
How to beat Apple - locopati
http://kottke.org/11/04/how-to-beat-apple
======
michaelpinto
Apple is brilliant at zigging when everyone else zags. Nobody cares about an
MP3 player -- Apple does the iPod. Smart phones are dead, just look at Palm --
Apple does the iPhone. Tablets are a joke, even Microsoft gave up -- Apple
does the iPad. Want to beat Apple? Just do something that nobody else cares
about anymore. You can build a better PC. You can reinvent MySpace. You could
even reinvent old Apple products like HyperCard or printers.

~~~
mgkimsal
Printers is an area which I've been waiting to see disrupted for a long time.

~~~
parbo
Ink/toner subscription with free printer?

~~~
mgkimsal
Not so much that, but better integration with other devices and services.

Printer integration to automatically wake up and print documents when I need
them, not when I remember to print. (boarding passes, etc).

Printers that can take half-size paper, and potentially auto-scale down
documents to work with that half-size paper. I hate printing because 70% of
the time I need about 5 things on the page, but they're all spread out, and an
entire sheet of paper is a waste. Email/web/bookmarks helps out, but we could
get by with smaller paper most of the time, except all printers expect larger
size paper.

Better auto-discovery of local printers around me, and cloud integration to
print things wherever I'm at.

Easier ways to print remotely. If I'm onsite at a client, I can't print
something I need until I get home, but I may forget then. Letting me print
remotely so it's ready when I get home would help, and/or the scheduling for
future printing, either at a set time or set context (IE - at home).

"3D printing" that would allow me to use those awesome red/blue glasses to get
the full 3D effect from my documents.

Relatedly, I'm not sure why companies aren't giving schools free paper with
ads on the back. This would help school budgets, and give advertisers a
captive audience.

~~~
cpeterso
Printer hardware and usability need some help, too. In my office, the printers
(and fax machines and copiers) are always jamming or difficult to replace the
ink or paper without referring to the manual.

The office printer room actually has a huge poster: _"How to fax in 12 easy
steps"_. Ironically, the process is so "easy" that the poster lists more than
12 steps.

~~~
crag
And don't get me started on the paper feeders!

------
StrawberryFrog
_in the near term, companies making iPhone and iPad competitors are never
going to beat Apple at their own game._

We must then assume that Android is playing some other game. Either that, or
he is simply ignoring large facts that don't fit his narrative.

I would say a bit of both - Android is different ecosystem, but to ignore
Android's market impact in smart-phones is negligent.

~~~
ja2ke
Is there a single Android handset that competes with the iPhone in terms of
units, or is it "Android collectively beats iPad and iPhone collectively?"

I think Kottke was referring to specific one off products like the iphone
itself. Google and the rest of the handset world collectively has surpassed
iOS usage, but we know that the iOS pie slice consists of just 3 broad models
-- iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch -- while Android slice consists of seemingly every
other phone under the sun. How does the landscape look if you stop looking at
it by collective mobile OS and start looking by handset model line?

I'm asking out of genuine curiosity, not to try and prove a point, so if this
post sounds smarmy or anything its not deliberate. Culturally, collectively,
"Android" seems like it is going toe to toe with iOS, but when you get down to
single models, everyone talks about the iPhone and iPad, but not much about
specific Android-sporting handsets. Android, in those conversation, always
gets abstracted back down (incorrectly) to a nebulous brand/make, or
(correctly) a platform.

~~~
StrawberryFrog
The statement _iPhone and iPad competitors are never going to beat Apple at
their own game_ seems wrong (note the "never going to"), since I'd say that
_Android collectively may well beat iPad and iPhone collectively_. To say that
iPhone is number 1 at present is plausible, to say that there is no threat to
that is not plausible.

I'm not going to argue about "my phone is better than your phone"; but Android
is definitely in the market and rising: [http://www.eweek.com/c/a/Mobile-and-
Wireless/Android-Has-37-...](http://www.eweek.com/c/a/Mobile-and-
Wireless/Android-Has-37-of-US-Smartphone-Share-Nielsen-681962/)

I think it's wrong to focus on particular models with Android, that's not how
Android is getting traction.

~~~
ja2ke
Android handset makers aren't competing with each other? Even if they aren't
right now, or if Android is the one thing they don't publicly compete over,
that will change. If the iOS slice of the pie shrinks enough at the expense of
the Android slice, don't be surprised if unifying "Android" branding starts
disappearing from all handset advertising. They'll all want to talk about how
they're unique and better an not the other guys, not about how they're holding
hands.

~~~
StrawberryFrog
_Android handset makers aren't competing with each other?_

Yes they are. In terms of "beating apple at their own game", is that even
relevant?

 _They'll all want to talk about how they're unique and better_

so far the vendor-UIs on top of android have been unique, but better? Not
usually. If one finally is, I'd welcome it, but there hasn't been a stand-out
that I know of.

 _not about how they're holding hands._

As a coder I'm interested in targeting all of them, which I can, and they'll
want to talk about "comes with a store full of bajillions of apps" so in that
sense they will make the co-operative nature a feature.

------
Cherian_Abraham
And I am not sure if Social is the key to making apple more successful or
whether its their inherent weakness. All I see today are solutions where
social seems to be tacked on as an afterthought regardless of whether it makes
sense or not.

And I cant speak for others, but I am not excited about a Facebook phone. A
hardware device does not seem to be a natural progression for a company like
Facebook. And allowing Facebook, an entity that has now taken dimensions
beyond a simple social network in to a Central identity provider, to track
every single aspect of my life (location, calls, contacts, browsing habits,
etc..) is simply a non-starter.

But maybe an FB phone will appeal to the 18-24 crowd for whom privacy is not
as important as the desire to be social.

~~~
Corrado
My first thought on this was the Microsoft phone platform (Windows Phone 7, or
whatever it's called this week). I haven't played with it but it looks like
they might have had a chance at hooking up with Facebook/Twitter/etc. and
splashing their app on the WP7 dashboard. However, it's probably too late for
that as the Windows phone platform seems to be heading down (again)...

~~~
nigelsampson
They have done this with Facebook, after setting up your People hub becomes a
merged list of both your contacts and facebook friends. Status updates from
both etc.

I believe similar Twitter integration is in the works.

~~~
Raphael
Facebook can merge with contacts in Android too.

------
gamble
> iTunes is showing its age and over the years has become a bloated collection
> of functionalities ...

iTunes 'bloat' is a huge competitive advantage. Apple can make changes to
their digital stores and instantly release to tens of millions of customers,
including Windows users who aren't going to install a half-dozen discrete
applications if Apple chose to split up iTunes.

~~~
atacrawl
I think you and Kottke are both right.

I commented a couple of weeks ago on a thread where I talked about brand
equity, and iTunes is a perfect example of this -- it hasn't been solely about
music in years, it has a half dozen bolted-on functionalities and it's in
desperate need of a refresh. And yet the iTunes brand is so strong that none
of that matters.

~~~
pavel_lishin
It's only strong for distributors. Have you ever met an end user who said,
"Gee, I love iTunes! So fast, so responsive, so awesome!"

The only reason I still use it, really, is because the last time I tried using
something besides iTunes to sync my music to my iPod, it nuked the whole
library. As far as I know, it's the only fool-proof way of synching my iPhone
with my iTunes library (which actually lives on my iPod, because its audio
jack died.)

~~~
guygurari
I love iTunes, both on Windows and on the Mac. It's reasonably fast on Windows
(and very fast on Mac), it does a great job organizing my collection, it makes
sharing and streaming between devices extremely easy (Mac, PC, Apple TV,
iPhones etc.). It let's me easily subscribe to podcasts, shop for music, and
sync with iOS.

I'm not aware of another media program that does half these things half as
well. But feel free to enlighten me.

------
bobstobener
Microsoft became successful primarily by IT department mandate in the 80's and
90's. Apple has been successful due to its focus on user/consumer experience.
We now live in an era where consumers have a larger voice in technology
selection and the Microsoft/Corporate IT department mandate is becoming less
significant. You can beat Apple only by delivering the best consumer
experience possible.

~~~
zppx
From what I read, I think there were not that much IT departments in the 80's
outside technical companies, I think Microsoft got its position because of a
series of factors, one of them was the presence of Visicalc-like programs
(specially Lotus 1+2+3), in the 80s Apple was already offering an absurdly
good user experience compared with Microsoft, yet it failed in the first time.

I remember that people got pretty excited with Windows 95, I don't think that
this excitement was a enterprise mandate at all.

------
ansy
1\. See the future. 2\. Execute. 3\. Profit.

The points in the article are as myopic as Apple's competitors. You aren't
going to beat Apple by reacting to what Apple does poorly today. Instead, ask
"Where is technology going in one, two, and five years?" Then get the people
that can do something about it and do it.

Maybe you will see a future that includes things Apple doesn't do. But maybe
you will see a future with things Apple already does and you had better get on
board or face extinction.

------
deidoe
An excerpt:

"...the Apple products & services that Apple does well are the ones that Steve
Jobs uses (or cares about) and the ones he doesn't use/care about are less
good (or just plain bad)..."

Seems about right. Funny.

~~~
Timothee
"but I'm pretty sure Jobs never has had to schedule his own appointments with
iCal so that program is less good"

Speaking of, one thing I know for sure Steve Jobs doesn't do is getting
directions to his meetings from iCal on his iPhone: the appointment's location
can't be tapped to open Google Maps. This is driving me crazy. Not only
because I want to use it, but because it's so simple and has been begging for
it since the iPhone came out.

~~~
jonknee
People come to Steve for meetings. His direction needs are pretty simple.

------
albertzeyer
MobileMe was never really successful because it costs. I would have tried it
the first time I heard about it if only it would have been free. Indeed, I
found it quite interesting. Dropbox didn't cost anything for the basic usage
so nothing stops you to just try it out. And then word of mouth does the rest.

------
webXL
I'd say that this article is spot on except for weak spot #2. Mobile Me
integrates very well with iOS devices (AppleTV incl.) right out of the box.
And then there's that huge datacenter they're building...

BTW, how is Dropbox more compelling than Mobile Me? Sure it's cheaper, but
that doesn't mean it's better.

I'm just saying I wouldn't dive headfirst into competition with them in the
cloud space just yet. The tethered syncing issue is a valid point, but don't
Microsoft and Google already have solutions for that?

~~~
bonaldi
Dropbox is way, way more compelling than iDisk, the equivalent bit of
MobileMe. Why? Because it just works: your files are always available on
whichever computer you're on, so long as it has been recently connected to the
net. With iDisk, that's almost never true, and you have to either put up with
a WebDAV implementation that's slower than making your own floppies and
posting them or a weird hybrid local sync that always breaks. It Never Works,
basically, and even if it did wouldn't have the great social and versions
features of DropBox.

As for the rest of MobileMe, the sync is OK, except when it gets confused. The
whole setup is definitely a weakness, it's just one to be exploited in pieces,
as DropBox has.

------
crag
It's not hard: build a better product. Talking computers, why the hell doesn't
Dell hire a few great industrial designers? Dells' best notebooks (which all
cost over 2k) look just like their $300 notebooks; fat, covered in black hard
plastic, stickers stuck on the palm rests - and not to mention loaded with
bloatware.

If Dell (and HP and all the rest) built compelling looking (and performing of
course) higher end notebooks then folk might not keep looking to Apple as the
standard "best". All these companies (except Apple, since they enjoy such high
profit margins on everything) fight over scraps at the low end. Even in their
business lines (not talking servers here just notebooks).

------
zarify
I just couldn't read the first point without cringing. Looking to Facebook to
socialise gaming? Christ. Games on Facebook might be popular (actually, I
don't know, are they still popular? I ditched Facebook a year ago), but they
sure as hell aren't good, and interaction with other people (ie the social
part) certainly seems to be restricted to blatantly pimping your game.

I'd be looking more to Steam for doing a decent job of mixing social with
gaming, where you have recommendations, inbuilt groups to join for people who
play the same games, etc. That way you're connecting with people you know
share an interest, not inflicting your latest 'social' game status updates on
your friends who are most likely not interested.

Personally what I find deficient in iOS devices is real time communication (I
know I know, they're called phone calls) and the single foreground task nature
of the device. With web based games or Steam there's always a real time method
of communicating with your friends no matter what you're doing, you can see
who's online and so on. On the other hand, due to the casual nature of
specifically gaming on phones and tablets, I don't think the desktop paradigm
really works anyway.

From a non-gaming perspective, what I'd like to see most on iOS is a better
way to manage files, rather than sending copies to any app which I would like
to use them with. I don't really want to access a file I've stored in DropBox,
then send it to GoodReader or Keynote or whatever. I don't want to load a
picture from Photos into $editingApp then save a copy into Photos then load
the new photo into something else. It seems a terribly wasteful way of
handling things (and very much a 'tacked on' approach while people figured out
what to do with a tablet).

------
WiseWeasel
FTA: "Someone should figure out how to leverage Facebook's social graph to
make the phone/app/gaming/music/video experience significantly better than on
the iPhone/iPad and then partner exclusively with Facebook to make it happen."

New title suggestion: How to Beat Apple and Drop Your Work into Facebook's
Lap.

I fail to see how this competitor might be more benevolent than the other.

------
asr
_"If they feel the need to compete with anyone on price in order to protect
their business interests, they can do so with price cuts deep enough and long
enough to drive most potential competitors out of business."_

If they try to drive competitors out of business by pricing below cost, this
is illegal. Apple is already getting looked at by regulators, and I doubt they
want to invite more investigation, which slows a company down and may prove
really harmful to the culture (see: Microsoft).

If this just means Apple might be willing to cut their margins, then yes, I
agree. So the key is to make something with a lower cost structure than Apple
has. Not going to happen for iPads in the near-term, but this industry changes
pretty quickly...

~~~
DavidAdams
Apple doesn't have to go below cost to outprice its competitors, just as Wal-
Mart doesn't have to. Apple has huge profit margins and huge economies of
scale that would enable it to, in some cases, sell products for less than
another vendor could build a comparable substitute for.

------
hernan7
About point #1... wasn't the Microsoft Kin supposed to be the "Facebook Fone?"

------
maverhick
Care about your business. Care about your people. Care about your people. Care
about your company. I mean really care. Obsess. That is what gives you the
best possible chance at building something great.

------
antihero
> Competitors should take a page from Apple's playbook here and be open about
> stuff that will give you a competitive advantage and shut the hell up about
> everything else. Open is not always better.

That's pretty horrible. Life isn't all about profit, you know?

~~~
kanamekun
In his previous sentence, Jason uses the phrase "competitors" and talks about
"competitive advantage". So when he says, "open is not always better" - he is
saying that being more open isn't always better for your competitive
advantage.

That is definitely a true statement. Life isn't all about profit, but staying
competitive is a huge contributor to maintaining any profit at all.

------
renegadedev
One of the reasons Apple fails at social is it's fanboys/gals. If you're
walking around telling people to "Get a Mac" when your friends run into minor
issues, chances are your social recommendations are not going down well
either.

------
jpr
One thing I find hard to beat when it comes to Apple: the image.

Apple is the hip and cool thing that your artistic cousin uses, whereas
Microsoft is the lame and boring thing that the enterprise uses.

Between these two stereotypes, what would be the image you would market to in
order to turn huge profits like Apple is doing? I have no idea, and I think it
would be unwise to _just_ imitate Apple, they have more experience being Apple
than anybody.

~~~
sudont
You have _no idea_ how many artists use shitty Windows XP laptops. As a
computer guy in my school, I had to root out a ton of viruses and other crap.
Even my painting professor, a renown watercolor and oil painter, had a 9 year
old Taiwanese micro laptop that chugged on IrfanView. Minus the rich kids,
designers and myself, I knew only about 10 other students with a Mac in the
art department.

Windows is cheap, which is good for an artist. Cultural cache can only go so
far when one's judged on their work.

~~~
jrwoodruff
I think this is changing as art/design schools are starting to require laptops
to be in the program, usually strongly 'recommending' mac laptops. Students
are using their student loan money to buy them now.

At least this is what was happening at my alma mater as I was graduating.

~~~
Stormbringer
It will be interesting to see if this trend reverses. Of course we've all seen
the photos of students sitting in classes and only one guy has a Windows
laptop and everyone else has a Mac...

... but that was back when Vista was at its prime level of stinkiness. General
feedback on Windows 7 (even if it is just a glorified Vista service-pack as
some claim) is that it is a lot better.

I've had a couple of opportunities this year to use Windows 7 desktops set up
by different organizations. And I noticed an improvement over Vista. I
wouldn't say it was completely pain free, but it is comparatively closer to an
OS X level of experience than Windows XP was back in the day (whereas Vista
was a decrease in that regard).

The question is, would you pay 70% of the price (keeping in mind student
discounts on Macs) to get 75 or 80% of the quality? To a lot of people that
will seem like an acceptable trade-off, and so we might see a resurgence in
Windows laptops on the campus.

------
rkon
Price is part of their brand image -- I really doubt they would ever undercut
a competitor on new products.

~~~
brianpan
Apple competes on price in ways that preserves their brand- offering more for
the same price, clearance/refurb section, previous model at a discounted
price.

I agree with Kottke, Apple has a huge ability to compete on price if needed,
and I think they are more than ever. Discounted previous models used to be
limited to clearance/refurb. But now you'll find the iPhone 3GS and the
MacBook prominently displayed as a part of the lineup. The iPhone is available
via the online store "from $49", not "from $199".

------
dean
_"Apple is absurdly profitable and cash-rich; if they feel the need to compete
with anyone on price in order to protect their business interests, they can do
so with price cuts deep enough and long enough to drive most potential
competitors out of business."_

Talk about 'not in their DNA', Apple will never compete on price. They never
have and they never will. A brief look back at the history of the PC clearly
shows this. They could have owned the PC market, they were first and best. But
just too expensive.

~~~
lotusleaf1987
That simply isn't true. The iPad clearly competes on price, it could have been
priced at $800 but they went for the aggressive $500 mark and began eating up
the netbook market.

Look at the iPhone it started out at $800, unsubsidized, and when that didn't
take off they quickly got it subsidized and down to $200, and then have kept
the 3GS around to sell at $99 and $49 price points... Clearly they are
competing on price.

~~~
dean
When I say Apple doesn't compete on price, I'm talking about pricing
aggressively as the OP suggested: "they can do so with price cuts deep enough
and long enough to drive most potential competitors out of business."

When a company has profit margins of 24.27%, as Apple does for the last
quarter, they are not competing on price. Companies that compete on price
typically have profit margins down around 5% (see Dell, Walmart).

Apple will not cut into those margins to make market share. They never have.
That's not to say they won't do whatever they can to gain market share. But
deep price cuts is not one of those things.

BTW the iPhone is subsidized by the carrier, not by Apple.

Also, this is the first time I've heard that the iPhone "didn't take off"
until the price came down. I kind of remember people lining up overnight to
buy it when it came out -- no price drop necessary.

~~~
r00fus
> When a company has profit margins of 24.27%, as Apple does for the last
> quarter, they are not competing on price. Companies that compete on price
> typically have profit margins down around 5% (see Dell, Walmart).

The iPad is seriously competing on price. This both elated and worried AAPL
investors, who are worried about gross margin as well as sales.

So, Apple can and will compete on price in one market (iPad) while being
nosebleed premium in other markets (Mac Pro).

Regarding iPhone, there are no BOGO (buy-one, get-one offers) while every
other manufacturer offers those, and the Average Selling Price (ASP) is a
nosebleed $600+ and hasn't come down over 3+ years... this is money that Apple
makes per unit.

Apple is both luxury AND competes on price - they're incredibly flexible for
such a large company.

~~~
dean
_"Regarding iPhone, there are no BOGO (buy-one, get-one offers) while every
other manufacturer offers those, and the Average Selling Price (ASP) is a
nosebleed $600+ and hasn't come down over 3+ years... this is money that Apple
makes per unit."_

You are making my case for me. :)

