6 ms·
Microsoft conference attendees can all laugh at the poor iPad user bent over an obviously flawed form factor when they should be using one of those tablets with
by mrshoe 16y ago
Microsoft conference attendees can all laugh at the poor iPad user bent over an obviously flawed form factor when they should be using one of those tablets with flip-around keyboards that have been out for 10 years running Windows.
And everyone at WWDC can laugh all the way to the bank every time Apple sells another million iPads.
The customers have spoken. Is denial really Ballmer's best option at this point?
- danpker 16y agoI was at the event and quite a large amount of people there had iPads too.
- dejb 16y agoThe same argument says Windows is the best desktop/laptop software. "The customers have spoken."
- Groxx 16y agoThe same logic begs the question "so why are they losing ground?" Momentum takes a while to reverse.
- webwright 16y agoUh who is windows losing ground to exactly? My understanding is that mac osx has been losing market share since Windows 7 came out.
- riffraff 16y agoI believe the same but I have no data, could you point to some source?
- g_lined 16y agoIt would appear that it is correct or partially correct. I couldn't find data for the whole time, but as of the end of last year, OS X market share appears to have flattened and then gone both up and down from that point by a fairly small amount. Here is an article talking about market share http://annasoft.wordpress.com/2010/10/04/report-ios-driving-apple-market-share-theappleblog/ http://annasoft.wordpress.com/2010/10/04/report-ios-driving-... and here is one which doesn't mention mobile: http://www.statowl.com/operating_system_market_share_trend.php http://www.statowl.com/operating_system_market_share_trend.p...
- junkbit 16y agoYes, when Android first launched it was very interesting to see Apple users use phrases like 100,000 apps in the app store and dominant market share, and how these have changed as they were overtaken. Mac users were always defending the boutique, specialist, quality over quantity arguments on the desktop and then suddenly it was all a numbers game for a while there.
- gfunk911 16y agoThere is a legitimate "existing library of apps / network effects" argument here, as well as an illegitimate "appeal to popularity" one.
- andreyf 16y agoAt a certain point the numbers no longer matter in an app store. My phone is a guitar tuner, one of five available. If my devices store had twice the apps, I don't think I'd benefit much.
- patgarner 16y ago"Mac users were always defending the boutique, specialist, quality over quantity arguments on the desktop and then suddenly it was all a numbers game for a while there.". The truth is, that the kind of people who say things like that are the kind of people who look for opportunities to argue about that kind of stuff and your statement reads like you have a clear bias. That's not a very objective perspective to my mind. -sent from my iPad
- mrshoe 16y agoI don't think so. If I was to claim that more people will buy Macs than PCs, then you could say "the customers have spoken" and that I was wrong. But I never claimed that. Ballmer here is claiming that nobody wants the iPad form factor. That's just patently false and you only need to point to sales numbers to show that.
- dejb 16y agoAll I'm doing is to point out the implications of your reliance on current sales as a measure for future success and/or 'goodness of product' (whatever that means). If you try to mix and match your metrics (or tenses) without explanation then you are being roughly as (in)consistent ad Ballmer himself.
- sigzero 16y agoNo, the biggest reason was pre-installation and nasty tactics by Microsoft out of the starting gate.
- metamemetics 16y agoWhich is why the derivative (or rate of change in OS market share) is more informative than current position (OS market share).
- GHFigs 16y agoAnd that remains correct. The difference is that Windows customers are the OEMs.
- forgottenpaswrd 16y agoIt was as quality-price ratio without a doubt. You wanted a cheap PC you could change different cards, you got PCs(and windows with it).
- lallysingh 16y agoApple's got over 90% of retail market share for computers > $1000. The customers have spoken, and said they'll take windows on cheap machines.
- dhbradshaw 16y agoI love the flip-around tablet. It's better than a touch screen for almost any creative application because of the great input resolution. The only real negative is that it's expensive.
- lsc 16y agomy buddy has a thinkpad x61 flip-around tablet, and it looks as usable as my thinkpad x60s non-tablet as a laptop, and it also looks like a reasonable tablet. (now, I'm not a tablet guy, so I can't evaluate how good a tablet is; the form factor is simply Not For Me. but my buddy likes it. he runs windows on the thing.) Me, I carry a (non tablet) thinkpad x60s running Linux. it gets maybe 4 or 5 hours on the extended battery, and I carry one extended battery and two (half the charge) regular batteries. (I'm a big guy and the thinkpad x series is small, so the extra weight doesn't really bother me. It's still lighter than my girl's giant T series laptop w/ extended battery. That thing is heavy.) Also, the thing is cheap enough that I don't get too bothered at the idea of it getting destroyed.
- tommusic 16y agoFor what it's worth: Woot.com's deal for the day is a flip-around tablet-style netbook. http://woot.com/ http://woot.com/