Cnet follows in sync with the iphone commercials with the real deal. Amazingly, reality is in line with the hype (Apple marketing).
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It may not have been the ringtone heard ’round the world, but there sure was a lot of fuss over a phone Friday. At 6 p.m., the Apple iPhone went on sale. “I’m hoping it will make me cool,” Ryan Petty, 37, joked of the phone, which he was getting for himself, as well as one for his wife.
Sphere: Related ContentAt this years All Things Digital Conference D5, hosted by the Wall Street Journal, Bill Gates and Steve Jobs were on stage together in a “fireside” interview with Walt Mossberg and Kara Swisher. This coming together was billed as one of the great events of all the D: conferences and in my view it was every bit as good as its billing.
Highlight clip:
There were so many great moments, that it is difficult to single any out without artificially reducing the rest. However, in the audience Q&A section, they were asked about things they had learned in building their companies. I thought Jobs answer was extremely insightful. He said,
People say you have to have a lot of passion for what you’re doing and it’s totally true. And the reason is because it’s so hard that if you don’t, any rational person would give up. It’s really hard. And you have to do it over a sustained period of time. So if you don’t love it, if you’re not having fun doing it, you don’t really love it, you’re going to give up. And that’s what happens to most people, actually. If you really look at the ones that ended up, you know, being “successful†in the eyes of society and the ones that didn’t, oftentimes, it’s the ones [who] were successful loved what they did so they could persevere, you know, when it got really tough. And the ones that didn’t love it quit because they’re sane, right? Who would want to put up with this stuff if you don’t love it?
So it’s a lot of hard work and it’s a lot of worrying constantly and if you don’t love it, you’re going to fail. So you’ve got to love it and you’ve got to have passion and I think that’s the high-order bit.
The second thing is, you’ve got to be a really good talent scout because no matter how smart you are, you need a team of great people and you’ve got to figure out how to size people up fairly quickly, make decisions without knowing people too well and hire them and, you know, see how you do and refine your intuition and be able to help, you know, build an organization that can eventually just, you know, build itself because you need great people around you.
Here are the pertinent links:
Transcript: http://d5.allthingsd.com/20070531/d5-gates-jobs-transcript/
RSS: http://d5.allthingsd.com/feed/
Complete video set:
http://d5.allthingsd.com/20070530/video-steve-jobs-and-bill-gates-prologue/
Is a $200 Billion Suit Headed Microsoft and Apple’s Way?
All I can say, for fear of being sued, or should I say it, for fear of being sued for NOT saying it??? We have sunk to a new low…
Sphere: Related ContentWith the rise of intellectual property (whether it be patents or content, like Pirates of the Caribbean, for example) has come a rise in the number of patent suits. Unfortunately, this has meant the emergence of companies like Acacia Technologies, which has used the IP laws to its advantage, acquiring patents and filing lawsuits against any number of industries, including porn providers.
The way a suit usually works, however, is that Company A sues Company B for “infringing” upon its technology, or using it illegally. On Friday, however, a startup sent a number of cease-and-desist letters to several tech bigwigs (Microsoft, Adobe, Real Networks and Apple) accusing them of not using their technology. This could be a first.
According to a press release, a company called Media Rights Technologies and BlueBeat.com, an Internet radio station that is owned by MRT, said that it has developed and tested the X1 SeCure Recording Control, a technology to prevent digital audio streams from being “ripped,” or copied.
What MRT claims, however, is this: “MRT asserts Apple, Microsoft, Real and Adobe have produced billions of these products without regard for the DMCA or the rights of American Intellectual Property owners, actively avoiding the use of MRT’s technologies. Failure to comply with this demand could result in a federal court injunction to any of the above named parties to cease production or sale of their products and/or the imposition of statutory damages of at least $200 to $2500 for each product distributed or sold.”
What this says to me is that the companies may be sued for not infringing upon MRT’s technology, a rather novel take.
InformationWeek Blog | Sometimes Steve Ballmer Just Takes Your Breath Away
Very insightful article which helps blow past the Ballmer spin machine. Of course, Ballmer has such an “historic” perspective on Microsoft’s success.
In a USA Today interview Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer is asked if he wishes consumers would get as passionate about Microsoft as they do when Apple comes out with something new. “It’s sort of a funny question,” he answers. “Would I trade 96% of the market for 4% of the market? I want to have products that appeal to everybody.” Steve, I’ve got one word for you: iPod.Ballmer wants to see the “my-OS-on-everybody’s-hardware” model play in the mobile phone space the way it has in the desktop-computer space. I am afraid, however, that’s not a forward-looking idea, it’s backward-looking wishful thinking.
Of course what was interesting to me was the low market share numbers for Windows Mobile devices, 5.6%. I must admit, for the past 6 months or so, I have been a Windows Mobile users–although not a happy one.
At the same time, while desktop PCs aren’t exactly going away, they’re being pushed to one side in the marketplace by other devices, and Ballmer can only dream about 96% of the market for cell phone operating systems. On the small percentage of phones that are smartphones — that is, they run applications — Microsoft’s Windows Mobile runs a distant third behind Symbian and Linux world-wide, according to figures on Wikipedia. (The breakdown is given as Symbian OS 72.8%, Linux 16.7%, Windows Mobile 5.6%, RIM 2.8%, and Palm OS 1.8%.)
If the enterprise market is at all on the iPhone’s radar screen, the key to breaking the Microsoft habit is to break the dependency on the Exchange/Outlook duopoly. There are a lot of enterprise buyers out there drooling over the iPhone and they have access to the corporate purchasing card, but they won’t buy the iPhone if they can’t get the corporate email. Since you can’t get Exchange out overnight, Apple, meet Blackberry/Blackberry meet Apple.
Furthermore, products like SharePoint should be seen for the evil they really are–and banished from all companies. It remains to be seen if products like Scalix, the Google office suite, or my personal favorite, Zimbra can gain market share in the collaborative software space. Only by breaking the Exchange/Outlook stranglehold on the enterprise, will Apple have a shot at piercing the enterprise market.
Sphere: Related ContentInformationWeek Blog | Ballmer Says iPhone Won’t Succeed. Has Windows Mobile?
Sphere: Related ContentSteve Ballmer seems to be full of bluster these days. In his latest potshot at the iPhone, the Microsoft CEO says, “the future of the mobile handset business will primarily depend on software influence rather than hardware.” In other words, Apple’s hardware approach to sales won’t work and Microsoft’s software approach is better. Let’s take a real look at the success of Windows Mobile’s software-drive success, shall we?
Fellow bloggers Stephen Wellman and David DeJean quoted a passage from Ballmer yesterday in which he says he’d rather have Microsoft software on 60% or 70% of the phones in the world than meet the hardware sales goals of Apple’s iPhone. Apple CEO Steve Jobs said at the iPhone’s launch that he would like to see the iPhone represent 1% of all mobile phone sales by the end of 2008. That’s 10 million devices. So he’s giving Apple 18 months (assuming a June launch) to reach that goal. I won’t say that it isn’t an ambitious goal. Given Apple’s success at selling iPods, I will reserve judgment for now on the iPhone’s real potential.
With the smartphone market approximating 10% of all mobile phone sales, it amounts to roughly 100 million devices sold per year. Of those 100 million, Windows Mobile appears on 5.6%, or 5.6 million of them. So, in the 5 years that Windows Mobile has been around, it has barely cracked 0.6% of all mobile phone sales. Ballmer has a long, long way to go to reach his target of 60%.
In light of Windows Mobile’s success, or lack thereof depending on your point of view, I’d say Ballmer doesn’t have all that much to crow about. In fact, if Apple does meet its hardware sales goals by 2008, which would best the number of Windows Mobile-powered devices by about 4 million, Ballmer will be forced to eat crow.
Why Steve Jobs Will Never Offer Music Subscriptions
Don’t hold your breath for music subscriptions from Apple’s iTunes music store — Steve Jobs will never offer them. Renting music flies in the face of consumer behavior. Consumers want to buy music, not rent it, and a big part of Steve Jobs’ genius is his firm, intuitive grasp of how consumers behave, and tailoring Apple’s technology to accommodate it — not the other way around.
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The infamous September 2000 video of CEO Steve Ballmer going nuts at a Microsoft 25th anniversary pep rally will likely go down in tech history as one of the funniest videos ever. Now in true Web 2.0 fashion, some anonymous soul has “mashed-up” that video with the famous iPod silhouette ads to create a possible new ad for Micrsoft’s ill-conceived, and likely ill-fated Zune.
Sphere: Related ContentMorgan Stanley analyst Kathryn Huberty reiterated her buy rating on Apple Inc. shares, saying she believed the market is underestimating the likely success of the iPhone. She raised her 2007 iPhone sales forecast by 33% to 8 million units from 6 million, following a survey of 2,500 U.S. consumers. Huberty also believes Apple’s ability to leverage strong iPhone demand is being underestimated. “While we see positive leverage drivers across Apple’s product segment, the iPhone alone increases scale (better pricing from suppliers), strengthens retail store leverage (increased velocity on fixed-cost base) and takes advantage of lower NAND [memory] pricing in the market,” Huberty said in a research note.
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Recently, I joined the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF). Some might equate the EFF the ACLU of the digital world. So, those of you that know my political leanings might ask, why? Let me try to explain.
Regular readers of this blog know that I work in the telecommunications industry. Specifically, for the last 10 years, I have been working to create products that allow telecommunications service providers (specifically telcos) to deliver broadcast quality video over Internet Protocol (IP) over their networks. Our customers, the service providers, demand we create innovations in IPTV which give them competitive differentiation over the incumbent video service providers–typically the MSO (Multiple Service Operator) the cable company, or the Direct to Home (DTH) satellite company. Our ability to deliver these innovations is constantly under threat from traditional media sources which continuously fight new technology. The EFF, is working to protect the rights of consumers to fair use which I believe protects our ability to innovate.
Does the EFF sometimes come into conflict with technology companies, yes. In many cases, the same companies that lead the innovation charge are also working with traditional media companies on schemes to “protect” digital content. Where this “protection” limits consumer freedom, the EFF steps in to fight for consumer rights. Interestingly, it appears to me, that wherein the EFF and technology companies are in conflict, such conflict is limited to the short-term interests (some would say shortsighted) of that company. Protection of consumer rights, is to the long-term benefit of all technology companies–whether they recognize this in their frenzy to generate quarterly results, depends on their ability to look beyond the numbers.
The EFF is fighting to protect consumer rights to fair use of content, whether it be in analog or digital formats.
Check out the Intellectual Property section of the EFF website. Two areas of particular interest are Digital Rights Management (DRM) and the Digital Millenium Copyright Act (DMCA). I encourage you to read the EFF information on both topics DRM and DMCA. For those of you who have PVRs or are contemplating a new HDTV purchase, the Digital Video Restrictions information is eye-opening.
EFF RSS Feeds can be found here.
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