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Comment by Kuyawa | Hacker News Reader

I want to ask an honest question, why more businesses don't rely on Apple products knowing the simplicity of just buying an iMac and adding some apps to it?

I talk about small businesses mostly, starting with ten or twenty computers, zero config, bonjour discovery, download apps from the app store, for me it looks like a total winner

Microsoft or Linux don't offer such an easy path to productivity, so why is it? What is lacking? What needs to be done in order for that scenario to work? What roadblock have you hit when trying to implement it?

We all use apple products, iMacs, Macbooks, and if we start a business for sure we as CEOs or managers will use one on our desktops, so why? Genuinely interested in answers...

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The context here is removing reliance on US. EU countries are trying to decouple from US (or at least diversify if not possible to decouple) in various critical sectors where they have become dependent. Over reliance on US software is one of them. They are basically doing what China did many decades ago. Have home grown alternatives to US apps/services so as to not be in deep waters if US decides to sanction them. It is all about independence.

> why more businesses don't rely on Apple products knowing the simplicity of just buying an iMac and adding some apps to it?

Apple is a US company first and foremost and US has become unreliable. It has nothing to do with simplicity or productivity if reliability is in question. What use is a Mac if it can be subject to US sanctions resulting in App Store being shutdown for you or your entire Country and apps/services stop working overnight?

Excellent point and I understand that, but then they should start working on building their own computers, and OS, and ecosystem, just like Huawei is doing for the past decade. It will take time, long years ahead but they should start now

I definitely like that future, but it should be built now

Market inertia is the holdup.

Agreed. I am all for every Country investing resources in semiconductors and building own computers/OS/ecosystem. More the merrier. I want to own my hardware. I want to repair my hardware. I don't want a future where I have to rent/subscribe everything from Big Tech.

And yet Apple is doing well in the far East Japan, Korea, Taiwan, China, and Vietnam. They are competitive in some of the toughest markets to sell electronic devices into.

Doing well in Australia and New Zealand too. Aside from Taco the only big headwind is memory.

You are missing the point I made. Point isn't whether Apple is doing well or not. It is about creating an alternative for a future when Apple won't exist in the Country because of US sanctions.

Here issue is not of whether Apple is reliable or not. Issue is unreliability of USA. If US Government decides Apple Store should be banned in Country X, Apple cannot do anything about it but abide by the decree.

Microsoft and Linux /do/ offer the same path to productivity. Buy 10-20 computers, zero config, native discovery services, download apps.

What businesses need is management services and business applications. Those exist for Apple as well, but two significant headwinds: 1) inertia of essentially every major business on earth using MS Active Directory means there are enormous support and ecosystem benefits, and 2) cost.

In my experience, the corporate world that uses mac has moved to Okta and other providers, not MS Active Directory. They may still use MS AD in some areas, but you can now federate to have that as an island - say you have some legacy accounting software that needs to run in AD environment.

IME, Okta is almost as popular as MS AD now, I think they have 30% market share compared to 40% for AD, with IBM and others taking up the rest.

My experience is that small companies in particular fields do/did use Macs. Staying on Mac is difficult though since any customer can expect you to do what they do or support what they do if they are Windows oriented and will only start with a conversation about compatibility if they haven't chosen the most popular choice.

The way enterprise software is licensed, and how those licenses are perpetuated means that, in the absence of a national security imperative, 99% of customers just go along to get along.

Other people already answered the non US reason. However I fell for this. I got myself an expensive iPad because I assumed it's actually like all the apple users are saying.

However, a lot of apps are unstable. Support is horrible to non existent for some. No refunds even when the app doesn't work at all directly after install. Most professional apps have a buy price AND a subscription price at this point. Most actually working apps are not apple exclusive these days.

It's definitely not as green over there as some apple people make it out to be.

I hear you, I am not an Apple pundit, just a developer always looking for the path to optimization and thought Apple was it, it is not, and to be honest they don't make it easy either. I've been in the waiting list to become an Apple developer for a month now and the road has been tortuous as a Venezuelan developer. But if Huawei offered a simpler path to developing on their ecosystem I'd give it a try in an instant. I am loyal to no one except to those who make my life easier

What tablet is better in the world today software and hardware wise?

I really don't need a tablet at all when all the software I have on my Linux laptop is arguebly not worse and definitely more stable. That's the moral I have taken.

I still like my iPad. The pen is amazing, and the sound is so good I use it as TV without extra speakers in my caravan. but I usually don't recommend it to anyone. Especially no one that has any form of fixed budget.

I would probably just get a cheap old one if I had known that I won't use most music/3d software on it anyway. I wouldn't have spent so much extra for the big hard drive, etc.

I'm going to guess because they are expensive. Do Apple to on-site support like Dell, HP, et cetera?

You mean paying twice to five times the price for something that is not configurable and on which you can run only a small subset of software, all very expensive?

2x-5x the price is not a like-for-like comparison then. TCO is lower for Macs in the enterprise over the lifespan of the device.

https://www.jamf.com/blog/debate-over-ibm-confirms-that-macs...

Cost

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