Jokieman
100+ Head-Fier
- Joined
- Oct 28, 2006
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Quote:
The deal is those other companies have already lost. Apple holds an insane market share for the portable MP3 player market and it's companion software Itunes.
the Zune will probably not do well, this year, but Microsoft has proven (with the Xbox) that when it really wants to compete, it can (Xbox 360).
Honestly I know a lot of people hate Microsoft, and it's an old hatred, and a lot of people probably don't even know why, exactly, they dislike microsoft so much, especially now.
In the last several years Microsoft has pushed very hard to provide better, more competitive products. Meanwhile companies like Apple have actually slipped in quality. (My Ipod Nano 2g had a misaligned clickwheel and a few other problems with it, very shoddy quality, IMO.)
And the great thing about Microsoft is that they have the ability to keep throwing money into R&D until they can make the Zune a huge success. I'm sure that when they decided to undertake the Zune they knew it might take them 5 years or more to beat down Apple's market share, but they've got the staying power to do it, and I'm glad they are, because Apple is really losing it's touch in the quality and customer service department.
Think about it, if it were Microsoft trying to peddle software like Itunes and making it's portable MP3 player work ONLY with THEIR software, they'd be hauled into court for attempting to monopolize the market, Yet Apple's done it and gotten away with it quite nicely so far and no one has even made a peep about the possibility of the idea of bringing apple into court over it's monopoly of the mp3 player market, and this has caused Microsoft not only to straighten up, but sharpen up as well.
I'd still use the Mac O.S. over Windows, hehe, and I'm not particularly fond of Microsoft, but I don't despise them like I used to, and honestly, Internet Explorer 7.0 loads way faster than Firefox does for me, and for some reason the new firefox does some weird crap with my keyboard mapping when it's been opened too long (it also has some memory leaks.) I don't have these problems in IE 7, so Microsoft must be doing something right. heh. Quite frankly Apple has made another mistake by refusing to release their OS for the PC market. Microsoft is making a killing from Mac users buying Windows XP to run on their new Intel based Mac's to play games and run other software they cannot run on OS X.
Another problem Apple has is that it's programmers for Itunes on the Windows XP platform suck. The Mac's version of Itunes runs just about perfectly with none of the problems that PC users are faced with. And quite frankly I hate apple just for it's non-descriptive updates. Oh I just loved the 1.01 firmware update for my nano. The update file said "Bug Fixes" lol. Can anyone be more vague then that? I laughed for about 10 minutes over that. Even the games I buy offer better patch notes and updates then that. lol. It's like they're afraid to admit what they fixed in case they didn't fix it right. hehe.
Apple is definitely showing the Chinks in it's armor as of late, the only thing they've got going for them is that Apple users are less likely to admit that the Apple brand is having it's fair share of problems too, and the perception that the general public has of apple is usually of cool products and a company that does everything right. And perception can be a hard thing to overcome without a better product and millions of dollars in marketing power.
Of course, you can't tell a die hard apple user anything of what I said, or they'll call for Steve Jobs to strike you down with lightning from his cloud up in heaven. hehe. I mean, I'm the first to admit that Steve Jobs is a genius, but the man really needs to turn his attention back to better customer service and better quality, because he's slipping, IMO.
| Originally Posted by blessingx Exactly, but what in MS's history makes you believe the Zune success will increase competition? You make it sound like two competitors is better than the one we have now, but there are currently many more than one choice. A MS success is likely (as many here and elsewhere have repeated) to be more a detriment to Creative, iRiver, iAudio, Sony, Samsung, Toshiba (after Zune 1st gen), SanDisk, Archos, etc. than Apple. If Zune succeeds (and as MS is already moving PlaysForSure, their "partner program," to the back burner, and making Zune player/store a complete closed system) your choices will likely shrink. While arguably MS gains should push Apple towards more innovation short term, lowering the numbers of competitors dramatically would likely have the opposite effect on the market as a whole long term. |
The deal is those other companies have already lost. Apple holds an insane market share for the portable MP3 player market and it's companion software Itunes.
the Zune will probably not do well, this year, but Microsoft has proven (with the Xbox) that when it really wants to compete, it can (Xbox 360).
Honestly I know a lot of people hate Microsoft, and it's an old hatred, and a lot of people probably don't even know why, exactly, they dislike microsoft so much, especially now.
In the last several years Microsoft has pushed very hard to provide better, more competitive products. Meanwhile companies like Apple have actually slipped in quality. (My Ipod Nano 2g had a misaligned clickwheel and a few other problems with it, very shoddy quality, IMO.)
And the great thing about Microsoft is that they have the ability to keep throwing money into R&D until they can make the Zune a huge success. I'm sure that when they decided to undertake the Zune they knew it might take them 5 years or more to beat down Apple's market share, but they've got the staying power to do it, and I'm glad they are, because Apple is really losing it's touch in the quality and customer service department.
Think about it, if it were Microsoft trying to peddle software like Itunes and making it's portable MP3 player work ONLY with THEIR software, they'd be hauled into court for attempting to monopolize the market, Yet Apple's done it and gotten away with it quite nicely so far and no one has even made a peep about the possibility of the idea of bringing apple into court over it's monopoly of the mp3 player market, and this has caused Microsoft not only to straighten up, but sharpen up as well.
I'd still use the Mac O.S. over Windows, hehe, and I'm not particularly fond of Microsoft, but I don't despise them like I used to, and honestly, Internet Explorer 7.0 loads way faster than Firefox does for me, and for some reason the new firefox does some weird crap with my keyboard mapping when it's been opened too long (it also has some memory leaks.) I don't have these problems in IE 7, so Microsoft must be doing something right. heh. Quite frankly Apple has made another mistake by refusing to release their OS for the PC market. Microsoft is making a killing from Mac users buying Windows XP to run on their new Intel based Mac's to play games and run other software they cannot run on OS X.
Another problem Apple has is that it's programmers for Itunes on the Windows XP platform suck. The Mac's version of Itunes runs just about perfectly with none of the problems that PC users are faced with. And quite frankly I hate apple just for it's non-descriptive updates. Oh I just loved the 1.01 firmware update for my nano. The update file said "Bug Fixes" lol. Can anyone be more vague then that? I laughed for about 10 minutes over that. Even the games I buy offer better patch notes and updates then that. lol. It's like they're afraid to admit what they fixed in case they didn't fix it right. hehe.
Apple is definitely showing the Chinks in it's armor as of late, the only thing they've got going for them is that Apple users are less likely to admit that the Apple brand is having it's fair share of problems too, and the perception that the general public has of apple is usually of cool products and a company that does everything right. And perception can be a hard thing to overcome without a better product and millions of dollars in marketing power.
Of course, you can't tell a die hard apple user anything of what I said, or they'll call for Steve Jobs to strike you down with lightning from his cloud up in heaven. hehe. I mean, I'm the first to admit that Steve Jobs is a genius, but the man really needs to turn his attention back to better customer service and better quality, because he's slipping, IMO.
