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Why do people repeat saying that "the personal pc landscape is […] moving toward mobile devices"? I don't know anyone who stopped using their PC just because th

Why do people repeat saying that "the personal pc landscape is […] moving toward mobile devices"? I don't know anyone who stopped using their PC just because they got a tablet or smartphone. Sure there is a decline in sales for PCs because the market is saturated and for the most people, unless they are gamers, their 5 year old computer will do just fine. Yet people keep shouting that the days of the desktop computer are over and everyone soon will write their eMails on their smartphone only.

thatthatis 13y ago
Hypothetical semi personal example: I got an iPhone and suddenly about 40% of my Internet consumption went to the iPhone. Now, in that case most of the 40% was incremental, but it did supplant about 10% of my desktop browsing. I got a tablet and suddenly about 30% of my Internet consumption is on the tablet, stealing about 10% from the iPhone, 10% incremental, and 10% from desktop. I've reduced my desktop Internet use by only about 20%, but now desktop only makes up about 40% of my internet activity. What sane mega-corp would sit there and say "well, we still dominate the desktop 40% so lets not worry about the other 60% that is now consumed by related products." Computing is moving to mobile doesn't mean the mobile use has to come from cannibalization.
nknighthb 13y ago
> I don't know anyone who stopped using their PC just because they got a tablet or smartphone. Sounds like a highly biased sample set. I know several people who barely touch their PCs since getting a tablet, and there are an increasing number of children for whom PCs are just these weird things they see in school that, for some unfathomable reason, don't do anything when you touch the screen. There already aren't a lot of reasons left for non-techies to not stick to tablets. Those reasons will continue to recede.
vertex-four 13y ago
My dad hasn't touched his laptop in well over a year, since getting his iPhone and iPad. I know several other people who use tablets and don't even own computers.
badman_ting 13y ago
Do you know what a growth market is? And why that might be important to a business, particularly a gigantic one? Jeez. Sorry for the tone but the continued head-in-the-sand attitude towards MS is driving me batty.
FigBug 13y ago
For Microsoft, it doesn't matter how many people are using PCs, it's how many are buying them. If usage is down, replacement time is up and OS price is down, how is that anything but bad for Microsoft? There are still a lot of XP users that have given Microsoft no money since at least 2006 and have still costed them money in support.
vinceguidry 13y ago
> I don't know anyone who stopped using their PC just because they got a tablet or smartphone. My mom did. Switched to using her iPad last year. Occasionally tries to make her ancient PC retrofitted with Win8 work for her, then shrugs and goes back to her iPad.
felipeerias 13y ago
"the “computing” market in Q3 2008 was 92 million units of which Windows[3] was 90% whereas in Q3 2013 it was 269 million units of which Windows was 32%." http://www.asymco.com/2013/10/10/the-five-year-plan/ http://www.asymco.com/2013/10/10/the-five-year-plan/

thatthatis 13y ago

Hypothetical semi personal example: I got an iPhone and suddenly about 40% of my Internet consumption went to the iPhone. Now, in that case most of the 40% was incremental, but it did supplant about 10% of my desktop browsing. I got a tablet and suddenly about 30% of my Internet consumption is on the tablet, stealing about 10% from the iPhone, 10% incremental, and 10% from desktop. I've reduced my desktop Internet use by only about 20%, but now desktop only makes up about 40% of my internet activity. What sane mega-corp would sit there and say "well, we still dominate the desktop 40% so lets not worry about the other 60% that is now consumed by related products." Computing is moving to mobile doesn't mean the mobile use has to come from cannibalization.

nknighthb 13y ago

> I don't know anyone who stopped using their PC just because they got a tablet or smartphone. Sounds like a highly biased sample set. I know several people who barely touch their PCs since getting a tablet, and there are an increasing number of children for whom PCs are just these weird things they see in school that, for some unfathomable reason, don't do anything when you touch the screen. There already aren't a lot of reasons left for non-techies to not stick to tablets. Those reasons will continue to recede.

vertex-four 13y ago

My dad hasn't touched his laptop in well over a year, since getting his iPhone and iPad. I know several other people who use tablets and don't even own computers.

badman_ting 13y ago

Do you know what a growth market is? And why that might be important to a business, particularly a gigantic one? Jeez. Sorry for the tone but the continued head-in-the-sand attitude towards MS is driving me batty.

FigBug 13y ago

For Microsoft, it doesn't matter how many people are using PCs, it's how many are buying them. If usage is down, replacement time is up and OS price is down, how is that anything but bad for Microsoft? There are still a lot of XP users that have given Microsoft no money since at least 2006 and have still costed them money in support.

vinceguidry 13y ago

> I don't know anyone who stopped using their PC just because they got a tablet or smartphone. My mom did. Switched to using her iPad last year. Occasionally tries to make her ancient PC retrofitted with Win8 work for her, then shrugs and goes back to her iPad.

felipeerias 13y ago

"the “computing” market in Q3 2008 was 92 million units of which Windows[3] was 90% whereas in Q3 2013 it was 269 million units of which Windows was 32%." http://www.asymco.com/2013/10/10/the-five-year-plan/ http://www.asymco.com/2013/10/10/the-five-year-plan/