

What would you do if you were Apple? - ZeroGravitas
http://stevenf.tumblr.com/post/277830536/slightly-longer-version-of-a-tweet-from-this

======
fragmede
I'd make sure Mobile Safari were up to snuff. Palm w/ WebOS has already made
the bet that in the long term, the web is the OS. People will always buy
iPhones, with all the money I've poured into the industrial design, so no
worries there, and while we've hit also 20% market penetration world wide, it
has surprised even me, and I realize that smart phones were around before me,
and that I've roused more than one sleeping giant. I think, initially, web
apps was my long term plan. In the original announcement, that /was/ the goal.
The 'app' should be just a special webpage and the browser is just the engine.

It's unavoidable, actually. How many apps are in the app store? Now, how many
web pages are there? One of those is numbers is much, much bigger. As the
media-rich, javascript-heavy web becomes more and more of what users do on a
full computer, Mobile Safari is, at least, going to have to play catch-up with
the rest of the internet.

So while, in today's market, your usage of your phone, your facebook, your
rememberthemilk, your twitter each has their own iPhone app(s) in the app
store, the web page probably has more features because it is a larger market.

I would take the app store and remove the distinction between a web app and a
native app, turning web apps into first class citizens, allowing people to buy
a web app for $.99 for Facebook-ing. I would slacken the app store approval
process for web apps to encourage development on that platform, and I'd make
sure that licensing were such that developers could sell an iPhone web app
while having the same javascript on their full website.

~~~
dasil003
Agreed. I don't think Apple would start making decisions like crippling WebKit
just to sell more apps in the short term. It's just not their style. Sure they
use lawyers, secrecy and all manner of proprietary strategies to maintain
market control, but they would never sell out the quality of their user
experience clutching greedy fingers at a market slipping away—that's more like
what Microsoft does.

------
rimantas
What would I do? I'd continue to make money by selling hardware, which is
exactly what Apple does now. Sure, ITMS, App Store provide nice revenue too,
but the bulk still comes from hardware.

~~~
bugs
I thought the bulk of apple's sales came from Itunes sales (which includes the
app store, music, movie, etc)

~~~
jpalmer
According to their latest 10K:

    
    
      Mac net sales = 13.7B
      iTunes store net sales* = 4B
    
      *Consists of iTunes Store sales, iPod services, and Apple-branded and third-party iPod accessories

~~~
weaksauce
4B is still nothing to throw out of your bed though, I imagine that the iTunes
sales of apps is a much smaller portion of that 4B. I think the lions share
would be going to the music and iPod accessories.

~~~
sil3ntmac
Yes, I recall that the actual apps sales cut for Apple is relatively small.
Combine that withtheir seeming reluctance to create an app store in the first
place (remember in the first year it was all about web apps), I'd say that the
app store isn't _that_ high on their priority list. But then again their
business model has shifted (marketing iTouch as a game device) so things are
probably a bit different

------
adriand
I was thinking about this precise issue this morning, because I was pondering
that PastryKit post that was posted here recently and wondering if it would be
in Apple's best interest to release that framework.

I think a lot of it comes down to competitors in the hardware space. If
Android really takes off, and it starts supporting web apps that work really
nicely - the way we are talking about, in ways that are similar to apps built
in Obj-C or Java that are running natively on the phones - then if I were
Apple, I'd ensure that web apps were just as slick on the iPhone as they are
on any competitor's hardware.

Otherwise, for purely evil and competitive reasons, I'd probably ensure that
web apps always had limitations compared to the native apps, unless I found a
way to monetize the web apps too (for example, by creating an easy payment
mechanism for use by web apps that ties in with iTunes, where I take a cut).

However, I think that Google is going to pile on the pressure to make web apps
super slick (they are already doing so).

------
CapitalistCartr
The IPhone is the first decent, easy-to-use, handheld computer. I've found
prior interfaces to be really annoying by comparison, e.g. Blackberry. Unlike
in the desktop arena, Apple are poised to be the dominant player in the next
platform. It's theirs to lose.

------
dirtyaura
If I were Apple, I would make Javascript APIs to iTunes payment system.

