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The Media's Crush on Apple
conq writes "BusinessWeek reports: "It's the first time in my memory that a product announcement by Steve Jobs has caused the AP to send an alert -- especially since this development was fully expected. And it says a lot about the intensity of media attention Apple generates. When is the last time a NewsAlert went out based on the words of Michael Dell or Bill Gates? Clearly, the AP's editors determined this news was important enough to warrant such action."
Here's a link to that if you're interested...
Bill Gates is the Nostradamus of our lifetime.
In his own words he has eliminated spam, brought speech and handwriting recognition to everyday computing, and has a solid foothold in our livingroom with their useful windows media center PCs.
Our potential truly is their passion.
Apple on the other hand just keeps releasing products that we can do nothing else with but use them...
OS X, Garage Band, iTunes, Spotlight...
If you don't know what AltaVista is (was), get off my lawn.
Apple's fascination by the media has to do with 3 things:
1. Dominance in entertainment (graphic artists, movie makers, etc). So when most journalists who interact with their geeky movie making counterparts, odds are they're going to see a Mac, no matter what they may be using. So Apple news has a direct impact on these people.
2. Steve Jobs has charisma. You look at the interviews with Bill Gates, or Ellison, or McNealy, and I'm sorry, but these guys are just not photogenic. They hardly sound interesting, and they talk about boring stuff. (More on that in a moment.) But at least Jobs - and the drama of his life, the "rags to riches" story, is at least interesting. Even with his mistakes, at least he makes them *big* and bold.
3. Most technology news is boring. Routers? Boring. Enterprise management? To the usual person, boring. New computer that lets you make movies? Well, that's kind of interesting! Music? That's something people are interested in, not "We can get 10,000 people to use a server to access a database!". My wife gets music - she could care less about using LDAP calls to Active Directory.
The rest of it - the fascination the tech industry has with Apple - is because usually their the first ones to do things in an interesting way. Not all of the ideas are really unique - like the iPod, or cameras on a computer. But they put it on with a style that few companies save Sony perhaps can match, so it feels like it's innovative - and sometimes, the way that Apple does it, it is.
As the article mentions, will this translate into bigger sales? MS dominated thanks to their IBM deal and focusing on business, while Jobs focused on the home. Gates won that part of the war. But now the war is moving into the entertainment business, where Microsoft keeps pushing their product but making slow headway while Apple is embraced by the same media who is fascinated with them.
Eh - so who knows about the future. I know I'll probably pick up a Macbook Pro sometime in the future and try it out, probably put a Windows partition or just use Cedaga for OS X whenever that arises. But I'm sure the fascination with Apple will continue as long as Jobs continues to be interesting.
Of course, this is just my opinion. I could be wrong.
52 Weeks, 52 Religions with John Hummel
It's all about branding my boy! Branding! Also, it leaves room for Apple to put AMD chips or anything else they want. They still can do that with the label on, you say. Ah, Apple is Apple. That's the only brand that Jobs wants you to see. And, I think there may be a time in the future where the end consumer will not know what the CPU is. It could be anything. Who cares? You're buying an Apple and that's all that matters. Do you care what the chips are in your monitor, TV, iPod, or your router? I don't. As long as I get something that works.
True. With Apple, you have to install the virus. With a Windows PC, it comes preloaded.
...His expertise is reliability and customer support ... thank you for praising Dell, please wait while your praise is rerouted to New Delhi...
To err is human, to really foul up requires a computer
Michael Dell has little to do with innovation.
I beg to differ. Perhaps little innovation in PC development, but in supply-chain management? The man's a god.
"I'd rather be a lightning rod than a seismometer." -Ken Kesey
Dell announces new systems built using AMD processors. Declares that customers should have a choice of the best systems available at the best prices available with full Dell support.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
Because Google hasn't done so much as fart (though you'd see it on the front page if they did) since Friday.
"I'd rather be a lightning rod than a seismometer." -Ken Kesey
Not only does Steve Jobs have a dynamic personality, but he KNOWS he does and can promote himself and his company accordingly. On top of that, Apple is the true innovator in the industry -- they produce must-have products, and those products almost unfailingly work extremely well.
By comparison, Bill's personality doesn't have the dynamic, charismatic element that Steve has. Bill certainly has the intellect, the will, and the drive, but he just comes across differently than Steve in a public setting.
It's like comparing Scorcese to Bruckheimer. Critics love Scorcese more and everyone will agree that Scorcese makes a superior product, but Bruckheimer is the one with the blockbuster hits.
Quite right.
Linus floats one inch above the ground.
Steve appears to float one inch above the ground, but that's an illusion caused by the RDF.
Bill stays at ground level, but the ground shrinks one inch away to avoid touching him.
Any more silly questions?
I have no problem with the media picking this up, but what the heck is up with appledot.org?
Apple: The Media's Crush on Apple
IT: 'The IT Crowd' UK Sit-com
Science: Taiwan Breeds Transgenic, Fluorescent Green Pigs
Apple: Windows on Intel Macs - Yes or No?
Apple: Apple Responds to iTunes Spying Allegations
IT: Lawmakers Try to Protect Kids From Spam
Apple: Sun and Apple Could Have Merged
Sorry, slashdot.org. Typo.
I just invaded Grammar Czechoslovakia and duped Grammar Neville Chamberlain; now it's on to Grammar Poland.
If they'd been here a while they'd recall that once upon a time Apple couldn't get a single positive article on here. Even the iPod got slammed around here./ 1816257&tid=107
.78" thick 6.5 ounces. 5 GB HDD, 10 hr battery life, charged via FireWire. Works as a firewire drive as well. Works in conjunctions with iTunes 2. Here are Live updates". No wireless. Less space than a nomad. Lame.
http://apple.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=01/10/23
Apple releases iPod
Posted by CmdrTaco on Tuesday October 23, @10:20
from the well-thats-not-very-exciting dept.
The BrownFury writes "At an invitation only event Apple has released their new MP3 player called the iPod. iPod is the size of a deck of cards. 2.4" wide by 4" tall by
The Bill Gates story was an article. AP generated dozens of them from CES alone.
The Apple piece in question was an alert: a one-sentence "breaking news happening now!" thing that AP passes on to its subscribers. For example, if a UFO lands in Detroit, there will be an immediate alert, followed later by a detailed story.
Just so you know.
Michael Dell has little to do with innovation. He's a brilliant businessman but I do not think his job function entitles him to media attention like Gates or Jobs.
Hold your horses there big boy. Sounds like your implying that Bill Gates innovates like Steve Jobs. Let me tell you something. Bill Gates packages software like Micheal Dell packages computers. There's no more software innovation happening at Microsoft than their is hardware innovation happening at Dell. Microsoft's business is taking what other people have innovated and marketing it like they're the ones who innovated. I watched a video of some MS guys talking about RSS in Vista a few months ago and I felt like I was watching a 2 year old discovering his toes. You can do alot of cool stuff with RSS today but watch how MS puts a spin on it when Vista is released. It'll be all MS and the average consumer will watch in awe and say "Gee, those MS guys are smart cookies".
ayottesoftware.com
Interestingly, Apple is very close to surpassing Dell in market value. Right now it's Apple: $72,301,066,720, Dell: $72,912,111,560. Apple keeps going up, while Dell has been down recently. Imagine the press coverage over Apple surpassing Dell in market value.
"Sufferin' succotash."
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Who were just *bleeping* lucky that they were a little company when they started, because the Xerox of 1978 couldn't have figured out that selling water to a thirsty man is good business.
The sheer amount of stuff Xerox invented, then pissed away, is staggering.
The inventor of the laser printer nearly got fired for even suggesting the idea. He was kicked out of the company's prestigious NY R&D facilities, exiled to Palo Alto with all those damned hippies at PARC, and given virtually no support.
In the end they let HP go on to dominate the printer industry.
They gave away the GUI to Apple for a song (all the stock Xerox got in return for the GUI was sold a month or so before Apple's stock price doubled.)
Bob Metcalfe invented ethernet there, they let him have the invention, and so begat 3Com.
They damned near gave away the copier business to various other competitors though sheer incompetence.
It's stunning Xerox is still around as a company.