Keynote post mortem: More (unspoken) shots at MS

Posted:
in Mac Software edited January 2014
Did anyone else notice that Apple just replaced Outlook? It didn't dawn on me until after the keynote, because they came up with a different way of handling the myriad problems that Outlook tries to tackle, but Jaguar has publishable calendars and a buffed-up Mail client. That's most of Outlook right there. And, unlike MS' solution, you don't need a special, expensive (not to mention buggy, unstable and incapable of scaling) server app - or even the same server - to host these capabilities.



iChat cements a relationship with MS' archenemy, and with Sherlock 3 it's a direct shot at MSN. Also, Sherlock 3 takes some of the functionality that MS was building into IE to differentiate it from the other browsers, improves on it, and makes it browser agnostic. So you can now have an application track auctions on eBay and still use Mozilla or OmniWeb. On a larger scale, this means Apple is not sitting back and allowing MSIE to become the gatekeeper to the Web.



The iChat + Rendezvous combination is aimed squarely at office LANs.



Things are definitely getting interesting. Apple came out swinging.
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Comments

  • Reply 1 of 44
    defiantdefiant Posts: 4,876member
    The Keynote wasn't that bad after all...



    I like the news.
  • Reply 2 of 44
    jahyjahy Posts: 54member
    Yes... They aren't hooking us up this time with free stuff, but I think that strategically they have never been better off software-wise. They are putting out some pretty great stuff with Jaguar.



    They're bleeding me dry though.
  • Reply 3 of 44
    Right on Amorph, I was think the same thing. I know people will bitch about hardware, but this was the coolest software show I have ever seen. we are really seeing the groundwork laid for the most incredible system, based on open standards. Oh, I also don't think we should underestimate the significance of the Sony CEO. This may prove to be the beginning of one very interesting partnership.
  • Reply 4 of 44
    kickahakickaha Posts: 8,760member
    Tossing in my agreement here... the sheer scale of raw infrastructure they showed off was incredible.



    Remember, iCal, iSync, Address Book... these aren't standalone apps. These are just front ends to industry standards behind them, such as SyncML, LDAP, and such. (Anyone know what iCal uses out of curiousity?)



    Rendevous is potentially huge to boot... again, this is an open standard that anyone can go use (zeroconf.org)... Apple's just once again leading the way.



    Does anyone realize what LDAP + Locations + Rendevous means for mobile computing? *drool* Walk into your workplace, your calendar is updated with your colleagues' public Work calendars, and they get yours. Walk into your house, and your family members' calendars are all synced with yours. Etc, etc, etc. It gets real fun, real fast.



    Heck, I'm even okay with the $100/yr for .mac, if it can provide my family members with peace of mind for backing up critical files, virus protection and such. Does it kinda sorta suck for those relying on that for their email? Yup. Would I like to see Apple keep a minimal quota version as free? Yup. Do I think .mac sucks? Not at all.
  • Reply 5 of 44
    pscatespscates Posts: 5,847member
    I thought this keynote was the best one I've ever seen.



    I'm not such a hardcore speed/spec freak that I was actually (like some around here) EXPECTING dual 1.4GHz G4s (or sillier: G5s).



    I'm MUCH more impressed and excited about the overall "big picture" approach and solutions Apple has their fingers in these days.



    It's all coming together nicely. I'm very excited about Jaguar, as well as iCal.



    And my march to finally replace my land-line with a cellular phone will probably step up and finally come to a conclusion, knowing that it all ties so nicely with my platform of choice.



    I enjoyed this keynote from start to finish. Can't say that about any others, you know?
  • Reply 6 of 44
    escherescher Posts: 1,811member
    I'm glad to see that the veterans around here are realizing the value of this almost exclusively software-focused Macworld keynote. The obsession of rumormongers with hardware often misses the big picture. That's why I originally started reading Think Secret, which filled the big hardware rumors void with plenty of software reports. Hardware will always get better and faster. But as users of the eminently user-friendly Mac OS (X), we all know that brilliant software is what makes the true difference.



    Apple makes most of its money from hardware sales and its hardware is quite innovative. But it is clear that Apple's innovative power is fundamentally software-driven.



    I can't wait to get my hands on Jaguar and all of the fun iApps that Steve-O announced today. Maybe I'll even have to get a new PowerMac to go with that copy of Jaguar. (The new wide-screen iMac is fantastic, but I've decided that the digital hub that will replace my Rev.A iMac needs to sit under my desk. )



    Escher
  • Reply 7 of 44
    hmurchisonhmurchison Posts: 12,419member
    Great thread! Apple does have a very compelling suite of apps and now has the infrastructure for Web Services. The future is now. I'm liking it. I know the Hardware will come when ready.
  • Reply 8 of 44
    screedscreed Posts: 1,077member
    I wonder if this is the beginning of a trend for Macworlds. "The Big Picture Show." As opposed to the hardware parade.



    Screed
  • Reply 9 of 44
    torifiletorifile Posts: 4,024member
    So, now the question is: Will Apple advertise this? The gauntlet has been thrown and people need to know that. Everyone. Schools, IT departments, consumers, everyone. For god's sake, Apple, if you're gonna pick this fight, let people KNOW about it. I hope the gloves really come off....



    edit: checking the sig...



    [ 07-17-2002: Message edited by: torifile ]</p>
  • Reply 10 of 44
    junkyard dawgjunkyard dawg Posts: 2,801member
    I agree too. This MWNY was about software, and it was a home run.



    Jaguar is a work of art IMO. Reportedly 10.2 has some people in Redmond losing sleep, and I don't doubt it. The iApps are all killer, and Rendevouze is so cool!



    A nice point that Amorph made, is that with Sherlock, Apple is removing the need for IE. Nice catch! It's clear that Apple is planning ahead for when Micro$oft pulls the plug on the MBU. Everything is in place on the Internet side, but there's still Office to contend with. I'm sure Apple has contingency plans for Office being pulled, but we aren't going to see them until it comes down to the worst.



    I think it's very smart for Apple to aim these expos primarily at software rather than hardware. After another year of this, Apple may escape from the sales slump in hardware that always preceeds an expo. Also, hardware often speaks for itself, but the software needs more explaining for the press to "get it". Steve Jobs is a master showman and he's the perfect one to be informing the public about WHY Apple's software is so bitchin'.
  • Reply 11 of 44
    buonrottobuonrotto Posts: 6,368member
    Nice observations.



    I remember reading an article on StepWise a while ago that discussed how NeXT (now assumably Apple) took a fundamentally different approach to creating complex software and making different software interact well. The gist of the article was that, as opposed to making" swiss army knife" applications like much of Microsoft's library as wel as Adobe's (and, it must be said, like Appleworks), NeXt developed many smaler more specific applications that worked well together via the pasteboard, drag-n-drop, services and the underlying frameworks. That's exactly what I'm seeing with all these small apps and technologies: Rendezvous, Bluetooth, Address Book, iCal, Mail, .mac (including its iDisk Utility and Backup Utility), iSync, iChat, Sherlock, even the System Preferences!



    But here's my question: is this array of apps that support these technologies too atomized? That is, is there a risk of being or seeming to be too complicated by dealing with so many little apps to deal with? And as a side-effect of this strategy (which I generally think is a good one), is the relative lack of a hierarchy in the Dock a problem in this case too?



    Like I said, I'm generally a fan of this K.I.S.S. approach to applications and interfaces, but the myriad of apps announced or previewed today got my head spinning a bit, and it might just be that I'm not perfectly clear on how, or how well they interact.
  • Reply 12 of 44
    agent302agent302 Posts: 974member
    Ah, I love simple, logical threads like this.



    MacWorld was wonderful in terms of attacking Microsoft. While the software side is important, I think the single most important announcement was the PC compatibility for the iPod. First, it's just going to be a huge revenue stream, because the iPod (especially at these new price points and with the new features), is the absolute best MP3 player on the market. Also, it shows a willingness (as does the collaboration with AOL on iChat) to work with other vendors (MusicMatch) to create solutions, as opposed to trying to solve everything themselves.



    Plus, I just love the new integration with the iPod. I've been looking for a calendar type program for a while, but I didn't want to buy a Palm. And now I don't have to. The value of my iPod just increased enormously, because I can keep my calendar on there now, and hell, I saved $50 or $60 because now I don't need to buy a watch like I was planning. Look long term, this was a fantastic keynote, and I can't wait for my FedEx box to arrive around August 24.
  • Reply 13 of 44
    telomartelomar Posts: 1,804member
    Actually I noticed a the same thing that you did Amorph but the other thing that really struck me was the blow Apple dealt out to Motorola.



    Motorola is the world's 2nd largest mobile phone manufacturer yet Apple chose to team up with Sony Ericsson. I really can't imagine Motorola liked that.
  • Reply 14 of 44
    macserverxmacserverx Posts: 217member
    I had a huge rant about how I, at 16, can do better with Mac OS X than 5 Tech guys on Windows, but it didn't correlate very well.



    Apple does has some very good friends. IBM, Motorola, Sony Ericsson, Texas Instruments, Adobe, SUN, Cisco, AOL/TimeWarner/Netscape, and countless others I cannot think of now.



    They have support from Open Source and UNIX communities.



    They have single source:

    Pro Video--&gt;FCP and Cinema Tools

    Pro DVD----&gt;DSP

    Pro Audio---&gt;Sound Studio Pro (just a guess, fomerlt Logic)

    ------------

    PowerSchool

    iApps + iPod +QTBroadcaster

    Rendezvous

    Bluetooth



    If G5s weren't delayed so much Apple would have killer combination, but the economy doesn't help much, people are being cheap and buying cheap.



    I'm 16 and should be able to Admin my school network with Jaguar a week after it comes out, it would be so simple. 1 full-time tech and 2-3 part time instead of 5 full time and however many outside contractors when they can't handle it. And by next summer I should be able to get my CCNA. And I do have a life, outside of school, church and computers. I don't study for hours on end. I read the manual when I feel like it.
  • Reply 15 of 44
    zapchudzapchud Posts: 844member
    I agree in that it was a GREAT software-show, I just really hope they have the hardware to back it up.



    Anyways, I still wait for the Apple internet browser, hopefully Chimera with shitloads of effort put in, with a, for a start, comparable feature-set (in the Apple-vs-M$ way of course, where Apple always wins). They have everything else now, just not the browser.

    I think they should call it just "i"
  • Reply 16 of 44
    Something that I read almost 20 years ago and is still true today: "You don't sell hardware. You sell the ability to run software."
  • Reply 17 of 44
    gordygordy Posts: 1,004member
    While I am impressed with the Keynote, I have to agree with Corel and Microsoft. What's the point of having all these cool features if you don't aggressively advertise it? Preaching to the choir gets you 2.5 million users, now go after the rest of the world.



    I've never used XP, but I know that it has a lot of features like intergrated instant messaging, multiple users, movie editing, etc. from the Madonna commercials alone. Can average PC users say that about Mac OS X? The most they could tell you is that it has something to do with water (aqua?).



    Come on, push the damn ball Apple! Personally, I'm tired of having to tell everyone about Mac OS X myself.
  • Reply 18 of 44
    kickahakickaha Posts: 8,760member
    What, you're believing that '20x more on iPod marketing than OS X marketing' quote from MS?



    Personally, I don't see it.



    What I do see, is every Switch ad, every print ad for a Mac model, every print pull-out, being an ad for MacOS X. What else would they be FOR?



    And to my eye, those vastly outnumber the iPod ads I see, by a wide margin.



    Think about it for a second. Assume that iPod and OS X marketing is *all* Apple does... the '20x' figure would mean that Apple was spending over 95% of their advertising budget on the iPod. That's just ridiculous. They're not. The figure is bogus.



    Could Apple push more? You bet. Are they anywhere as bad as some poor deluded folks (*cough* MS) would have you believe? Of course not.



    I mean, after all, it's not like MS gains *anything* from spreading FUD about Apple, now is it?
  • Reply 19 of 44
    alcimedesalcimedes Posts: 5,486member
    i was floored by the show. other than the price of .mac, everything rocked.



    the .mac was a surprise, but i'm still out on whether or not i'll pay for it. i think i'll just sit back and wait, i've got a few months to decide before it matters.



    otherwise, it was a jaw droppingly good show.



    this is the first time in ages i was actually impressed with software that's coming out. things are happening that are great! apple is doing amazing things with their OS. things are working great together, a nice, tight package.



    the biggest deal to me though? massive use of open standards. apple is working and bringing geeks onboard left and right, they're playing nice in the industry and throwing a great gift to a wide variety of hardware producers for nothing.



    they've got a smoking OS that's stable. the upgrades are coming fast and furious. the additions to the OS are both useful and relevent.



    trust me, as a long time windows user, seeing all of this coming down the pipe with nothing more than .mac tacked on is like a miracle.
  • Reply 20 of 44
    serranoserrano Posts: 1,806member
    Apple's business model is really firming up, hardware be damned, the future looks good.
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