The Movie.

A report (from Ars Technica via Slashdot) suggests that users want a solution for downloadable movies.

Over 10,000 Internet users were surveyed in China, South Korea, Italy, Canada, United Kingdom, Taiwan, Germany, United States and Japan—with 1,609 being from the United States—to get a feeling for what consumers want in their future “digital homes. The results found that nearly half (47 percent) of those surveyed in the US want to be able to download movies, TV shows, and other video content to their television sets, with even more of those surveyed globally (54 percent) wishing for such technology.

Macworld, unsurprisingly, thinks Apple can dominate this market. Well, Apple did have a good start:

In just a week, Apple’s iTunes Store sold $1 million USD worth of downloadable Disney movie content.

Jet-something

I was reading the Deal Architect’s post on an interview with the CIO of Jetstar, a low cost spin-off of Quantas. I was struck with the sudden adoption of “jet” by several new low-cost airlines across the globe:
SpiceJet
Jet Airways
CanJet
WestJet
GlobeJet
EasyJet
and, of course, JetBlue.

Any naming/branding experts out there to chime in?

Adobe v Microsoft

The Stalwart harshes on Adobe for fussing over Microsoft’s use of PDF. I concur with the Stalwart’s assessment that firms should try to add value, especially since its a given that Microsoft will try to muscle into your territory and erode your profits. But I am not sure that this statement is a valid point:

In conclusion, if your product has great value, it should be very tough for MSFT to just do a little R&D and plunk similar software into Windows for almost free. Look, Google Search is still killing MSFT. MySpace is way ahead of MSFT as well. The greatest threats to Microsoft these days have come from companies with completely new ideas, acting through innovation instead of lobbying for government-enforced shackles around their competition.

Its obvious that Microsoft is getting their asses whooped in web services since it cannot leverage its monopoly to prevent user adoption. Adobe does not have other cash cows beyond its desktop products – the same reason Microsoft can’t throw out Windows and Office and move en masse to the web. Adobe’s position is shaky since a substantial portion of Adobe’s product portfolio is under attack by Microsoft. Adobe has a lot to gain by prolonging and disrupting Microsoft’s new efforts, including Vista. That’s how you play hardball!

Let’s check back in 2008 to note if Adobe is an Intuit or Novell or worse yet, Netscape.