4 ms·

What is there to say about this that Gruber hasn't already said? From http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/08/31/reisinger http://daringfireball.net/linked/20

What is there to say about this that Gruber hasn't already said? From http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/08/31/reisinger http://daringfireball.net/linked/2008/08/31/reisinger It doesn’t matter how well Apple is doing, how remarkably profitable the Mac has become, how remarkably fast Mac sales are growing — the idea that Apple “must” or “should” license Mac OS X to other computer makers will never die.

gojomo 18y ago
There was another time Apple was "remarkably profitable" and had an even higher market share than it does now -- the early 90s -- and they somehow lost that position. And the strategy that drove Apple to the margins -- and that built the largest financial success of the PC era -- was Mirosoft's broad licensing. Then again, Apple tried a form of licensing their OS to clonemakers in the late 90s, and did not get the hoped-for benefits at that time. So it's more complicated than Gruber's simplistic "Apple doing great right now -- licensing silly" sentiment. Different eras require different strategies, and Apple may yet hit (or already be at the point) where the winning move is to put MacOS on others' hardware. I suspect if Jobs announced a licensing program tomorrow, we would hear from Gruber how brilliant of an idea it is.
- mechanical_fish 18y ago
  Sure, different eras require different strategies. That's what makes this argument so funny: It's hopelessly mired in a bygone era. They're debating the best move in a game that Apple stopped playing two or three games ago. Apple doesn't care much about desktop marketshare. That game is old. They care about desktop hardware profits, which are doing nicely -- they've got one of the most profitable segments of that market sewn up, and it's a nice cash cow. And they care about control, the control that enables them to coordinate their hardware and software better than anyone else in the industry, and to ensure that any new thing they bring out (like the iPhone) fits seamlessly into at least one major operating system in its first month of release. But the focus has long since moved off the desktop OS. First it moved to the music hardware and content business, but by now even that has arguably become a cash cow -- Apple owns the most profitable slice of the music hardware market, and is one of two or three major content players, and they're running out of music industry to dominate. Growth is slowing. So, having sewn that up, they're on to game #3: the mobile hardware industry, with side plays in the "Web OS" business (Safari and iTunes run on Windows -- that's just about the only "Apple on PC hardware" play that the company cares about) and some latent TV and movie stuff that is seemingly waiting for a chance to break out. These days Apple thinks about Google and Nokia and RIM and Amazon and the cable companies. Microsoft is not much of a player in the games that Apple plays today. Let them keep their big fat Windows marketshare. It's not making them any more nimble.

gojomo 18y ago

There was another time Apple was "remarkably profitable" and had an even higher market share than it does now -- the early 90s -- and they somehow lost that position. And the strategy that drove Apple to the margins -- and that built the largest financial success of the PC era -- was Mirosoft's broad licensing. Then again, Apple tried a form of licensing their OS to clonemakers in the late 90s, and did not get the hoped-for benefits at that time. So it's more complicated than Gruber's simplistic "Apple doing great right now -- licensing silly" sentiment. Different eras require different strategies, and Apple may yet hit (or already be at the point) where the winning move is to put MacOS on others' hardware. I suspect if Jobs announced a licensing program tomorrow, we would hear from Gruber how brilliant of an idea it is.

mechanical_fish 18y ago
Sure, different eras require different strategies. That's what makes this argument so funny: It's hopelessly mired in a bygone era. They're debating the best move in a game that Apple stopped playing two or three games ago. Apple doesn't care much about desktop marketshare. That game is old. They care about desktop hardware profits, which are doing nicely -- they've got one of the most profitable segments of that market sewn up, and it's a nice cash cow. And they care about control, the control that enables them to coordinate their hardware and software better than anyone else in the industry, and to ensure that any new thing they bring out (like the iPhone) fits seamlessly into at least one major operating system in its first month of release. But the focus has long since moved off the desktop OS. First it moved to the music hardware and content business, but by now even that has arguably become a cash cow -- Apple owns the most profitable slice of the music hardware market, and is one of two or three major content players, and they're running out of music industry to dominate. Growth is slowing. So, having sewn that up, they're on to game #3: the mobile hardware industry, with side plays in the "Web OS" business (Safari and iTunes run on Windows -- that's just about the only "Apple on PC hardware" play that the company cares about) and some latent TV and movie stuff that is seemingly waiting for a chance to break out. These days Apple thinks about Google and Nokia and RIM and Amazon and the cable companies. Microsoft is not much of a player in the games that Apple plays today. Let them keep their big fat Windows marketshare. It's not making them any more nimble.