Remember when all we technopundits had to argue about was Apple vs. Microsoft; the Mac vs. PCs? Oh, how times have changed. The mighty Microsoft tried, but couldn’t dispose of poor old Apple. Now it’s Google’s turn and the giant search engine behemoth is giving away what Apple sells and still can’t win.
Marginalize For Fun And Profit
Businesses do everything they can to marginalize a competitor; whether direct or indirect.
mar·gin·al·ize (märj-n-lz)
tr.v. mar·gin·al·ized, mar·gin·al·iz·ing, mar·gin·al·iz·es
To relegate or confine to a lower or outer limit or edge, as of social standing.
All companies engage in marginalizing efforts against their competition. For Google, Android and Chrome are attempts to marginalize Apple and Microsoft. After all, they’re giving away for free what Apple and Microsoft charge money for– operating systems on devices.
For Apple, the tens of thousands of popular iPhone apps which use the internet but bypass Google help to marginalize Google’s search and advertising business in the rapidly growing mobile device arena.
Take That, Geeky Search Giant!
Despite all out attempts to diminish Apple’s growing influence in mobile devices, both Google and Microsoft are on the ropes. Enter iPhone 5. What can it bring that further marginalizes both Google and Microsoft?
Let me count the ways.
How about voice control? Nobody has decent voice control in any device (unless you count a GPS device voice which controls where you drive; but that’s the reverse of what I mean).
Apple has worked tirelessly and secretly to bring voice control to our future iDevices. How about this? Speak a name and date and the information automatically goes into your iPhone’s calendar.
How about voice control that is so precise you can control iTunes music selections? Or, voice control connected to a built-in, non-Google map system. No more Google Maps. How about search by voice that does not use Google to search?
Pushing Google Aside
That’s what’s happening now, and the iPhone 5 promises to push Google further away from daily mobile device usage. Google makes money from advertising. It’s a one-legged stool (pun intended). Apple’s app-oriented platform has damaged Google’s ability to generate substantial revenue from mobile device search, while more and more computer users use Google’s search less and less.
Mobile devices are the future. Apple is the mobile device leader. Where Apple goes, others follow; sometimes kicking and screaming. A voice controlled mobile device that has no need for Google or Bing is a dangerous device. That will be iPhone 5.
Is Apple having fun yet? I’m sure of it.
Google, Amazon and Microsoft focus on trapping the end-user and making money, Apple focuses on the end-user needs and makes money on as a result of this end-user focus.
Interesting observation. Apple’s approach is so much different. It matches product to customer. That’s it. Microsoft and Google treat the customers differently, too; the former with disdain, and the latter the customer is really the product (hence, another class of disdain).
All Apple has to do is keep making products that are better than the others, and they’ll do fine.