Is Apple the new Microsoft?

We have a strange phenomenon within the IT industry where companies are at first admired for the innovation they being to the world. But if they start to be become too successful and popular it seems everyone is then out to ‘get’ them. Take for example IBM – there used to be a saying in the old days which was something like “nobody gets fired for choosing IBM”. In that era if you could afford to buy an IBM mainframe this was the de facto choice. Fast forward a few years and the same company which went on to bring PCs to the worlds desktops falls victim to it’s own success. Yes they probably got too big and too arrogant and nobody likes that so everyone turns against them.

History almost repeats itself when we look at Microsoft – a company people love to hate. In the days when Lotus ruled the roost with desktop applications with products like Lotus 123 and even desktop email products like Cc Mail not to mention the groundbreaking Lotus Notes in came Microsoft. They had rival products which were so much more intuitive and easy to use. They had a common user interface so learning another product from the Microsoft Office suite was simple because you knew a lot already from the app you used so far. They blew Lotus away big time which considering the marketshare Lotus had at the time was nothing short of amazing.

Even in the Operating System and Browser worlds there have been very worthy challengers to Microsoft’s crown yet they still outweigh their competition. We’ve had years and years of Microsoft-bashing – some of it justified because like IBM they probably became too big and too arrogant and again nobody likes that.

Is the same now happening to Apple? For years they have been a good niche product maker with loyal following never quite hitting the masses. But a few years ago the tide started to turn and they started to bring out products that started to appeal to the masses. Personally I think their breakthrough came with the iPod and iTunes. This was groundbreaking because it even spawned the birth of the podcasts that really changed things. Next came the iPhone and as luck would have it Microsoft released Vista. The iPhone took the world by storm but maybe not as much as Apple may have liked since as usual with Apple their products are great but often beyond the reach of the masses. That has changed with the iPhone 3G with the cost now half price and since so many don’t like Vista people are starting to move over to Apple Mac machines in the various flavours they come in. More and more people I know are making the switch but at the same time criticism of Apple and Steve Jobs is increasing all the time. Why is this? Like IBM and Microsoft before them have they become too big or maybe too arrogant and people are turning on them?

Or is it really that any company that becomes very successful gets the worlds attention. Since we’re all very fickle we quickly forget the innovation these compaies have brought to our lives and we start focussing on the things that the products don’t do and nobody likes that!

I hope we don’t see another repeat if history but instead I would like to see more collaboration and cooperation between companies which give us, the consumers, the benefit. Let’s be fair to companies that bring us innovation and feedback constructively on what we would like to see improved or in future products.

Here’s to the future!