Posted on 10/25/2010 6:29:11 PM PDT by Wooly
Microsoft has been at the top of the heap for almost as long as people have used PCs. Theyve managed to sustain an overwhelming competitive advantage, even after a decades worth of antitrust action and the astonishing transformation of Apple into a profit-making machine that has built one billion-dollar business after another while the entire rest of the tech industry is stuck in neutral. Indeed, the presence of Apple and Google as direct competitors suggests that maybe Microsoft is overdue to take a tumble.
There is never a shortage of Apple-versus-Microsoft yammering in the blogosphere, but I havent seen much in the way of actual data. Is Apple really making a dent in Microsofts long-standing Windows monopoly? Are mobile devices like the iPhone and iPad taking over tasks that used to be done by PCs? Sales figures tell part of the story, but in my opinion the best data comes from analyzing how devices are being used in the real world. I went off in search of hard numbers, and I found them at the same source I used earlier this year to measure Windows 7 adoption rates (see When will XP finally fade away?).
(Excerpt) Read more at zdnet.com ...
That's pretty funny...
"Obama is known to use Apple products in the White House, and Jobs is a long-time supporter of Democratic causes and candidates."
Microsoft is it’s own worst enemy. Apple, et al, just add a dash of overt humiliation.
... but what about Steve Ballmer and the repeated, embarassing flops during his tenure at Microsoft? He’s the evil twin doppelganger of John Sculley, as far as I can tell.
Care to speculate?
No, they generally cost about 4 times as much.
The mac folks are like democrats. They’ll willingly pay top dollar for smug.
Wow. VPN? VPN is independent of OS, though.
Any company that has as their policy, no advertising on Fox news, will ever get support from me. I don’t care if the Apple is the most astonishing computer on the planet. Which it isn’t. Not to mention that all of their products are way over priced. No Apples, other than the edible sort, see the light of day in this house.
Microsoft has never been an innovative company. They have always stolen ideas from smarter companies then crush them with their market monopoly.
This isn’t going to work with Google and Apple. Both companies are way to smart and too large themselves for this strategy to work. Open source also grows stronger every day.
Inertia will carry them for another 10 years or so. But if they can’t change the company culture then they will be a diminishing force.
OTOH, I would bet some UNIX (Core OS X) geek could blow your question right out of the water you are trying to muddy...
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If you want on or off the Mac Ping List, Freepmail me.
I think any company that runs on cults of personality are eventually going to wind down. Neither Gates/Ballmer or Jobs is perfect, they all have made great decisions and made some really terrible decisions, pride gets in the way of better solutions, personalities clash, etc.
The two companies appeal to people for different reasons. But in many ways both have tried to clamp down on stuff that would ultimately help them more than hurt them, in the long run. Visionaries aren’t usually visionary forever.
Bring back DOS!
And while governement contracts for PC based systems are down, Apple's sales to the government are up approximately 100% under this administration.
I'm still waiting to see the mythical open source Exchange killer.
Not so. Prices of applications are competitive or less.
Also, the PC is an open system. So, there is competition. Competition means cheaper hardware and software. Apple is not.
Hardware competition has resulted in a race to the commodity bargain basement. . . and no profit margins. As to open system, the Mac is UNIX... you can't get more open than that. In addition, the Mac can run all versions Windows software as well as all Mac software, all UNIX software, and all Linux software as well as several other OS's software in windows under OSX.
I expect that....lower forms of life using a lower, less productive, form of technology.
"Productivity" is probably relative, depending on what you're producing. I have noticed that the social-networked twentysomethings that seem to make up the rank and file obamabots like their iThings, and they're writing the contract specs now.
That's not really an issue, Ramius. Encrypting the whole disk is not necessary. Why encrypt the UNIX OS and the apps? All that is necessary is to encrypt the user partitions under UNIX, something that has been done in the enterprise far longer than Windows security has been around. OSX is certified UNIX... with industrial strength permissions, accesses, encryptions and management from UNIX.
True, but worth every penny.....HP and Microsoft has to be the worst computer ever and that is talking from experience. The Apple is less frustrating and never has issues.
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