Bottom line- Apple has focused on a very fickle mobile tech market. All it will take is for one company to come up with the next coolest thing and Apple is done. This is a very dangerous game they're playing. We've seen Sony do it with the Walkman. Apple could be next.
They need to focus on all aspects of their business- pro computers and mobile devices. Ignoring one for the other, which they've been doing, could be quite disastrous if one of those tanks. And trust me, there will be a day when someone bests Apple in the mobile device market. If they let the professional market down too, like they have been, they will be toast.
And if my mother had wheels I'd be a wagon.
Apple is playing this "dangerous game" with iPods, Macs, iPhones, and iPads, iTunes, the App Store, and all the software associated with these products and services. They ARE focusing on all aspects of the consumer market. In fact, Apple *creates* consumer markets.
You're positioning Apple nearer and nearer to your imagined cliff purely because their level of success is so uncommon - and so inexplicable given conventional wisdom, that it must be so beyond the norm that it won't last due to what you think is its fragility.
The fact is that the competition has had years to beat Apple at their own game of mindshare-cool and product desirability. Some of the best companies in tech have tried, have thrown untold amounts of money at the problem, and have devoted lord knows how many hours of R&D. All of them for the past decade at least have failed. Apple continued to rise and is now enjoying a position that in terms of profitability and value is right behind Exxon-Mobil. Nearly every product Apple produces on the consumer market is pulling in substantial profit for Apple. After all this time, all this opportunity, and the competition *still* hasn't figured it out.
Can they (as a group or singly) ever figure it out and *then* complete the doubly difficult task of implementing Apple-like strategies that reflect this competition's own awesome, avant-garde identity and vision?
There is no way, ZERO way in fact, anyone will best Apple without FIRST spending years creating an entire ecosystem to support the final product or group of products. The iPhone isn't just a hot feature phone that exists in a vacuum, appearing from nothing. It is part of an ecosystem of products that took Apple years to develop - to the level where it's currently untouchable and so far ahead of everyone else it's almost mind-bowing. This isn't a Sony Walkman situation. Sony on their best day couldn't pull off what Apple has in so many sectors of the tech industry - from computers to mobile devices to software. Apple is so penetrated and entrenched in key areas - not just mobile - that
any competitor must FIRST master every other area Apple has already mastered - computers (controlling the whole widget), mobile devices, software, media distribution vehicles - App Store, music store, media in its totality - in order to pull off a decisive and lasting win over Apple in only a single area.
You won't see this anytime soon.
So we can continue with absurd statements like "one day Apple will fail" or other obvious baloney. One day Apple will be bested (somehow) and they'll be "toast." Sure, why not. One day Microsoft will fail as well (given recent events that day might come sooner than we might think!) And one day the sun will turn into a red giant, expanding beyond the orbit of earth, burning it to a cinder. But arguing these points as if they are clear and imminent dangers now is completely absurd.
Apple has tapped in to exactly what drives customers to stand in long lines in rain or shine. Apparently, tapping into consumers' psyches in that manner and to that extent is exceedingly difficult to accomplish - yet Apple has and continues to make it look easy. At this point it looks like Apple's formula is for whatever reason unknowable and un-implementable by anyone other than the kind of people that work at Apple. Everyone else has had years to match it. Hasn't happened.
You'll need to find some other stick to wield against Apple. Wet noodles such as your post aren't going to cut it.
Just as credible as any other blog/rumors site/"insider"
