Slashdot Mirror

That article was wrong. You can look at the files yourself. It's Mach, BSD, and the Cocoa frameworks:

iPhone OS X Architecture: Cocoa Frameworks and Mobile Mac Apps
iPhone OS X Architecture: the BSD Unix Userland
iPhone OS X Architecture: Disk, Shell, and Password Security
iPhone OS X Architecture: the Mach Kernel and RAM

That article was wrong. You can look at the files yourself. It's Mach, BSD, and the Cocoa frameworks:

iPhone OS X Architecture: Cocoa Frameworks and Mobile Mac Apps
iPhone OS X Architecture: the BSD Unix Userland
iPhone OS X Architecture: Disk, Shell, and Password Security
iPhone OS X Architecture: the Mach Kernel and RAM

That article was wrong. You can look at the files yourself. It's Mach, BSD, and the Cocoa frameworks:

iPhone OS X Architecture: Cocoa Frameworks and Mobile Mac Apps
iPhone OS X Architecture: the BSD Unix Userland
iPhone OS X Architecture: Disk, Shell, and Password Security
iPhone OS X Architecture: the Mach Kernel and RAM

One embarrassing footnote to the "million Zunes sold" meme is that few of those sales have been to individuals. The majority of Zunes are still sitting on store shelves. We know this because Microsoft managed to shovel an excess inventory of at least 4 million Xbox 360s on retailers. That fact that Microsoft hasn't been able to fake similar levels of sales for the Zune indicates that sales of the Zune are REALLY low.

More Articles on Zune.

Meanwhile, Apple shipped several times as many iPhones in its first weekend, selling it only in its own retail stores and AT&T shops. That says something about Apple and Microsoft's ability to retail.

Apple has also been selling iPods at a profit; Microsoft's Zune + Xbox division has lost BILLIONS every year. Think about that for a moment.

-
Ten Fake Apple Scandals: 1 - Phony Rage About iPhone Price and Profits
Reality: The iPhone costs less than any smartphone, and will have a higher resale value after two years than any phone. Here's why.

Viruses will infect a new Windows PC plugged into the Internet before its patches can be downloaded.

You are right that users control their own security, but this is also the case on the Mac, and Mac users aren't plagued with constant malware problems. I have never scanned a PC and not found lots of malware. I work with a lot of different clients in different settings, from large enterprise groups that hire me to work on specific issues, to small business and home users. I have run large and medium sized IT environments, from several hundred users to several thousand.

It is a bit absurd to first say that user security is the tough problem and Microsoft can't protect its users from themselves, and then concede that Microsoft owns the Enterprise of managed desktops with locked down security. That's where big money is being lost due to real viruses and worms.

Apple has a very large business among home users and in education, both of which tend to have less draconian security in place, and a more permissive and less technically savvy userbase. But Mac users aren't poking their own eyes out downloading malware; it's the Windows users that are.

You can't hide behind market share numbers forever. There is quite obviously a big problem architecturally for Windows when even tightly managed IT pros can't keep their systems up to date and safe, while Mac users experience zero problems and the only known exploits for the Mac are theoretical lab concepts that require crossed fingers and aligned planets.

RoughlyDrafted Magazine

Journalism was regarded as the "Fourth Estate," independent from the (first) clergy, (second) politics, (third) merchant bourgeoisie.

In that classification, its reports were held up as a way to inform people, not to tell them what they wanted to hear (entertainment) or to tell them what others wanted them to hear (preaching, propaganda, and advertising).

By selling off journalism to the highest bidder, our society has systematically lost the most important aspect of a free society: an informed populace. This is particularly the case in the US, where most TV has turned to bottom scraping, lurid entertainment, and "news" has become a religio-political farce serving the needs of those whom we really need to be informed about. Fox is guarding the henhouse, as they say.

It is now at the point where the only way to truly inform is to entertain, so we have people like Michael Moore making comical movies to inform people that the US health system is in dire crisis, and South Park and the Daily Show provide much of the rest of the US' critical commentary.

This is unfortunate. A state run media would not solve this problem, because it appears we already have that with Fox News. We need an independent system of journalism, and unfortunately, we're not going to get that as long as we are happy being passively entertained.

RoughlyDrafted Magazine

What do CNET and Business 2.0 offer beyond smart alec FUD columnists and advertiser-friendly reviews?

It was sad to see most of the serious newspapers dry up, leaving nothing but wire fed papers that write to a 4th grade reading level.

It was sad to see local radio stations dry up, leaving nothing but Clear Channel fed recordings from Texas.

However, I have few tears for crappy magazines and their equally vapid online "portals" that never offered much in the first place.

The real issue is that we've sold off the Fourth Estate to advertisers, and we have very little real journalism left. We're all fed our news from the same ~5 mega corps who own everything. We are not informed because we gave up our media to capitalism, which works well as a way to price widgets, but is not really very good at providing truth. It only knows how to provide marketing spin.

Bloggers could provide some respite, but the Internet provides little in terms of a reputation system. Anyone can shout down unpopular truths, and any group can astroturf their marketing messages. Few people who follow Digg or Reddit links verify the credibility of sources they visit.

We've traded our serious tradition of journalism for a cheap bit of daily entertainment from who knows where and a media buffet prepared by a market driven media.

The fact that the least fit portions of our capitalist replacement for journalism are struggling to survive should be expected. The fact that our media is being run like a free market is the real story.

RoughlyDrafted Magazine

The article was not a joke, it was a presentation of OS X used in the iPhone.

It referenced the MacTech joke about SNOJOB, but that wasn't a central part of the story. It was presented among other jokes that hinted around the truth: that Pixo did not deliver Apple's iPod for it, that Apple has seven years of experience in delivering the ARM based iPod, and that Apple has delivered core portions of the iPod, as Pixo is not a kernel, but rather a UI framework.

Why Slashdot decided to present the 2004 article as the key message of the article, and why readers made a huge stink about tagging the article as a joke and then feigned their indignation about being joked, are all much more ridiculous than anything in the article itself.

If you'd prefer a simpler version of the article without any subtlety and written at a Digg level, there is this version:

The OS X iPod is the iPhone! Pixo, ARM, and the Mac OS

No, the iPhone runs Mach and has BSD userland, as TFA's linked articles makes obvious:

iPhone OS X Architecture: the BSD Unix Userland

iPhone OS X Architecture: Disk, Shell, and Password Security

iPhone OS X Architecture: the Mach Kernel and RAM

Leopard, Vista and the iPhone OS X Architecture

No, the iPhone runs Mach and has BSD userland, as TFA's linked articles makes obvious:

iPhone OS X Architecture: the BSD Unix Userland

iPhone OS X Architecture: Disk, Shell, and Password Security

iPhone OS X Architecture: the Mach Kernel and RAM

Leopard, Vista and the iPhone OS X Architecture

No, the iPhone runs Mach and has BSD userland, as TFA's linked articles makes obvious:

iPhone OS X Architecture: the BSD Unix Userland

iPhone OS X Architecture: Disk, Shell, and Password Security

iPhone OS X Architecture: the Mach Kernel and RAM

Leopard, Vista and the iPhone OS X Architecture

No, the iPhone runs Mach and has BSD userland, as TFA's linked articles makes obvious:

iPhone OS X Architecture: the BSD Unix Userland

iPhone OS X Architecture: Disk, Shell, and Password Security

iPhone OS X Architecture: the Mach Kernel and RAM

Leopard, Vista and the iPhone OS X Architecture

Roughly Drafted has articles every day. It's on /. once every month or two. It has more articles translated into Spanish, Russian and Hebrew by fans than articles posted here:

http://roughlydrafted.com/RD/Translations.html

I doubt OSDL is being supported by an individual writing tech articles that are of general interest. Remember it was Digg that didn't like R D, and that was because of too many "Xbox aren't selling" and "Vista is late and Microsoft has never pushed the state of the art" articles.

OP was wrong. BSD itself is a standard fat kernel like Linux or Solaris' SVR4-ish kernel.

Mach can be implemented as a microkernel, but it didn't really work out very well in practice. This is the microkernel architecture with an OS hosted as a personality, used in IBM's Workplace OS or OSF / Digital Unix.

NeXT (and Mac OS X) used the BSD kernel with the architecture of Mach injected into it, making it neither a microkernel nor a standard BSD kernel, but something that borrows from both. Above the Mach/BSD kernel is a conventional Unix userland, allowing Mac OS X to run regular POSIX software. Macs ship with a standard distribution of BSD software, GNU tools, and other common "Linux distro" software.

Recall that Linux is technically only a kernel; most of the software that ships with it and is associated as being part of Linux (including being targeted by Microsoft's patents threats) is really just Unix/GNU software, and is part of Mac OS X as well.

Unraveling the Mac OS X Microkernel Myth: What is Mach?.

Despite all the flowery language, its still a matter of Microsoft using the Zune to advertise its music store. You squirt an ad (trial song) to your friends, and then they go and buy it.

The only thing "new" is that, having failed to garner any interest in squirting, Microsoft is now planning to pay squirters a commission on sales. All the talk about "converting piracy" is bullshit. It's a program to tie a bone around the Zune music store so somebody will want to play with it.

How is this different than existing affiliate programs? I squirted some iTunes affiliate ads on my website, and when readers decide to click on them and buy something from iTunes, I get a small commission. How is this patentable? Because Microsoft described it it effusive language that presents advertising its store as a pirate magic trick? Is there something novel about sending files over a wireless network? I'm happy with Microsoft patenting the whole "squirt and die" model, as I don't want anyone else adopting it, but come on, what's novel about affiliate advertising?

Universal vs Apple in the iTunes Store Contracts
When reports surfaced that Universal Music Group, the world's largest music label, refused to resign its existing deal with Apple's iTunes Store, there were private schadenfreude celebrations held in many closets.

Chang's analysis was absurd. There will be no iPhone Nano for years if ever.

Kevin Chang, iSuppli and The iPhone Nano Myth
Reuters broadly reported JP Morgan's Kevin Chang forecasting the imminent arrival of a smaller cheaper, version of the iPhone dubbed the 'iPhone Nano.' The problem: not only is there is nothing backing up the iPhone Nano prediction, but it makes no sense at all. Even JP Morgan has distanced itself from the initial report.

Without a bail out from Microsoft in the late 90's Apple and its platform would have perished.

This old saw has been amply discussed elsewhere. It was not a financial bailout. Apple had over $1.2 billion in cash assets at the time. Microsoft's $150 million investment was not a big deal financially. What Apple DID need was investor confidence. Microsoft's commitment to keep producing Office for the Mac was important for Apple. On top of that Microsoft had its own business reasons for making the "investment." QuickTime code had turned up in Windows Media Player, and Apple was raising a big stink about it. Part of the deal was an undisclosed cash settlement on this matter. Also, Microsoft got the commitment from Apple to make Internet Explorer the default Mac browser, which was one way for Microsoft to fight off the competitive threat from Netscape. Read about it here: http://www.roughlydrafted.com/RD/RDM.Tech.Q1.07/59 2FE887-5CA1-4F30-BD62-407362B533B9.html

As was the case with the PC market in it's early stages, from the user perspective there have been lots of issues and problems with Windows Mobile phones. Marrying an OS platform from one company with hardware and software from another is not simple, and pretty much impossible to do right until after repeated attempts. As with the PC market eventually it will be right for the average consumer, to date it's really only been a satisfactory for the technology enthusiast.

Things are different today than they were in the 1980s, and the differences matter even more with respect to mobile devices. PCs have always dominated the workplace, and that dominance enabled Windows to take over the home market as well. Today, however, so much is done through the internet and using open standards. It's a complete fallacy to think that all mobile devices will have to have the same operating system in order to run the same programs or use the same files. What matters is that devices need to work reliably and be easy to use. Apple's approach delivers in this regard.

The problem with Windows Mobile, is that it has attempted to apply the same ideology to the mobile market as what was done in the PC market, and it has experienced similar technical problems to the PC market in it's early stages. Adopting companies are small, inexperienced, lacking quality control, they are technologically lagging major players, lacking marketing and distribution channels.

Precisely.

Windows Mobile is waiting for it's Dell, Compaq etc. Unlike the PC market the competition in the mobile market is well established and the user base is far less tolerant of the glitches that have plagued many of the Windows Mobile devices.

Yeah, just like Dell was going to take over the iPod business from Apple. So-called analysts were saying that soon Apple's marketshare on iPods would mirror its marketshare in computers. Now, Dell has bowed out of the business. This time, manufacturers cannot count on Microsoft's monopoly to carry the day.

So in the short term, yes you're right, Apple should feel right at home competing against the like's of Sony, Nokia etc who share their closed system ideology. But do you really believe this sort of ideology will last forever?

Nothing lasts for forever, but it is clear that we are moving to an era in mobile devices where software is becoming king. Yes, you still need a good piece of equipment, but the biggest source of innovation will be on the software side. Apple is extremely well-position to succeed in this world.

There are at least two companies that have been reported in reputable papers to have signed a deal over the iPhone, T-Mobile in Germany and O2 in the UK.

That sounds odd, considering that it would seem most reasonable to have one distributor for all of Europe. However, Apple runs 17 iTunes stores in Europe, and neither T-Mobile nor O2 cover the three territories Apple is reported to be targeting with its first volley of iPhones: Germany, France and the UK.

There are some other complications as well, but having multiple operators isn't as non-nonsensical as it might seem.

International iPhone: Europe, Japan and 3G UMTS
Apple introduced the iPhone exclusively in the US. Here's a look at what's involved in getting the iPhone to work in other markets now, and challenges Apple will face in the mobile market internationally.

Unraveling Anti-Apple Panic: iPhone Activation Privacy Scare
CNET's Michael Tiemann desperately wants your attention before you activate your iPhone. It's apparently a matter of Internet Safety, if his blog tags are not just random words to bait the attention of Google. Don't dismiss Tiemann just because he blogs for the notoriously anti-Apple CNET. He's also president of the Open Source Initiative and vice president of open source affairs at Red Hat.

Unraveling Anti-Apple Panic: the iPhone Launch Success
Apple captured international attention at the launch of the iPhone, despite only being available to consumers in the US. In January, Steve Jobs set the goal of selling 10 million iPhones by the end of 2008. Various analysts warned the the unit's higher up-front price and requirement to use AT&T service would raise significant barriers.

There are at least two companies that have been reported in reputable papers to have signed a deal over the iPhone, T-Mobile in Germany and O2 in the UK.

That sounds odd, considering that it would seem most reasonable to have one distributor for all of Europe. However, Apple runs 17 iTunes stores in Europe, and neither T-Mobile nor O2 cover the three territories Apple is reported to be targeting with its first volley of iPhones: Germany, France and the UK.

There are some other complications as well, but having multiple operators isn't as non-nonsensical as it might seem.

International iPhone: Europe, Japan and 3G UMTS
Apple introduced the iPhone exclusively in the US. Here's a look at what's involved in getting the iPhone to work in other markets now, and challenges Apple will face in the mobile market internationally.

Unraveling Anti-Apple Panic: iPhone Activation Privacy Scare
CNET's Michael Tiemann desperately wants your attention before you activate your iPhone. It's apparently a matter of Internet Safety, if his blog tags are not just random words to bait the attention of Google. Don't dismiss Tiemann just because he blogs for the notoriously anti-Apple CNET. He's also president of the Open Source Initiative and vice president of open source affairs at Red Hat.

Unraveling Anti-Apple Panic: the iPhone Launch Success
Apple captured international attention at the launch of the iPhone, despite only being available to consumers in the US. In January, Steve Jobs set the goal of selling 10 million iPhones by the end of 2008. Various analysts warned the the unit's higher up-front price and requirement to use AT&T service would raise significant barriers.

There are at least two companies that have been reported in reputable papers to have signed a deal over the iPhone, T-Mobile in Germany and O2 in the UK.

That sounds odd, considering that it would seem most reasonable to have one distributor for all of Europe. However, Apple runs 17 iTunes stores in Europe, and neither T-Mobile nor O2 cover the three territories Apple is reported to be targeting with its first volley of iPhones: Germany, France and the UK.

There are some other complications as well, but having multiple operators isn't as non-nonsensical as it might seem.

International iPhone: Europe, Japan and 3G UMTS
Apple introduced the iPhone exclusively in the US. Here's a look at what's involved in getting the iPhone to work in other markets now, and challenges Apple will face in the mobile market internationally.

Unraveling Anti-Apple Panic: iPhone Activation Privacy Scare
CNET's Michael Tiemann desperately wants your attention before you activate your iPhone. It's apparently a matter of Internet Safety, if his blog tags are not just random words to bait the attention of Google. Don't dismiss Tiemann just because he blogs for the notoriously anti-Apple CNET. He's also president of the Open Source Initiative and vice president of open source affairs at Red Hat.

Unraveling Anti-Apple Panic: the iPhone Launch Success
Apple captured international attention at the launch of the iPhone, despite only being available to consumers in the US. In January, Steve Jobs set the goal of selling 10 million iPhones by the end of 2008. Various analysts warned the the unit's higher up-front price and requirement to use AT&T service would raise significant barriers.

EDGE has a theoretical max around 230 kbit/s, but AT&T's network was limited to real world throughput of 70-120 kbit/s. They recently rolled out an upgrade that had been in the works for a while, but which appeared to be tied to the iPhone. Testing has found recent jumps to around 200.

Therefore, all the complaints about the glacial speed of EDGE have been based upon the old version. It's never going to be ridiculously fast, but with the new boost, its much faster than the early reviewers noticed.

I have a Sprint Treo now, and I'm happy to trade off network speed for a real browser that can eventually show me what I want, rather than quickly getting me to an unusable page.

Would it be cooler to have a faster network? Of course, but with the options available, I think Apple made good choices. People who don't agree have the freedom to get an N95 or TyTN or several other 3G phones available from other carriers.

Apple's Secret iPhone Application Business Model
At WWDC, Apple revealed that outside developers could build custom iPhone web applications. But what about real iPhone apps, the kind that use the full power of the Cocoa frameworks and run on the bare metal of the iPhone itself, and not in a secured sandbox environment of the standards-based web?

Astroturf doesn't have to be secret to remain astroturf.

What part of "deliberately seeking to engineer the impression of spontaneous public reactions to a product," centrally coordinated through Federated Media, do you not connect with this campaign?

It almost sounds like the Wiki page was written specifically with this campaign in mind.

Astroturf is planting fake conversations designed to mimic a real grassroots movement. Microsoft has a history of Astroturfing, both in its ad campaigns, its criminal defense campaigns, its political lobbying campaigns, and its technology FUD campaigns against other products. Do you think ZDNet's bloggers spontaneously all decided to rag on the iPhone when they wrote 50 negative articles within a week about a product from Apple that has little to do with their jobs or blogs? Is it a freak coincidence that just a few months ago they were singing the praises of the Zune, a product that found zero real interest in the market at week two?

iPod vs Zune: Microsoft's Slippery Astroturf

Exactly. And this isn't something new from Microsoft. During the anti-trust trial, it set up a fake grassroots movement to "condemn the government going after a poor criminal corporation just trying to innovate," and was busted by the LA Times. The Zune had a similar astroturf campaign that suggested real interest in the product, when all of the sites were simply parroting off a campaign.

Journalists have been reading ad copy on the radio for as long as there's been radio, but we know its an ad. Journalists with integrity present advertising as advertising, they don't present opinions about a campaign as part of the campaign, and intermingled with their other opinions. That's clearly a difference.

This is the same thing Fox News gets raked over the coals for: reporting a decreed spin on events from a central editorial board rather than facts. The media is too important as an information source to turn it into a commercial and political joke, just because it is financially expedient to do so.

Pod vs Zune: Microsoft's Slippery Astroturf

The Newton wasn't so much a flop as it was a poorly aimed product that Apple didn't really bother to sell. It started out as a do everything tablet, and then Apple executives crippled it into an oversized handheld so as not to compete against the Mac. Apple then never got around to completing its sync software, and did a crappy job of supporting third party accessories.

As one Newton developer explained:
"Apple's sales expectations were far too high. The Apple II sold 16,000 units the second year it was out and was considered a huge success. The Mac sold 60,000 units its first year and was considered a modest success. The Newton sold over 100,000 units its first year and was a 'flop.'"

When Newton sales did begin to take off, Apple was in such bad shape that it wasn't really in the position to manage it. By then (1997), the cheap Palm was arriving, although Apple had several licensees lined up, including Motorola, who sold it as the wireless Marco. Jobs killed it perhaps because he thought it was a distraction and based on too much experimental technology to be practical. It had no specific purpose; it tried to do everything, and was only fair at all things.

Compare Windows CE, which took off in 1998, and was a bad joke until at least 2002. Since then, it has been a poor product, struggling for applications. It's still embarrassing after a decade of work. Even Microsoft decided to give up on WinCE for use in the Xbox and then Origami. It was never really good at anything apart from being a Palm Pilot replacement. Unfortunately, the Palm pilot didn't need a replacement because nobody wanted PDAs.

Now look at the iPhone: clear purpose as a phone, an iPod, and a web browser. Lots of cool tech, solid sync system already in place and working for the iPod/Apple TV, media ecosystem behind it, incredible brand and marketing, a hugely successful chain of retail stores waiting to pitch it. This quite obviously isn't a Newton.

--

Newton Lessons for Apple's New Platform
Apple is building a new platform, and applying lessons it learned from the 90s, when tried to launch the Newton as a new platform. Like the original Macintosh from a decade prior, the Newton started as one product, and intended to branch out into a range of systems. Here's why it failed and the lessons to be learned.

Apple: iPhone Now Costs Less than Ballmer's Lame Motorola Q
After earlier blowing apart iPhone battery panic with an announcement of 8 hours of talk time, Apple dropped yet another bombshell upon "business as usual" in the mobile market. In addition to simplified calling plans that start well under what had been predicted, the company also unveiled home activation. ...With the new plans announced by Apple and AT&T, that has changed. The minimum plan with unlimited data is $59, or $1416 over two years. That makes the iPhone over a hundred dollars less than Verizon's limp Motorola Q.

Using Apple's iPhone in the Enterprise
The iPhone is quite obviously targeted at consumers. However, it offers a significant leap forward in key features which make it attractive to business customers, particularly executives who like having the best communications tools available.

ZDNet's Mary Jo Foley Says Apple's iPhone Needs ActiveSync
Mary Jo Foley, who describes her ZDNet blog as "an unblinking eye on Microsoft," seems to have been charged with the unpleasant task of producing a somewhat positive sounding iPhone story, and gave it her best shot. Unfortunately, it wasn't very well thought out, and reflects a preoccupation with flattering Microsoft.

The Newton wasn't so much a flop as it was a poorly aimed product that Apple didn't really bother to sell. It started out as a do everything tablet, and then Apple executives crippled it into an oversized handheld so as not to compete against the Mac. Apple then never got around to completing its sync software, and did a crappy job of supporting third party accessories.

As one Newton developer explained:
"Apple's sales expectations were far too high. The Apple II sold 16,000 units the second year it was out and was considered a huge success. The Mac sold 60,000 units its first year and was considered a modest success. The Newton sold over 100,000 units its first year and was a 'flop.'"

When Newton sales did begin to take off, Apple was in such bad shape that it wasn't really in the position to manage it. By then (1997), the cheap Palm was arriving, although Apple had several licensees lined up, including Motorola, who sold it as the wireless Marco. Jobs killed it perhaps because he thought it was a distraction and based on too much experimental technology to be practical. It had no specific purpose; it tried to do everything, and was only fair at all things.

Compare Windows CE, which took off in 1998, and was a bad joke until at least 2002. Since then, it has been a poor product, struggling for applications. It's still embarrassing after a decade of work. Even Microsoft decided to give up on WinCE for use in the Xbox and then Origami. It was never really good at anything apart from being a Palm Pilot replacement. Unfortunately, the Palm pilot didn't need a replacement because nobody wanted PDAs.

Now look at the iPhone: clear purpose as a phone, an iPod, and a web browser. Lots of cool tech, solid sync system already in place and working for the iPod/Apple TV, media ecosystem behind it, incredible brand and marketing, a hugely successful chain of retail stores waiting to pitch it. This quite obviously isn't a Newton.

--

Newton Lessons for Apple's New Platform
Apple is building a new platform, and applying lessons it learned from the 90s, when tried to launch the Newton as a new platform. Like the original Macintosh from a decade prior, the Newton started as one product, and intended to branch out into a range of systems. Here's why it failed and the lessons to be learned.

Apple: iPhone Now Costs Less than Ballmer's Lame Motorola Q
After earlier blowing apart iPhone battery panic with an announcement of 8 hours of talk time, Apple dropped yet another bombshell upon "business as usual" in the mobile market. In addition to simplified calling plans that start well under what had been predicted, the company also unveiled home activation. ...With the new plans announced by Apple and AT&T, that has changed. The minimum plan with unlimited data is $59, or $1416 over two years. That makes the iPhone over a hundred dollars less than Verizon's limp Motorola Q.

Using Apple's iPhone in the Enterprise
The iPhone is quite obviously targeted at consumers. However, it offers a significant leap forward in key features which make it attractive to business customers, particularly executives who like having the best communications tools available.

ZDNet's Mary Jo Foley Says Apple's iPhone Needs ActiveSync
Mary Jo Foley, who describes her ZDNet blog as "an unblinking eye on Microsoft," seems to have been charged with the unpleasant task of producing a somewhat positive sounding iPhone story, and gave it her best shot. Unfortunately, it wasn't very well thought out, and reflects a preoccupation with flattering Microsoft.

The Newton wasn't so much a flop as it was a poorly aimed product that Apple didn't really bother to sell. It started out as a do everything tablet, and then Apple executives crippled it into an oversized handheld so as not to compete against the Mac. Apple then never got around to completing its sync software, and did a crappy job of supporting third party accessories.

As one Newton developer explained:
"Apple's sales expectations were far too high. The Apple II sold 16,000 units the second year it was out and was considered a huge success. The Mac sold 60,000 units its first year and was considered a modest success. The Newton sold over 100,000 units its first year and was a 'flop.'"

When Newton sales did begin to take off, Apple was in such bad shape that it wasn't really in the position to manage it. By then (1997), the cheap Palm was arriving, although Apple had several licensees lined up, including Motorola, who sold it as the wireless Marco. Jobs killed it perhaps because he thought it was a distraction and based on too much experimental technology to be practical. It had no specific purpose; it tried to do everything, and was only fair at all things.

Compare Windows CE, which took off in 1998, and was a bad joke until at least 2002. Since then, it has been a poor product, struggling for applications. It's still embarrassing after a decade of work. Even Microsoft decided to give up on WinCE for use in the Xbox and then Origami. It was never really good at anything apart from being a Palm Pilot replacement. Unfortunately, the Palm pilot didn't need a replacement because nobody wanted PDAs.

Now look at the iPhone: clear purpose as a phone, an iPod, and a web browser. Lots of cool tech, solid sync system already in place and working for the iPod/Apple TV, media ecosystem behind it, incredible brand and marketing, a hugely successful chain of retail stores waiting to pitch it. This quite obviously isn't a Newton.

--

Newton Lessons for Apple's New Platform
Apple is building a new platform, and applying lessons it learned from the 90s, when tried to launch the Newton as a new platform. Like the original Macintosh from a decade prior, the Newton started as one product, and intended to branch out into a range of systems. Here's why it failed and the lessons to be learned.

Apple: iPhone Now Costs Less than Ballmer's Lame Motorola Q
After earlier blowing apart iPhone battery panic with an announcement of 8 hours of talk time, Apple dropped yet another bombshell upon "business as usual" in the mobile market. In addition to simplified calling plans that start well under what had been predicted, the company also unveiled home activation. ...With the new plans announced by Apple and AT&T, that has changed. The minimum plan with unlimited data is $59, or $1416 over two years. That makes the iPhone over a hundred dollars less than Verizon's limp Motorola Q.

Using Apple's iPhone in the Enterprise
The iPhone is quite obviously targeted at consumers. However, it offers a significant leap forward in key features which make it attractive to business customers, particularly executives who like having the best communications tools available.

ZDNet's Mary Jo Foley Says Apple's iPhone Needs ActiveSync
Mary Jo Foley, who describes her ZDNet blog as "an unblinking eye on Microsoft," seems to have been charged with the unpleasant task of producing a somewhat positive sounding iPhone story, and gave it her best shot. Unfortunately, it wasn't very well thought out, and reflects a preoccupation with flattering Microsoft.

The Newton wasn't so much a flop as it was a poorly aimed product that Apple didn't really bother to sell. It started out as a do everything tablet, and then Apple executives crippled it into an oversized handheld so as not to compete against the Mac. Apple then never got around to completing its sync software, and did a crappy job of supporting third party accessories.

As one Newton developer explained:
"Apple's sales expectations were far too high. The Apple II sold 16,000 units the second year it was out and was considered a huge success. The Mac sold 60,000 units its first year and was considered a modest success. The Newton sold over 100,000 units its first year and was a 'flop.'"

When Newton sales did begin to take off, Apple was in such bad shape that it wasn't really in the position to manage it. By then (1997), the cheap Palm was arriving, although Apple had several licensees lined up, including Motorola, who sold it as the wireless Marco. Jobs killed it perhaps because he thought it was a distraction and based on too much experimental technology to be practical. It had no specific purpose; it tried to do everything, and was only fair at all things.

Compare Windows CE, which took off in 1998, and was a bad joke until at least 2002. Since then, it has been a poor product, struggling for applications. It's still embarrassing after a decade of work. Even Microsoft decided to give up on WinCE for use in the Xbox and then Origami. It was never really good at anything apart from being a Palm Pilot replacement. Unfortunately, the Palm pilot didn't need a replacement because nobody wanted PDAs.

Now look at the iPhone: clear purpose as a phone, an iPod, and a web browser. Lots of cool tech, solid sync system already in place and working for the iPod/Apple TV, media ecosystem behind it, incredible brand and marketing, a hugely successful chain of retail stores waiting to pitch it. This quite obviously isn't a Newton.

--

Newton Lessons for Apple's New Platform
Apple is building a new platform, and applying lessons it learned from the 90s, when tried to launch the Newton as a new platform. Like the original Macintosh from a decade prior, the Newton started as one product, and intended to branch out into a range of systems. Here's why it failed and the lessons to be learned.

Apple: iPhone Now Costs Less than Ballmer's Lame Motorola Q
After earlier blowing apart iPhone battery panic with an announcement of 8 hours of talk time, Apple dropped yet another bombshell upon "business as usual" in the mobile market. In addition to simplified calling plans that start well under what had been predicted, the company also unveiled home activation. ...With the new plans announced by Apple and AT&T, that has changed. The minimum plan with unlimited data is $59, or $1416 over two years. That makes the iPhone over a hundred dollars less than Verizon's limp Motorola Q.

Using Apple's iPhone in the Enterprise
The iPhone is quite obviously targeted at consumers. However, it offers a significant leap forward in key features which make it attractive to business customers, particularly executives who like having the best communications tools available.

ZDNet's Mary Jo Foley Says Apple's iPhone Needs ActiveSync
Mary Jo Foley, who describes her ZDNet blog as "an unblinking eye on Microsoft," seems to have been charged with the unpleasant task of producing a somewhat positive sounding iPhone story, and gave it her best shot. Unfortunately, it wasn't very well thought out, and reflects a preoccupation with flattering Microsoft.

Yes, you do get what you pay for. I'd agree that .Mac needs a significant upgrade, but the baseline service is $99, for the same as what MS is offering. What .Mac really needs is a speed upgrade and far higher bandwidth limits, so it makes any sense as a hosting service.

When I had the chance to skewer Steve Jobs about it, it did.

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Answers from Steve Jobs at Apple's Shareholder Meeting
At Apple Inc.'s May 10 annual shareholder meeting, a series of proposals were presented for voting after which CEO Steve Jobs answered a series of questions from the audience.

ZDNet's Mary Jo Foley Says Apple's iPhone Needs ActiveSync
Mary Jo Foley, who describes her ZDNet blog as "an unblinking eye on Microsoft," seems to have been charged with the unpleasant task of producing a somewhat positive sounding iPhone story, and gave it her best shot. Unfortunately, it wasn't very well thought out, and reflects a preoccupation with flattering Microsoft.

Yes, you do get what you pay for. I'd agree that .Mac needs a significant upgrade, but the baseline service is $99, for the same as what MS is offering. What .Mac really needs is a speed upgrade and far higher bandwidth limits, so it makes any sense as a hosting service.

When I had the chance to skewer Steve Jobs about it, it did.

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Answers from Steve Jobs at Apple's Shareholder Meeting
At Apple Inc.'s May 10 annual shareholder meeting, a series of proposals were presented for voting after which CEO Steve Jobs answered a series of questions from the audience.

ZDNet's Mary Jo Foley Says Apple's iPhone Needs ActiveSync
Mary Jo Foley, who describes her ZDNet blog as "an unblinking eye on Microsoft," seems to have been charged with the unpleasant task of producing a somewhat positive sounding iPhone story, and gave it her best shot. Unfortunately, it wasn't very well thought out, and reflects a preoccupation with flattering Microsoft.

Privacy, security, speed? Even with a hot downlink, you generally get a slow upload. And many people don't have fast internet, particularly here in the backward US.

Relying on service providers is great as long as they work flawlessly. Once they go "offline for maintenance" at random times, or lose your data "sorry, we recommend backups," your perspective changes. Google is also infamous for deciding on a whim to cancel user's accounts, which makes depending on them a bit risky. Is Microsoft going to do better? This company playedforsure its own significant partners, is it going to give a crap about joe schmoes?

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Using Apple's iPhone in the Enterprise
The iPhone is quite obviously targeted at consumers. However, it offers a significant leap forward in key features which make it attractive to business customers, particularly executives who like having the best communications tools available.

ZDNet's Mary Jo Foley Says Apple's iPhone Needs ActiveSync
Mary Jo Foley, who describes her ZDNet blog as "an unblinking eye on Microsoft," seems to have been charged with the unpleasant task of producing a somewhat positive sounding iPhone story, and gave it her best shot. Unfortunately, it wasn't very well thought out, and reflects a preoccupation with flattering Microsoft.

Privacy, security, speed? Even with a hot downlink, you generally get a slow upload. And many people don't have fast internet, particularly here in the backward US.

Relying on service providers is great as long as they work flawlessly. Once they go "offline for maintenance" at random times, or lose your data "sorry, we recommend backups," your perspective changes. Google is also infamous for deciding on a whim to cancel user's accounts, which makes depending on them a bit risky. Is Microsoft going to do better? This company playedforsure its own significant partners, is it going to give a crap about joe schmoes?

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Using Apple's iPhone in the Enterprise
The iPhone is quite obviously targeted at consumers. However, it offers a significant leap forward in key features which make it attractive to business customers, particularly executives who like having the best communications tools available.

ZDNet's Mary Jo Foley Says Apple's iPhone Needs ActiveSync
Mary Jo Foley, who describes her ZDNet blog as "an unblinking eye on Microsoft," seems to have been charged with the unpleasant task of producing a somewhat positive sounding iPhone story, and gave it her best shot. Unfortunately, it wasn't very well thought out, and reflects a preoccupation with flattering Microsoft.

Certainly Google can stumble, but what did you say about the 360 entering late and doing better than expected? HAHA!

The 360 jumped the gun on the next gen consoles, so it entered the game a year ahead of the Wii and PS3. Even so, Microsoft had to stuff the channel unmercifully just to meet its US goals. It has not done anything in foreign markets, and in the US it satiated the market and has not been doing well.

This spring, Microsoft even dropped their 5 million estimate for the first half of 07 down to 2. The growth is dead, and the Wii is outpacing it rapidly, even with an exclusive year head start for the 360. The market is panning both the 360 and PS3 as more of the same, and sales are very much not doing even as good as expected.

It's one thing to be excited about a product, but don't make up shit that isn't remotely true just because you like playing xbox.

Myth 7:The Xbox Success Myth
Ten Myths of the Apple TV: Xbox and Hardware

Certainly Google can stumble, but what did you say about the 360 entering late and doing better than expected? HAHA!

The 360 jumped the gun on the next gen consoles, so it entered the game a year ahead of the Wii and PS3. Even so, Microsoft had to stuff the channel unmercifully just to meet its US goals. It has not done anything in foreign markets, and in the US it satiated the market and has not been doing well.

This spring, Microsoft even dropped their 5 million estimate for the first half of 07 down to 2. The growth is dead, and the Wii is outpacing it rapidly, even with an exclusive year head start for the 360. The market is panning both the 360 and PS3 as more of the same, and sales are very much not doing even as good as expected.

It's one thing to be excited about a product, but don't make up shit that isn't remotely true just because you like playing xbox.

Myth 7:The Xbox Success Myth
Ten Myths of the Apple TV: Xbox and Hardware

The iPhone already has .Mac integration, because iTunes already syncs it with Safari's bookmarks, email/contacts/calendars, and email settings. ITunes in turn, syncs with .Mac. Users don't have to do anything, and they don't even need to pay for .Mac unless they have various systems they all want to sync together.

Also, bookmarks, contacts, and email can be accessed from .Mac via the web, which the iPhone can do too. I suppose there would be further ways to integrate or expand .Mac, but it works as is already. I don't know what Microsoft offers that is comparable.

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ZDNet's Mary Jo Foley Says Apple's iPhone Needs ActiveSync
Mary Jo Foley, who describes her ZDNet blog as "an unblinking eye on Microsoft," seems to have been charged with the unpleasant task of producing a somewhat positive sounding iPhone story, and gave it her best shot. Unfortunately, it wasn't very well thought out, and reflects a preoccupation with flattering Microsoft.

I'm sorry but as a long time Treo user, I'll have to call you on your crap.

The Treo was cool five years ago because it pioneered the idea of having a Palm PDA with a phone. It hasn't kept up, and Palm OS is creaky and needs a bullet in the head. Even Palm abandoned its own product to deliver a Windows Mobile version, which is actually less functional and more problematic.

I hope the iPhone results in Palm closing down. It really deserves the failure it earned by dumping trash on its own customers.

The Egregious Incompetence of Palm
Windows Mobile, Palm OS, Linux, and Symbian currently power the world's smartphones. How does each stack up against Apple's OS X in the iPhone? This article presents an overview of Palm. Palm's early products actually followed a trajectory strikingly similar to Apple's original Macintosh. Differences in the choices made at Palm provide an interesting glimpse into "what if" scenarios of a parallel universe.

You can avoid the iPod because it is a free market. You can buy a Zen or even a Zune.

You can't do the same in the PC market. You will grow grey hairs before Dell or HP or any other PC maker will offer you real options in your OS. Sure, a few token free OS offerings to hobbyists, but no commercial competition, and no hope for that situation to change. It's been the same since the early 90s. That's a monopoly.

Avoiding Windows is like trying to avoid roads or money. Sure you can barter and live in a cave, but there is really no option to avoiding Windows. You can easily avoid any products from Apple and find all sorts of competitive alternatives.

Apple: iPhone Now Costs Less than Ballmer's Lame Motorola Q
After earlier blowing apart iPhone battery panic with an announcement of 8 hours of talk time, Apple dropped yet another bombshell upon "business as usual" in the mobile market. ...With the new plans announced by Apple and AT&T, that has changed. The minimum plan with unlimited data is $59, or $1416 over two years. That makes the $500 iPhone well over a hundred dollars less than Verizon's limp Motorola Q, which is $2170 with its required service plan.

Fair enough - I could see VoIP being useful in that situation. I will point out, though, that most plans these days (at least in the US) for residential use include unlimited night and weekend minutes, i.e. the times you would presumably be at home talking to another person. Granted, night tends to start rather late (9-ish?).

As I said before, the biggest problem with VoIP on an iPhone is the complexity of it - in order to have it on the phone, Apple has to be willing to explain to people how it works and explain to AT&T/Cingular why it's a good idea to let people have a phone with that capability built into it. Getting AT&T's signature is easier when you're established in that market (Apple isn't... at least not yet). Getting people to understand why VoIP in general is "cool" will become a lot easier when it becomes, well, a lot easier. Personally, I suspect you'll see an Apple-supported Asterisk install on an Xserve ("Macsterisk"?) before you'll see an iPhone with VoIP support. Interestingly, Roughly Drafted actually mentioned just that in an article last year.

Lots of PCs had USB ports on them, but they frequently did not work. Microsoft didn't provide real support for USB until Win 98 "Second Edition" in 1999, making those ports not so useful.

Conversely, the hardware makers who put USB on PCs were also guilty of slowing its adoption by leaving legacy RS-232 and parallel ports on their PCs until around 2006. Apple simply stripped everything old off the iMac and left USB as the only option. It also provided a fair keyboard and a horrible yoyo mouse that forced demand for a third party flood of USB peripherals.

I'm not trying to give Apple some special credit for "inventing USB," I'm just stating that Apple doesn't hold things up for PC users, it only pushes the state of the art. That is a good thing even for people who hate Apple. Apple is also pushing EFI after it pretty much died of a lack of interest in the Itanium and PC worlds. Intel Macs are basically PCs from the future.

How Apple's Firmware Leapfrogs BIOS PCs
The Tentacles of Legacy

Lots of PCs had USB ports on them, but they frequently did not work. Microsoft didn't provide real support for USB until Win 98 "Second Edition" in 1999, making those ports not so useful.

Conversely, the hardware makers who put USB on PCs were also guilty of slowing its adoption by leaving legacy RS-232 and parallel ports on their PCs until around 2006. Apple simply stripped everything old off the iMac and left USB as the only option. It also provided a fair keyboard and a horrible yoyo mouse that forced demand for a third party flood of USB peripherals.

I'm not trying to give Apple some special credit for "inventing USB," I'm just stating that Apple doesn't hold things up for PC users, it only pushes the state of the art. That is a good thing even for people who hate Apple. Apple is also pushing EFI after it pretty much died of a lack of interest in the Itanium and PC worlds. Intel Macs are basically PCs from the future.

How Apple's Firmware Leapfrogs BIOS PCs
The Tentacles of Legacy

Hi Matt,

Here's why your complaints above were undeserving of an insightful moderation:

You said I had the "gall to label some bloggers as 'impassioned.'" The gall?

While I describe a lot of people as impassioned (you're at the front of the line), its not the worst thing a person can be. What I have criticized in some of my articles is bloggers who rant on about a subject with highly emotional rhetoric without really trying to make a point, just using emotionalist language (like gall) to portray a sensationalist position and smear others without using any facts or reasoning. I hope my articles express some passion about what I think, but I also try to back up everything I say with reasonable logic. I do not intend to spread emotionalist fear.

I wrote a half dozen articles about the Zune because the CNET universe was shamelessly gagging on it in anticipation with regurgitated Talking Points. I pulled it apart as a bad product with a poorly conceived strategy at a time when nobody else was saying much of the same. Only after it failed miserably did it become fashionable to point out what a pile of crap it was. It was quite obviously a bad product, I just pointed it out first.

You rag on me for calling a spade a spade, but you didn't present any errors or falsely emotional appeals I made to inflate the iPhone beyond what it really is. I merely tore apart the baboonery that sits in for honest criticism these days. If you're going to post hate mail about my impassioned style, make sure you do it in a way that is at least as factual and logical as I try to be in my articles.

You are sounding a lot like the average Digg user. That is not a complement.

Zune vs. iPhone: Five Phases of Media Coverage

You are right that POP and IMAP are designed for email, not calendaring. However, Microsoft implemented calendaring features over IMAP by treating appointments and invitations as special emails that the Outlook or Entourage client then displays as a calendar. Apple's iCal client has some support for communicating with Microsoft's calendar-emails, but it is working to deliver its own calendar server, which is not based upon proprietary extensions to email.

Apple's new iCal Server is an open source calendaring server project that communicates with its clients using the emerging CalDAV standard. CalDAV is based on WebDAV, which is based on HTTP. That makes iCal basically a specialized, two way web server that handles calendaring.

Apple not only built the new server on open CalDAV standards, but has also released it under the FOSS Apache 2.0 license so anyone can use their code to build interoperable Calendar servers on any platform. It is working with OSF and a variety of other groups to create a calendar server that works a lot like Apache does for the web in general. Linux is lacking a strong calendar server needed to compete against Exchange; many of the current options attempt to clone an Exchange work-alike. It seems like it would be better to design an open calendar server from the ground up, and Apple is helping lead that.

If the project takes off, it will benefit both Linux in servers as well as making calendaring clients more open and interchangeable. It will also weaken the need for small and medium sized businesses to build a vast Exchange infrastructure, and end up as Windows only server shops. That will be good for open source, and will be good for Apple in trying to sell Xserve hardware.

"As comparison below shows, while Dell servers are comparably priced with Apple's, the expense of Windows Server and Exchange licensing, along with CALs for 100 users, makes a basic Microsoft email server over three times as much as an Xserve, which includes unlimited use of Mac OS X Server: $17,200 vs $5500!"

Apple Takes On Exchange Server
Apple's Open Calendar Server vs Microsoft Exchange

You are right that POP and IMAP are designed for email, not calendaring. However, Microsoft implemented calendaring features over IMAP by treating appointments and invitations as special emails that the Outlook or Entourage client then displays as a calendar. Apple's iCal client has some support for communicating with Microsoft's calendar-emails, but it is working to deliver its own calendar server, which is not based upon proprietary extensions to email.

Apple's new iCal Server is an open source calendaring server project that communicates with its clients using the emerging CalDAV standard. CalDAV is based on WebDAV, which is based on HTTP. That makes iCal basically a specialized, two way web server that handles calendaring.

Apple not only built the new server on open CalDAV standards, but has also released it under the FOSS Apache 2.0 license so anyone can use their code to build interoperable Calendar servers on any platform. It is working with OSF and a variety of other groups to create a calendar server that works a lot like Apache does for the web in general. Linux is lacking a strong calendar server needed to compete against Exchange; many of the current options attempt to clone an Exchange work-alike. It seems like it would be better to design an open calendar server from the ground up, and Apple is helping lead that.

If the project takes off, it will benefit both Linux in servers as well as making calendaring clients more open and interchangeable. It will also weaken the need for small and medium sized businesses to build a vast Exchange infrastructure, and end up as Windows only server shops. That will be good for open source, and will be good for Apple in trying to sell Xserve hardware.

"As comparison below shows, while Dell servers are comparably priced with Apple's, the expense of Windows Server and Exchange licensing, along with CALs for 100 users, makes a basic Microsoft email server over three times as much as an Xserve, which includes unlimited use of Mac OS X Server: $17,200 vs $5500!"

Apple Takes On Exchange Server
Apple's Open Calendar Server vs Microsoft Exchange

"Ihnatko and Apple's insistence that the device is running OS X contradicts suggestions that, to be blunt, it is not, as a post on tech site Slashdot explains."

I'd recommend reading this for a good overview of how Windows Media and QuickTime grew out of the muck.

Bluray and HD-DVD will decode VC-1 if the material is encoded with VC-1. Most disks use H.264 because it's a better codec anyway and Hollywood is very skeptical about allowing Microsoft technologies to encapsulate "their" media, so it's lightly used. Most corporations have learned that any agreement with Microsoft is treacherous territory. Given the chance, they'll devour you from the inside and spit out your bones. If you examine Microsoft's history of practically any technology which is inherently interoperable, their constant effort is to distill everything work only on Windows. That's a huge problem which is working against them big time.

Microsoft found itself in a very uncomfortable situation with VC-1. They expected everyone to beat a path to their toll gate when High Definition DVDs were being developed. That didn't happen and they were the only ones who were surprised. What actually occurred was they weren't even invited to the party, so Microsoft found itself in the position of throwing the codec at standards committees, begging for ratification and it still took several years. Microsoft wanted exclusive control over the codec and that was unacceptable to those who understood the way Microsoft would eventually hold the content owners hostage. Microsoft had to provide the source code and define the royalty structure up front - something they've never had to do. This was the first time anything from Microsoft was properly standardized.

Another detractor against using Microsoft technologies was the long history of failed efforts and broken promises from Microsoft in the media business. Look at how often Microsoft has renamed existing technologies over the years because they have always culminated in some sort of train wreck. That kind of technical stability isn't something manufacturers were looking for long term. Manufacturers also had no faith in Microsoft's ability to deliver a secure product. During that time frame, the well known inverse of "Security" was "Microsoft".

The VC-1 codec is separate from Windows Media Player, literally removed from the Microsoft wrapper and offered seperately. Windows Media Player, with the possible exception of corporations which have signed exclusive deals with Microsoft, is shriveling up rapidly in favor of the MPEG4 container and H.264 codec (pronounced "QuickTime"). Many major video portals and hardware manufacturers have started shipping Flash (H.263) or MPEG4 with more on the way. Right now, Windows Media is working along side these technologies where a few years ago it was nearly alone in the field. Eventually, Windows Media may well fall away completely. The most popular format for paid media uses the interoperable and extensible MPEG4/H.264, not Windows Media (the iTunes Store).

The Windows Media Player wrapper is the shell which embodies mechanisms to track your movements, blow advertising at you, restrict your ability to view things as well as a few useful functions. Relatively, QuickTime is the crown jewel of media with far more flexibility than Windows Media could even pretend to have.

Konquerer uses KHTML, and Safari's WebKit was built from that as a starting point, but is really a fork. Apple worked on it for a year before notifying KHTML, and there were troubles in merging the changes Apple submitted.

There has been some effort to get KDE to adopt WebKit.

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Cuckoo for Cocoa: Is Safari on Windows the next iTunes?
Will Apple be able to achieve the same level of success with Safari as it has with iTunes, or are the circumstances completely different? Apple is betting on a handful of reasons why Windows users who already have a favorite web browser might want to use Safari. Here's a look at those reasons, what Safari shares in common with Apple's existing offerings--and in particular iTunes--and how it all relates to interesting possibilities in Apple's future strategies.

The Future of the Web: Safari, Firefox and Internet Explorer
Imagine jumping back in time to 1993 and rescuing the world from fifteen years of enslavement to proprietary technologies that held up innovation and put development decisions in the hands of a few salesmen.

Konquerer uses KHTML, and Safari's WebKit was built from that as a starting point, but is really a fork. Apple worked on it for a year before notifying KHTML, and there were troubles in merging the changes Apple submitted.

There has been some effort to get KDE to adopt WebKit.

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Cuckoo for Cocoa: Is Safari on Windows the next iTunes?
Will Apple be able to achieve the same level of success with Safari as it has with iTunes, or are the circumstances completely different? Apple is betting on a handful of reasons why Windows users who already have a favorite web browser might want to use Safari. Here's a look at those reasons, what Safari shares in common with Apple's existing offerings--and in particular iTunes--and how it all relates to interesting possibilities in Apple's future strategies.

The Future of the Web: Safari, Firefox and Internet Explorer
Imagine jumping back in time to 1993 and rescuing the world from fifteen years of enslavement to proprietary technologies that held up innovation and put development decisions in the hands of a few salesmen.

How about some facts?

Look at Wikipedia's reports of various market share stats for that period. There is no controversy that Netscape's market share plunged in 1997. Now look up the browser MS shipped in 1997. It was not a superior product competing in the market place, because nobody chose IE; they got it by default.

Sure, after MS set up a barrier to Netscape's business plan, it could then invest more into browser development. After 1997, Netscape could do very little, while MS rapidly released three major new versions in 97, 99, and 2001.

What needs to be noted is what happened after AOL/Netscape/Mozilla stopped delivering anything as a competitor. Microsoft, without any further need to take the browser market, froze development of the browser for half a decade. Another version of IE wasn't delivered until 2006, and only because Firefox was starting to compete again.

You can say all you want about what "Steve Jobs" wants or knows, but since you can't understand why anticompetitive behavior and monopoly maintenance are bad for markets, I also have to assume you know nothing about what was going on inside Apple.

We also know, because Jobs announced it, that Jobs did try to sign fair contracts with cloners, and we also know (those of us that do) that Jobs entertained the idea of broadly licensing Rhapsody and YellowBox for Windows. That was NeXT's business model, and Apple tried to maintain it under the name Apple Enterprise.

The problem was that OEMs like HP and Dell would have nothing to do with Apple because Microsoft threatened to raise their Windows OEM prices dramatically if they did. Dell even scrambled to move its web store from NeXT's WebObjects to Microsoft's ASP after Apple bought NeXT.

Linux faces the same barriers to competition, but largely lacks the marketing muscle of Apple, making it even more difficult to line up and offerings of Linux on name brand hardware. Dell's placeholder Linux offerings are quite obviously bullshit, and as was recently reported, it will not sell them to businesses at all. Why not?

You have sassy comebacks for all sorts of things, but they are all based on fact free assertions. You also seem happiest when building strawmen and asserting your victory in ripping them apart. I did not admit any problems in a "primary argument" I never made. Instead, I linked to the article I wrote where one of the main points was that Netscape failed due to its own problems, both in strategy and in development.

Microsoft used Netscape's weakness in order to dominate the market, tying the web platform to its monopoly on the desktop and injecting proprietary extensions in order to make web apps require IE on Windows. That prevented any opportunity for competition, and ended any vehicle for Sun's Java. MS pretended to support Java on its own browser, but only with the intent of leading Sun down a dark hallway and shooting it when out of sight. That helped prevent any sort of meaningful cross platform way to deliver applications.

If you can't fathom a link between "no competition" and "no innovation," and want me to list innovations that are being prevented by anti-competitive behavior, I'll have to leave it at that, because there's no point in arguing with someone who willfully chooses to be obtuse. You may as well demand proof for the roundness of the Earth, evidence of man-made climate change, or a complete study on why dumping more war into Iraq won't solve the problems.

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Web Browser Wars: Netscape vs Internet Explorer

No, but how about a string of them. Cairo, Longhorn... Win 95 was SUPPOSED to be Cairo, but all the features were stripped out before release and we ended up with a dressed up (and admittedly more stable) win 3.1 STILL on top of DOS. Then NT was supposed to be Cairo, but again, didn't make the cut. Then Win XP was supposed to be Cairo, but again, same story. Then they shifted to talk to Longhorn.... you can connect the dots. Microsoft has been selling vaporware to catch up with competitors for 20 years now. Wake up. http://www.roughlydrafted.com/RD/Q4.06/4E2A8848-57 38-45B1-A659-AD7473899D7D.html

You make a couple comments that are technically true, but gloss over details to an absurd degree.

"IE4 surpassed Navigator in marketshare some time in 1999." Who cares? The real fact to consider is that IE resulted in an immediate plunge in Netscape's market share, from over 80% in 1996 to being a minority a year later. That's leverage. Part of that leverage in 1997 was MS using threats of delaying Office for Mac to get Apple to sign an exclusive deal to only put IE on the Mac desktop.

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Mac Office, $150 Million, and the Story Nobody Covered

"In July of 1997, the ongoing rivalry between Apple and Microsoft appeared to vanish with the announcement a new cooperative partnership. Why did Microsoft invest millions in a partnership with its most obvious remaining competitor in the desktop operating system market? "
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MS didn't have to "surpass" anyone in market share immediately, it only had to suffocate Netscape and destroy its cross-platform strategy so there were no choices left. After there is no choice, MS is your choice.

I agree that Netscape screwed up its own game. However, MS not only put a bullet into Netscape's head, but further monopolized the browser market, to the point where the only competitors since have been a free project and a few niche micro-minorities: Opera on mobiles, and Safari on the Mac. That is not an open market.

Your comments about there being no market for Linux or Mac OS X on PCs fallacious; if you don't know how OEM contracts work, go look it up. There is no open market for PC OS and hasn't been since the early 90s. Apple could not find licensees the same way Linux can't get OEMs to offer it outside of a token hobbyist offering. Those contracts were all tied up by MS.

Nothing is free. If you want the browser to be free, and MS to provide it, you are inviting MS to run your desktop. Good for you, I don't care. The problem is that the market should not be dominated by any player with the ability to set prices and prevent innovation, particularly not the tech market.

You can also support mob protection for your block because they do such a good job, but that doesn't mean the world shouldn't enforce racketeering laws. Most of us don't want to live in a shitty world run by thugs.

You provide a good example of someone with an argument but without much grasp of what has happened, is happening, or will happen if the status quo is maintained. That makes your arguments, which are easy to pull apart, simply not worth very much.

One could also say having a browser is a "demanded feature" of an OS. What was wrong about MS tying IE with Windows?

In addition to leveraging its monopoly position on 98% of the world's PCs to instantly create overwhelming market share for IE almost instantly in 1997, MS also added proprietary extensions to IE to distort the market of the web itself. That allowed MS to kill Netscape's revenue from servers. IE didn't compete with Netscape as a product until Netscape itself began to fail with the fiasco of Communicator 4. IE 1-3 were junk. IE 4-6 were better than what Netscape offered only because the company had been vanquished and was no longer offering anything.

Google faces the same impossible leverage. While MS can "compete" against Google desktop or browser tools, it can't compete in web search and marketing. So it is using its monopoly desktop position to roll out integrated search that can't be disabled or replaced by third party vendors. Once MS establishes market share on the basis of disposable PCs being replaced, and not consumer choice, it can then start directing all web search to its own servers exclusively.

Google currently has to fund Mozilla's Firefox to the tune of about $50 million a year to maintain an alternative browser. That reminds one of the fact that the only competition to Windows on the desktop PC is Linux, which is free. Microsoft has still managed to prevent OEMS from bundling it.

So anyone who thinks that MS' monopoly isn't in place or is no longer being abused is delusional:

- There is no free market in PC desktop OSs (Apple could not sign up OEMs, and even the free Linux struggles to gain adoption)
- There is no free market in desktop application suites (Office is rivaled mainly by free OpenOffice)
- There is hardly a free market in web browsers (the only option is the free, DIY Firefox)

Do we want to further restrict the market in online web search and offer Microsoft additional exclusive power over a market where there is now choice?

What's next, will we make all peripherals only something one can buy from Microsoft? How about games? What other markets would people prefer to hand over to Microsoft?

The problem is, when markets are handed to MS, they become entangled in proprietary tetherings to Windows and innovation rapidly stops. Once MS marginalized Netscape, it quit its own development of IE, and another major version wasn't shipped until *five years* later, and only then because Firefox had begun eating back some market share.

The problem with Windows enthusiasts is they they do not understand what is going on, they don't grasp what has happened, they fail to consider the consequences of further abuse. They are very much the same as the ~25% of Americans who support a rudderless war with a blank check, a president who had installed the beginnings of a fascist, terrorizing police state, and the beginnings of a pseudo-christian theocracy ruled by a clergy of corporate board members.

So far, so good! Let's see more of the same cause it's working so well. Don't consider the alternatives! Stay the course.

These people make my head explode.

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Safari on Windows? Apple and the Origins of the Web
One of the surprises unveiled in the WWDC keynote was the beta release of Safari 3.0 for both Mac OS X Tiger and Windows XP and Vista. While it was known that a new version of Safari would appear in Mac OS X Leopard in October, getting a beta now for today's Tiger was news. The release of Safari for Windows PCs went even further, raising the question of why Apple would port its browser to a platform that perhaps has too many already.

Apple in the Web Browser Wars: Netscape vs Internet Explorer
Apple's surprise delivery of the Safari web browser for Windows at WWDC was described by seve