Thats ignoring the network effect. Loss of market share is not inevitable. It did not happen to Windows for example. Apple is losing market share because its them against all the other OEMs. iOS would have maintained market share if other OEMs could license the OS, but of course we know that will never happen.
Basically because iOS is closed from a licensing POV the market share loss was inevitable. And at a critical point that also means a loss of influence. When Apple gets to 10% market share, like in the PC business, do you really think games will be released on iOS first? Or social apps? What would be the point, except for a trial run?
I would have though long time Mac users would have known market share very much does matter, no matter what Apple's profits are.
Oh heck, you're back again. Making stupid arguments.
You just don't get it, do you? Apple makes almost all of its money on hardware. In fact, it's pretty much the only company making money hand-over-fist in HW (granted, Samsung is showing some measure of success too, but I'd wait at least a couple of more years to see if that's sustainable).
In the HW game, market share and profits have a complicated relationship -- it's probably inverse-V-shaped: it is positively correlated up to point where you've got most of the high-end customers, but it starts to get negative as you start to scape the increasingly marginal customer. Apple takes a lion's share of the profits in each of its segments since it understands this.
All Apple needs to attract the best ecosystem (network effects) is a sufficiently large share of the high-end customer, not 90%, share. Apple does not need or want the riffraff -- and the relentless pressure for scraping the bottom of the barrel -- that the extra share will bring beyond a point.
Its share in markets such as the tablets, smartphones, and music players will go to 10% only in your dreams. In the only market where it has a global share less than 10% (Macs) its share is poised to grow massively in the next decade (as countries such as India, China, Indonesia, Brazil and so on get wealthier: no one who can afford it wants to be caught dead toting a PC in those markets).
10 years? You missed it by quite some years, my friend. Apple was on the verge of bankruptcy back in 1996, but has had a tremendous rise since that time. But I guess there are many new iOS-fans around that doesn't know the history
I actually think that Apple is doing everything in its power to NOT be the next Windows. Two things I want to point out.
1) Apple has thus far kept things very secure in iOS. They refuse to add features and capabilities until they figure out how to do it in a way that does not compromise that security. Microsoft was in a rush with Windows. They rushed to add a features and made security an afterthought. Most notably was the idiotic decision to integrate IE into the operating system.
2) I believe Apple is actively trying to avoid making decisions that could be used to build an anti-trust case Apple does not reject an app simply because it competes with it an Apple product. Apple clearly wants to avoid being branded anti-competitive. They removed Google maps, released their on maps, then approved a stand-alone Google Maps app. They just approved Google Now, which is clearly a Siri competitor. Every time I see a "Apple will never approve it", I just laugh. As long as Apple approves and disapproves apps on a published set or standards, app makers and trust busters will have a hard time building a case.
I think Apple learned a great deal from Microsoft about how NOT be Windows. Apple may make their own mistakes, but I doubt they're going to repeat the ones made by Microsoft.
What were their choices? Develop their own OSes? License an out of date windows mobile? Or take a free OS?
All of the above. Why couldn't they make their own OS? Apple did it, Palm did it, and BB did it. Do Apple, Google, and MS have the only programmers able to make a mobile OS? Nobody forced them to hitch their wagon to Android.
Are you purposely being obtuse? Your argument is like MS' "How are we leveraging anything when we allow other internet browsers to be installed?" They offer up something seemingly "cheap" to gain market share quickly and then generate fees at the other end. Are you really going to claim those billion "activations" and all those services they charge vendors for aren't there to generate any revenue under the guise of a "free" OS? If there was no one attaching themselves to Google's services then you'd have a point, but that's the exception, not the rule. Now it's a completely other argument as to whether this is illegal or not but their actions of "giving away" an OS are quite clear so please stop trying to paint Google as being altruistic.
That's different, MS definitely leveraged the power that they already had. They new quite well that although other browsers could be installed it wasn't easy to do so. Obviously Google is trying trying to make money, they are after all a business, but you cannot tell me that they've forced their way to where they are. Amazon has disconnected themselves from them, and Samsung doesn't mention them at all. I wouldn't be surprised if in the near future the exception becomes the rule.
The point is, for a long time iPad was really the only game in town. That's no longer the case, and Apple's share of the tablet market has slipped below 50%.
Right. Market share slips because they are no longer the only game in town.
Not because the other tablets coming to market are that much better. It's simply that they exist and fill a shelf in a store. Someone will purchase, thus taking share from Apple.
Right. Market share slips because they are no longer the only game in town.
Not because the other tablets coming to market are that much better. It's simply that they exist and fill a shelf in a store. Someone will purchase, thus taking share from Apple.
Not much a cause for concern as long as the sales of iPads continue to rise.
I'm amazed at the amount of sheer crap and downright lies that the Android fanboys infesting this Apple-enthusiast forum are spewing out in the hopes it gets picked up and mistaken for fact. Amazing. Are these iHaters really believing their nonsense?
You just don't get it, do you? Apple makes almost all of its money on hardware. In fact, it's pretty much the only company making money hand-over-fist in HW (granted, Samsung is showing some measure of success too, but I'd wait at least a couple of more years to see if that's sustainable).
All Apple needs to attract the best ecosystem (network effects) is a sufficiently large share of the high-end customer, not 90%, share. Apple does not need or want the riffraff -- and the relentless pressure for scraping the bottom of the barrel -- that the extra share will bring beyond a point.
In the only market where it has a global share less than 10% (Macs) its share is poised to grow massively in the next decade (as countries such as India, China, Indonesia, Brazil and so on get wealthier: no one who can afford it wants to be caught dead toting a PC in those markets).
I know you identify with Apple, but Apple's profits doesnt actually directly help you. A more ubiquitous iOS would actually be a lot more useful to its users, due to the aforementioned network effect. Not best for Apple's profits, but for its users certainly.
Regarding your sufficiently large percentage of high-end users, doesnt Apple have close to 100% of high end PC users, and how did that network effect go then in securing software for the platform?
In Europe Apple has much less than 20% market share and dropping. Worldwide it was obviously 17% and dropping, and if we exclude USA, where Apple is holding their own (due to operator subsidies), it is closer to 14% and presumably also dropping. Is 10% really that far away?
This statement is already looking funny and out of touch with the trend.
Its share in markets such as the tablets, smartphones, and music players will go to 10% only in your dreams.
Eric Schmidt and Mark Zuckerberg are standing on the shoulders of Steve Jobs. If there was never an iPhone, do you really think Google would have spontaneously generated Android? Would Facebook be so ubiquitous without the popularization of an easy to use and understand pocket computer by Apple?
If there was never an iPhone, do you really think Google would have spontaneously generated Android?
They would have spontaneously generated a clone in every way of BlackBerry OS.
Would Facebook be so ubiquitous without the popularization of an easy to use and understand pocket computer by Apple?
This I'm not so sure. Facebook just got integration in iOS 6, and I don't remember its rise being punctuated by the existence of its app (or even web access to the site) on iOS. But that could very well be my memory.
Eric Schmidt and Mark Zuckerberg are standing on the shoulders of Steve Jobs. If there was never an iPhone, do you really think Google would have spontaneously generated Android? Would Facebook be so ubiquitous without the popularization of an easy to use and understand pocket computer by Apple?
Really? That list can go on and on. Would there be a iPhone if there weren't any smartphones before it? Apps like Facebook is what helped the iPhone become so popular. Since the first iPhone was 5 years ahead of it's time i think we would've had the first really useful touch screen devices by now.
… This I'm not so sure. Facebook just got integration in iOS 6, and I don't remember its rise being punctuated by the existence of its app (or even web access to the site) on iOS. But that could very well be my memory.
No one can know what would have happened if the iPhone didn't exist but Facebook was wildly popular in it's web based form and already a "thing" before the iPhone took off. Arguably, the existence of mobile devices accelerated things a lot, but we will never know by how much and by the standards that existed at the time, it was already very, very popular.
I remember quitting Facebook in disgust at least a year or more before I ever had an iPhone, and I remember using an app to access it in 2008-9 and all my Facebook friends being "amazed" that you could do that with a smartphone instead of having to use the web interface.
Neither iOS nor Android are the new Windows. Comparisons and metaphors are used far too often in tech. The worst ones are those comparing Apple to BMW. I suppose people just like to categorize and use other examples for a frame of reference. Smart phones and the companies that make them are creating an entirely new computing paradigm and the first chapter is just now being written. We have no idea what the phone or tablet landscape will look like in 5 years time. I don't see any one company dominating the landscape though. Apple has a great foundation to build on and will still be a major player. The future for HTC, Sony, RIM, Motorola, Nokia and others are on far shakier ground unless they learn how to increase their profits. RIM and Nokia might have the best shot and gaining customers since they offer alternatives which may or may not gain traction.
I don't see Android or iOS disappearing anytime soon. Android may continue to fork out more sharply as Amazon have done. If Samsung and Google grow further apart then perhaps you might see them release more Tizen phones while retaining the ability to run Android apps. If that happened Google would likely retaliate by showing preferential treatment and features for Motorola and the remaining companies sticking with Android. I don't see why they don't do that now since they own Motorola it seems they would at least cut them a break and at least give them them exclusivity on the Nexus devices. A landscape with only Samsung left is not a great proposition for Google. Even though they make money regardless of the phone platform being used they have too much skin in the game not to try and keep Android relevant and with a choice of more than just one manufacturer succeeding.
I expect companies like ZTE, Huawei, and other relatively unknown Chinese brands to ultimately steal most of the low hanging fruit in the under $350 market where Samsung is currently doing pretty well. Apple is smart to ignore that sector as it will be a bloodbath with incredibly low margins. But if they can continue to do well in the premium sector and possibly expand their lineup with a little more variety in size and choices they have a lot of room to grow.
Thats ignoring the network effect. Loss of market share is not inevitable. It did not happen to Windows for example. Apple is losing market share because its them against all the other OEMs. iOS would have maintained market share if other OEMs could license the OS, but of course we know that will never happen.
Basically because iOS is closed from a licensing POV the market share loss was inevitable. And at a critical point that also means a loss of influence. When Apple gets to 10% market share, like in the PC business, do you really think games will be released on iOS first? Or social apps? What would be the point, except for a trial run?
I would have though long time Mac users would have known market share very much does matter, no matter what Apple's profits are.
I guess others have already pointed it out but this is just the biggest pile of horse shit I've read in a long time. Almost everything you say is wrong.
In the first place, iOS *isn't* actually "losing market share," the reports that say so are based only on channel shipments which are not even close to the same thing as saying that a product has "X% share of the market." The market consists of more than just your channel partners. iOS is *gaining* (true) market share on Android almost daily. More people use it than Android and it's pretty much *always* been that way so far. More people buy iPhones than any other phone in the market. It's the market leader in fact with all three models (5, 4, 4s), both selling more, and being more popular than all the other devices on the market.
Secondly, the market share loss (if it were actually happening), is not at all "inevitable" because Apple doesn't licence it's OS. A licensed OS had no inherent superiority over a non-licensed one.
Finally, as a long-time Mac user I can tell you that the fact that OS X didn't always have the huge market share it does now, did not in any real way affect my enjoyment and use of the platform all these years. There was a brief period in the dark days before Steve Jobs returned where some software wasn't made available for the platform, but we are talking maybe six months out of the entire lifespan of Apple. All the standard apps that we use now were available for mac almost all along and now that the Mac has a HUGE market share and everyone is using it, there are no apps that have become available (at least not any that I use or have heard about), that weren't there before.
Basically, you are just taking this wild (and easily disproven) account of Android market share rising and beating out iOS, and weaving it into a private fantasy for yourself where Apple's iOS market share shrinks to a small fraction ("10%"), of the market. You just don't want to admit that you read that report wrong.
Android dominance over iOS isn't going to happen, it isn't happening now and it won't happen in the future. There are absolutely no indicators that iOS is slipping in popularity. There is nothing to indicate that it's (true) market share is going down, in fact all indicators are that it's going up. Something north of 90% of the tablet computers in use out there are iPads. The three most popular phones on the planet are all iPhones.
Comments
I thought he was going to say bloated and buggy.
Quote:
Originally Posted by fredD
Thats ignoring the network effect. Loss of market share is not inevitable. It did not happen to Windows for example. Apple is losing market share because its them against all the other OEMs. iOS would have maintained market share if other OEMs could license the OS, but of course we know that will never happen.
Basically because iOS is closed from a licensing POV the market share loss was inevitable. And at a critical point that also means a loss of influence. When Apple gets to 10% market share, like in the PC business, do you really think games will be released on iOS first? Or social apps? What would be the point, except for a trial run?
I would have though long time Mac users would have known market share very much does matter, no matter what Apple's profits are.
Oh heck, you're back again. Making stupid arguments.
You just don't get it, do you? Apple makes almost all of its money on hardware. In fact, it's pretty much the only company making money hand-over-fist in HW (granted, Samsung is showing some measure of success too, but I'd wait at least a couple of more years to see if that's sustainable).
In the HW game, market share and profits have a complicated relationship -- it's probably inverse-V-shaped: it is positively correlated up to point where you've got most of the high-end customers, but it starts to get negative as you start to scape the increasingly marginal customer. Apple takes a lion's share of the profits in each of its segments since it understands this.
All Apple needs to attract the best ecosystem (network effects) is a sufficiently large share of the high-end customer, not 90%, share. Apple does not need or want the riffraff -- and the relentless pressure for scraping the bottom of the barrel -- that the extra share will bring beyond a point.
Its share in markets such as the tablets, smartphones, and music players will go to 10% only in your dreams. In the only market where it has a global share less than 10% (Macs) its share is poised to grow massively in the next decade (as countries such as India, China, Indonesia, Brazil and so on get wealthier: no one who can afford it wants to be caught dead toting a PC in those markets).
Quote:
Originally Posted by Garamond
10 years? You missed it by quite some years, my friend. Apple was on the verge of bankruptcy back in 1996, but has had a tremendous rise since that time. But I guess there are many new iOS-fans around that doesn't know the history
Time flies when you're having fun!
I actually think that Apple is doing everything in its power to NOT be the next Windows. Two things I want to point out.
1) Apple has thus far kept things very secure in iOS. They refuse to add features and capabilities until they figure out how to do it in a way that does not compromise that security. Microsoft was in a rush with Windows. They rushed to add a features and made security an afterthought. Most notably was the idiotic decision to integrate IE into the operating system.
2) I believe Apple is actively trying to avoid making decisions that could be used to build an anti-trust case Apple does not reject an app simply because it competes with it an Apple product. Apple clearly wants to avoid being branded anti-competitive. They removed Google maps, released their on maps, then approved a stand-alone Google Maps app. They just approved Google Now, which is clearly a Siri competitor. Every time I see a "Apple will never approve it", I just laugh. As long as Apple approves and disapproves apps on a published set or standards, app makers and trust busters will have a hard time building a case.
I think Apple learned a great deal from Microsoft about how NOT be Windows. Apple may make their own mistakes, but I doubt they're going to repeat the ones made by Microsoft.
All of the above. Why couldn't they make their own OS? Apple did it, Palm did it, and BB did it. Do Apple, Google, and MS have the only programmers able to make a mobile OS? Nobody forced them to hitch their wagon to Android.
That's different, MS definitely leveraged the power that they already had. They new quite well that although other browsers could be installed it wasn't easy to do so. Obviously Google is trying trying to make money, they are after all a business, but you cannot tell me that they've forced their way to where they are. Amazon has disconnected themselves from them, and Samsung doesn't mention them at all. I wouldn't be surprised if in the near future the exception becomes the rule.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Tallest Skil
Didn't Apple bring a kid up on stage once to demo how easy it was to code in a language they'd created? Maybe that was NeXT…
Most likely Apple and the precursor to HTML. It sure as hell wasn't MVC OO Programming and the NeXT Paradigm. We weren't that delusional.
Originally Posted by mdriftmeyer
Most likely Apple and the precursor to HTML. It sure as hell wasn't MVC OO Programming and the NeXT Paradigm. We weren't that delusional.
That's quotable.
"We weren't that delusional." —mdriftmeyer on children programming for NeXT
Quote:
Originally Posted by graxspoo
The point is, for a long time iPad was really the only game in town. That's no longer the case, and Apple's share of the tablet market has slipped below 50%.
Right. Market share slips because they are no longer the only game in town.
Not because the other tablets coming to market are that much better. It's simply that they exist and fill a shelf in a store. Someone will purchase, thus taking share from Apple.
Not much a cause for concern as long as the sales of iPads continue to rise.
I'm amazed at the amount of sheer crap and downright lies that the Android fanboys infesting this Apple-enthusiast forum are spewing out in the hopes it gets picked up and mistaken for fact. Amazing. Are these iHaters really believing their nonsense?
Quote:
Originally Posted by anantksundaram
You just don't get it, do you? Apple makes almost all of its money on hardware. In fact, it's pretty much the only company making money hand-over-fist in HW (granted, Samsung is showing some measure of success too, but I'd wait at least a couple of more years to see if that's sustainable).
All Apple needs to attract the best ecosystem (network effects) is a sufficiently large share of the high-end customer, not 90%, share. Apple does not need or want the riffraff -- and the relentless pressure for scraping the bottom of the barrel -- that the extra share will bring beyond a point.
In the only market where it has a global share less than 10% (Macs) its share is poised to grow massively in the next decade (as countries such as India, China, Indonesia, Brazil and so on get wealthier: no one who can afford it wants to be caught dead toting a PC in those markets).
I know you identify with Apple, but Apple's profits doesnt actually directly help you. A more ubiquitous iOS would actually be a lot more useful to its users, due to the aforementioned network effect. Not best for Apple's profits, but for its users certainly.
Regarding your sufficiently large percentage of high-end users, doesnt Apple have close to 100% of high end PC users, and how did that network effect go then in securing software for the platform?
In Europe Apple has much less than 20% market share and dropping. Worldwide it was obviously 17% and dropping, and if we exclude USA, where Apple is holding their own (due to operator subsidies), it is closer to 14% and presumably also dropping. Is 10% really that far away?
This statement is already looking funny and out of touch with the trend.
Its share in markets such as the tablets, smartphones, and music players will go to 10% only in your dreams.
Originally Posted by Robin Huber
If there was never an iPhone, do you really think Google would have spontaneously generated Android?
They would have spontaneously generated a clone in every way of BlackBerry OS.
Would Facebook be so ubiquitous without the popularization of an easy to use and understand pocket computer by Apple?
This I'm not so sure. Facebook just got integration in iOS 6, and I don't remember its rise being punctuated by the existence of its app (or even web access to the site) on iOS. But that could very well be my memory.
Really? That list can go on and on. Would there be a iPhone if there weren't any smartphones before it? Apps like Facebook is what helped the iPhone become so popular. Since the first iPhone was 5 years ahead of it's time i think we would've had the first really useful touch screen devices by now.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Tallest Skil
… This I'm not so sure. Facebook just got integration in iOS 6, and I don't remember its rise being punctuated by the existence of its app (or even web access to the site) on iOS. But that could very well be my memory.
No one can know what would have happened if the iPhone didn't exist but Facebook was wildly popular in it's web based form and already a "thing" before the iPhone took off. Arguably, the existence of mobile devices accelerated things a lot, but we will never know by how much and by the standards that existed at the time, it was already very, very popular.
I remember quitting Facebook in disgust at least a year or more before I ever had an iPhone, and I remember using an app to access it in 2008-9 and all my Facebook friends being "amazed" that you could do that with a smartphone instead of having to use the web interface.
Neither iOS nor Android are the new Windows. Comparisons and metaphors are used far too often in tech. The worst ones are those comparing Apple to BMW. I suppose people just like to categorize and use other examples for a frame of reference. Smart phones and the companies that make them are creating an entirely new computing paradigm and the first chapter is just now being written. We have no idea what the phone or tablet landscape will look like in 5 years time. I don't see any one company dominating the landscape though. Apple has a great foundation to build on and will still be a major player. The future for HTC, Sony, RIM, Motorola, Nokia and others are on far shakier ground unless they learn how to increase their profits. RIM and Nokia might have the best shot and gaining customers since they offer alternatives which may or may not gain traction.
I don't see Android or iOS disappearing anytime soon. Android may continue to fork out more sharply as Amazon have done. If Samsung and Google grow further apart then perhaps you might see them release more Tizen phones while retaining the ability to run Android apps. If that happened Google would likely retaliate by showing preferential treatment and features for Motorola and the remaining companies sticking with Android. I don't see why they don't do that now since they own Motorola it seems they would at least cut them a break and at least give them them exclusivity on the Nexus devices. A landscape with only Samsung left is not a great proposition for Google. Even though they make money regardless of the phone platform being used they have too much skin in the game not to try and keep Android relevant and with a choice of more than just one manufacturer succeeding.
I expect companies like ZTE, Huawei, and other relatively unknown Chinese brands to ultimately steal most of the low hanging fruit in the under $350 market where Samsung is currently doing pretty well. Apple is smart to ignore that sector as it will be a bloodbath with incredibly low margins. But if they can continue to do well in the premium sector and possibly expand their lineup with a little more variety in size and choices they have a lot of room to grow.
They would have to first learn how to make a profit before learning to increase it.
Quote:
Originally Posted by fredD
Thats ignoring the network effect. Loss of market share is not inevitable. It did not happen to Windows for example. Apple is losing market share because its them against all the other OEMs. iOS would have maintained market share if other OEMs could license the OS, but of course we know that will never happen.
Basically because iOS is closed from a licensing POV the market share loss was inevitable. And at a critical point that also means a loss of influence. When Apple gets to 10% market share, like in the PC business, do you really think games will be released on iOS first? Or social apps? What would be the point, except for a trial run?
I would have though long time Mac users would have known market share very much does matter, no matter what Apple's profits are.
I guess others have already pointed it out but this is just the biggest pile of horse shit I've read in a long time. Almost everything you say is wrong.
In the first place, iOS *isn't* actually "losing market share," the reports that say so are based only on channel shipments which are not even close to the same thing as saying that a product has "X% share of the market." The market consists of more than just your channel partners. iOS is *gaining* (true) market share on Android almost daily. More people use it than Android and it's pretty much *always* been that way so far. More people buy iPhones than any other phone in the market. It's the market leader in fact with all three models (5, 4, 4s), both selling more, and being more popular than all the other devices on the market.
Secondly, the market share loss (if it were actually happening), is not at all "inevitable" because Apple doesn't licence it's OS. A licensed OS had no inherent superiority over a non-licensed one.
Finally, as a long-time Mac user I can tell you that the fact that OS X didn't always have the huge market share it does now, did not in any real way affect my enjoyment and use of the platform all these years. There was a brief period in the dark days before Steve Jobs returned where some software wasn't made available for the platform, but we are talking maybe six months out of the entire lifespan of Apple. All the standard apps that we use now were available for mac almost all along and now that the Mac has a HUGE market share and everyone is using it, there are no apps that have become available (at least not any that I use or have heard about), that weren't there before.
Basically, you are just taking this wild (and easily disproven) account of Android market share rising and beating out iOS, and weaving it into a private fantasy for yourself where Apple's iOS market share shrinks to a small fraction ("10%"), of the market. You just don't want to admit that you read that report wrong.
Android dominance over iOS isn't going to happen, it isn't happening now and it won't happen in the future. There are absolutely no indicators that iOS is slipping in popularity. There is nothing to indicate that it's (true) market share is going down, in fact all indicators are that it's going up. Something north of 90% of the tablet computers in use out there are iPads. The three most popular phones on the planet are all iPhones.
Get used to it.