@rjc999 - useful comments but remember a couple of variations: 1. "Sooner or later the App Store's advantages in content will be eroded." It possibly has been already, in terms of titles and overall ability. But Apple's store is curated and Android stores are not. I, for one, do not want AV stuff on my phone killing the battery.
2. reports indicate that Apple's cost-of-manufacturing is better than anyone else. Competitors will have to work hard to compete on price. Since all of them but Samsung are presently losing money, it will be interesting to see how long they keep shoveling money into the hole. As you say, "it is unstoppable".
Have you read what Miguel de Icaza said about Linux?
In the country I live in there are two large camps: Microsoft and Linux.
For quite a few years I've worked for both, and that is why I'm pretty well aware who Miguel is.
Now I do iOS and Mac OS development on my own (no decent employer here develops software for Apple). Note, that I write even the network services on Mac OS, so I do not underestimate it as a server-side OS. The Launch Daemon, GCD, etc - they are well thought-out and without competition / analog.
So, I'm pretty well aware of the shortcomings of Linux - all the GUIs are total bullshit - free/open source reincarnations of the crappy Windows. Android is an obvious example with it's crappy and laggy user interface; with time passing the OS clogs exactly like Windows.
Nevertheless, I'm fan of Linus Torvalds, especially of the way he treats idiots. And Miguel has been on Linuses radar quite a few times. GNOME itself is a total crap. They had Qt which is a pretty decent, object-oriented GUI framework. Obviously, Cocoa is the best framework out there; second place - maybe far behind, but nevertheless second - is for Qt. But they decided to go write GNOME. So, Miguel is an obvious idiot.
Now, stating the obvious, that Mac OS X obliterates every other OS in the consumer market, being the friendliest, easiest to use and technologically superior in many respects, doesn't make him (Miguel) any more smarter. Well, at least he is not a total idiot.
What Miguel states does not change the fact, that Linux is on 95% of the top 500 supercomputers. And that by itself is a significant success. Don't make the mistake to underestimate the success of others just because you don't like them. I try not to.
I fully agree with you that 90+% of the Open Source fans only understand and like the FREE part of it. If they understood the concepts of the Open Source Initiative, they would hate companies like Google who rarely contribute anything of a significance, and disguise payments for services (Google search being default in Firefox) as sponsoring Open Source projects.
Last, but not least, I don't like GPL exactly because it binds Open Source with Freeware.
In the country I live in there are two large camps: Microsoft and Linux.
For quite a few years I've worked for both, and that is why I'm pretty well aware who Miguel is.
Now I do iOS and Mac OS development on my own (no decent employer here develops software for Apple). Note, that I write even the network services on Mac OS, so I do not underestimate it as a server-side OS. The Launch Daemon, GCD, etc - they are well thought-out and without competition / analog.
So, I'm pretty well aware of the shortcomings of Linux - all the GUIs are total bullshit - free/open source reincarnations of the crappy Windows. Android is an obvious example with it's crappy and laggy user interface; with time passing the OS clogs exactly like Windows.
Nevertheless, I'm fan of Linus Torvalds, especially of the way he treats idiots. And Miguel has been on Linuses radar quite a few times. GNOME itself is a total crap. They had Qt which is a pretty decent, object-oriented GUI framework. Obviously, Cocoa is the best framework out there; second place - maybe far behind, but nevertheless second - is for Qt. But they decided to go write GNOME. So, Miguel is an obvious idiot.
Now, stating the obvious, that Mac OS X obliterates every other OS in the consumer market, being the friendliest, easiest to use and technologically superior in many respects, doesn't make him (Miguel) any more smarter. Well, at least he is not a total idiot.
What Miguel states does not change the fact, that Linux is on 95% of the top 500 supercomputers. And that by itself is a significant success. Don't make the mistake to underestimate the success of others just because you don't like them. I try not to.
I fully agree with you that 90+% of the Open Source fans only understand and like the FREE part of it. If they understood the concepts of the Open Source Initiative, they would hate companies like Google who rarely contribute anything of a significance, and disguise payments for services (Google search being default in Firefox) as sponsoring Open Source projects.
Last, but not least, I don't like GPL exactly because it binds Open Source with Freeware.
I never said that Linux wasn't good for a server environment. Obviously Red Hat is fairly successful, but financially, they've been limping along at making $150 Mil a year in Net Profits, which compared to others, that's the equivalent of a gnat's ass. For the desktop average consumer, Linux isn't a good solution. I know the Linux is great for a company developing a specialized hardware system that's focused on a specific market where they need a free Open Source OS that they can deploy in a specific application that is locked down and controlled by the mfg of that product. Midas Consoles, and a variety of other companies make/design specific need products with Linux. It's great for that. It's great for college students working on college projects where they need to get access to the source code. But to try to attempt to displace Windows, OS X, iOS? Nope. That's not going to happen. Android has lots of faults and primarily because of the how it's OEM licensing is modeled and that the OEMs basically don't do a very good job with updating all of their products as soon as an update is released. To me, Open Source OSs like LInux is running more like an Open Loop OS, with no one taking charge with enough money to dump into it and make it a viable alternative for a desktop/laptop OS. They would basically have to create another OS in the same manner as Apple did with Open Source Kernel where it's locked down and controlled with tight integration with hardware and mobile device siblings, or how Microsoft does their OS where it's the same thing just made to run on whomever's hardware, but is consistent from OEM to OEM with consistent updates to prevent fragmentation.
If someone wants to play games or screw around with some DIY computer and be a hobbyist, fine. I'm sure they'll have a ball. I know certain high end apps that certain niche groups have been using Linux like in the animation and engineering markets, but I'm sure some of the app developers might start looking at OS X depending on the market acceptance of their new MacPros. Yeah, I think it's a bold move of a hardware platform, but it's hard for Apple to play the tower game and compete when they have to ensure a decent profit and sell enough units to make it worthwhile. Apple doesn't want to fall into the commodity PC trap which is causing practically every PC mfg to have little to no profits. Look at all of the PC mfg and see who is making anything more than 10% Net Profits. None of them are, they are barely breaking even. HP has already indicated they tried to sell off the PC unit, but no one is interested. Dell isn't doing all that well, Lenovo either. No one in the PC box industry knows what they are doing to survive.
To throw this free OS like its going to solve everyone's problem is completely arrogant and delusional to think it's going to displace Microsoft or Apple in the desktop world. Obviously there are a lot of applications trying to vie for market leader and what happens is only the best survive and continue to make a profit.
How many DAW software apps will the audio recording industry support? Off the bat, I can think of about 6 or so that are on both Windows and OS X, maybe one or two that runs on one or the other, but the LInux world, that I've seen, doesn't have anything that competes with the top 2 or 3 players. If there is a DAW app, it's not even in the same league as being able to topple ProTools, Logic, and the next 2 or 3 top players. The same goes with Video editing. Eventually, the bottom half of those apps will go bye bye due to lack of sales. this happens in every market.
The FREE apps like Open Office, Star Office? they provide free software, but the Office apps is going to go through the same thing. Free apps come and go, especially when the developers aren't making money. Apple has the right approach in making their Office apps run on all devices and then coming out with a nicely done browser version. As long as they hit all of the buttons, it will continue to be a nice product and it sells. I know Microsoft is supposed to be releasing a Linux version of Office, but I don't know if they'll make any money on it, and it wouldn't surprise me if it fails to produce enough profit. Personally I think Microsoft is desperate.
Either way, what I dispise about Linus is the BS hype around it. I usually hear kids that put their own computer together strictly to play video games on a DIY computer and act like its the best thing since sliced bread and think that EVERYONE has to use their model because they think that everyone else is wasting money on a Mac or Windows computer. Face it, there is a lot of people that have no money to spend and instead of just admitting it, they should be respectful towards companies that design, support and sell products to make a profit and to offer decent paying jobs rather than supporting platform that doesn't make much money. How do people survive with a Free app and basically a free OS? Donations? Please, I'm sure a company can go public with that model and attract stockholders.
There is obviously fragmentation in the Linux camp and it's just something for a limited number of users and there aren't 20 Million people running LInux on the desktop as a replacement for OS X or Windows. I don't buy that. I think that most of those 20 Million deployments are servers. Heck, even Ubuntu got their site hacked and someone made off with 1.82 registered users email addresses and passwords, so if that all they have registered and they are the largest version of Linux on the desktop? I just am not buying there are 20 million users. I think a lot of them are kids playing games. Kids don't have any money, if they do, it isn't much. I don't listen to kids playing games because they don't use business apps until they grow up and get a job in the real world. Computer geeks typically don't have very good business sense and business minded people don't always have technical expertise that the geeks have, but someone with a business sense and MONEY has to be able to get Linux to compete against Microsoft and Apple, which I don't see happening. Google may try, but they''ll only get so many people to buy into it but from my perspective, Android is a pile of garbage being sold to the consumers not to corporate accounts, etc. Google's answer is the Chromebook product line. A complete failure.
Ubuntu seems to be getting some money, but I don't see them as being successful. I'm sure it has its little niche fanbase, but they won't get serious traction. Not enough money behind it.
Apple contributes to the Open Standards with Open CL.
Open Source to me is still more for college kids, specialized projects and maybe servers, but Red Hat is going to have to make a heck of lot more than $150 Mil a year in net profits to impress me. Apple does that much in less than 2 weeks. Red Hat could be snapped up by HP, Oracle, IBM, Dell, etc. at a moments notice. The company is only worth about $1.5 Bil, which is chump change.
I wonder what would happen if all of the Linux desktop OS orgs charged $200 a copy, how many REAL users would there be? That's what a software only company would probably have to charge for a desktop OS. That's what Microsoft charges for their upper end version. But again, they can sell 100 Million licenses between $100 and $200 for upgrades and home version licenses to OEMs in 6 months. Could Linux? NOPE. They might sell a couple of thousand at $200 a pop. That would be an interesting study, how much would all of the current users of Linux for the desktop actually be willing to PAY to keep on using Linux, how much money would that generate and could these businesses run profitable. 20 Million people paying $0 equals $0.
In the country I live in there are two large camps: Microsoft and Linux.
For quite a few years I've worked for both, and that is why I'm pretty well aware who Miguel is.
Now I do iOS and Mac OS development on my own (no decent employer here develops software for Apple). Note, that I write even the network services on Mac OS, so I do not underestimate it as a server-side OS. The Launch Daemon, GCD, etc - they are well thought-out and without competition / analog.
So, I'm pretty well aware of the shortcomings of Linux - all the GUIs are total bullshit - free/open source reincarnations of the crappy Windows. Android is an obvious example with it's crappy and laggy user interface; with time passing the OS clogs exactly like Windows.
Nevertheless, I'm fan of Linus Torvalds, especially of the way he treats idiots. And Miguel has been on Linuses radar quite a few times. GNOME itself is a total crap. They had Qt which is a pretty decent, object-oriented GUI framework. Obviously, Cocoa is the best framework out there; second place - maybe far behind, but nevertheless second - is for Qt. But they decided to go write GNOME. So, Miguel is an obvious idiot.
Now, stating the obvious, that Mac OS X obliterates every other OS in the consumer market, being the friendliest, easiest to use and technologically superior in many respects, doesn't make him (Miguel) any more smarter. Well, at least he is not a total idiot.
What Miguel states does not change the fact, that Linux is on 95% of the top 500 supercomputers. And that by itself is a significant success. Don't make the mistake to underestimate the success of others just because you don't like them. I try not to.
I fully agree with you that 90+% of the Open Source fans only understand and like the FREE part of it. If they understood the concepts of the Open Source Initiative, they would hate companies like Google who rarely contribute anything of a significance, and disguise payments for services (Google search being default in Firefox) as sponsoring Open Source projects.
Last, but not least, I don't like GPL exactly because it binds Open Source with Freeware.
Apple contributes to the Open Standards with Open CL.
Actually, Apple contributes to a lot of standards and technologies:
- Open CL - you've already mentioned it
- LLVM / Clang - now everybody jumped on the wagon, but 5 years ago only Apple saw the potential in the project and supported it.
- The HTML5 Canvas - all Apple patents related to it are free.
- nanoSIM - Again, royalty-free standard thanks to Apple
- MPEG - They provided the Quicktime container, again royalty-free.
Open Source to me is still more for college kids ...
When I was in college I did assemble my PCs personally. And it was in no way cheaper than a preassembled computer, since I always went for the best (and priciest) components - CPUs, GPUs, RAM, HDD, Water Cooling, etc. But it took large part of my free time always measuring parameters, tuning the system ... Simply put, I had time on my hands. Those machines always had some issues.
Nowadays I find Apple's products to have the lowest cost-of-ownership. Yes, the initial price is significant, but Macs don't break (none of my 3 Mac computers, nor any of the iPhones, iPads broke even once). The OS does not get clogged like Windows and Linuxes GUI do. So, no additional support is required.
The time I save not dealing with crappy OSes, the money I make in that time, is enough for me to pay for a brand new top of the line MacBook Pro every 2-3 years. Or, I can just sit and relax, write in forums, go see friends, etc.
@drblank: To be honest, I don't see any contradiction between my opinion and yours.
I'm in Bulgaria, Eastern Europe.
Actually, Apple contributes to a lot of standards and technologies:
- Open CL - you've already mentioned it
- LLVM / Clang - now everybody jumped on the wagon, but 5 years ago only Apple saw the potential in the project and supported it.
- The HTML5 Canvas - all Apple patents related to it are free.
- nanoSIM - Again, royalty-free standard thanks to Apple
- MPEG - They provided the Quicktime container, again royalty-free.
When I was in college I did assemble my PCs personally. And it was in no way cheaper than a preassembled computer, since I always went for the best (and priciest) components - CPUs, GPUs, RAM, HDD, Water Cooling, etc. But it took large part of my free time always measuring parameters, tuning the system ... Simply put, I had time on my hands. Those machines always had some issues.
Nowadays I find Apple's products to have the lowest cost-of-ownership. Yes, the initial price is significant, but Macs don't break (none of my 3 Mac computers, nor any of the iPhones, iPads broke even once). The OS does not get clogged like Windows and Linuxes GUI do. So, no additional support is required.
The time I save not dealing with crappy OSes, the money I make in that time, is enough for me to pay for a brand new top of the line MacBook Pro every 2-3 years. Or, I can just sit and relax, write in forums, go see friends, etc.
Bulgaria. Does Apple have any Apple Stores in that Country? If it doesn't, then I could see why they wouldn't have much presence. Oh, I know if someone is going to throw together a high end DIY, they can get rather pricey, but that's not the norm. Most of the people I run into are throwing together computers for $800 and they are pretty much playing games.
TCO is a concept only thought about by people that have a brain. Most people don't have the time, energy, technical background or interest in a DIY computer and since one can't call a 800 to get ALL of their support questions answered and a technician that will fix it, one has a spend a lot time doing the research in the component selection process, gathering all of the components and then assembly. People don't realize how many additional hours it takes to do that research.. But it's more of a hobby to them and its fun, which I can understand, but after a while, it's doesn't become fun, it becomes more like a job that doesn't pay even minimum wage. The DIY crowd, whether they are installing Windows, Linux, or Hackintosh systems become so arrogant sometimes because they act like they just split an atom or created free source of energy in their bedroom. And all they end up doing is playing video games or playing around with software, but don't really make any money. But they seem to be a loud group of individuals that refuse to discuss or understand TCO or admit that it's not for the mainstream population. I could certainly put together my own computer having technical training and having been in the reseller industry for many years. But I'm long past that age where I want to screw around. I understand the concept of paying for what you get and understanding that the rules companies have are there so they can make a profit. I've been on the other end and there is nothing worse than trying to make a living providing a service but people just want everything at such low margins, one can't make any money. Being a corporate reseller account rep is NOT an easy job. I had to learn not one brand of products, I had to learn EVERY thing that I had in my catalog of h/w and s/w. Which means, I'm configuring CIsco switches and routers one minute, configuring (for quoting purposes) HP, or Compaq, or IBM desktops/laptops/servers for a project, etc. This was either before we had the on-line configuration tools or right when it was just starting to emerge. If you notice, a lot of high end products are on the on-line web sites to configure and it's not an easy proposition to configure a high end application server. I configured a quote for a HP server for a customer one time for an imaging project and it ended up being a 3 page quote that took several days to configure. The amount of commission on a server deal isn't that much money because we had extremely low margins and account reps can't charge consulting fees for doing a quotation. Believe me, I should have charged 20 hour @ $150 an hour for my time and added it as consulting services in order to make it worth my time.
I had a customer that was buying lots of different server and workstations from Sun (Solaris) and HP (HP-UX) and those quotations were a pain in the rear because we had to list 3 part numbers per item. We had to list each part separately. You had to list the part number of the memory itself, but then an installation part number and then a warranty part number, PER ITEM. The memory took three part numbers, the CD drive, hard drives, monitor, processor, monitor card, keyboard kit, etc. etc. would all require 3 part numbers per part listed. What should take only 4 part numbers if I was to quote a regular PC or Mac turned into a Federal Case where the quotation was 2 pages long of a laundry list of items and if you messed up, they order would get kicked back into your lap because you forgot some stupid item like a drive cage. It was just a mess. and there's no room for screw ups. Cisco switches were a REAL difficult process unless you had everything memorized as to what works and doesn't work and to return a badly configured switch takes an act of two Gods to get things resolved. And a high end Cisco switch isn't some tiny little box you buy at your local Best Buy or computer superstore. These can cost upwards of $150K a piece. There was just no room for errors. Even the Cisco technical people would screw up from time to time and leave a critical component out.
I actually was going to start charging to put together quote for customers, especially one of them in particular because he would always ask me to give him quotes on high end workstations and servers because I never made any mistakes, but he would go to another company because his account rep was a very attractive woman and she sold the exact same equipment by $50 or $100 less, since she already knew my pricing. Yet, I do all of the work, but rarely got the actual deal. Trust me, in every industry we have our "special customers' that seem to work us to death for no money. It's frustrating. It's a tough racket and the reseller industry has gone through it's weeding out period. In the 80's, it was a lot of fun since it was exciting, but it ceased to be exciting unless you work for a good company that pays well, has good products and is well managed, but those kinds of companies are far and few between.
I can appreciate someone wanting to save some money or do something technical to put their own system together, but when they have an attitude like it's better than a Mac because it's cheaper, I just have a low tolerance for that.
Comments
1. "Sooner or later the App Store's advantages in content will be eroded." It possibly has been already, in terms of titles and overall ability. But Apple's store is curated and Android stores are not. I, for one, do not want AV stuff on my phone killing the battery.
2. reports indicate that Apple's cost-of-manufacturing is better than anyone else. Competitors will have to work hard to compete on price. Since all of them but Samsung are presently losing money, it will be interesting to see how long they keep shoveling money into the hole. As you say, "it is unstoppable".
In the country I live in there are two large camps: Microsoft and Linux.
For quite a few years I've worked for both, and that is why I'm pretty well aware who Miguel is.
Now I do iOS and Mac OS development on my own (no decent employer here develops software for Apple). Note, that I write even the network services on Mac OS, so I do not underestimate it as a server-side OS. The Launch Daemon, GCD, etc - they are well thought-out and without competition / analog.
So, I'm pretty well aware of the shortcomings of Linux - all the GUIs are total bullshit - free/open source reincarnations of the crappy Windows. Android is an obvious example with it's crappy and laggy user interface; with time passing the OS clogs exactly like Windows.
Nevertheless, I'm fan of Linus Torvalds, especially of the way he treats idiots. And Miguel has been on Linuses radar quite a few times. GNOME itself is a total crap. They had Qt which is a pretty decent, object-oriented GUI framework. Obviously, Cocoa is the best framework out there; second place - maybe far behind, but nevertheless second - is for Qt. But they decided to go write GNOME. So, Miguel is an obvious idiot.
Now, stating the obvious, that Mac OS X obliterates every other OS in the consumer market, being the friendliest, easiest to use and technologically superior in many respects, doesn't make him (Miguel) any more smarter. Well, at least he is not a total idiot.
What Miguel states does not change the fact, that Linux is on 95% of the top 500 supercomputers. And that by itself is a significant success. Don't make the mistake to underestimate the success of others just because you don't like them. I try not to.
I fully agree with you that 90+% of the Open Source fans only understand and like the FREE part of it. If they understood the concepts of the Open Source Initiative, they would hate companies like Google who rarely contribute anything of a significance, and disguise payments for services (Google search being default in Firefox) as sponsoring Open Source projects.
Last, but not least, I don't like GPL exactly because it binds Open Source with Freeware.
Quote:
Originally Posted by capasicum
In the country I live in there are two large camps: Microsoft and Linux.
For quite a few years I've worked for both, and that is why I'm pretty well aware who Miguel is.
Now I do iOS and Mac OS development on my own (no decent employer here develops software for Apple). Note, that I write even the network services on Mac OS, so I do not underestimate it as a server-side OS. The Launch Daemon, GCD, etc - they are well thought-out and without competition / analog.
So, I'm pretty well aware of the shortcomings of Linux - all the GUIs are total bullshit - free/open source reincarnations of the crappy Windows. Android is an obvious example with it's crappy and laggy user interface; with time passing the OS clogs exactly like Windows.
Nevertheless, I'm fan of Linus Torvalds, especially of the way he treats idiots. And Miguel has been on Linuses radar quite a few times. GNOME itself is a total crap. They had Qt which is a pretty decent, object-oriented GUI framework. Obviously, Cocoa is the best framework out there; second place - maybe far behind, but nevertheless second - is for Qt. But they decided to go write GNOME. So, Miguel is an obvious idiot.
Now, stating the obvious, that Mac OS X obliterates every other OS in the consumer market, being the friendliest, easiest to use and technologically superior in many respects, doesn't make him (Miguel) any more smarter. Well, at least he is not a total idiot.
What Miguel states does not change the fact, that Linux is on 95% of the top 500 supercomputers. And that by itself is a significant success. Don't make the mistake to underestimate the success of others just because you don't like them. I try not to.
I fully agree with you that 90+% of the Open Source fans only understand and like the FREE part of it. If they understood the concepts of the Open Source Initiative, they would hate companies like Google who rarely contribute anything of a significance, and disguise payments for services (Google search being default in Firefox) as sponsoring Open Source projects.
Last, but not least, I don't like GPL exactly because it binds Open Source with Freeware.
I never said that Linux wasn't good for a server environment. Obviously Red Hat is fairly successful, but financially, they've been limping along at making $150 Mil a year in Net Profits, which compared to others, that's the equivalent of a gnat's ass. For the desktop average consumer, Linux isn't a good solution. I know the Linux is great for a company developing a specialized hardware system that's focused on a specific market where they need a free Open Source OS that they can deploy in a specific application that is locked down and controlled by the mfg of that product. Midas Consoles, and a variety of other companies make/design specific need products with Linux. It's great for that. It's great for college students working on college projects where they need to get access to the source code. But to try to attempt to displace Windows, OS X, iOS? Nope. That's not going to happen. Android has lots of faults and primarily because of the how it's OEM licensing is modeled and that the OEMs basically don't do a very good job with updating all of their products as soon as an update is released. To me, Open Source OSs like LInux is running more like an Open Loop OS, with no one taking charge with enough money to dump into it and make it a viable alternative for a desktop/laptop OS. They would basically have to create another OS in the same manner as Apple did with Open Source Kernel where it's locked down and controlled with tight integration with hardware and mobile device siblings, or how Microsoft does their OS where it's the same thing just made to run on whomever's hardware, but is consistent from OEM to OEM with consistent updates to prevent fragmentation.
If someone wants to play games or screw around with some DIY computer and be a hobbyist, fine. I'm sure they'll have a ball. I know certain high end apps that certain niche groups have been using Linux like in the animation and engineering markets, but I'm sure some of the app developers might start looking at OS X depending on the market acceptance of their new MacPros. Yeah, I think it's a bold move of a hardware platform, but it's hard for Apple to play the tower game and compete when they have to ensure a decent profit and sell enough units to make it worthwhile. Apple doesn't want to fall into the commodity PC trap which is causing practically every PC mfg to have little to no profits. Look at all of the PC mfg and see who is making anything more than 10% Net Profits. None of them are, they are barely breaking even. HP has already indicated they tried to sell off the PC unit, but no one is interested. Dell isn't doing all that well, Lenovo either. No one in the PC box industry knows what they are doing to survive.
To throw this free OS like its going to solve everyone's problem is completely arrogant and delusional to think it's going to displace Microsoft or Apple in the desktop world. Obviously there are a lot of applications trying to vie for market leader and what happens is only the best survive and continue to make a profit.
How many DAW software apps will the audio recording industry support? Off the bat, I can think of about 6 or so that are on both Windows and OS X, maybe one or two that runs on one or the other, but the LInux world, that I've seen, doesn't have anything that competes with the top 2 or 3 players. If there is a DAW app, it's not even in the same league as being able to topple ProTools, Logic, and the next 2 or 3 top players. The same goes with Video editing. Eventually, the bottom half of those apps will go bye bye due to lack of sales. this happens in every market.
The FREE apps like Open Office, Star Office? they provide free software, but the Office apps is going to go through the same thing. Free apps come and go, especially when the developers aren't making money. Apple has the right approach in making their Office apps run on all devices and then coming out with a nicely done browser version. As long as they hit all of the buttons, it will continue to be a nice product and it sells. I know Microsoft is supposed to be releasing a Linux version of Office, but I don't know if they'll make any money on it, and it wouldn't surprise me if it fails to produce enough profit. Personally I think Microsoft is desperate.
Either way, what I dispise about Linus is the BS hype around it. I usually hear kids that put their own computer together strictly to play video games on a DIY computer and act like its the best thing since sliced bread and think that EVERYONE has to use their model because they think that everyone else is wasting money on a Mac or Windows computer. Face it, there is a lot of people that have no money to spend and instead of just admitting it, they should be respectful towards companies that design, support and sell products to make a profit and to offer decent paying jobs rather than supporting platform that doesn't make much money. How do people survive with a Free app and basically a free OS? Donations? Please, I'm sure a company can go public with that model and attract stockholders.
There is obviously fragmentation in the Linux camp and it's just something for a limited number of users and there aren't 20 Million people running LInux on the desktop as a replacement for OS X or Windows. I don't buy that. I think that most of those 20 Million deployments are servers. Heck, even Ubuntu got their site hacked and someone made off with 1.82 registered users email addresses and passwords, so if that all they have registered and they are the largest version of Linux on the desktop? I just am not buying there are 20 million users. I think a lot of them are kids playing games. Kids don't have any money, if they do, it isn't much. I don't listen to kids playing games because they don't use business apps until they grow up and get a job in the real world. Computer geeks typically don't have very good business sense and business minded people don't always have technical expertise that the geeks have, but someone with a business sense and MONEY has to be able to get Linux to compete against Microsoft and Apple, which I don't see happening. Google may try, but they''ll only get so many people to buy into it but from my perspective, Android is a pile of garbage being sold to the consumers not to corporate accounts, etc. Google's answer is the Chromebook product line. A complete failure.
Ubuntu seems to be getting some money, but I don't see them as being successful. I'm sure it has its little niche fanbase, but they won't get serious traction. Not enough money behind it.
Apple contributes to the Open Standards with Open CL.
Open Source to me is still more for college kids, specialized projects and maybe servers, but Red Hat is going to have to make a heck of lot more than $150 Mil a year in net profits to impress me. Apple does that much in less than 2 weeks. Red Hat could be snapped up by HP, Oracle, IBM, Dell, etc. at a moments notice. The company is only worth about $1.5 Bil, which is chump change.
I wonder what would happen if all of the Linux desktop OS orgs charged $200 a copy, how many REAL users would there be? That's what a software only company would probably have to charge for a desktop OS. That's what Microsoft charges for their upper end version. But again, they can sell 100 Million licenses between $100 and $200 for upgrades and home version licenses to OEMs in 6 months. Could Linux? NOPE. They might sell a couple of thousand at $200 a pop. That would be an interesting study, how much would all of the current users of Linux for the desktop actually be willing to PAY to keep on using Linux, how much money would that generate and could these businesses run profitable. 20 Million people paying $0 equals $0.
Quote:
Originally Posted by capasicum
In the country I live in there are two large camps: Microsoft and Linux.
For quite a few years I've worked for both, and that is why I'm pretty well aware who Miguel is.
Now I do iOS and Mac OS development on my own (no decent employer here develops software for Apple). Note, that I write even the network services on Mac OS, so I do not underestimate it as a server-side OS. The Launch Daemon, GCD, etc - they are well thought-out and without competition / analog.
So, I'm pretty well aware of the shortcomings of Linux - all the GUIs are total bullshit - free/open source reincarnations of the crappy Windows. Android is an obvious example with it's crappy and laggy user interface; with time passing the OS clogs exactly like Windows.
Nevertheless, I'm fan of Linus Torvalds, especially of the way he treats idiots. And Miguel has been on Linuses radar quite a few times. GNOME itself is a total crap. They had Qt which is a pretty decent, object-oriented GUI framework. Obviously, Cocoa is the best framework out there; second place - maybe far behind, but nevertheless second - is for Qt. But they decided to go write GNOME. So, Miguel is an obvious idiot.
Now, stating the obvious, that Mac OS X obliterates every other OS in the consumer market, being the friendliest, easiest to use and technologically superior in many respects, doesn't make him (Miguel) any more smarter. Well, at least he is not a total idiot.
What Miguel states does not change the fact, that Linux is on 95% of the top 500 supercomputers. And that by itself is a significant success. Don't make the mistake to underestimate the success of others just because you don't like them. I try not to.
I fully agree with you that 90+% of the Open Source fans only understand and like the FREE part of it. If they understood the concepts of the Open Source Initiative, they would hate companies like Google who rarely contribute anything of a significance, and disguise payments for services (Google search being default in Firefox) as sponsoring Open Source projects.
Last, but not least, I don't like GPL exactly because it binds Open Source with Freeware.
What country do you live in? I'm curious.
I'm in Bulgaria, Eastern Europe.
Actually, Apple contributes to a lot of standards and technologies:
- Open CL - you've already mentioned it
- LLVM / Clang - now everybody jumped on the wagon, but 5 years ago only Apple saw the potential in the project and supported it.
- The HTML5 Canvas - all Apple patents related to it are free.
- nanoSIM - Again, royalty-free standard thanks to Apple
- MPEG - They provided the Quicktime container, again royalty-free.
When I was in college I did assemble my PCs personally. And it was in no way cheaper than a preassembled computer, since I always went for the best (and priciest) components - CPUs, GPUs, RAM, HDD, Water Cooling, etc. But it took large part of my free time always measuring parameters, tuning the system ... Simply put, I had time on my hands. Those machines always had some issues.
Nowadays I find Apple's products to have the lowest cost-of-ownership. Yes, the initial price is significant, but Macs don't break (none of my 3 Mac computers, nor any of the iPhones, iPads broke even once). The OS does not get clogged like Windows and Linuxes GUI do. So, no additional support is required.
The time I save not dealing with crappy OSes, the money I make in that time, is enough for me to pay for a brand new top of the line MacBook Pro every 2-3 years. Or, I can just sit and relax, write in forums, go see friends, etc.
Quote:
Originally Posted by capasicum
@drblank: To be honest, I don't see any contradiction between my opinion and yours.
I'm in Bulgaria, Eastern Europe.
Actually, Apple contributes to a lot of standards and technologies:
- Open CL - you've already mentioned it
- LLVM / Clang - now everybody jumped on the wagon, but 5 years ago only Apple saw the potential in the project and supported it.
- The HTML5 Canvas - all Apple patents related to it are free.
- nanoSIM - Again, royalty-free standard thanks to Apple
- MPEG - They provided the Quicktime container, again royalty-free.
When I was in college I did assemble my PCs personally. And it was in no way cheaper than a preassembled computer, since I always went for the best (and priciest) components - CPUs, GPUs, RAM, HDD, Water Cooling, etc. But it took large part of my free time always measuring parameters, tuning the system ... Simply put, I had time on my hands. Those machines always had some issues.
Nowadays I find Apple's products to have the lowest cost-of-ownership. Yes, the initial price is significant, but Macs don't break (none of my 3 Mac computers, nor any of the iPhones, iPads broke even once). The OS does not get clogged like Windows and Linuxes GUI do. So, no additional support is required.
The time I save not dealing with crappy OSes, the money I make in that time, is enough for me to pay for a brand new top of the line MacBook Pro every 2-3 years. Or, I can just sit and relax, write in forums, go see friends, etc.
Bulgaria. Does Apple have any Apple Stores in that Country? If it doesn't, then I could see why they wouldn't have much presence. Oh, I know if someone is going to throw together a high end DIY, they can get rather pricey, but that's not the norm. Most of the people I run into are throwing together computers for $800 and they are pretty much playing games.
TCO is a concept only thought about by people that have a brain. Most people don't have the time, energy, technical background or interest in a DIY computer and since one can't call a 800 to get ALL of their support questions answered and a technician that will fix it, one has a spend a lot time doing the research in the component selection process, gathering all of the components and then assembly. People don't realize how many additional hours it takes to do that research.. But it's more of a hobby to them and its fun, which I can understand, but after a while, it's doesn't become fun, it becomes more like a job that doesn't pay even minimum wage. The DIY crowd, whether they are installing Windows, Linux, or Hackintosh systems become so arrogant sometimes because they act like they just split an atom or created free source of energy in their bedroom. And all they end up doing is playing video games or playing around with software, but don't really make any money. But they seem to be a loud group of individuals that refuse to discuss or understand TCO or admit that it's not for the mainstream population. I could certainly put together my own computer having technical training and having been in the reseller industry for many years. But I'm long past that age where I want to screw around. I understand the concept of paying for what you get and understanding that the rules companies have are there so they can make a profit. I've been on the other end and there is nothing worse than trying to make a living providing a service but people just want everything at such low margins, one can't make any money. Being a corporate reseller account rep is NOT an easy job. I had to learn not one brand of products, I had to learn EVERY thing that I had in my catalog of h/w and s/w. Which means, I'm configuring CIsco switches and routers one minute, configuring (for quoting purposes) HP, or Compaq, or IBM desktops/laptops/servers for a project, etc. This was either before we had the on-line configuration tools or right when it was just starting to emerge. If you notice, a lot of high end products are on the on-line web sites to configure and it's not an easy proposition to configure a high end application server. I configured a quote for a HP server for a customer one time for an imaging project and it ended up being a 3 page quote that took several days to configure. The amount of commission on a server deal isn't that much money because we had extremely low margins and account reps can't charge consulting fees for doing a quotation. Believe me, I should have charged 20 hour @ $150 an hour for my time and added it as consulting services in order to make it worth my time.
I had a customer that was buying lots of different server and workstations from Sun (Solaris) and HP (HP-UX) and those quotations were a pain in the rear because we had to list 3 part numbers per item. We had to list each part separately. You had to list the part number of the memory itself, but then an installation part number and then a warranty part number, PER ITEM. The memory took three part numbers, the CD drive, hard drives, monitor, processor, monitor card, keyboard kit, etc. etc. would all require 3 part numbers per part listed. What should take only 4 part numbers if I was to quote a regular PC or Mac turned into a Federal Case where the quotation was 2 pages long of a laundry list of items and if you messed up, they order would get kicked back into your lap because you forgot some stupid item like a drive cage. It was just a mess. and there's no room for screw ups. Cisco switches were a REAL difficult process unless you had everything memorized as to what works and doesn't work and to return a badly configured switch takes an act of two Gods to get things resolved. And a high end Cisco switch isn't some tiny little box you buy at your local Best Buy or computer superstore. These can cost upwards of $150K a piece. There was just no room for errors. Even the Cisco technical people would screw up from time to time and leave a critical component out.
I actually was going to start charging to put together quote for customers, especially one of them in particular because he would always ask me to give him quotes on high end workstations and servers because I never made any mistakes, but he would go to another company because his account rep was a very attractive woman and she sold the exact same equipment by $50 or $100 less, since she already knew my pricing. Yet, I do all of the work, but rarely got the actual deal. Trust me, in every industry we have our "special customers' that seem to work us to death for no money. It's frustrating. It's a tough racket and the reseller industry has gone through it's weeding out period. In the 80's, it was a lot of fun since it was exciting, but it ceased to be exciting unless you work for a good company that pays well, has good products and is well managed, but those kinds of companies are far and few between.
I can appreciate someone wanting to save some money or do something technical to put their own system together, but when they have an attitude like it's better than a Mac because it's cheaper, I just have a low tolerance for that.