According to the BBC’s Tim Weber, Apple botched Mac OS X Snow Leopard. How? Apparently, only Tim Weber knows. Nearly everyone else already knows that Snow Leopard has grown faster than any version of Mac OS X. Our friends across the pond have a penchant for hyperbole.
On Thursday, Microsoft launches Windows 7, the latest version of its operating system. Its success or failure will determine the future of the world’s biggest software company.
Windows Vista was a disaster for Microsoft, which has resorted to laying off thousands of employees and reported a huge drop in revenue and profits in the most recent financial quarter. Weber likes to use the term botched.
More importantly, three years ago Microsoft botched the release of Vista, the operating system that preceded Windows 7.
By botched, does Weber mean the actual launch, the implementation, or the product itself? Only Weber knows.
Windows 7 is Microsoft’s one and maybe only chance to redeem itself. “We have learned a lot from what went wrong with Vista,” is a mantra repeated by every Microsoft executive.
So, Windows Vista isn’t all that good, users and companies shunned it in favor of keeping Windows XP instead of upgrading to the latest, and Weber claims that Windows 7’s success or failure will determine Microsoft’s future. If Vista was a characteristic misstep for Microsoft, what of Apple?
Also useful is the misstep of its other nemesis, Apple, which uncharacteristically botched its new operating system Snow Leopard, not anywhere near as badly as Vista, but enough to give Microsoft a clear run for its Windows 7 launch.
How was Snow Leopard botched? Weber doesn’t say. Snow Leopard unit sales and penetration into the user base exceed that of Tiger and Leopard. Hiccups are rare. Most reviews point out that Snow Leopard is a faster, leaner, more polished version of Leopard. What exactly got botched?
Microsoft’s Jean-Philippe Courtois says:
We don’t feel great about Vista adoption… The Windows ecosystem is the broadest in the world, and we have to take care of that… We expect business to adopt Windows 7 much faster… I really have to go back to Windows 95 to remember people being so excited about a new operating system.
Evidently, Microsoft executives didn’t pay attention to the crowds lined up at Apple Stores to buy Mac OS X Jaguar, Tiger, Leopard, and Snow Leopard. The last time Windows users lined up for anything except support was 1995.
Again, the basic question, How did Apple botch Mac OS X Snow Leopard? Or, did the BBC simply allow Tim Weber to spout off knowing that such a perspective would pump up page hits, which pumps up advertising impressions, which pumps up revenue? See how much Faux News has learned from the Brits?