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Why Apple Failed in the 90s
An anonymous reader writes "With news of amazing sales figures for both Mac hardware and the iPod, the future for Apple looks bright. But it wasn't always that way. The 90s were a bad time for the company, and Roughlydrafted.com has a look at Apple's failures of the previous decade." From the article: "During the development of Mac OS X, Apple polished the existing classic Mac OS, and salvaged what it could of Copland developments. Apple modernized its existing Mac APIs into Carbon, which would run software in Mac OS 9, and later allow it to run natively in Mac OS X. Despite fixing the obvious flaws in Apple's operating system offering, Mac OS X did not in itself solve Apple's problem. The company now only had an improved platform that nobody had any reason to buy. The real solution to Apple's problem was stumbled onto by a fortunate accident. "
Me too!
The wikipedia page is more informative than this article...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_Computer
Which after reading it, provides better insight than the article....
Non sequitur: Your facts are uncoordinated.
ven if their share rises from 2% to 4%,
Their share has moved from 2% to 6% already gartner You'll need a new line now.
There were reasons Apple went rotten to the core. I know because I have owned and operated many of their computers throughout the years. I would say the most important reason for my exit from using Apple was the concept they had regards software. I had bought the machines to program them for business applications unique to the industry I was in. The shop was small. We didn't have multi-million dollar budgets.
When we tried to program we ran up against limitations associated with the programming languages available. They were good programming languages but they lacked the adequate documentation for us to make them really effective and useful. We contacted Apple. They bluntly told us that information was proprietary and we should hire Claris Works to write the software. That was it. We were out in the cold. No more Apples for me.
Microsoft started with the IBM PC. The PC had a fortunate spy incident in which IBM OS basics were stolen before the PC came out. This opened up and allowed thousands of programmers entry into the business. It was this farm of people that Microsoft drew from. Apple had no such farm because it herbacided the crop every time they could. They viewed programmers as weeds.
Apple is succeding now with IPod etc largely because many many people can play. If they wanted to take out Microsoft, it would be easy. All they have to do is take their basic superiority in graphics and etc and lock the doors open to developers. It will be a short time indeed before MS is on the ropes.
Never Politically Correct ~ I prefer the facts If you don't like what I say, get a life, or comment yourself.
Any bets on what the fortunate accident was?
That's just a lame cliffhanger so you go back and click his ads some more.
the fortunate accidents were:
- Steve Jobs coming back
- them hiring Johnathan Ive (iPod, iMac designer)
Them conspiring to make Apple a more branded, more complete experience, and hype it up, using their assets (OSX with a shiny interface, loyal designer crowd following them, the MS/Adobe/Macromedia software packs).