Analyzing Apple's iPhone Strategy

Galen Gruman submitted infoworld's summary of Apple's grand strategy for the iPhone. He points out that the real important part of the new iPhone is the software, not the hardware. He talks about the new SDK stuff, the ad-hoc app distribution, and other stuff. It's a reasonable read if you have been ignoring the iPhone and want to know what the hype is about over this release, but doesn't break any new ground if you've been paying attention.

Comments

Objective C

[thammoud]

The language is a serious turn off for most developers I know.

Re:Objective C

[140Mandak262Jamuna]

I have no doubt most good programmers can pick up a new language pretty fast and even become quite productive. But it is the hiring manager you have to get through. Most HR bean counters go by grep $keyword resume.txt .

So many programmers feel it is better to stick with what they are asking for in the ads.

Re:Objective C

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

The language is a serious turn off for most developers I know.

Really? The only developers I can think of that it would be a problem for are those guys who learned Java or VB at their trade school and have never learned anything else. Pretty much everyone else has picked up C at some point and Objective C is just a superset.

I'd also note that from what I've read developers are raving about the ease of use of the iPhone dev kit. From the development forums I see a lot of happy people, with the occasional clueless person asking if they can develop for the iPhone using Visual Basic 6. I've seen some complaints about the slow rate at which people are letting developers into the program, but not about objective C.

Re:Objective C

[EastCoastSurfer]

Because today's programmers don't learn programming or engineering, but instead a language. A real programmer should be able to program regardless of a language. In fact they should be able to pick a language based on the problem at hand and not the other way around.

Re:Objective C

[mmurphy000]

If you see learning a new language as an issue, please just don't ever call yourself a developer.

Define "issue".

Is the choice of Objective-C a part of the reason why I'm not planning on doing iPhone development any time soon? Yes. Because it's a dead end.

While you can use Objective-C to build Mac applications, you don't need to — there are other languages that run on the Mac that are also commonly available on other platforms. And, outside of OS X and iPhone, there are no platforms I can think of where Objective-C is the "right answer", or even a "likely candidate". It's more like "you're using...what?" or "didn't that language die out a decade ago?"

Now, I'm not above learning a language solely to use a platform — I'm learning Python to play with Google AppEngine, for example. But Python has greater potential utility to me beyond AppEngine, more so than Objective-C does beyond iPhone, and so Python is less of an issue.

If the issue were solely language — say, for example, iPhone was likely to be as open as Android is likely to be — I'd probably overcome it. But, combine the language issue with the other issues, and iPhone just isn't compelling at present. Maybe that will change.

Re:Objective C

[Comatose51]

It's not just the language that matters. Yes any decent programmers can pick up a language in no time but the real issue is the libraries and frameworks and patterns that often go with a language and its environment. Re-learning the APIs for the environment takes time. Good documentation helps a lot and so does being open source (or use the Lutz reflector if you're doing .Net). Even then there are still certain conventions for different environments. Python programmers talk about code being "Pythonic". While there are many ways to do something in Python, there is usually a few good ways or patterns for a problem. So, it's not just the language but everything else that goes around the language that also matters.

Slow news day?

[SimonGhent]

It's a reasonable read if you have been ignoring the iPhone and want to know what the hype is about over this release, but doesn't break any new ground if you've been paying attention.

Well, in that case, why is it on the front page?

Surely if a /. reader has been ignoring the iPhone up till now they're pretty unlikely to read past the thread title.

Meta-summary: apple is still a software company.

[argent]

Apple is, like Cisco, primarily a software company. It's Apple's software that sells its hardware, so while their revenue model is based on hardware sales, it's the software that makes them happen. No matter how nice Apple's hardware might be, without their software they'd sell no more than any other boutique hardware vendor, and once they burned through their cash reserves and liquid assets they'd just be another Alienware waiting to be bought by Dell or HP.

Focussing on their hardware, whether it's the iMac or iPhone, is definitely missing the point. This guy definitely gets it.

One thing that I would like to see more of is details of the ad-hoc licensing. My google-fu is failing me there.

Apple's grand strategy? Lock-in.

[xxxJonBoyxxx]

Apple's grand strategy is the same as any highly successful tech company: lock-in based on a solid platform. e.g., Microsoft: proprietary OS platform with integrated business apps; Apple: proprietary hardware and music store with integrated components; Cisco, proprietary hardware overlaid with integrated interface, etc.

The real strength is the iPhone 2.0 software

Nah...as a developer I really don't give two hoots about this unless it's something I can use cross-platform. The iPhone is such a small player in the cell phone market that I'd rather just handle it through optimized web sites and web services than building some localized app that will break with iPhone 3.0 software.

Re:Strategy?

[The End Of Days]

I guess you missed the part where nearly 85% of iPhone users regularly use the web from their phone.

Re:Apple's grand strategy? Lock-in.

[mrchaotica]

If I can develop an application for the iPhone, I can be an independent developer without having to go through anyone but Apple.

And if you're a PC developer, then you can be independent without having to go through anyone full stop. It's a crying shame, and a testament to the egregious and undue influence the telecom industry has over our government, that the cell phone market isn't like that too. This kind of shit -- that is, requiring apps to have the "blessing" of the device manufacturer or service provider to work -- ought to be illegal!

Re:Apple's grand strategy? Lock-in.

[xxxJonBoyxxx]

If I charge $10, I get to keep $7. If 14 people in the world buy it, I've broken even.

Yikes - yes, let's keep you away from the business side of the house.

You forgot to include the value of your time to develop the application, any time it might take to market it (e.g., even if it's just posting to Slashdot), any support costs, taxes, etc. Also, if 10K people might buy your app for their iPhone, there might be 100K people who might buy it if had a wider cell phone base, or 1000K people who might buy it if it was available for PCs, etc., so you might be chasing a tiny "profit pool" anyway if you only target the iPhone.

Microsoft has a similar model going with MSDN and lesser licenses and so do thousands of other vendors with a proprietary platform and a paid SDK/API/dev environment.

The $99 is there basically to protect Apple from the total time-wasters; Apple would otherwise give this away free so they can get developers, developers, developers.

Re:Still no open source apps

[UnknowingFool]

This is the showstopper for me. A smartphone without a real freeware ecosystem will never truly thrive, for the same reasons that that open source development and commercial s/w development drive each other on standard platforms.

From a geek's standpoint, you don't want a smartphone without open source options. For an average consumer, do they really care? They just want things to work. When the iPod came out there was a lot of griping about technically inferior the iPod was, and that it would never flourish. Hundreds of millions of iPods later, I would say that it's been a success. Really, my grandma didn't/doesn't care that the iPod can't play ogg-vorbis. All she knows is that when she puts her new CD into her computer in iTunes and then plugs in her iPod, she gets her music. If she got an iPhone she'd only care about getting on eBay to see if she won that cute figurine. She doesn't need to see the source code.

Apple's strategy... unchanged

[Anonymous Coward]

Their strategy is pretty easy to decode:

1. make money.
2. make money.
3. make money, so that we can
4. make even more money.

I think they are doing great. Just for kicks (and to kick myself), I looked at how much I could have made if I had just invested $1000 in Apple in 1985. Taking the stock splits into account, that stock would be worth more than $500,000.

Apple is a great example of how you can take a fanatical fan base, show them nothing but contempt, charge outrageous amounts of money for everything connected with your products... and be adored all the more for it. THAT'S the kind of stock worth investing in, but it's a shame that setup is so difficult to replicate.

And... best of all, they are eating Linux's lunch. If someone hates Microsoft SO much, they aren't going to get Linux. They are going to buy a Mac, of course, and get locked in to that money sink (at least $150 in El Jobso's pocket every time they make a point release is great for Apple's bottom line!).

While Linux likewise has the fanatical user base... they just have no way of monetizing it. Linux users like being locked into that platform, but not enough to actually pay for anything. They are happy to use hardware two generations out of date, happy with being completely locked into FOSS (since extremely few companies will write for Linux), etc, but not happy enough to actually spend any money supporting what they supposedly believe in. Look at Red Hat- they've been doing poorly for years now, and that's not going to change (although their dropping the failed "Linux on the Desktop" project will undoubtedly help them a great deal).

While Apple has been gaining market share (up to 4-5%)... Linux's has remained flat for the past ten years (always around 0.65%, even as the size of the market has virtually exploded). Meaning... every Apple sold is coming from Linux's share of the market (either actual or potential). Which is good, since Linux has no chance of succeeding in competition with Microsoft, while Apple can do quite well with a tiny market share.

Re:Apple's grand strategy? Lock-in.

[gutter]

I think the point he's trying to make is that he doesn't have to worry about any infrastructure. He doesn't need a hosting account, he doesn't have to create a license scheme, he doesn't have to worry that if he gets popular his server goes down. All he has to do is pay Apple the $99 and he's good to go. That actually seems like it might be worth the tradeoff of having to go through Apple.

Re:Strategy?

[davecrist]

The iPhone for the vast majority of people buying it is about having the latest coolest toy.

I am sick and tired of reading/hearing this bullshit.

The iPhone is my 6th cell phone and the first that is an honest pleasure to use and powerful enough to accomplish more than playing 10 second ring tones. The iPhone literally represents the FIRST TIME I have been able to have a good phone, my iPod, email, calendar, contacts, maps, camera, web, etc in a single device that seamlessly syncs to my Mac computer. Period.

If you don't want to buy one, fine, but for me, having an iPhone is about having aall that stuff, and more, in a single device that elegantly works. The fact that it might look nice or 'cool' is merely icing.

Usability and functionally are not 'playing with a cool toy.' Getting things/work done in an intuitive way on your phone is still getting things/work done. Whether or not it was 'cool' or even fun to do it shouldn't take away from the fact that it was accomplished.

I am at a loss to understand why it is so hard for people to understand that futzing with poor UI is not fun for 99% of the people who use computers. The average user hates 'tinkering with their' tools (har!). They just want to USE them to Get Stuff Done. For you, perhaps menu-*-9-5-1-4-2 might be a fast way to access your pictures on your phone but for most people, myself included, it sucks way more than swipe-tap-tap-swipe.

Re:Apple's Strategy

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

Very simple. Make stuff that looks a certain way on the basis that you are appealing to the fact that some people are prepared to pay for exclusivity, rather than functionality, first.

I disagree. There are dozens of phones out that look very similar to the iPhone, by intention. Nah, Apple's strategy with the iPhone is the same one they used with the iPod. Enter a market with a product that is not cheaper or more featureful than the competition, but usability test the heck out of it, including the surrounding services and software. Provide only the features that work really, really well and easily. For the most part, people buy and use iPhones because a lot of the features present on other smartphones are just too hard to use for the average person. They're fine for geeks, but just not there for normal people. This explains why iPhone users actually use the features of their phones more often than users of competing phones. Is the iPhone the only one that can look up your location on a map and then find the closest sushi place and it's phone number? Nope. If it was my father using it, though, I'd sure rather he had an iPhone so he could do it in less than ten minutes and didn't have to ask me questions.

Basically, it is the same reason the Wii is selling so well, they expanded an existing market by making it more suited to the masses.

Re:Apple's grand strategy? Lock-in.

[mrchaotica]

See, here's the thing: there's a huge fucking difference between having this service be available, and having it be mandatory. Having it available is good; I agree that it would be very convenient for small proprietary developers. Having it mandatory is bad, because it locks out Free Software and hobbyists.