Check Mate: Apple's iPad and Google's Next Move
radar.oreilly.com
radar.oreilly.com
Let's see. Who has "Check Mate"d who?? CheckMate is the end of a chess game where one side unambigously wins over the other.
If anything the game is just beginning.
Oh yeah and what is "Google's Next move?" Does the author ever make that clear? Or did he just throw it into the title for effect?
I'm looking forward to downloading and running the Kindle iPhone program from the App Store.
Actually, they'd probably wind up selling more of their kit by doing this!
On the other hand, businesses generally buy PCs because they're far cheaper, but the market for MP3 players in a business context is basically non-existent, whereas it's potentially huge for the tablet market, so that's another mark against Apple.
It'll be interesting to see how it all turns out.
As highlighted in the iPad launch, Apple introduced the modern laptop with the first ever PowerBook. The laptop market is now definitely commoditized but that doesn't stop Apple from making a lot of money selling fewer highly profitable laptops.
They have something under 10% of the total laptop market but 90% or more of the segment > $1,000 per computer.
Since technology advances faster than consumer demand, the differentiating factor for purchases changes over time. First it's possibility, then power/flexibility, then price, then convenience/usability. iPods and mp3 players got cheap enough that the usability of th iPod/iTunes Music Store became the deciding factor and there was no demand for undercutting it on price.
Also, the music use case is so well defined that there wasn't much room to compete on flexibility. PCs have miles and miles of flexibility, but by defining the role of the iPad as music, movies, books, and games (basically media consumption), it might be staking out a territory where it can outperform everyone rather than compete with commodity devices.
Kind of touching in an odd way. I will miss Steve Jobs when he retires from Apple.
When someone else amasses both the will and the capital to achieve what Steve has then more power to 'em.
I'm pleased that Google is there to keep Apple working hard unlike Symbian, Mobile Linux and Microsoft. Checkmate? More like "please keep playing!"
I didn't catch a single compelling reason that anyone should want to use this device, particularly in preference to iPod/iPhone or a larger netbook. A statement like
But the final bit of noteworthy, and compelling, good about iPad is that this just feels like the device that real people (read: non-techies) are going to flock to.
really doesn't come close to a real argument.
Also, the paragraph
the iPod and iPhone that came before it were truly revolutionary devices, offering wholly new functionality, delivering new value chains, and fundamentally changing the relationship that consumers had with, first their media ... and then their communications.
Seems incorrect to me. iPod was another MP3 player, of which we've had a zillion. iPhone, too, is just evolutionary, in its melding of phone + PDA; really, is it that much of a revolution to add a better UI (even if that UI is great by all accounts)?
And if it's this UI revolution (if it is one) that is going to carry this, then -- as the article admits -- it will do so by cannibalizing existing Apple customers. In that case, how does this affect Google's prospects at all?
The difference being, of course, that the Air is a high-margin luxury item and was always intended to be so. Apple never intended to sell them by the millions, and is no doubt happy with the revenue generated. The iPad is priced just a tiny bit higher than a netbook, and looks to have a rather larger part cost (LED screen, large touch surface instead of a cheap keyboard, scary amounts of flash, custom chipset instead of mass-market Intel stuff).
There's no room there for "niche" products. If that's all they get, the product will be stillborn.
How would that work? All of the other devices are based on a touch interface. Is Apple going to break into the television market with a multi-touch TV?
Not to mention that all of the Apps are based on the touch interface, so you would have a hard time using them out of the box on an iPhoneOS-based Apple TV.
Consider the extremes. Something that was impossible to learn would have zero users that know how to use it. Everyone would know how to use a device that required no learning.
It's this latter hypothetical to which the iPod/iPhone/iPad aspire. So why should Apple care to make the point that so many people already know how to use it?
After some thought (and I may be slow to the conclusion that everyone else has come to already), I think it is because they knew that "It's just a big iPod Touch" would be one of the main objections. This particular point about the 75MM users was an attempt to turn an aspect of the device that could be perceived as a big negative into a postive.
For me - the relatively uninitiated into the world of pitchmen - it's an interesting piece of marketing.
Problem with this is the web was developed with point & click in mind.