My entire life I have rallied behind open platforms. Microsoft’s philosophy of licensing bowed well early in the computer business. As to be expected Microsoft created tremendous products and set common standards. Their office products have become a staple item in businesses throughout the world, and even the open source products will encourage people to save documents in Microsoft’s widely accepted format “doc.” Microsoft’s aggressive licensing model proved effective nearly snuffing out any and all competitors in the computer business.
There is one problem though, they weren’t easy to use.
My career in IT started out, like most, as a service desk technician. Most users then had one computer at home, and one at the office. Most users complained about the computers being complicated and not working well. They complained that it wasn’t user friendly nor stable. Most people used a computer as a tool, not in a fun or friendly way that one would use a consumer device like a TV.
On the flip side of that you had Apple. Steve Job’s developed Apple with the philosophy of closed source applications — controlling the entire end user experience from hardware to software. Job’s philosophy lead to a much easier to use and much more stable product. It also made for an extremely small market share. Early on this philosophy didn’t bow well for the masses. If you want people to adopt something you need to make it cheap — something that Apple was far from. By the time I was working as a service desk tech, Apple was on life support. After the ousting of Steve Jobs, John Sculley went on to make years of poor decisions leaving Apple in shambles and a shadow of its former self. CEO’s were like a revolving door at Apple till eventually Steve was brought back in (after the NeXT merger).
The climate had changed significantly. The internet was the new thing and technology was now consumed by the masses. People were demanding more from their computers and Microsoft went on to make Windows 2000, and XP. Computers got faster and soon people had 2 computers in their house. Steve recognized that consumerism of the products was extremely critical — so he made them appealing to consumers.
The PC was dull and beige, so Apple made computers in colors. Most of us in the IT business laughed — but we were computer experts, we didn’t have issues with our computers. To us computers were powerful tools.
Steve was right.
At the height of the .com bubble Steve recognized that distribution of media over the internet was going to take place. It wasn’t long till people were downloading swarms of MP3s and movies. Steve managed to revolution the business with the iPod and iTunes. iTunes was the first completely legitimate music store online that actually made sense. There was no subscription, you didn’t have to buy a whole album, and it didn’t take a rocket scientist to figure it out. The iPod was the same way. It was the first (and arguably only) mp3 player that made sense — and it held an unprecedented 1000 songs.
When Mac OS X shipped it improved the end user experience on a Mac, and would leave Microsoft shaking their head. Apple wasn’t going after the core of Microsoft business, the business market, they were simply eroding Microsoft’s consumer market. While end users used PC’s everyday at work, they never actually figured out how to use them. They were overwhelming and complicated. Apple filled that gap in their lives.
Under Steve’s direction Apple would go on to transform what we expected computers to look like, how they worked, and what they could do. They transformed the music industry taking a failing CD business and turning it into a multimillion dollar goldmine. They brought the same philosophy to cell phones. Those of us in business will tell you that the iPhone is not a business friendly phone, however, its the most powerful consumer phone on the market.
Consumers want products that are easy to use, simply work, and don’t take a PHD to use. Apple figured this out and excelled at it. I work in IT so there is nothing that irritates me more than Apple’s stupid rules and “Apple’s way or the highway” but the market place has changed. As more and more people adopt smart phones as consumers, not business people, they want phones that are easy to use — and stable.
When my wife’s laptop broke and needed to be replaced we looked at all these different sales. She just needed internet, email, and word processing. Something basic would work. As we looked at all the laptops they were slow, shipped with a bunch of crap she didn’t need and she turned to me and said “You know, I’d really like an iPad.” So begrudgingly I bought her an iPad. After using her iPad for a few months, she fell in love with it. Naturally when her contract was up on her phone she asked if she could get an iPhone since Verizon now had them. Again, I begrudgingly agreed. I tried to drive her to the Android powered phones like I had or stick with her tried and true Blackberry. While the Blackberry is extremely good at what it does — and I personally believe the only phone any executive should be using — its not consumer friendly. While the Android is like a carbon copy of the iPhone and available on hundreds of different hardware platforms, its not stable, its slow, and their apps by in large are garbage.
Now that Liz had both an iPad and an iPhone, I decided it made since to buy a Mac. We needed a new computer, and I wasn’t partial to Mac or PC. A Mac would be easier for her to use with her iPad and as a music teacher there was much more sophisticated software available for her to write music. So I bought a 27inch iMac — I could do my photos and videos, she could do her music, and it wasn’t a huge learning curve.
So that brings us to today. This weekend while standing at Verizon watching my mother-in-law (who barely knew how to use her old phone) and my brother-in-law who just graduated college both buy iPhones, my Droid X locked up for the last time. I had enough. I was tired of pulling the battery, I was tired of the apps that crashed, I was tired of listening to music and then have it just randomly reboot the phone. I was done. I gave Google enough rope to hang themselves.
So since they were out of stock on the 16gb black 4s where I was, I drove across town to the other Verizon store where they had just gotten more in stock. I marched in and told the sales rep “I want the 16gb 4s in black with a car charger, a screen protector, and that’s it.” He said “Ok, I can do that”
So now I write this on my iMac, with my two iPods and iPhone sitting in front of my on the desk.
I don’t miss my Android phone.
The point of this is to articulate a lesson. Microsoft, Apple, and Google are all extremely successful companies. They have brilliant people working at them, running them, and all create innovative products. Nobody can touch Microsoft’s business market with its extremely robust enterprise messaging, collaboration, and unified messaging products. Google has the market cornered on consumer consumption of search, email and with voice they have created a consumer based unified messaging platform that is among the best in its class.
Apple though figured out how reach consumers. The reality of it is while Google may get more customers due to volume of Android powered phones, and Microsoft will still dominate the work place, I suspect Apple will still win the hearts of consumers.
People like my father, my brother, my mother in law, my wife, and millions of other consumers have something in common. They want their phone, tablet, and computer to simply just work.
UPDATE: Since Mark was a whining pain in the ass below, it is worth noting that I made him suffer unbearably through the years. My relentless torment and ripping him down for drinking from the keg of glory that is Steve Jobs. You are most definitely older, and certainly wiser, at least in this subject. Though this will never happen again. Happy now?