Is it the iPhone vs. the world?
Questions surfaced over the weekend about Apple’s “culture” and the effect that is likely to have on their business, mainly as regards the supremacy of the iPhone in a world of Android clones.
It should be fairly clear to any rational observer that Apple’s “culture” has not exactly been holding it back in recent years. All of the indicators have showed “up” as the corporate direction, and they continue to look that way. That is no less true of the iPhone microcosm than it is of the Apple macrocosm. Yet, people continue to ask if the way Apple does business (quality, innovation, tight product control) is going to finally drag them down, when it is readily apparent that those are the things that have put them in the catbird seat of the tech industry.
As an example, a New York Times article points out that there are now more Android phones being sold than iPhones. Of course, that article also points out that there are over 90 different models of Android phone. It should be pretty clear that with odds of 90 to 1, that is going to be the case. Similarly, if you pit any one automobile brand against all other automobile brands, the single brand will sell less than all others combined, whether it be Audi, Chevrolet, or Volkswagen. Why is this such a surprise to everyone?
The lines are more clearly drawn in the smartphone business. The design of the iPhone is what began chipping away at the lead enjoyed by the Blackberry in the smartphone arena. It was cleaner, sexier, easier, and more useful. That innovation brought the iPhone the reputation of the smartphone to beat. Google, with Apple’s iOS as a pattern, then built an operating system (Android) that works much like Apple’s phone OS does. That, in turn, allowed manufactures to build 90 iPhone clones that run Android. Again, no surprise. Imitation is still flattery and that’s all this is.
It is no wonder that Android phones can be good. They are essentially copies of the iPhone paradigm. There is no real innovation involved. Companies looked at the iPhone, found it to be good, and copied it, both in form and in function. And still, it took 90 of them to catch the sales of that one iPhone handset. I don’t know about you, but it’s pretty easy to me who is winning. And pretty easy to see where the next big smartphone thing is likely coming from.
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October 18th, 2010
I hope so, the whole iphone and apple world is getting me tired. I think they are fun toys but not to great passed that.