Apple Predictions

[jpark]

This is your chance guys to show that your understanding of technology is just as good as Steve Jobs - but you don't have to start a company to demonstrate it  :-D

Question:  Forecast either Apples most likely next major step with its product line OR what is the best next step for its product line in its continual cycle of innovation.

For myself - on both counts - Apple is moving into an area where its strengths will be best leveraged - consumer electronics (small, hip over engineered products that folks will overpay for).  I think a cell phone initiative has already been announced - that to me is promising.  iPod video may turn out to be more useful for business applications than pure entertainment (e.g. download the webcast of a company presentation and review later).

Not sure if latest Apple numbers indicate whether their PC sales are undergoing stronger growth - if they are - then the  halo strategy is working.

[Righ]

As I mentioned in another thread, the best next step for Apple is to drop the Mach microkernel. They may not sell as many computers as they do iPods, but they make more profit from them. MacOS X has been the strongest attribute of their platform for some time. Now that they are selling Intel boxes, there is less differentiation from Wintel besides the OS. It has to perform well.

[HaemishM]

My Apple prediction:

Their next product will be overdesigned, oversimplified, shiney trash that art fags will masturbate over and Apple will charge way too much for while being unable to meet the demand from said art fags.

[Jain Zar]

Im a Mac user now, so take my viewpoint as one of these so called artfags:  (Funny I don't feel pretensious. I am enjoying the lack of spyware, adware, virii, DRM, and other PC annoyances though.)

Its not so much a prediction as something Apple needs to do:  SUPPORT GAMING.  While Apple currently isn't anti gaming (like they were in the past), they aren't exactly pushing gaming either.
Apple needs to get gaming going in a big way, pushing developers for either exclusive must have titles (doubtful), simultaneous releases with the PC/Consoles (iffy), or same/next quarter releases. (Most likely, and more probable as the Intel machines take over.  Probably 2-3 years for a total switch.)

The fact they put gaming as important in their blurbs about their newest iMac shows they are wising up.  Gamers are stupid enough to spend 300-500 bucks for a video card, and possibly a stupid fucking physics card (which won't ever take off IMHO.  As a coprocessor on a video card?  Sure.  As a stand alone?  NO FUCKING WAY.  Does too little for too small an audience.  As something that could be a bullet point on an existing card though?  Could be big.  Will be YEARS before it matters though. Laptops won't have them for a long time, desktops are dying except to the hardcore, and Mac/Linux folks won't have em either most likely.) would be willing to switch systems for a must have game on a better computer.

And my iMac G5 is the best computer I have had since my Commodore Amiga 500.  People are making the switch.  You do get what you pay for from Apple.  (Almost.  Not totally, but almost.)

[Morfiend]

Speaking of Apple gaming. I would love to see the numbers of how many people play WoW on a Mac. AFAIK WoW was the first MMOG to support Macs.

[Righ]

Mac MMOGs:

Clan Lord
Oberin
Lineage
Shadowbane
A Tale In The Desert
Everquest
Vendetta Online
World of Warcraft
Second Life
First Star Online 2

[jpark]

My Apple prediction:

Their next product will be overdesigned, oversimplified, shiney trash that art fags will masturbate over and Apple will charge way too much for while being unable to meet the demand from said art fags.

There is something deeply ironic about this post in a community that ultimatetly all shares some kind of techno fetish.

I, however, remain heterosexual.

[Jobu]

Its not so much a prediction as something Apple needs to do:  SUPPORT GAMING.  While Apple currently isn't anti gaming (like they were in the past), they aren't exactly pushing gaming either.
Apple needs to get gaming going in a big way, pushing developers for either exclusive must have titles (doubtful), simultaneous releases with the PC/Consoles (iffy), or same/next quarter releases. (Most likely, and more probable as the Intel machines take over.  Probably 2-3 years for a total switch.)

The biggest block to developers supporting Apple is their own preferences for using Direct3D. If Apple could somehow license that from Microsoft (never gonna happen) it would be a lot easier to convince developers to support both platforms. Apple enjoyed a pretty nice resurgence of games before Direct3D became preferable over OpenGL. If more games were supported, I'd be an unabashed Apple owner by now.

[Kageru]

The biggest block is apples vanishingly small market share. Last time I looked they were well under 5% of the desktop market,
despite their huge media image. And a decent number of those machines are probably low end and not well suited for gaming.
Given that PC gaming seems sickly itself it's unlikely that a great deal of development effort is going to be spent on a niche
platform. I'm dubious that ones choice of MP3 player is going to drive desktop purchasing decisions in many cases, and
certainly not enough to challenge an entrenched dominant monopoly.

[schild]

Apple had to support windows with the iPod. Out of the box and with USB. It was a necessity for them to make huge bank.

It will destroy them in the end.

[pants]

I read a writeup, ur somewhere, that predicted Apple's next big move will be towards the media centre PC market.  They'll build some integrated HTPC style jobbie that easily matches in with your iPod, enables you to download videos and TV shows from iTunes, use that airport thingy to stream the media to anywhere in your house, do PVR style stuff, and most importantly use Apple's very good UI/design skills which non-technies can easily use, and it will be astoundingly successful because it will be easy to use and people like their iPods.  I reckon thats right too.

[Righ]

If Apple could somehow license that from Microsoft (never gonna happen)

Apple don't need to license Direct3D. The technology predates the patent cross licencing deal made between Microsoft and Apple in 1997. They do however need to code it, since Microsoft dropped their Mac Direct3D project at around the same time. It is a possibility if Apple finds some man hours spare, since the "not invented here" syndrome started clearing up, uh, around when Gasse left Apple.

I don't expect to see the Mac become a games platform, despite there being more consoles that use OpenGL and despite Direct3D being a possibility on the Mac. However, I'm intrigued to see what happens when Vista's Desktop Compositing kills windowed OpenGL on the Windows platform.

[jpark]

Apple had to support windows with the iPod. Out of the box and with USB. It was a necessity for them to make huge bank.

It will destroy them in the end.

You mean you're predicting the demise of Apple?

And this time is different compared to the countless other times Apple was pronounced near death because...

[schild]

Apple had to support windows with the iPod. Out of the box and with USB. It was a necessity for them to make huge bank.

It will destroy them in the end.

You mean you're predicting the demise of Apple?

And this time is different compared to the countless other times Apple was pronounced near death because...

Not the demise, but rather a Nintendo like depression. Portable media is their money right now. The rest of this pompous dicking around needs to stop. Also, prices need to be cut in half. That's the only way they're going to be able to compete on the desktop front. They're charging way too much for too little. And I don't just mean on the hardware end, I mean on compatbility. It's truly a case of paying more for less. At one point they were the cream of the crop for LCD displays, but now I can get a better Dell LCD for $400-700 less? Nice.

[Fabricated]

I predict that Apple will remain comfortably in their niche like they always have.

They'll make the news with a new iPod model off and on, pimp how fast the new iMacs and towers are with dubious benchmarks, claim to have gained marketshare, and then not say anything when it slips back down into the single-digit percentages again shortly thereafter. Sunrise sunset.

[jpark]

Schild's and Frabricated's posts above make sense.

You're likely correct but I am going to go out on a limb:

If Apple has a fraction of the success with video it did with music - it will be bring the firm to a whole new level as a company.

[schild]

If >I< were Apple, I'd throw the whole cult thing out the fucking window, start filling up Apple designed cases with premium shit and out-Alienware Alienware. I'd become the new face of high end PCs. The iMac? I'd go straight at the throat of shuttle. I'd cram nomads and other Mp3 players down the throats of their creators. I'd create a mobile palm unit that looked like an ipod but had a full touchscreen face. I'd buy the rights to Infiniums Labboard and put out a media center PC. Mac OS used to have it's time and place. But the majority of students and mothers that use it just like how shiny it is. It's not that it's easier - as it really isn't anymore. Hell, my family has been a mac family for YEARS and instead of going Mac we're getting a Dell for my dad. It'll be his first computer ever. He's a bit of a redneck though, so I suppose a Mac would have made him feel like a nancy boy.

Jpark - I don't think so. They'll charge too much because they're economic morons. The ipod worked because it's utilitarian and every model is a fantastic fashion accessory. It's looks have as much if not more to do with anything than it's capabilities as an Mp3 player - which are lacking. The non-moving media PC that sits there though? Pffft. Unless you're talking about Ipod video, to which I respond, screens to small and every phone will be able to stream video soon. I already have access to over 2,000 shows streaming off my own computer through Orb.com straight to my cellie. Fuck an ipod.

[Righ]

So if you were Steve Jobs, you'd license Windows and attempt to undercut Dell? You do realise it would just be easier for a guy with as much money as he has to just do that with a second third company and leave Apple to generate more money while he's proving your wonderful new venture?

Windows is a games and Visio platform thats fucking horrible to use, so I'd really rather you weren't in charge of Apple. Oh good, no chance of it.

[schild]

So if you were Steve Jobs, you'd license Windows and attempt to undercut Dell? You do realise it would just be easier for a guy with as much money as he has to just do that with a second third company and leave Apple to generate more money while he's proving your wonderful new venture?

Windows is a games and Visio platform thats fucking horrible to use, so I'd really rather you weren't in charge of Apple. Oh good, no chance of it.

No, I'd undercut Alienware.

You didn't read any of that, did you? I didn't say anything about even competing with Dell with my fictional bullshit company. Competing with Dell is like competing with Blizzard. It's a big goddamn waste of time.

[Righ]

Alienware. Dell. Same thing, different number of boxes sold, different markups. You stick 7800GTs into DP boxes with 10,000 RPM drives and so on, and you have a handful of customers. You charge them lots as a result. Alienware's huge margins support a much smaller company than Apple becaus ethey have few people buying stuff.

The PC business is competitive as hell and done to death.

[jpark]

Mac OS used to have it's time and place. But the majority of students and mothers that use it just like how shiny it is. It's not that it's easier - as it really isn't anymore.

I used to be a heavy mac user but my ventures in business require less creativity than basic research :)

So I don't know the state of the current OS and whether this is true.  I think though - there is more to Apple than this alone.  Since the company has control over so many aspects of its hardware/software platform - it can enforce standards and take responsibility for user interface - creating an ideal platform to try/test new technologies.

OS - its not just about ease of use.  Look at Windows right now:

1.  Each time you launch a new application or a new instance of an application - a NEW menu bar appers inside the new window.  This wastes display real estate - the Mac has always had a singular menu bar at the top of the screen - it changes as you move from one application to another.

2.  Alt Tab.  Forget it.  It fine for those of us whose lives are neatly defined by the creative services of Microsoft office.  But if you do graphic modelling - or like to manipulate data in several applications and see the results simultaneously - you want to see the windows from each appliation all on the screen at once.  Windows is very awkward at tiling applications - this is why Alt Tab is popular.  For Mac though it is elegant - you can position windows from each application easily on different portions of the screen - and not have to deal with #1 mentioned above.

I am ranting a bit here I guess - the windows interface still leaves a lot to be desired - I just notice it less because these days MS office meets my needs as a business moron.

[Tebonas]

A large portion of the Mac Customer is in the "Anything but Windows" crowd, trying to out-Alienware Alienware would lose them large important parts of their current userbase. I predict that would be their death. Gamers are a fickle crowd.

I predict as well that their next point of attack would be media centers. Its the next logical evolution from their iPod and Musicstore successes.

[Stephen Zepp]

Apple does have a pretty big internal push towards gaming, but for games that they think attract their market: casual/niche games. There was a big issue with the OpenGL 2.0 standards acceptance, but they also seem to be much more behind it, and that should trickle down into more support from the tech companies that support OpenGL (GarageGames is one of them) to implement even more cross-platform technology for game development.

Look at what comes packaged with Windows on the game front: things like solitare, chess, etc.

Then look at what comes bundled with some of the new Mac platforms, and I think you'll see at least an internal agreement that games are more important than they once thought.

Final thought--especially for our T2D (Torque Game Builder) technology, we are seeing a vastly disproportionate amount of either pure Mac developers, or "requires cross platform that includes Mac" interested in the technology compared to the total market share of desktops each company has.

[Jain Zar]

Front Row is already a step into media center territory.
Cept its got the usual Apple style, simplicity, and elegance.
The final G5 iMac (the one I have) was the first step in that direction.

[Murgos]

A stronger Mac push into gaming is a very good thing IMO.  It's a very short step from there to true cross platform development and anything that pushes OS competition is not a good thing it's a great thing.

Strong OS competition will bring more focus on stability issues (i.e. better drivers and memory management) and also on strict performance metrics such as how many CPU cycles are being spent just to maintain the OS enviroment.

[TheTijuanaBrass]

Strong OS competition will bring more focus on stability issues (i.e. better drivers and memory management) and also on strict performance metrics such as how many CPU cycles are being spent just to maintain the OS enviroment.

Or on who has the prettiest desktop pre-installed on the cheapest computers. Or maybe I'm just being overly cynical.

[Murgos]

Not if they are going to compete in the high-end gaming market and all the attendant buzz.

I don't know if you noticed but all those 'tweaker' hardware sites out there push a LOT of business.  It's been known for a long time that the early adopters and cutting edge users have a lot of influence on purchases by the masses later on down the line.

[jpark]

The gaming push makes a lot of sense.  However, Apple communicated this strategy almost 10 years ago (?) and had some temporary momentum - but it just did not seem to build beyond a certain point.  Maybe it is a problem as some suggest with the Open GL technology and its acceptance.

[Murgos]

OpenGL was initially much more popular than DirectX and by accounts of friends who do a lot of graphics intensive applications (not gaming though, just 3-D modelling for things like brain scans) is still the perferred choice, though that may be more a platform dependent issue, so I am not too sure on that hypothesis.

I think that what probably happened was that Microsoft pushed Direct 3D on a lot of people very heavily early on and that since then they have been able to adapt to demand for new features much more quickly than the OpenGL group.  We often see incremental releases of Direct 3D with some new adaptation but how often is the OpenGL standard updated?

If someone like Apple were to begin pushing the OpenGL Group for more intermediate, incremental updates to standards that the video card manufacturers can easily adopt and tout in their press releases I think they could easily pick up some more momentum.

[TheTijuanaBrass]

Not if they are going to compete in the high-end gaming market and all the attendant buzz.

I don't know if you noticed but all those 'tweaker' hardware sites out there push a LOT of business.  It's been known for a long time that the early adopters and cutting edge users have a lot of influence on purchases by the masses later on down the line.

I'm just not seeing the whole gaming apparatus switching OS anytime soon. Gamers are where the games are, and games are where the market is. Moving either the gamers or the games without the other isn't going to happen easily, and moving both is possibly even more difficult. But I guess it's possible.

[Murgos]

Gamers are where the games are, and games are where the market is. Moving either the gamers or the games without the other isn't going to happen easily, and moving both is possibly even more difficult. But I guess it's possible.

Difference of expectation I guess.  I was thinking 5-7 year timeline, I certainly wasn't thinking easy.

[TheTijuanaBrass]

No, I understood that you weren't. What I'm trying to say is that it would require a good bit of reprofiling and marketing before most gamers would even consider getting an Apple system. I'm not convinced that it's something that Apple are interesting in doing, nor that it would be worth their effort. Getting gamers to switch over to Apple hardware is not something I see happening without a price adjustment, and getting gamers over just to get them to switch OS is something that probably wouldn't be worth the effort. I don't really see why Apple should care for the gaming market; the gaming market is sufficently entrenched between Microsoft, Nintendo and Sony that Apple would have one hell of a time launching a platform of their own. And if gaming gets truly platform independant I see more gamers moving to Linux and BSD systems than to Macs, so why should Apple care for that?

All in all I don't really see an opening for Apple to enter the gaming market where the money and effort wouldn't be spent better elsewhere. I'm no market analyst though, so I might very well be missing something.

[Murgos]

Heh, well Apple is making (has made) a big push into consumer electronics.  Maybe they are eyeing the console market?  An Apple aesthitic box infront of the TV thats fully integrated with iTunes and iVideo and plays games?  I don't know if Apple has the pockets to do what Microsoft did (is doing) with the X-Box but maybe thats what they are thinking?

[jpark]

Besides over-engineering, asthetics and ease of use Apple has one other core advantage:

It has control over almost its entire computer platform (OS, computer, monitor etc.).  It has the potential to introduce completely new devices that might require standardization across a number of components - which Apple has enough control to do.

It's odd that in pioneering the PDA market with the Newton - with hand writing recognition - that they have not returned to this market segment now that it is in full swing.

Consumer electronics - If Apple could partner/design a cell phone with the panache of the iPod - that could be a huge opportunity for them.

[pants]

Consumer electronics - If Apple could partner/design a cell phone with the panache of the iPod - that could be a huge opportunity for them.

They kinda have already - the Motorola ROCKR is a partnership they did with Motorola.  However reviews are so crap that some analysts think Apple deliberately kiboshed it so as to not cannibalise any iPod market share...