Winer Goes Mental on Apple, Benson Smiles and Nods

I have a Mac SE upstairs.  It's the only apple product I have ever personally owned.  I wrote my first computer virus on the Apple II.  It was called "Justasecondplease" and it rewrote users' hello programs to say "Please wait, system is in configuration mode."  Then it would save tiny randomly named files to their disc until it filled up and crashed.

I have always coveted Apple products but have never owned them (except for the SE, which I bought used so I'd finally have a mac). 

Fundamentally, I've always been bothered by Apple's firm control over their hardware.  It seemed to me that it was an untenable business model.

How have they gotten away with it?  By having a product of huge quality. 

But as products advance, people's expectations advance with them.  The iPhone sure looked neat and when I saw it I said, "Wow, that's cool!"  But then I read that the iPhone wouldn't allow third party extensions, would not integrate with Outlook, and would have other extensibility limitations.

The iPhone is therefore pointless. It looks nice and has created some hype, but why would one ever buy a phone with such obvious limitations out of the box?

So, Dave Winer went crazy today with the bandwagon jumping of bloggers - talking about how cool the iPhone looked or how great their other new products were.

He rants:

I don't believe for a minute that Jobs's closed-box approach to cell phones is the right one. Growth is driven by choice. The Internet grew because, for the 80th time, it was the platform with no platform vendor. The Apple II won, the Mac won, the PC won, even Windows won, because you could install any software you wanted on them. The iPod is a wonderful product, but damn it's time we made one that could run our software, could run any software, so users have choice, and so you don't have to buy new hardware to get software features, and so the market can grow at the rate of innovation, not at the whim of one marketer.

I believe what you see from Dave here is recognition of great products coming from Apple, but their inherent platform limitations is frustrating. 

I'll let Winer do the rant and just note that Apple won't be sustainable if they keep limiting their products.

 

Technorati tags: rant, winer, apple, innovation

Blogged at my house in Seattle with Live Writer

Comments

[Jay Fienberg]

"...but why would one ever buy a phone with such obvious limitations out of the box?"

Because the majority of mobiles purchased are even more limited. The iPhone can do everything my current phone does, and a whole lot more. I can imagine a lot of people seeing it in those terms first.

Also, I think it's like asking the question: why do people buy movie tickets when they know they'll be forced to watch bad previews and ads, and then the movie itself will be filled with product placements?

One answer is: people want to enjoy the experience of seeing a movie in person, and are willing to pay for that experience with a combination of cash and the surrender of control. So, with the iPhone, people will want the iPhone experience, and will be willing to pay, and surrender control to get it.

I don't think it's correct to assume that people expect massive amounts of software control with their hardware devices. Because, people still associate each hardware form factor with a limited set of functions--if you give people the ability to use those functions, it meets expectations.

But, it will be different when it's more common to find devices used for anything--when your camera also works as an email and web browser, or your refrigerator is a web server. And, I certainly agree with the observation that the iPhone strategy might really be one step forward / two steps back in the direction of that kind of freedom.

(also see my "The future of music playback" post: http://earreverends.com/notes/200406/playbacks_future_music.html

Things will be different as form factor less and less to implies function.)

[Jim Benson]

Ow! Blogslapped by my co-author!

[Jay Fienberg]

Oops, sorry--didn't mean that strictly as a blogslap :-)

I think there's this interesting situation: Apple makes hardware and software that has incredible popular appeal, and will potentially be widely adopted and/or imitated. At the same time, these products are designed to lock-in and restrict people from making certain choices.

Ideally, someone would figure out how to make similarly compelling hardware and software that also increases freedom from that kind of lock-in and restriction.

(There are things out there--like Songbird instead of iTunes of Rocketbox OS for iPods, etc.)

Besides all of the restrictive designs in the telecom, music industry, movie industry, etc., I don't know of any company or movement (e.g., Web 2.0) with the ability to implement so many interrelated devices / applications with compelling designs--and compelling interconnectedness.

Apple has an iPhone, but part of its appeal is its relationship to software programs like iTunes.