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Apple's Missed Opportunity With Leopard Delay

Posted by CowboyNeal on from the timing-is-everything dept.

An anonymous reader writes "According to an article on OSWeekly.com, Apple missed a big opportunity by not releasing Leopard soon. They could've taken advantage of Vista's losing streak and one upped Microsoft, the author suggests. 'It's not uncommon for Windows users and technology consumers in general to say that Microsoft missed out on making the most of Vista both before and after its launch. Longtime fans of Windows have changed their tone due to Vista's inadequacies, and regular users are in many cases stuck with trying to figure out why they still can't get certain things to work within the operating system. Granted, it's not a completely horrific OS, but is that even a compliment worth accepting?'"

17 of 641 comments (clear)

  1. Hardly... by gilesjuk · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Windows users will stick with XP, there's no evidence to say that they would give up on Windows and get a Mac. Firstly they would need to buy new hardware, the obvious choice is to go to Linux since you can keep your hardware.

    1. Re:Hardly... by alfredo · · Score: 5, Informative

      Apple's market share is over 8% now. Those customers are coming from somewhere.

      With Parallels you can run Linux on the Mac, and if you don't want to do that but still want Nix software, you can do it. I'm using GIMP, Scribus, Inkscape, Xephem, and other titles I was used to in the Nix world. I've even ran Gnome on top of OSX.

      --
      photosMy Photostream
    2. Re:Hardly... by electroniceric · · Score: 5, Insightful

      If people other than tinkerers and enthusiasts are going to change OS, they're going to do so either because they bought a new computer, or because there's something they want to do that they can't now or something that really made them unhappy. That process takes longer than a couple months.

      What's really changed with Vista is that people are not willing to be shepherded along from release to release by Microsoft. This is partly due to the Mac's resurgence and more due to a much broader understanding that there are choices. I'd love to attribute that understanding of choices to Linux and open source, but I think that's only had an much of an effect within the developer community. But users more broadly no longer see Microsoft as a miracle-worker for producing these computers that do all sorts of things, because they just expect computers to do the things they do. And many more of them have seen the forced upgrade phenomenon firsthand, and are waiting for a little more bang for their $400. That's reflected in the press with far more writers adopting critical tone towards Microsoft than ever before.

      All of the articles we've seen about Apple and missed opportunities (after all this TFA is just some dude at a small website pontificating for an evenings' entertainment) are generally people expressing their desire for David to knock off Goliath and have very little to do with any insights about the market or business opportunities for Apple or Microsoft. To the extent that Apple keeps producing computers that people like and are relevant to what people want to do with them, on terms that are favorable to Apple, their market opportunities are still enormous. And that's almost totally independent of market share - the desktop OS market is simply not an unexploited area in the way it was 15 years ago.

    3. Re:Hardly... by sarathmenon · · Score: 5, Insightful

      And that's more to do with human nature. People will rather live with a familiar piece of crap, rather than switch to something totally new that may (not) be better. I don't see any sudden shifts in computing, windows is going to be at the helm for a long time, atleast a decade or two more. No, there will not be a year of the linux desktop, there may be a year of the mac desktop.

      That said, awareness of apple as a good hardware vendor is increasing. In the end, a very less part of apple's bottom line will be affected by vista. Leopard's timing will not affect this much, in fact I think they made the wise move by releasing it near the holiday season.

      --
      Microsoft: "You've got questions. We've got dancing paperclips."
    4. Re:Hardly... by diverman · · Score: 5, Interesting

      I completely agree. I also think that it can be attributed to a continuing breakdown of the perception that there is a gross incompatibility between Mac users and the rest of the world. While I still do field questions such as "Will I be able to open a Word file someone sends me," they are becoming less frequent. I even hear concern about whether someone with a Mac will be able to receive email from someone with a Windows computer. I think that as the Mac becomes more popular, more people realize that there really isn't a whole lot of compatibility issues for the majority of what they want to do.

    5. Re:Hardly... by igb · · Score: 5, Interesting
      I'm in the fortunate position of having been in the IT trade for over twenty years and never having used a Windows machine for more than half an hour at a time, so my opinion doesn't count for much. But I run the IT for ~1200 employee company, and when XP shipped we had a path beaten to our desks by people demanding XP now, and when for the first few months we re-installed new hardware with Windows 2000 there were threats of violence. I've heard nothing at all from users wanting Vista, and our policy of installing XP SP2 on newly purchased laptops barely evokes comment. Out of the office, in my guise as the go-to guy from friends and family, I've not heard Vista mentioned.

      On the other hand, both my parents and my in-laws, all in their 70s, have bought four Macs between them, and in the office I've now got a list of people who wants Macs officially supported along with the unofficial ones that have crept in. With a team of three plus two on the helpdesk support SuSE, CentOS, Solaris and Windows is tough enough, but with Macs on my desk and that of one of my team we ought to give it a go. IMAP, SMTP, Office, a compliant web browser and the Oracle Collaboration Suite client is pretty much the baseline, and it's all there...

      ian

  2. A Little Early ... by thornomad · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I'm not sure how you can say they missed an opportunity until after some initial sales figures and responses come out. It took a while before the non-desire for Vista became apparent. It will take some time before people have a chance to respond (with their wallets) to Leopard.

  3. Soon? by Ophion · · Score: 5, Insightful

    According to an article on OSWeekly.com, Apple missed a big opportunity by not releasing Leopard soon.

    Apple is releasing Leopard soon, unless six days now qualifies as a long wait. Perhaps the author of the summary meant "earlier."

  4. Re:That depends. by wootest · · Score: 5, Funny

    horrific adjective see Windows Me

  5. Just the same ol' story... by DreadfulGrape · · Score: 5, Insightful

    ...which has been re-written ad nauseum for the past six months.

    The average mac enthusiast doesn't give a rat's ass about strategic timing of OS releases. If OS 10.5 wasn't ready until now, that's certainly good enough for me.

    --
    sig has been sent away for a few small repairs...
  6. This guy is clueless by phillymjs · · Score: 5, Insightful

    One of the main reasons Vista has been so maligned is because it was ridiculously late and Microsoft was desperate to save face... so they started stripping out promised features and shipped it before it was truly ready. The bad reviews were legion. Word of mouth has spread. Even non-technical people have heard of Vista's bad reputation... I've lost count of the posts I've seen on here where someone mentions their surprise that their mom or whoever remarked something on the order of, "Vista? Isn't that the bad one?"

    By holding Leopard back until they were sure it was ready, Apple has laid the groundwork for an even bigger opportunity. There are a lot of people out there who flat out don't like or don't want Vista. Delayed or not, if Leopard gets good reviews in the media and the word of mouth is positive, that's going to give a nice boost to Mac sales.

    ~Philly

  7. Re:Author is clueless by Shadowmist · · Score: 5, Insightful

    People that buy apple products aren't technical enough to know if leopard is better than any past build revision of FreeBSD that apple leeched. They buy apple because it looks cute and they can remain oblivious to technology. The author is a clueless monkey if he thinks people suddenly want to buy apple crap because it's build 10.3.1. That's a comment that makes sense only to someone who's entire OS life is spent underneath a command prompt. FreeBSD while an important part of X is only part of the foundation. It's everything else that's on top and underneath that makes the OS something other than a gearhead toy. And since when is making use of Open Source some sort of moral crime? Apple makes it's acknowledgements and last time I checked it's changes are open sourced back in the form of Darwin. Have you tried Darwin and made any real comparison? Or are you just some Linux Nazi who is lashing out with unsubstantive bile for the simple reason that it's not Linux. If so, you're no different than Mac Nazis, or Windows Nazis, or Amiga Zombies that still think there's a future for that last platform, you're acting from unreason.
  8. Apple née Computer by fermion · · Score: 5, Insightful
    I think with the delay of OS X, and the change in name, and the release of the iPhone SDK, Apple has chosen where future growth will lie. They will likely keep making computers, laptop for consumers and towers for pro content creation, but small high profit consumer devices are the future.

    If anything, Apple has decided that 5% of the computer market is all it will have, and little it does will displace the PC from corporate, the only way it can get much more than 10%. However, with good consumer toys, it can be the home electronics supplier for those with disposable incomes.

    --
    "She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
  9. Macs are not replacing Windows PCs by AHumbleOpinion · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Macs are not replacing Windows PCs, they have become Windows PCs. Buyers no longer have to choose Mac OS X or Windows, they can have both. That is the catalyst that is driving the increased sales.

    There is little point in running Linux on the Mac. Mac OS X is a capable *nix box, most FOSS software is not Linux specific and targets Mac OS X as well. Plus Mac OS X has a superior user interface. If someone is running Parallels they are doing so to use Windows XP. Exceptions are rarities such as a developer who needs to do compatibility testing under Linux.

  10. Same as it ever was by maggard · · Score: 5, Funny

    Apple missed a big opportunity by not releasing Leopard soon.

    Yeah, they shoulda released it around 1989, before Windows 3.0 shipped...

    Think of all the misery they'd have saved everyone!

    --
    I don't read ACs: If a post isn't worth so much as a nom de plume to its author then I wont bother either.
  11. Only counting NEW mac sales? by JonTurner · · Score: 5, Interesting

    >>Apple's market share is over 8% now. Those customers are coming from somewhere.

    Exactly! But there's more to the number than the statistics would indicate.

    In the past three years most of my family switched to a Mac. I switched (desktop and laptop), my college-aged daughter bought a mac, I switched my parents and inlaws, and two of my colleagues switched off their PCs and are now using Macs for everyday work. So that's seven Macs in my immediate circle of family and friends. But only two of them were new machines, the rest were used G4s. The statistics in this review are only counting sales of new computers, so these switchers are "invisible."

    However, that brings up a question I've had for some time. It's quite common to hear about people switching from PCs to Macs. What about the other direction?What percentage of people switch from Macs to PCs. I would wager that figure is extremely low.

    (And yes, Parallels desktop is awesome!)

  12. Re:OSWeekly is wrong by HopeOS · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I'm a professional Windows software developer who has been there since Windows 3.0. Windows and Windows APIs are my bread and butter. And you sir, are living in a complete fantasy land.

    ...the people that 'actually' used Vista for a significant amount of time (i.e. the testers) don't see Vista as the horrible OS that others looking in that haven't used it extensively do.

    We beta tested this from alpha to release. It was clunky and busted all along, and it didn't even firm up until the end. Our company still, after dedicating all that effort, will not support running our product on Vista. Which is just as well, since none of our customers, all major financial institutions, are asking for it.

    Vista added a lot of architectural changes...

    The fact that Vista has revised how its internal subsystems interconnect has had zero impact on the user experience, and your assertation that Vista is faster than XP flies in the face of reality. It is so much slower that we have to reimage all our new computer purchases back to XP because none of our developers will stand to have one on their desk. It literally takes 50% longer to build our entire product tree on Vista than XP. It boggles the mind.

    The other big shove Vista has going for it is the migration for development to not only a new set of APIs, but a new concept of development that is as revolutionary as Drag and Drop event based programming made popular with Visual Basic back in 1993.

    I'll tell you straight out, no one's going to touch it. No developer in their right mind is going to code to an API that is not backwards compatible to XP. Not going to happen. And in our field of software, financial services, if it doesn't run on W2K, it doesn't ship. Forget shiny, we do not care about shiny. Amateur programmers play with that stuff. Professional programmers code with event horizons of five to ten years. We will not be beta-testing yet another crazy development model from Microsoft. Ask VB6 programmers how well their legacy code bases are doing today. Our company still has mission-critical code written to MFC for God's sake. Do you honestly expect that successful businesses are going to recode their entire product line every time the wind changes in Redmond? We're tired of this crap.

    Vista also added enough new features ... more than XP ...more than Leopard, which makes Leopard look like a catch up OS...

    Now here, you're just deluding yourself. Vista announced plenty of features and FAILED to deliver on damn near every single one. Off the top of my head, I cannot think of one single feature Vista introduced that was not already available in OSX by the time Vista shipped. WinFS? Didn't happen. Aero? Meet OSX Quartz. Successfully implemented and delivered on time. Full system indexing and searching on Vista is a dog. Ever tried Spotlight on OSX? You don't even it notice it's there. Look at the underlying designs for both and you can see why.

    Pick almost any Leopard feature and Vista has the feature, and architecturally there is no 'killer' feature of OS X that Vista cannot implement via 3rd part support.

    Which is just another way of saying, Vista has some features and doesn't have the others.

    On the other hand Vista has technologies that OS X, Linux, etc don't have yet and won't have for several years.

    Name one.

    Until OS X or Linux can handle and pre-emptively multi-task GPU operations...

    I think if you talk to the Core Video, Core Audio, Core Animation, and Core Whatever-the-heck developers at Apple, you'd find that you're talking out of your ass. As for Linux, who cares. If they cared about that kind of thing, they'd have implemented it.

    On Vista you can run several CAD/High End graphical applications under the Aero interface and not lose performance in any of the applicat