Jobs and Gates to appear side-by-side at WSJ 'D' Conference

[AppleInsider]

Apple chief executive Steve Jobs and Microsoft Corp. Chairman Bill Gates have committed to a rare joint appearance at the fifth anniversary of the The Wall Street Journal's "D: All Things Digital" conference later this year.

The two men, both seminal figures in the development of the personal computer, will jointly discuss the history and future of the digital revolution in an unrehearsed, unscripted, onstage conversation on May 30 with D co-producers Walt Mossberg and Kara Swisher.

Both Jobs and Gates have made multiple individual appearances at the past D conferences, but this will be their first joint session at D, the Wall Street Journal announced on Tuesday.

In addition to participating in the joint session with Gates, Jobs will appear on his own in a separate segment at the conference, dubbed D5, to discuss the latest developments at Apple, including new ventures such as the iPhone and Apple TV.

Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer will also appear at the conference in his own segment, to discuss Windows, Office, the Xbox, Zune, and other topics.

In addition, the D5 conference will feature an impressive roster of other leaders in technology and media. Confirmed speakers include Google CEO Eric Schmidt; CBS President Les Moonves; Cisco CEO John Chambers; film director George Lucas; online pioneer Steve Case; Time Inc. CEO Ann Moore; News Corp. President Peter Chernin; Palm founder Jeff Hawkins; and Steve Chen and Chad Hurley of YouTube.

Although Apple's Jobs was not amongst the guests at last year's D4 conference, he attended the two previous years and came bearing gifts. In 2004, he used the conference to unveil the AirPort Express Base Station. He also revealed that Apple had recently developed a modern-day PDA device that was scrapped just ahead of its introduction.

During D3 the following year, a witty Jobs previewed iTunes 4.9 while also dropping the first hints at an iTunes movie store and iPhone. It was during this year's conference that Jobs also vowed to take his fight against AppleInsider and the PowerPage to the United States Supreme Court. The case never made it; Apple conceded following a unanimous defeat in the California Court of Appeals and was later ordered to pay $700,000 in legal fees to the Electronic Frontier Foundation.

Like past editions of the conference, D5 will be an all-interview event, without canned speeches, The Journal said. The sold out conference will take place May 29-31 near San Diego, California.

If you plan on attending the conference, please drop us a line.

[ View this article at AppleInsider.com ]

[SpamSandwich]

I would pay good money to see Jobs and Ballmer on the same stage squaring off... ...forget about Bill, he's too busy with his charity work to make an interesting sparring target.

[Kickaha]

My money's on the Raging Turtleneck. Moneybags might get a shrill shriek in, but he's no match for the Elevator Glare of Doom. Now, if the little guy can be kept from tagging in Behemoth Ballmer, all will be good.

[elroth]

The interesting thing is this conference comes right at the same time that Leopard and the iPhone will be released - hopefully Leopard will already be out by then (spring doesn't end until June 21st).

I don't see a big debate between Jobs and Gates - Jobs has pretty good manners in public, and will probably save his best barbs for his individual presentation. If they let people ask questions, they'll probably pepper Jobs for info, while ignoring Gates and sad old Vista.

[DeaPeaJay]

Wow, this should be good, especcially after Bill Gate's little rant. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16934083/site/newsweek/

Maybe he'll be able to control his temper a bit more this time, and not be completely delusional?

[DeaPeaJay]

I wonder if Steve's reality distortion field will have any effect on Gates

[mbaynham]

haha they should do a 'get a mac' ad, i would pay good money to see that!

[Jimmy01]

I hope Jobs destroys and utterly humiliates that 4-eyed bug once and for all.

[BlackSummerNight]

You are some type of crazy if you think Bill will ever be ignored.

Originally Posted by elroth

The interesting thing is this conference comes right at the same time that Leopard and the iPhone will be released - hopefully Leopard will already be out by then (spring doesn't end until June 21st).

I don't see a big debate between Jobs and Gates - Jobs has pretty good manners in public, and will probably save his best barbs for his individual presentation. If they let people ask questions, they'll probably pepper Jobs for info, while ignoring Gates and sad old Vista.

[TBaggins]

Originally Posted by BlackSummerNight

You are some type of crazy if you think Bill will ever be ignored.

Why not? Everything PC-centric at CES got completely upstaged by the iPhone and MacWorld last month:

Macworld vs CES: Macworld emerges as victor
http://today.reuters.co.uk/news/arti...CWORLD-CES.xml

Bill's on his way out the door anyway, retiring from MS in favor of his Foundation work (which I actually admire).



.

[Johnny Mozzarella]

I wonder how much that "modern-day PDA" that got scrapped resembles the iPhone.

I think what elroth meant was that the audience will have many more questions for Jobs and not really that interested in what Bill has to say. I'm sure Walt Mossberg will give them equal time to be polite.

[vinney57]

These things are always handled very politely, fairly and with great respect; otherwise the 'great beasts' simply wouldn't turn up. I love the fact that it makes Apple look like the equal of MS (when MS is still 10x the size) and that Jobs always wins the 'column inches' battle at these gatherings.

[anantksundaram]

This is like gravity and antigravity together........ uh-oh

[EagerDragon]

Originally Posted by DeaPeaJay

I wonder if Steve's reality distortion field will have any effect on Gates

It gets magnified by the coke bottle eye glasses.

[EagerDragon]

Originally Posted by Johnny Mozzarella

I wonder how much that "modern-day PDA" that got scrapped resembles the iPhone.

I think what elroth meant was that the audience will have many more questions for Jobs and not really that interested in what Bill has to say. I'm sure Walt Mossberg will give them equal time to be polite.

You mean Gates has something to say?
What the same old rant that he has for years?
The buggy and quirky Vista?
What if anything the man has to say?

[sunilraman]

[EagerDragon]

Originally Posted by sunilraman

Love it

[extremeskater]

Originally Posted by Jimmy01

I hope Jobs destroys and utterly humiliates that 4-eyed bug once and for all.

How do you destroy someone when your market share along with your net worth isn't 10%of the person your attempting to destroy?

Take Gates net worth along with the fact that he has pounded Apple for the last 20 years and honestly if I was Jobs I would just be nice to the guy. When it comes tot he sucess of each business Apple isnt even really in the same league as MS.

Anyone can dispute what OS is better that subjective, bottom line math isnt.

[anantksundaram]

Originally Posted by sunilraman

LOL!

[sunilraman]

[zanshin]

Umm, am I missing something? What's there for Steve Balmer to discuss about the Zune?

Isn't that kinda like your dorky Uncle Lester saying "phat" a lot, and jerking around to Greenday in front of your friends?

[futuretheory9]

Originally Posted by mbaynham

haha they should do a 'get a mac' ad, i would pay good money to see that!

That would be brilliant, yet obvious. Still, it simple must happen.

[futuretheory9]

Looks like Steve is giving himself boob Jobs

[sunilraman]

Originally Posted by futuretheory9

Looks like Steve is giving himself boob Jobs

[TBaggins]

Originally Posted by extremeskater

Take Gates net worth along with the fact that he has pounded Apple for the last 20 years

If by 'pounded', you mean 'copied shamelessly', then yeah, I agree with you.

Its not for nothing that Microsoft refers to Apple as 'R&D South'.





"We will, just as soon as you actually innovate."

.

[JeffDM]

Originally Posted by SpamSandwich

I would pay good money to see Jobs and Ballmer on the same stage squaring off... ...forget about Bill, he's too busy with his charity work to make an interesting sparring target.

Jobs might wear a red hat with red overalls, and Balmer might throw a couple barrels!

[JeffDM]

Originally Posted by Johnny Mozzarella

I wonder how much that "modern-day PDA" that got scrapped resembles the iPhone.

He did say that the iPhone was in development for two and a half years, so they may well have took what they learned from their previous development and went in a different direction.

Originally Posted by futuretheory9

Looks like Steve is giving himself boob Jobs

More like groping his own man-boobs.

[extremeskater]

Originally Posted by TBaggins

If by 'pounded', you mean 'copied shamelessly', then yeah, I agree with you.

Its not for nothing that Microsoft refers to Apple as 'R&D South'.





"We will, just as soon as you actually innovate."

.

It's always been said that MS always copies the best. Really that isn't the point if you look at my last post.

The fact is it't Apple that is chasing MS and thats always been the case. Hardcore Mac fans always have this hope that they are going to bring down MS and history has just proven time and time again that isn't going to happen.

The lines have been dug so deep in the sand after 20+ years that really I don't see things changing much. Vista is setup so it will never fail any new system will have Vista pre loaded just like Xp was preloaded and so on. The same on the Mac side Leopard will be pre loaded when it becomes available.

People make this big issue out of the cost of upgrading, most users don't upgrade they just move to the next OS when they get a new system, Mac users I believe tend to upgrade more than Windows users.

Like I said in my previous post which OS you like is subjective, each has their good points and weak points. However the battle of which business is going to dominate the market was won a long time ago by MS. What the long term future holds, who knows but for the short term it doesn't look like much is going to change.

Let me also state that Apple will never gain ground if they continue to refuse to listen to their customer base (mid level tower) and if they continue to refuse to price drop based on market standards.

If you take the iMac as an example it has not dropped in price since coming to market with the core 2 duo. In that time frame, lcd prices have dropped, ram has stayed fairly stable and of course gpu prices have dropped. Apple would have no problem offering a 24" iMac with 2 gigs of ram and a 7600 card for 1999.00 with recent price drops yet they still play their old way of doing business. They can attract new customers that way.

The upgrade price from a 7300gt to a 7600gt is more than you can buy a 7600gt card for outright.

At the begining of the year Apple made is sound like they were going to target the hardware vendors on the pc side like Dell, I guess they have given up on that because in no way have they done anything to truly compete with Dell, HP, Gateway, Sony or Acer.

Its just bad business on their part.

[TBaggins]

Originally Posted by extremeskater

It's always been said that MS always copies the best.

We agree on something. 8)

The fact is it't Apple that is chasing MS and thats always been the case. Hardcore Mac fans always have this hope that they are going to bring down MS and history has just proven time and time again that isn't going to happen.

I'd be wary of lumping 'hardcore Mac fans' all into one pile. I myself don't think Apple will 'take out Microsoft' (though judging from Microsoft's own internal paranoia, they fear that Apple, or Google, or someone, will be raping and pillaging Redmond any day now), I just think Apple will continue to do what it's always done- run a solid business and make Microsoft look slow, boring, and foolish in comparison. Apple continues to live up to being BMW to Microsoft's General Motors, and I'm happy with that.

Let me also state that Apple will never gain ground if they continue to refuse to listen to their customer base (mid level tower) and if they continue to refuse to price drop based on market standards.

If you take the iMac as an example it has not dropped in price since coming to market with the core 2 duo. In that time frame, lcd prices have dropped, ram has stayed fairly stable and of course gpu prices have dropped. Apple would have no problem offering a 24" iMac with 2 gigs of ram and a 7600 card for 1999.00 with recent price drops yet they still play their old way of doing business. They can attract new customers that way.

The upgrade price from a 7300gt to a 7600gt is more than you can buy a 7600gt card for outright.

At the begining of the year Apple made is sound like they were going to target the hardware vendors on the pc side like Dell, I guess they have given up on that because in no way have they done anything to truly compete with Dell, HP, Gateway, Sony or Acer.

Its just bad business on their part.

I actually agree with all of that. I don't think Apple can just sit there and go, "Here's a Mac, the design is superior to PCs, the OS is better, buy it or you're stupid." They need to compete against 'Dellcrosoft' axis of 'good enough' and hit more pricepoints and fill the obvious holes in their product lineup (15" MacBook, subnotebook, expandable midrange desktop).

They can still win marketshare gains against the PC world even while not doing the above things (as recent history has shown, and as Apple apologists like to point to as a reason for 'staying the course'), but Apple would do even better if they'd check some of the attitude and truly compete. Sounds like you and I are on the same page there.


.

[Johnny Mozzarella]

Originally Posted by TBaggins

...I actually agree with all of that. I don't think Apple can just sit there and go, "Here's a Mac, the design is superior to PCs, the OS is better, buy it or you're stupid." They need to compete against 'Dellcrosoft' axis of 'good enough' and hit more pricepoints and fill the obvious holes in their product lineup (15" MacBook, subnotebook, expandable midrange desktop).

They can still win marketshare gains against the PC world even while not doing the above things (as recent history has shown, and as Apple apologists like to point to as a reason for 'staying the course'), but Apple would do even better if they'd check some of the attitude and truly compete. Sounds like you and I are on the same page there.

Apple has been growing marketshare very quickly and You've probably noticed how crowded it always is at the Apple Store.
Apple has to guard against marketshare inflation(growing to quickly).
This is a very real danger and could be disastrous to Apple's reputation and image.

You've said yourself that Apple has been growing healthy marketshare without those new products you mentioned.
When will we start seeing more of those gaps filled in?
When growth slows down or Apple feels it can handle faster growth.

Don't forget last year Apple was a 2-Dimensional company... Mac + iPod
Now they are in the 4th dimension... Mac + iPod + iPhone + AppleTV
That alone should continue to drive growth for the next several years.

[TBaggins]

Originally Posted by Johnny Mozzarella

Apple has been growing marketshare very quickly and You've probably noticed how crowded it always is at the Apple Store.
Apple has to guard against marketshare inflation(growing to quickly).
This is a very real danger and could be disastrous to Apple's reputation and image.

You've said yourself that Apple has been growing healthy marketshare without those new products you mentioned.
When will we start seeing more of those gaps filled in?
When growth slows down or Apple feels it can handle faster growth.

Don't forget last year Apple was a 2-Dimensional company... Mac + iPod
Now they are in the 4th dimension... Mac + iPod + iPhone + AppleTV
That alone should continue to drive growth for the next several years.

Apple WAS growing quickly. But marketshare in the last quarter or so has stagnated worldwide, and fallen in the US:

Gartner: Apple's Mac market share slips to fifth in US

Apple dropped slightly to fifth place in rankings of US computer sales during the fourth quarter of 2006, according to preliminary Gartner data obtained by AppleInsider.

The Mac maker fell a full percentage point to 5.1 percent of the domestic market between the third and fourth quarters of the year, trading places with Toshiba, which climbed from 5.1 to 5.3 percent. Apple remained out of the top five in the world rankings, but a similar set of data released by IDC on Wednesday puts its international share at 2.4 percent.

Shipments of Macs in the U.S. also dipped significantly from 975,000 US systems to 808,000, indicating a genuine slowdown in sales for the Cupertino-based company following a stellar back-to-school quarter.

http://www.appleinsider.com/article.php?id=2420

Even if Apple had continued to go gangbusters last quarter, it would be a moot point, because the question is not whether they're doing well, but if they could be doing even better. I believe they can. 8)

I also believe that Vista will be a bit of a headwind for Mac marketshare growth, perhaps not so much now, but definitely by the time SP2 rolls around.

.

[extremeskater]

Originally Posted by TBaggins

I actually agree with all of that. I don't think Apple can just sit there and go, "Here's a Mac, the design is superior to PCs, the OS is better, buy it or you're stupid." They need to compete against 'Dellcrosoft' axis of 'good enough' and hit more pricepoints and fill the obvious holes in their product lineup (15" MacBook, subnotebook, expandable midrange desktop).

They can still win marketshare gains against the PC world even while not doing the above things (as recent history has shown, and as Apple apologists like to point to as a reason for 'staying the course'), but Apple would do even better if they'd check some of the attitude and truly compete. Sounds like you and I are on the same page there.


.

I feel Apple moving to a 15" notebook is a very good idea, while many Mac users are asking for a 12" notebook I believe 15" will hit more of whats considered standard in the market.

The comment about buy it of your stupid is a very good point. Apple needs to look at things differently they need to understand that most home users have no clue what their ads mean, they might think they are funny but they show nothing about what Mac has to offer.

The ads lead you to believe that a Mac is easy to setup and easy to upgrade yet as always Apple somehow believes that if they keep things a secret it will lead to more interest, that just isn't working with anyone other than current Mac users.

If you polled 1000 people I would say most of them would have heard to the term Vista, if you polled the same 1000 people and asked them what Apples new OS is going to be most wouldn't have a clue.

As far as hardware this is the part that really gets me. When it comes down to it Apple has one true desktop system everything is even if its an AIO it has all moble components. All for the sake of looks.

Before Apple adopted intel they could get away with people not making an Apple to Apple comparision (excuse the pun) but now that they are using intel parts, the same ram as everyone else and same gpus they need to keep prices within standard market limits to attract new customers.

Some of the Mac faithful will say the hardware is more expensive because it is better, it isn't its the same hardware found everywhere else, when there was a laptop battery issue Apple was using the same Sony batteries as everyone else.

I guess for me the reason I post about this is I would love to see some real competition, Intel is killing AMD right now, ATI is starting to narrow the gap agains with Nvidia and Apple is back to its 6% market share if that, I havent looked recently.

It makes for high prices and really poor quality for everyone when a few dominate the market.

[Chucker]

Originally Posted by TBaggins

Apple WAS growing quickly. But marketshare in the last quarter or so has stagnated worldwide, and fallen in the US:

Consecutive quarters. Meaningless. Year over year, there is growth, and that's all that matters.

[extremeskater]

Originally Posted by Chucker

Consecutive quarters. Meaningless. Year over year, there is growth, and that's all that matters.

So where are they going to grow. Do you honestly expect the iphone and itv to huge sellers?

There are only so many people you can sell ipods too, the market may stay steady but I believe 2006 will show as their banner year for ipods.

People believed for years that Dell would continue to grow and the stock would be worth far more than its worth today, even Michael Dell understood there are only so many people on this earth that will buy a computer.

iphone will be a thud, and itv should do really well for a overpriced wireless dvr. This will be the year that Steve Jobs learns consumers will not pay a premium for his product.

Well let me change that no one new will pay a premium for his product, the people that have in the past will continue to do so blindly.

[Chucker]

Originally Posted by extremeskater

So where are they going to grow. Do you honestly expect the iphone and itv to huge sellers?

tv, not so much. iPhone? Yes, I would expect so.

[extremeskater]

Originally Posted by Chucker

tv, not so much. iPhone? Yes, I would expect so.

The iphone is going to have alot to offer, im just not sure people are going to react well to the price tag put on it.

Most consumers have it in there head if they sign a 2 year contract they should get the phone for next to nothing, while I would agree that isn't going to be your typical iphone customer its still priced a good 200-300 higher than a pda phone with a 2 year contract.

I guess time will tell.

[Galley]

Bill Gates will leave the stage in tears when he "comes to a sad realization".

[sunilraman]

Originally Posted by extremeskater

So where are they going to grow. Do you honestly expect the iphone and itv to huge sellers?

There are only so many people you can sell ipods too, the market may stay steady but I believe 2006 will show as their banner year for ipods.

People believed for years that Dell would continue to grow and the stock would be worth far more than its worth today, even Michael Dell understood there are only so many people on this earth that will buy a computer.

iphone will be a thud, and itv should do really well for a overpriced wireless dvr. This will be the year that Steve Jobs learns consumers will not pay a premium for his product.

Well let me change that no one new will pay a premium for his product, the people that have in the past will continue to do so blindly.

The iPhone is going to blow out of the water anything previously done by Apple - Mac, iPod, AppleTV, iTunesStore, whatever. It is going to be MASSIVE.

[sunilraman]

Originally Posted by Galley

Bill Gates will leave the stage in tears when he "comes to a sad realization".

Good one. 8)

[Johnny Mozzarella]

Originally Posted by sunilraman

The iPhone is going to blow out of the water anything previously done by Apple - Mac, iPod, AppleTV, iTunesStore, whatever. It is going to be MASSIVE.

I couldn't agree more.
I think we will continue to see a lot of skepticism until June.
Once people get their hands on the thing and start seeing others using it...they'll want one.
It was the same story with the iPod.
I also think may nay-sayers underestimate how huge of an advance the multi-touch screen is.