[Steve_S]

Macalope wrote:

Quote

Except that Windows didn’t really start to run away from the Mac until Microsoft’s OS had features that were technically superior, like protected and dynamic memory.

Sounds like a bit of revisionist history here. Microsoft had the enterprise market and most of the consumer market locked prior to Microsoft shipping a product with these features (Windows 95). At the time, the market was growing rapidly and we all know Apple's situation. It wasn't pretty. The point being, the market share lock was already well in place before Microsoft had any technically superior features. Let's not pretend that was the driver.

[markwk52]

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The New Yorker used to be known for quality journalism and yet today they publish an article that calls the launch of the iPhone 5 'tepid' while the Galaxy Note is a roaring success and guess what Apple is doomed.

The article by James Surowiecki did say "tepid," and accurately cited the Note's surprising sales growth overseas. The final sentence: "A wobble in flight is all it takes for people to proclaim [Apple's] inevitable crash." Surowiecki's analysis directly challenged simplistic predictions about Apple's future.

[markwk52]

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Netscape was an influential company, but not a successful company. In its best year, Netscape earned a profit of just $23 Million and had working capital of just $202 Million. Netscape lost money during most of its other years in existence. Apparently, Tim Wu never bothered to review Netscape's SEC filings. What's more frightening is that his editor at the New Yorker never thought to ask, "Are you sure about including Netscape in that litany?" This explains why I stopped reading the New Yorker a while ago. Apple, having just reported its best quarter, is of course doomed. Let's hope Tim Cook doesn't borrow from Netscape's playbook. If he does, AOL will end up buying Apple for a few billion dollars. The Macalope is wrong. This isn't high hanging fruit. It's highbrow low hanging fruit.

Let me get this straight - you stopped reading the New Yorker because a lengthy and complex piece on their website made a questionable implication about Netscape?
Tim Wu made some wrongheaded comments and a lot of interesting ones. The Macalope made an actual glaring mistake once, but I didn't find it "frightening" and I didn't stop reading Macworld.

[bastion]

Steve_S, on 27 February 2013 - 07:01 AM, said:

Macalope wrote:

Quote

Except that Windows didn’t really start to run away from the Mac until Microsoft’s OS had features that were technically superior, like protected and dynamic memory.

Sounds like a bit of revisionist history here. Microsoft had the enterprise market and most of the consumer market locked prior to Microsoft shipping a product with these features (Windows 95). At the time, the market was growing rapidly and we all know Apple's situation. It wasn't pretty. The point being, the market share lock was already well in place before Microsoft had any technically superior features. Let's not pretend that was the driver.

Windows != Microsoft. It's a fine distinction to make perhaps, but you're both right. Microsoft had a pretty strong lock on the market, but Windows specifically had a fairly slow ramp up before Win95.

[Steve_S]

bastion, on 28 February 2013 - 03:35 AM, said:

Steve_S, on 27 February 2013 - 07:01 AM, said:

Macalope wrote:

Quote

Except that Windows didn’t really start to run away from the Mac until Microsoft’s OS had features that were technically superior, like protected and dynamic memory.

Sounds like a bit of revisionist history here. Microsoft had the enterprise market and most of the consumer market locked prior to Microsoft shipping a product with these features (Windows 95). At the time, the market was growing rapidly and we all know Apple's situation. It wasn't pretty. The point being, the market share lock was already well in place before Microsoft had any technically superior features. Let's not pretend that was the driver.

Windows != Microsoft. It's a fine distinction to make perhaps, but you're both right. Microsoft had a pretty strong lock on the market, but Windows specifically had a fairly slow ramp up before Win95.

While I agree there is a distinction between Microsoft and Windows, I'd also suggest it bears little relevance to this discussion.

The point here is that there was no inflection point along Microsoft's roadmap where the addition of better technology actually made any significant change to their market share. Yes, we might all agree that Win95 was the first real Mac competitor from a technical position. That is, it wasn't just a shell layered over DOS like Win 3.1 and below where. However, what actually happened was Microsoft's existing customers transitioned from DOS/Windows 3.1 to Windows 95. As I recall from using Win 3.1 back in the day, that was fine for some applications, but you'd still have to go back to DOS to run games. Anyone remember having to load DOS into high memory just to be able to run a game? Yes, Win95 alleviated those problems and thereby unified Microsoft's customers onto a single OS. That accounts for the uptake of Windows for Microsoft's customers. However, Microsoft's business had "run away from the Mac" long before this. This is very different from what our "esteemed horned great one" had suggested. That's all.

[bastion]

Steve_S, on 28 February 2013 - 08:04 AM, said:

bastion, on 28 February 2013 - 03:35 AM, said:

Steve_S, on 27 February 2013 - 07:01 AM, said:

Macalope wrote:

Quote

Except that Windows didn’t really start to run away from the Mac until Microsoft’s OS had features that were technically superior, like protected and dynamic memory.

Sounds like a bit of revisionist history here. Microsoft had the enterprise market and most of the consumer market locked prior to Microsoft shipping a product with these features (Windows 95). At the time, the market was growing rapidly and we all know Apple's situation. It wasn't pretty. The point being, the market share lock was already well in place before Microsoft had any technically superior features. Let's not pretend that was the driver.

Windows != Microsoft. It's a fine distinction to make perhaps, but you're both right. Microsoft had a pretty strong lock on the market, but Windows specifically had a fairly slow ramp up before Win95.

While I agree there is a distinction between Microsoft and Windows, I'd also suggest it bears little relevance to this discussion.

The point here is that there was no inflection point along Microsoft's roadmap where the addition of better technology actually made any significant change to their market share. Yes, we might all agree that Win95 was the first real Mac competitor from a technical position. That is, it wasn't just a shell layered over DOS like Win 3.1 and below where. However, what actually happened was Microsoft's existing customers transitioned from DOS/Windows 3.1 to Windows 95. As I recall from using Win 3.1 back in the day, that was fine for some applications, but you'd still have to go back to DOS to run games. Anyone remember having to load DOS into high memory just to be able to run a game? Yes, Win95 alleviated those problems and thereby unified Microsoft's customers onto a single OS. That accounts for the uptake of Windows for Microsoft's customers. However, Microsoft's business had "run away from the Mac" long before this. This is very different from what our "esteemed horned great one" had suggested. That's all.

It's only different because you're continuing to conflate Windows with Microsoft. I'm assuming that the author wrote what they meant. You're assuming the author meant something else. The release of Win95 wasn't an inflection point on Microsoft's roadmap but it was certainly one in that of the Windows brand. Not (only) technologically but also in terms of market acceptance. That's what happened and that's what the article says.

[juandesant]

Quote

Quote

I like to leave the comment "Macaloped" on the article sites. What would really help is a Macalope call to go with it. I checked Animal Planet. No luck, oddly. Closest I can find is a moose call, which I will render thusly: "Yooahhh. Wah. Wah. Wah." Can we have a native Macalope call rendering to use?

Shouldn't the Macalope sound like a 3.5" floppy being ejected given the classic Mac as a head?

So, it would be something like "Yooahhh.Wah. Wah. Whirrrrrrr clic."

[Steve_S]

bastion, on 28 February 2013 - 02:27 PM, said:

It's only different because you're continuing to conflate Windows with Microsoft. I'm assuming that the author wrote what they meant. You're assuming the author meant something else. The release of Win95 wasn't an inflection point on Microsoft's roadmap but it was certainly one in that of the Windows brand. Not (only) technologically but also in terms of market acceptance. That's what happened and that's what the article says.

Two things.

First, suggesting I continue to conflate the difference between Microsoft and Windows is to suggest Windows had not already "run away from the Mac" prior to Win95. It had. Hence my point of revisionist history. Hence my suggestion that distinguishing the two bares little relevance to this discussion.

Second, I'm not making assumptions of what the author meant. I'm commenting on what the author said. Windows had already surpassed the Mac prior to "adding technically superior features" (Win95). The author claimed this didn't happen "until" these features were added to Windows. This also implies causation for Win95's success while ignoring other pretty obvious factors such as Microsoft stopping the sale of Windows 3.1 and DOS, etc.

Nobody is arguing that Win95 was indeed popular for Microsoft. The point is, the success of this product has nothing to do with the Mac. If you actually take the time to read what was written, words like "until" describe a linkage to the Mac as if the Mac was somehow holding sales of Windows at bay until that point. That's simply not the case. If you wish to debate this further, please do so by quoting what was said by both parties and not by making your own interpretations.

[Sigivald]

"Most of the winner firms in the eighties to the aughts, like Microsoft, Dell, Palm, Google, and Netscape, were open"

Dell?

"Proprietary power supply connector that destroys your motherboard if you plug in a standard replacement power supply" Dell?

THAT Dell?

("Got bought out because they suck" Dell?)