Google Sets Its Sights on Apple

[jnpy!$4g3cwk]

You have it backwards

I agree with jobs, Google's 'Don't be Evil' crap, it's bull*****!!
I liked it when Google & Apple were close, imagine the great results we could have seen... Now, it's just Google copying.
I have more respect for Microsoft now, than I ever have.

Google and Apple competing is great-- both companies need to grow up a little.
Both companies are built on continuing to create new product ideas. Who says there is only room for one company that knows how to innovate? I can hardly wait for the Google vs Apple ads. (Microsoft who!?!? )

 

[NSMonkey]

Sadly, this is the truth. Macs are taking a beating and the beating is coming from Apple. Sure they still sell well, but it seems in recent times, this is mostly due to the aura around Macs, not any actual meat on the bone. OS X is still great and I'd still buy one of the new 15" MBPs if I had the dough, but the update was late, very late (one of the reasons I don't have the cash, my money went on something other than a computer).

Just to reiterate, Macs are selling better than ever and you would like to buy a new one, yet they are "taking a beating". Bit of a paradox, no?

 

[dernhelm]

I couldn't disagree agree more - your criteria must be so different than mine, I'd love to know how you conclude that Apple is the new Microsoft, because they in my mind couldn't be more different.

How do you think they are similar? Please explain.

It's called being a troll.

 

[jnpy!$4g3cwk]

High school

Reminds me of high school nonsense. Remember the guy that got pissed at you because you had a beatifull girlfriend, and then you had to fight him time and again?

I don't remember having a beautiful girlfriend in high school. I remember being the first kid on my block who knew how to program.

 

[jnpy!$4g3cwk]

Big Brother

Being labeled "Big Brother" by Google is like being called a racist by Hitler.

Google controls and mines more personal data and tracks more personal habits to maximize advertising than anyone. They own massive amounts of satellite imagery and have it linked to everyone's address, with images of your front door. This is tied to your name, phone number, and other personal data and habits. They will be in your living room monitoring and providing your TV and tracking your music tastes. They gobble up books and digitize them with out permission.

Apple is Big Brother? Truly hilarious. Since Google was probably making unauthorized digital copies of "1984", you would think they had at least read it.

I would like to say something about Google here, but, I'm afraid that it will haunt me forever.

 

[MisterK]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 3_1_3 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/528.18 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0 Mobile/7E18 Safari/528.16)

I'm obviously on Apple's side in this fight, but have to admit that Google TV sounds compelling. Android does not compare to iPhone. I've used both and I appreciate that some people will not care about the polish, but I like good wine and won't apologize that some people can't tell the difference between the good stuff and the ****** stuff. iAds is cool and if I'm going to see ads then they may as well be interesting. No big deal to me there.

In my eyes, Google gets too much credit. For all the people calling Apple a one trick pony for their iPods (forgetting the Apple II, iMac, iTunes, iPhone, and now iPad), what about Google and search? Now THAT is a one trick pony. And now that search is basically solved (search field and good results) Google is ******** themselves because they can't really change the formula without ruining it and others can now catch up. So they're branching out and getting way too much credit for every step.

 

[WilliamLondon]

Hardware with an OS and nothing more on it is hardly "useless"...

Perhaps you and I differ in how we are amused and satisfied with products. If I turn a product on, I want it to do something, I don't just want to look at its pretty lights.

I used to work for IBM and one of our largest customers would not accept any shipment of our products without software fully loaded on them, because, as they said, "they're nothing more than expensive door stops". I agree. Yes, they boot, but their functionality is nothing.

What else did you think "being Microsoft" meant? Being lazy? Being big?

Using their monopoly position to lock people in to their standards, which are ripped off (mostly from open standards) and turned into a Microsoft version. This is easy, I could go on and on. Next, they write a set of user interface guidelines, then break them in their own products, creating an OS without any guidelines for how products should operate. Next, they used their ubiquitous position on the desktop, rammed a browser on to everyone's desktop, loaded the back end (IIS) with IE only widgets and locked people in to Microsoft. What else? How about providing exclusive access to their applications to secret or undocumented OS functions?

I could go on and on and on, the two are not the same in the slightest. Their mantras are different, one is hardware one is software, their business models are different, everything about them is different. To suggest anything else is ignoring everything about the reality of the two organisations.

 

[Steve Jobs.]

Go Google!

 

[KnightWRX]

Yet, apple in its ministry of truth is dictating what's appropriate, in their app store approval process.

Heck, they've denied a pulitzer prize winner's political cartoon app, They pulled a mulsim app, but kept a similar Christian bashing one. They are determining what information is being released on the iPhone.

They were (are?) trying to force developers to only use iAds and no other ad company. They restricted developers from using any other sdk other then theirs.

Sounds like big brother to me

I see at least one person here has actually read 1984 and not just heard about it. It's funny seeing all these people trying to define what is and isn't Big Brother that have no clue about 1984 at all.

 

[Will do good]

Just this last week I decided to un-Google my online life. The creepy, sinister, and downright cheesy nature of Google just gave me the heeby-jeebies once too often.

Chrome browser is fast and warm, but Apple isn't mining my data when I use Safari.

Picasa was easy to navigate, but iPhoto is prettier.

Google Documents was convenient, but so incredibly ugly and impossible to format or convert properly.

Gmail was fine, but for the first time this week I started using Apple's MailApp (after using Hotmail for ten years and Gmail for the last few), and suddenly I have no idea how I've put up with web mail for so long.

Google is choking the internet with ugly blighted ads, but Apple's iAd plan of going with quality over quantity gets my vote.

There are people on this thread calling for Apple to "go head-to-head" with Google, but that's not where it's at. It's better to have 10% market share (either in hardware, software, or advertising) and have huge profits than it is to be a blight on the world like Google is becoming, and Microsoft has been, despite their own profits.

I'll give Microsoft credit for one thing, though. They've always been about dominating markets for the purpose of making money. I don't like that approach, but I can respect it. Google's aim is to own every single last piece of your life so they can make money. I do not respect that. It's gross and anti-human.

Somehow Google has made me see Microsoft as a corporation with integrity. Never in my wildest dreams did I see that coming. Nice job, Google. Thanks. You accomplished something, anyway.

Apple should just keep on doing what it's been doing: creating a walled garden of useful, aesthetically-pleasing hardware and software products for people who recognize quality and will pay a premium for it.

I've been paying that premium since my first Macintosh Plus, and I'll keep paying it because I'll go with quality and integrity over crap and duplicity every time.

+1

 

[Wordslinger29]

Apple made thier bed and now they can sleep in it. If the iPhone wasn't exclusive to AT&T nobody would care about Android. Maybe the rumors of it going to Verizon are true, but right now Apple is leaving a massive amount of customers behind. I upgraded to a HTC Incredible because of the lack of iPhone on Verizon (I have a financial incentive to stay with Verizon over switching to AT&T). Even though I do like aspects of Android, I'll most likely switch to an iPhone should it come to Verizon even if it means paying the early termination fee. I'm willing to bet a lot of customers who aren't Apple fans and just looking for a cool phone won't.

And Apple screwed itself by calling the Apple TV a hobby for so many years. It might be all about the mobile OS today, but tomorrow the battle will be for the living room.

Apple is letting Google gain ground it should never have been in position to take.

 

[davidgrimm]

Google comparing Apple to big brother? That's rich! I don't think Apple has been the company accused of collecting personal information on its users.

I appreciate Apple blocking some of the crap applications, especially the apps which are nothing more that phishing attempts. Sometime Apple goes too far, but its better than having a user beware mentality.

 

[Anuba]

Perhaps you and I differ in how we are amused and satisfied with products. If I turn a product on, I want it to do something, I don't just want to look at its pretty lights.

Sigh. I know perfectly well that computers are little more than doorstops without software, what I meant by "not useless" is the fact that Apple and Microsoft were perfectly able to SELL their respective platforms without nearly any software included for years. Nobody forced Microsoft to add stuff like a web browser, a mail client or a media player – we got by fine with Netscape, Eudora and other third-party stuff back then – but they did it anyway, and Apple followed suit later.

I could go on and on and on, the two are not the same in the slightest. Their mantras are different, one is hardware one is software, their business models are different, everything about them is different.

Yes, a lot of things are different, but they have one thing in common and that's the very practice that got Microsoft into antitrust trouble.

What did Microsoft do? Create a web browser (IE) and integrate it with the system (Win 98 SE) so that it couldn't be removed. By making IE ubiquitous in this manner, they quickly gained so much market share that Netscape became obsolete. This later resulted in United States vs. Microsoft as well as a similar case in the EU, where the EC ordered Microsoft to pay a fine of $613M for having included and integrated IE with Windows. In a similar case in 2007, the EC ordered Microsoft to remove Windows Media Player from the shipping version of Vista sold in the EU. And for Win7, MS decided to ship it pretty much bare-bones in the EU, just as a precaution.

Do you get it? Microsoft wasn't dragged into court all over the world because they rip off open standards, or their poor adherence to their own UI guidelines, or their proprietary file formats, or any of the things you associate with "being Microsoft". They got in trouble because they shipped the OS with various applications included. Ergo, if the positions were reversed in terms of market share, it would've been Apple who were forced to sandbox Safari so that it can be uninstalled from the system, it would've been Apple who were ordered to ship OS X without iTunes/iLife/Mail/Quicktime Player/iChat/Safari in the EU. But they get away with doing what got Microsoft into trouble, because their OS market share is small.

 

[charlituna]

Lets look at this....

Apple TV - Google TV
Apple did this first. (Google setting sights on Apple)

minor correction. google tv is supposed to be a web browser AND tv so it should be
WebTV+AppleTV - Google TV

Apple may end up selling MORE music if Android users are able to easily sync with iTunes.

the issue here is actually very similar to the whole 'no translation layered apps' if the Android OS/Palm OS/etc makes a change, Apple may have to change iTunes to fix any malfunction. And if Apple wants to change itunes they have to consider whether it would cause said malfunction.

iPhone OS - Android OS
Google bought Android INC in 2005..

And??? first off just cause the iphone didn't come out until 2007 doesn't say anything about when the project started. this sort of things takes time. they could have been working on it in 2005 or even before.

Also, Google bought it in 2005 and it took how long to have a product. 3-4 years. Apple got out 3 generations before they got out one. And Google's mindset and marketing (as well as Droid's etc) is Apple doesn't, we do. Even if it is possible that Apple made the better decision

 

[surferfromuk]

Google is the worlds largest unelected unaccountable entity in control of the world largest technological totalitarian human data collection system which the individual is powerless to opt-out of.

As Orwell said in 1984 - The private life is over. Who really is Big Brother?

Not Apple that's for sure...

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencet...ition-debate-goggles-privacy-controversy.html

 

[Anuba]

Google is the worlds largest unelected unaccountable entity in control of the world largest technological totalitarian human data collection system which the individual is powerless to opt-out of.

As Orwell said in 1984 - The private life is over. Who really is Big Brother?

Not Apple that's for sure...

I found this: 25 Surprising Things That Google Knows About You. Most of it's not really "surprising" and some borders on tin foil hat alert ("Google knows when you'll be getting the flu"), but it's a fun read anyway.

1. What you’re searching for: Google is used by millions of people worldwide-and they know what every user is searching for, even if it’s not personally identifiable.

2. The web pages you visit: Google AdSense is used by many web pages for online advertising, and Google’s cookies record your visits to web pages with their ad program on them.

3. The blogs you read: If you use Google Reader, Google knows the blogs you subscribe to. Even if you’re not on Google Reader, Google knows all of the Blogger pages you visit.

4. Your financial information: Users of AdSense and/or Google Checkout share financial information, addresses, and other personal information with Google.

5. The strength and popularity of your website or blog: For users of Google Analytics, Google knows what sites you control, how they are doing, and their trends.

6. Who and what you’re emailing: GMail users, and those who send mail to GMail users share a variety of personal and business information with Google.

7. What’s on your PC: If you’re using Google Desktop, Google knows everything that you keep on your computer.

8. Your research paper, bills, upcoming blog post, etc.: Docs and Spreadsheets are great web-based office tools, but using them means exposing the information in your documents to Google.

9. Your schedule: Google Calendar opens your personal and business schedule up to the prying eyes of Google.

10. Your social network and interests: Google indexes sites like Orkut, Facebook, and Digg, and as such, has access to information about what you’re interested in online.

(11-25 removed for brevity)

 

[KnightWRX]

Google bought it in 2005 and it took how long to have a product. 3-4 years. Apple got out 3 generations before they got out one.

3 years. The T-mobile G1 (HTC Dream) was launched in october 2008. And by that time, Apple had only shipped the iPhone 3G. That is 2 generations, not 3.

And Google's mindset and marketing (as well as Droid's etc) is Apple doesn't, we do.

That's a Verizon commercial, not a Google commercial. Shows what you know.

 

[KnightWRX]

Google is the worlds largest unelected unaccountable entity in control of the world largest technological totalitarian human data collection system which the individual is powerless to opt-out of.

As Orwell said in 1984 - The private life is over. Who really is Big Brother?

Not Apple that's for sure...

Read 1984 again. Especially that long boring part in the middle of the book. Surveillance of one's private life is one aspect (one which Google doesn't do, until at least, they have the Google In-house View and not just Public Street View).

"War is peace, Freedom is slavery, Ignorance is strength"
"Flash is a battery hog, Choice is confusion, H.264 is free".

 

[cutthroughthebs]

Glad Google is doing this... Apple will have to lower the prices since Google is likely to offer most of its products for free, and even some of them open source while Apple is closed source and at prices for Apple customers

Sorry Steve... you cannot fight Google Try to come up with decent prices and you might not fail, otehrwise... good luck...

Where do you clowns come from? I come here only to read these rediculous posts. If there's anyone I feel sorry for it's MR's and these types of people who talk this trash.

 

[cutthroughthebs]

Sigh. I know perfectly well that computers are little more than doorstops without software, what I meant by "not useless" is the fact that Apple and Microsoft were perfectly able to SELL their respective platforms without nearly any software included for years. Nobody forced Microsoft to add stuff like a web browser, a mail client or a media player – we got by fine with Netscape, Eudora and other third-party stuff back then – but they did it anyway, and Apple followed suit later.


Yes, a lot of things are different, but they have one thing in common and that's the very practice that got Microsoft into antitrust trouble.

What did Microsoft do? Create a web browser (IE) and integrate it with the system (Win 98 SE) so that it couldn't be removed. By making IE ubiquitous in this manner, they quickly gained so much market share that Netscape became obsolete. This later resulted in United States vs. Microsoft as well as a similar case in the EU, where the EC ordered Microsoft to pay a fine of $613M for having included and integrated IE with Windows. In a similar case in 2007, the EC ordered Microsoft to remove Windows Media Player from the shipping version of Vista sold in the EU. And for Win7, MS decided to ship it pretty much bare-bones in the EU, just as a precaution.

Do you get it? Microsoft wasn't dragged into court all over the world because they rip off open standards, or their poor adherence to their own UI guidelines, or their proprietary file formats, or any of the things you associate with "being Microsoft". They got in trouble because they shipped the OS with various applications included. Ergo, if the positions were reversed in terms of market share, it would've been Apple who were forced to sandbox Safari so that it can be uninstalled from the system, it would've been Apple who were ordered to ship OS X without iTunes/iLife/Mail/Quicktime Player/iChat/Safari in the EU. But they get away with doing what got Microsoft into trouble, because their OS market share is small.

NO! NO! NO!
Apple is an integrated solution that only runs on it's own system... MS is on EVERY PC built! Big difference there bud.

 

[pharmx]

....

Do you get it? Microsoft wasn't dragged into court all over the world because they rip off open standards, or their poor adherence to their own UI guidelines, or their proprietary file formats, or any of the things you associate with "being Microsoft". They got in trouble because they shipped the OS with various applications included. Ergo, if the positions were reversed in terms of market share, it would've been Apple who were forced to sandbox Safari so that it can be uninstalled from the system, it would've been Apple who were ordered to ship OS X without iTunes/iLife/Mail/Quicktime Player/iChat/Safari in the EU. But they get away with doing what got Microsoft into trouble, because their OS market share is small.

But Microsoft's actions affected multiple companies that relied on Windows as an operating system...this is completely different than how Apple's "walled garden" is setup. Anything Apple does with OSX only affects Apple customers. Why do people always overlook this fact?

With Microsoft/Google, problems with the OS will affect hardware manufacturers like Dell, HP, etc. With Apple, problems with the OS only affects Apple since it is only available on their own hardware.

Google actually has the potential to be far worse than Microsoft ever was due to their online presence, not to mention sheer data at their disposal.

 

[Consultant]

This is exactly why Apple prefers a closed system. They control the hardware and the software to give you an optimal experience. This is also why they need to distance themselves from AT&T. This exclusivity B.S. needs to end right now. I hate the fact that my Apple iPhone runs more efficiently in a foreign country than in the country it was conceived in (notice I said conceived and not built).

Agree.

The problem in the U.S. is that Verizon uses old CDMA technology, and T-Mobile uses a non-standard GSM frequency for full 3g.

And with the data-use of iPhone, it's unlikely Verizon can handle it. (40 times increase of data need in a few years, who has capacity for that?)

 

[Anuba]

NO! NO! NO!
Apple is an integrated solution that only runs on it's own system... MS is on EVERY PC built! Big difference there bud.

What part of "if the positions were reversed in terms of market share" was difficult to understand? Integrated solution or not, the antitrust cases against MS had to do with including certain software with the OS. The fact that Mac is an integrated solution wouldn't have helped if Apple had been in Microsoft's shoes (>90% marketshare), it would only have made it worse from an antitrust standpoint. In fact "integrated solution" was the very term Jim Allchin of Microsoft used for describing the idea of integrating IE with Windows. This is what he wrote in an email in 1996:

"My conclusion is that we must leverage Windows more. Treating IE as just an add-on to Windows loses our biggest advantage -- Windows marketshare. We should dedicate a cross group team to come up with ways to leverage Windows technically more. We should think first about an integrated solution -- that is our strength."

"We do not use our strength -- which is that we have an installed base of Windows and we have a strong OEM shipment channel for Windows. We have to be competitive with features, but we need something more -- Windows integration. If you agree that Windows is a huge asset, then it follows quickly that we are not investing sufficiently in finding ways to tie IE and Windows together. Memphis must be a simple upgrade, but most importantly it must be a killer on OEM shipments so that Netscape never gets a chance on these systems."

But Microsoft's actions affected multiple companies that relied on Windows as an operating system...this is completely different than how Apple's "walled garden" is setup. Anything Apple does with OSX only affects Apple customers.

Yes, it only affects Apple customers, but how would that make any difference if the OS X and Windows marketshares were reversed? Do you really think authorities around the world would have left Apple's walled garden alone then? Heck, they're already considering an anti-trust probe into the issue of Apple forcing iPhone app developers to use Apple's tools. Now imagine if the iPhone had a marketshare similar to that of the iPod...

 

[Simmias]

I think that while Google is competing directly against Apple, Google's stuff is way lower quality and very badly designed compared to Apple's software. I had a look at my friend's Android phone a few weeks ago and the OS is just a mess, it's seriously lame compared to the iPhone. Then there's the GMail web interface, which is a huge mess as well, full of features I will never use, making it the opposite of simple and minimalistic.

The only things I like from Google are:

• Google Search
• Google Maps
• The Google Chrome Browser (only on PC since Safari is bad on PC)

I disagree that Google's software is poorly designed compared to Apple's. I love my MPB, iPod, and iPad, but I find myself preferring Google's apps for my everyday use in nearly every instance versus the equivalent Apple native apps. For my needs:

Chrome > Safari
Picasa > iPhoto
Google Docs > iWork
Gmail > Mail
GCal > iCal
Not to mention Google Maps, Google Voice, etc.

The reasons that I prefer the Google apps are speed, accessibility, and functionality. Re: speed, Chrome and Picasa launch almost instantly when I click the icon. It's simply amazing, and they are very snappy overall. I'll take that any day over flashy graphics and animations.

Re: accessibility, like many people, I use a Mac at home and PC at work. This is not by choice, it's the reality of working in today's corporate environment. Being able to access all my Google software and data seamlessly from work or home is incredibly valuable. Apple is not friendly to any platform other than their own. For instance, even with iWork.com, I have no way to edit an iWork document on my work PC, where I spend 70% of my waking hours. We live in a cross-platform world, which Apple refuses to recognize.

Re: functionality, Gmail blows away Apple Mail with innovative features like threaded conversations, labels, embedded YouTube videos, etc. I find that Apple's interfaces are sometimes oversimplified, and it takes me a long time to do what I actually want to do. Chrome, though, is a model of powerful simplicity. Not all of the Google apps are equally mature (most are developing rapidly), but most have sharing and collaboration features that truly leverage the web in a way that Apple has only done in a half-assed way so far. Re: Google sharing anonymous data with advertisers, it is not a concern and does me no harm. Plus, I never have to worry about syncing with the web apps.

The net result is that I barely use the much touted iLife suite. OS X is great, but I spend almost all my time in the browser, and I'm willing to bet that a high percentage of people are like me. Unless Apple gets into the cloud in a big way and starts supporting cross-platform mobility between work and home lives (will enterprises ever adopt the Mac platform?), I could see myself moving to the Chrome/Android universe as those offerings mature. I love Apple products, but I simply am not able to live my whole life in their closed ecosystem. Google's products still lack some polish, but they are constantly iterating and it is hard to beat the convenience of their model right now.

 

[kdarling]

The problem in the U.S. is that Verizon uses old CDMA technology, and T-Mobile uses a non-standard GSM frequency for full 3g.

CDMA radios were state of the art for handling more users and bandwidth. That's why GSM adopted a form of CDMA for 3G.

And with the data-use of iPhone, it's unlikely Verizon can handle it. (40 times increase of data need in a few years, who has capacity for that?)

You've confused numbers.

The iPhone accounts for 40% of the data traffic on ATT. But that's on ATT.

The iPhone only uses on average about twice what other smartphones do, and even that difference is disappearing.

Verizon already handles several times the amount of data that ATT does, and has done so for years due to much higher bandwidth laptop dongles.