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First Adobe...next OS X?
#25891 05/10/13 01:48 AM
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If Adobe's apps can run from the cloud, what prevents Apple from going the same route with OS X (as I speculated about months ago)?

Edit: My speculation was based on the introduction of complete-installation FileVault.

Edited by artie505 (05/09/13 10:52 PM) ET


cyn's note: This post was originally a reply to tacit in What's Going On At Adobe?

Last edited by cyn; 05/10/13 10:11 AM. Reason: Add note and update subject line.

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Re: First Adobe...next OS X?
artie505 #25892 05/10/13 02:15 AM
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What is complete installation FileVault? I missed that.


Mac Pro dual Quad-Core Intel Xeons Early 2008; 16GB RAM; MacOS X 10.11.6, iOS 9.3.5
Re: First Adobe...next OS X?
JoBoy #25893 05/10/13 02:30 AM
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It's the new incarnation of FileVault that was introduced in OS X 10.7, and rather than merely encrypting your home folder it encrypts your entire OS X installation. (I'm still running 10.6.8, so I'm relating what I remember, and I think it's correct.)

At the time, I saw it as an obvious precursor to running OS X from the cloud, and if I remember correctly, one of tacit's points against was that stuff like Creative Suite were too big for that.


The new Great Equalizer is the SEND button.

In Memory of Harv: Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. ~Voltaire
Re: First Adobe...next OS X?
artie505 #25895 05/10/13 03:12 AM
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Artie505:

I can see a lot of institutions and companies resisting the consolidation of computing into server farms controlled by a few companies for the main purpose of extracting more money out of the users. We may be reaching a place where the potential of the Internet and software is being fulfilled and that is why the cloud idea came up. If you can't keep dazzling them with progress, then control them physically and start a new paradigm. I don't know where Apple is going, but they don't have the same pizazz as the Jobs eras. He was one of a kind.

I can see a lot of folks going back to Unix and a new era of Unix software emerging as a commodity product along with separate Internet or satellite transmission capability.

If the cloud folks become too few and they tend to control the industry and keep their prices about the same, the antitrust laws will kick in like they did with the oil companies several times in the past. Well, enough of this speculation. This is the first time I've really become unhappy with Apple and Adobe. I've always thought Microsoft was on the edge of antitrust violations and IBM before the advent of Bill Gates who let them nuture him when he came on the scene.


Mac Pro dual Quad-Core Intel Xeons Early 2008; 16GB RAM; MacOS X 10.11.6, iOS 9.3.5
Re: First Adobe...next OS X?
JoBoy #25896 05/10/13 03:46 AM
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1. I'm certain that Apple is following a long-term plan laid out by Jobs before he passed away, I suspect that it's quite a long-term plan, and if you don't like what he envisioned, think about what his successors are liable to come up with.

2. I just bought a brand new, refurbed April 2010 MacBook Pro precisely so I can run OS X 10.6.8 and avoid the future for as long as possible.

3. I've actually considered Linux, with which my sister is fully proficient, if not expert, and would help me, but it's too soon for that drastic a course of action.

4. I've speculated in the past that Apple is treading on the edge of anti-trust territory, but the more I think about it, they've invented a completely new type of trust that isn't contemplated by existing legislation - think Starzelius, the spherical trust in Pohl & Kornbluth's The Space Merchants - and further, they've got some pretty neat justification for at least some of their violations...0.03mm, 1/4 oz, etc.


The new Great Equalizer is the SEND button.

In Memory of Harv: Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. ~Voltaire
Re: First Adobe...next OS X?
artie505 #25898 05/10/13 01:14 PM
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I first encountered the idea of "renting" software on a per use or per keystroke basis when I worked for Microsoft in the early and mid 1990s. Bill Gates and Steve Balmer were faced with almost total market saturation for Windows and Office, leaving them with a market they totally dominated and not enough new customers coming on line to continue the continually expanding income stream they had become accustomed to. Their proposal was to rent applications to businesses and users on a per month, per hour, or even per keystroke basis. In exchange the software would be continually updated, upgraded, and maintained by Microsoft.

At the time Microsoft believed the internet was a toy of universities and the Department of Defense and would never be mainstream, so implementation of the scheme would have essentially required business, universities, and individuals turning all control of the software and OS servers over to Microsoft — at a healthy fee. The proposal failed because Microsofts's primary customer base — business and industry — balked. Business did not want it for many and to my mind obvious reasons including the networking technology of the time. I believe they envisioned encompassing government computing in this scheme if for no other reason tan to make anti-trust actions too counter-productive for congress to complain.

So don't lay this at Steve Jobs feet. Place it firmly at the foot of Microsoft's throne.


If we knew what it was we were doing, it wouldn't be called research, would it?

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Re: First Adobe...next OS X?
artie505 #25899 05/10/13 08:08 PM
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Renting software that runs from the cloud is one thing (and Creative Cloud doesn't really run from the cloud; most of the actual software is on your computer, but it updates from the cloud and requires an active subscription in order to run). Running an operating system from the cloud is another thing.

Can it be done? Sure. Apple allows you to boot a computer from a copy of OS X living on a NetBoot server.

Do you want to do it? Except in certain very limited circumstances, no. Even if you have a very fast local area network, it's going to be agonizingly slow compared even to a slow hard drive, much less to a SSD. Everyone wants fast computers, not slower.

Running an OS from the cloud creates huge demands on bandwidth, a miserable user experience, and any network interruption crashes your computer. It's hard to see a business model for this. Apple is a hardware company, not a software company; they want to ship boxes, not OS licenses. And they don't want to pay for the bandwidth to run an operating system from their servers, or deal with the complaints about what a terrible experience it is.

Chrome OS, Google's cloud-based operating system, is only intended for doing simple online tasks (using Google's services, natch) and isn't intended as a desktop operating system...and even it only has niche markets, really.


Photo gallery, all about me, and more: www.xeromag.com/franklin.html
Re: First Adobe...next OS X?
tacit #25900 05/11/13 02:57 AM
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Thanks to all of you. This has become a real education for me. Please keep it going if there's more.


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Re: First Adobe...next OS X?
joemikeb #25901 05/11/13 06:28 AM
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You blind-sided me there, but it's my own fault.

I should have made it clear that I wasn't envisioning Apple's "renting" OS X, rather I was envisioning OS X's migration to the cloud as another step in Apple's relentless push towards ever smaller computers, in keeping with its position as, above all, a hardware manufacturer.

> So don't lay this at Steve Jobs feet.

And under any circumstances, considering his well known penchant for "implementing other people's ideas," it's difficult to lay anything at Steve Jobs's feet authoritatively.


The new Great Equalizer is the SEND button.

In Memory of Harv: Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. ~Voltaire
Re: First Adobe...next OS X?
tacit #25903 05/11/13 07:34 AM
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Your points are on-target and well-taken, but I'll guess that you'd have raised similar points had I suggested Internet Recovery in the early days of DSL.

Apple is well known for pushing the limits of technology...sometimes too far, as can be seen from their much belated introduction of Thunderbolt/Ethernet & Firewire adapters when they were confronted with the ugly reality that the world was not ready for computers lacking those ports.

Further, Apple has, with its introduction of Internet Recovery, shown more or less complete disdain for un-technologically prepared users, so I'll guess that they're preparing to make a huge grab in the huge business computing market - where cutting-edge technology is demanded and money is readily available if its expenditure is justified - that has eluded it for so long...at the expense of us little guys who've only given it a 5% share of the computing market.

If I knew what the future really holds in store I'd be in the process of trading "Venus" for a Wally 115, but I'm not that close to the situation, so I'm limited to guessing...

It wouldn't surprise me in the least if Apple was in the process of designing its own super high-speed satellite network for the benefit of the big-spenders who'll spring for its services and leaving the rest of us to FIOS, which we'll all almost certainly have within the next week or two. tongue grin crazy


The new Great Equalizer is the SEND button.

In Memory of Harv: Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. ~Voltaire
Re: First Adobe...next OS X?
artie505 #25905 05/11/13 09:31 AM
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Quote:
...the huge business computing market - where cutting-edge technology is demanded...

I don't know which planet you're reporting on, but it ain't this one. This planet is one in which former COBOL programmers came out of mothballs in the late 1990s to patch active code so old the Y2K problem wasn't even on the radar when it was written. IT departments are, in fact, notoriously anti-cutting edge. How do you think the Blackberry stayed prevalent so long?



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Re: First Adobe...next OS X?
artie505 #25906 05/11/13 12:34 PM
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Originally Posted By: artie505
Apple is well known for pushing the limits of technology…sometimes too far, as can be seen from their much belated introduction of Thunderbolt/Ethernet & Firewire adapters when they were confronted with the ugly reality that the world was not ready for computers lacking those ports.
IMO it is because Apple continually pushes the envelope that they continue to exist. Apple has always been a technology leader. If apple were not the technology leader they would long ago been subsumed as just another Windows PC. If you want to be a technology follower then you should be using a Dell computer running Windows 95. Being a technology leader means they will inevitably stumble from time to time. More often it is simply a matter of waiting for the rest of the industry to catch up with the new technology. Your complaint about Thunderbolt sounds almost exactly like what late adaptors were saying when Apple abandoned SCSI or when Firewire was introduced.
Originally Posted By: artie505
Further, Apple has, with its introduction of Internet Recovery, shown more or less complete disdain for un-technologically prepared users, so I'll guess that they're preparing to make a huge grab in the huge business computing market - where cutting-edge technology is demanded and money is readily available if its expenditure is justified - that has eluded it for so long…at the expense of us little guys who've only given it a 5% share of the computing market.
I pity Apple's measly 5% share of the computer market. Of course with only that 5% share Apple has vaulted past Microsoft, Dell, HP, etc to be the first or second most valuable corporation in the world. As to your comment about cutting edge technology in business and industry, one of the reasons Windows is such a dog is because their business customer base demands compatibility with applications that in no few cases were originally written to run on MS-DOS. Updating those applications might cost business a few dollars they do NOT want to spend. In fact Wall Street will punish them for spending it. Apple has, I believe wisely, chosen to tell foot dragging users they have to move on. In the long run Apple's is the more cost effective path, but business and especially Wall Street is notoriously driven by short term goals and to &*!! with the future.
Originally Posted By: artie505
It wouldn't surprise me in the least if Apple was in the process of designing its own super high-speed satellite network for the benefit of the big-spenders who'll spring for its services and leaving the rest of us to FIOS, which we'll all almost certainly have within the next week or two. tongue grin crazy
I would not hold my breath waiting on FIOS. AT&T has already announced a decision to cease installing fiber optic and to not offer their fiber optic service in any more neighborhoods. In fact, they are not planning on installing landlines of any type in new neighborhoods. Apparently their vision of the future is strictly cell phones and 4G.


If we knew what it was we were doing, it wouldn't be called research, would it?

— Albert Einstein
Re: First Adobe...next OS X?
artie505 #25915 05/12/13 03:35 AM
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It's hard to imagine why they'd want a cloud-based OS. It has, as near as I can see, only downsides and no upsides for them.

It would piss off customers, create a poorer experience, make their laptops worthless in places where no wi-fi was available, cause anyone who is concerned about security not to use Apple products, and force Apple to maintain enormous data centers all over the world just dedicated to nothing but pumping out massive quantities of bandwidth for every Apple computer. And for what? They want to sell boxes, not operating systems.

SSD drives are becoming tiny. Have you seen the SSD drives in MacBook Airs? They're barely the size of a RAM stick! Moving to a cloud-based OS wouldn't make their devices any smaller; in fact, portable devices would likely get larger, because they'd need to use more bandwidth, and that's power-expensive for laptops, tablets, and phones.

Even the Adobe Creative Cloud apps live on your hard drive and keep their data on your hard drive. They don't actually run from the cloud, per se; the information that passes over the network is (mostly) license-checking information.


Photo gallery, all about me, and more: www.xeromag.com/franklin.html
Re: First Adobe...next OS X?
dkmarsh #25918 05/14/13 05:51 AM
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Originally Posted By: dkmarsh
Quote:
...the huge business computing market - where cutting-edge technology is demanded...

I don't know which planet you're reporting on, but it ain't this one. This planet is one in which former COBOL programmers came out of mothballs in the late 1990s to patch active code so old the Y2K problem wasn't even on the radar when it was written. IT departments are, in fact, notoriously anti-cutting edge. How do you think the Blackberry stayed prevalent so long?

Surely, even a historian can be more forward thinking than that!

I'm anticipating technology that generates orders from the top down, not requests from the bottom up.

Edit: As usual, you responded to an out of context portion of my post, which really read

Originally Posted By: artie
...the huge business computing market - where cutting-edge technology is demanded and money is readily available if its expenditure is justified...

and Y2K demonstrated that money is readily available when its expenditure is justified. (Why even mention Y2K? Did IT ever try to sweep it under the rug?)

Last edited by artie505; 05/14/13 07:39 AM.

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Re: First Adobe...next OS X?
artie505 #25919 05/14/13 09:51 AM
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I think he was trying to make the point that IT is not so cutting-edge.


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Re: First Adobe...next OS X?
artie505 #25920 05/14/13 10:13 AM
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Quote:
...an out of context portion of my post...

So it's not your contention that cutting-edge technology is demanded in the huge business computing market? Then we're in agreement! Sorry I misinterpreted the larger, in-context meaning.

Unfortunately, I have no idea what that is. "Technology that generates orders from the top down, not requests from the bottom up?" Huh? As for Y2K and readily-available money, the point is that resources were not poured into anything remotely cutting-edge; they were poured into patching code that had been around for decades, written in a programming language invented in 1959.



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Re: First Adobe...next OS X?
roger #25921 05/14/13 10:15 AM
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Originally Posted By: roger
I think he was trying to make the point that IT is not so cutting-edge.

His response artfully ignored the fact that I didn't specifically say they were.


The new Great Equalizer is the SEND button.

In Memory of Harv: Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. ~Voltaire
Re: First Adobe...next OS X?
dkmarsh #25922 05/14/13 10:27 AM
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That's a pitiful attempt at sarcasm! frown


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In Memory of Harv: Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. ~Voltaire
Re: First Adobe...next OS X?
artie505 #25923 05/14/13 02:52 PM
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Originally Posted By: artie505
Originally Posted By: roger
I think he was trying to make the point that IT is not so cutting-edge.

His response artfully ignored the fact that I didn't specifically say they were.


well you said this:

Quote:
the huge business computing market - where cutting-edge technology is demanded and money is readily available if its expenditure is justified


so color me confused.


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Re: First Adobe...next OS X?
roger #25925 05/15/13 07:31 AM
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1. I neither specifically said nor meant IT; I was talking about management, which makes its own decisions, unilateral ones included, and he made his own unilateral decision that I was talking about IT.

2. He addressed part of a qualified statement as a complete unqualified statement.

If he was trying to make a point without regard for my intent he should have made it clear.


The new Great Equalizer is the SEND button.

In Memory of Harv: Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. ~Voltaire
Re: First Adobe...next OS X?
artie505 #25985 05/26/13 08:21 PM
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Originally Posted By: artie505
rather than merely encrypting your home folder it encrypts your entire OS X installation


It only does that partition though. The restore partition should be in the clear?


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Re: First Adobe...next OS X?
Virtual1 #25990 05/28/13 01:36 AM
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FileVault2 works at the volume level, not the device level.


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Re: First Adobe...next OS X?
joemikeb #26001 06/01/13 05:45 AM
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Originally Posted By: joemikeb
Originally Posted By: artie505
Apple is well known for pushing the limits of technology…sometimes too far, as can be seen from their much belated introduction of Thunderbolt/Ethernet & Firewire adapters when they were confronted with the ugly reality that the world was not ready for computers lacking those ports.

IMO it is because Apple continually pushes the envelope that they continue to exist. Apple has always been a technology leader. If apple were not the technology leader they would long ago been subsumed as just another Windows PC. If you want to be a technology follower then you should be using a Dell computer running Windows 95. Being a technology leader means they will inevitably stumble from time to time. More often it is simply a matter of waiting for the rest of the industry to catch up with the new technology. Your complaint about Thunderbolt sounds almost exactly like what late adaptors were saying when Apple abandoned SCSI or when Firewire was introduced.

I've never criticized Apple for pushing new technology; it's what tech companies must do. I've been critical only of some of their recent implementation decisions that seem to have been made either without much or with distressing forethought. (I wasn't around for the SCSI or FireWire transitions, and under any circumstances, I'm at a loss as to why anybody would have complained about FireWire, which added new, improved functionality with no loss of existing functionality.)

Just for the heck of it, though, I suggest a poll: How do you feel about Thunderbolt? (Check as many boxes as are applicable.)
  1. I need/anticipate needing its high-speed throughput.
  2. I need/anticipate needing its expanded connectivity capability.
  3. I want it to cut down on the number of cables plugged in to my Mac.
  4. I want it because it's the latest and greatest toy in its genre.
  5. I neither have nor anticipate having any need for it.
Originally Posted By: artie505
Further, Apple has, with its introduction of Internet Recovery, shown more or less complete disdain for un-technologically prepared users, so I'll guess that they're preparing to make a huge grab in the huge business computing market - where cutting-edge technology is demanded and money is readily available if its expenditure is justified - that has eluded it for so long…at the expense of us little guys who've only given it a 5% share of the computing market.

Originally Posted By: joemikeb
I pity Apple's measly 5% share of the computer market. Of course with only that 5% share Apple has vaulted past Microsoft, Dell, HP, etc to be the first or second most valuable corporation in the world.

You can't possibly be serious! laugh Do you really think Apple's position as a *GIANT* makes their minuscule share of the computer market even the least little bit palatable?

Originally Posted By: joemikeb
As to your comment about cutting edge technology in business and industry, one of the reasons Windows is such a dog is because their business customer base demands compatibility with applications that in no few cases were originally written to run on MS-DOS. Updating those applications might cost business a few dollars they do NOT want to spend. In fact Wall Street will punish them for spending it. Apple has, I believe wisely, chosen to tell foot dragging users they have to move on. In the long run Apple's is the more cost effective path, but business and especially Wall Street is notoriously driven by short term goals and to &*!! with the future.

The days of corporate downsizing taught us that Wall Street rewards even huge losses when they hold out the promise of even "huger" down-the-road benefit.

iPods made people stop and think about Apple, and iPhones elevated them from cult status to a real presence, but iPads have given them credibility in the corporate world, not only because 90% or more of the Fortune 500 are either testing or actively using them, but because even if only minimally, all those corporate execs and managers are actually experiencing Apple-style computing first hand.

I've got no doubt that Apple's vision of the world has an iPhone in every pocket, an iPad in every hand, and a Mac on every desk, and I'm guessing that they've got something in the works that is so seductive that the corporate world will spring for it, and offers so much down-the-road benefit potential that Wall Street will applaud the expenditure. And further, I don't doubt that they'd give every one of us in the 5% a free high-end PC and our walking papers if it would help them sink their hooks into the 95%.

Apple can't be accused of muddling around and introducing products and technology willy-nilly, indiscriminately; more so than any company I've ever seen, they've got a vision.

Originally Posted By: joemikeb
Originally Posted By: artie505
It wouldn't surprise me in the least if Apple was in the process of designing its own super high-speed satellite network for the benefit of the big-spenders who'll spring for its services and leaving the rest of us to FIOS, which we'll all almost certainly have within the next week or two. tongue grin crazy

I would not hold my breath waiting on FIOS. AT&T has already announced a decision to cease installing fiber optic and to not offer their fiber optic service in any more neighborhoods. In fact, they are not planning on installing landlines of any type in new neighborhoods. Apparently their vision of the future is strictly cell phones and 4G.

My reference to FIOS was in no way meant to be taken seriously; it was a sarcastic, oblique reference to Apple's high-tech Internet recovery strategy - bothering friends, neighbors, relatives, or bosses - for users who haven't got high-speed Internet.

Your response got me wondering, though, how many people will have to give up their landlines in favor of cell-phones before there are too few paying customers to support maintenance of the infrastructure?


The new Great Equalizer is the SEND button.

In Memory of Harv: Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. ~Voltaire
Re: First Adobe...next OS X?
tacit #26002 06/01/13 05:58 AM
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Originally Posted By: tacit
It's hard to imagine why they'd want a cloud-based OS. It has, as near as I can see, only downsides and no upsides for them.

It would piss off customers, create a poorer experience, make their laptops worthless in places where no wi-fi was available, cause anyone who is concerned about security not to use Apple products, and force Apple to maintain enormous data centers all over the world just dedicated to nothing but pumping out massive quantities of bandwidth for every Apple computer. And for what? They want to sell boxes, not operating systems.

SSD drives are becoming tiny. Have you seen the SSD drives in MacBook Airs? They're barely the size of a RAM stick! Moving to a cloud-based OS wouldn't make their devices any smaller; in fact, portable devices would likely get larger, because they'd need to use more bandwidth, and that's power-expensive for laptops, tablets, and phones.

Even the Adobe Creative Cloud apps live on your hard drive and keep their data on your hard drive. They don't actually run from the cloud, per se; the information that passes over the network is (mostly) license-checking information.

Sorry for being slow to respond, but I wanted to respond to joemike first.

I can't argue with you, so I'll challenge you (the entire FTM membership, in fact) instead: Using Apple's recent history - innovations, implementations, statements by Steve Jobs and others, etc. - as a basis for your answer, where do you think Apple is headed...in which direction do you think its future lies?


The new Great Equalizer is the SEND button.

In Memory of Harv: Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. ~Voltaire
Re: First Adobe...next OS X?
artie505 #26004 06/01/13 06:09 PM
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Originally Posted By: artie505
I can't argue with you, so I'll challenge you (the entire FTM membership, in fact) instead: Using Apple's recent history - innovations, implementations, statements by Steve Jobs and others, etc. - as a basis for your answer, where do you think Apple is headed...in which direction do you think its future lies?

An even better question might be "in which direction do you think the future of the industry lies as compared to Apple?"

Office 365 for Windows and Mac and Creative Suite would indicate software is headed in the direction of software leasing. You get to use it for a year or a month for a price and for that price you get free updates/upgrades. This makes enormous financial sense for companies like Microsoft and Adobe whose market domination puts severe constraints on their future income stream.

On the other hand Apple is looking toward the market segment that has produced its greatest income stream, the "iDevices". Each upgrade of OS X and iOS brings the two development streams closer together. The App store appears to be Apple's view of the future of software. Rather than relying on market dominating applications, Apple appears to be focusing on relatively inexpensive and highly targeted "apps" developed primarily by third party developers with compatibility, security, and reliability assured through the App Store mechanism/process. How many years has it been since there was an upgrade of any Apple software product other than OS X or iOS? There have been updates to Pages, Numbers, Keynote, Aperture but those have all been relatively minor and in no way could be considered upgrades. Even the reputed upgrades to iTunes have been primarily aimed at improving App Store functionality and interface.

As far as hardware goes, I have heard rumors and conversations indicating Apple may be approaching the end of the laptop era as the iPhones and iPads become more powerful and more functional. I know several people who are not purchasing laptop upgrades because they have switched to the iPad. Certainly as OS X and iOS move closer and closer toward a single OS environment the distinction between laptops and iDevices gets really blurry. ICloud seems to me a logical even essential link in that chain.

Whether the future is in software leasing as envisioned by Microsoft and Adobe or Apple's App Store the internet and high speed internet at that will be essential. By the way, places where the internet is unavailable are becoming fewer and further between. Last week in a snow storm at the 10,500 foot peak of Cumbres Pass between New Mexico and Colorado I was surprised when my iPhone connected to someone's WiFi.


If we knew what it was we were doing, it wouldn't be called research, would it?

— Albert Einstein
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