Next from Apple

Apple has long time since understood the power of enabling. They enabled designers some 20 years ago with the realease of the Macintosh, the GUI and together with Adobe, made the Postscript language usable.

In more recent times, Apple started listing 3rd party apps, sorted in categories and nicely presented, thus making it really easy to find software you needed. A really simple thing, really. It was easy to add the software (for developers) and it was easy to get it (for users). Later, Apple did the same thing with widgets for Dashboard. Top 50 list, featured app, etc. Really easy to find and install what you needed. When you downloaded a widget, you were automatically asked if you wanted to install it (or update, in case you already had a previous version), and then if you wanted to keep it.

This is crowdsourcing at its best. Apple only needs to provide the framework. 3rd party developers did most of the work writing the apps and supporting them.

When Wordpress, the most popular self-hosted blogging platform in the world – also driving this very blog, did the same for their plugins some time in 2006, they saw dowloads increase 15-fold. All they needed to do was make it easy for developers to list and present their plugins and presto, users started finding them and using them, which led to more plugins being developed, and contributed to the massive growth Wordpress has seen since version 1.5.

Both Apple and Wordpress have also added ratings to allow users to promote stuff they like. They both make top lists available so casual users don’t have such a hard time finding the most popular items. That’s what you have to do if you want to go mainstream.

And now, Apple does it again with the App store for iPhone. And they take it even further. Read the rest of this entry »

Nokia bought Symbian the other day in what is clearly a desperate move to catch up with Apple. Let’s see how that plays out. Apple, however, still has the great advantage of also offering desktops and laptops, plus the necessary sync between all devices.

People don’t want to do everything on their tiny smartphone’s screen, some things you want to take care of on your desktop/laptop and then sync over. Nokia has a lot of software to write to make this happen. In addition to the hardware and software lead, Apple leads by leaps on the GUI side. And, they have iTunes with it’s enormous amount of content. Nokia is trying to take on that too, with Ovi, but it won’t be easy.

How come Apple managed to sneak up on Nokia like this?

You might also want to read these commentaries on what’s happening by Mashable and Signal to Noise.

Here’s what’s next.

Daniel Eran Dilger wrote an interesting piece about Apple’s PA Semi acquisition where he ponders the reasons Apple might have for doing this, for many, seemingly odd deal.

While the transition to Intel has afforded Apple tremendous new opportunities, the downside to using commodity chips is that Apple’s roadmap is now closely tied to Intel’s. That means there are fewer surprises Apple can pull off and less differentiation between Macs and generic PCs.

Apple has invested heavily in building software tools that spin processor intensive tasks out to specialized hardware.

By developing more its own integrated components, Apple could potentially save money, support new proprietary features, and throw copycats off its trail and force them to develop their own devices from scratch. As Apple blazes into uncharted territories by accelerating its iPod line into a new series of WiFi mobile devices, cost savings, differentiated features, and difficult to copy designs will all become increasingly important. PA Semi’s hardware expertise can help in that regard.

So, in short, Apple is betting on built-in or add-on acceleration chips to stand out from the increasingly similar competition. Snow Leopard’s Grand Central and OpenCL technologies are additional proof of this direction.

What’s going to happen next Monday, at Apple’s WWDC 2008?

Ok, it’s as certain as it can be that a new iPhone will see the light of day. It will have everything the previous one was critizised for not having: video calls, video recording, 3G with fast HSDPA (maybe even the superfast HSPA+), GPS, better battery life, slimmer form factor (not that the first iPhone wasn’t slim, but everything in electronics just keeps getting smaller), Exchange support (promised by Apple as part of the new firmware 2.0), and support for third party apps & widgets sold at the new App Store. All this, and worldwide availability.

But what else? Read the rest of this entry »

Usually, when people in Finland - the birth home of the mobile phone giant Nokia - are asked what phone they will buy next, the answer is “a Nokia, again”. But now more and more people add “or an iPhone”. The competition is heating up in the Nordic countries, and TeliaSonera just managed to make a huge deal.

Well, chalk one up for Apple’s creative moves. It really seems like they are going to have a full month of no iPhone sales, incredible as it may sound.

So I was definitely wrong on this one. Sorry about that.

Apple very often announces on Tuesdays. Mondays are busy at work, and towards the end of the week people’s minds are increasingly elsewhere. When announced on a Tuesday, the news lives for the rest of the week. I haven’t verified this, but wouldn’t be surprised if internet traffic is highest on Tuesdays.

iPhones have been unavailable at the US Apple Store for a couple of days now. There is no question new phones are right around the corner. My guess is tomorrow, Tuesday. New iPhones immediately for the US, and a trickle to the rest of the world soon after (”in coming weeks and months” or something like that.)

Some believe that Apple is just clearing the channel, but that they won’t release the new phones before the keynote on June 9. That’s a month from now! I don’t believe Apple would be so careless with their logistics that they miss a whole month of sales. That’s just not going to happen.

I can’t remember Apple ever clearing channels that much in advance. And they have had excellent timing for years now. Here’s what I think. Read the rest of this entry »

Good article in NYT by David Carr:

Studios may own the copyright and content, but if Apple achieves anywhere near the penetration in movies that it has achieved in music, the studios could become vassals in a closed digital community, ginning up content that is controlled, priced and distributed by someone else.

Read more