Way ahead of what? Apple, these days, doesn't really make brand new products, they observe what's out there, how it's doing, what it's strengths and weaknesses are, how it could be streamlined and improved, and then they basically make their own version several years down the line that may not hold a torch to the competition spec-wise, but runs vastly superior custom in-house software. That's how they succeed, not by forging ahead with whole new products.
Tablets have been around for YEARS. I'm a big follower of Apple but even I'm not as blind are you perhaps are. I'm certainly not as juvenile. 🙂
Oh so very true. Apple biggest products have been more of a copy of an ideas already in the market just improved apon and changed to work better and time really well to take advantage of the take off of the product
For example
iPod -- It was not the first MP3 player nor first HD mp3 player. Apple saw what was out there and made it better and fixed a huge problem in MP3 players at the time and that was software on the computer side making syncing and organizing the libraries/play list of the music to the MP3 player. Top it off timed really well to match with the mp3 player market taking off.
iPod shuffle- Complete copy of other flash drive MP3 players out there. Just tied it into iTunes with no one else could do.
iPhone -- Not the first touch screen, Not the first smart phone. Apple saw the smartphone sector of the cell phone market was going to grow and they saw touch screens becoming the new thing in phones. So what does apple do. They make a touch screen phone taking advantage of the new multitouch technology they got their hands on. Tied it in to the iPod success in the music. They also took advatage of the fact that everyone else laid the groundwork for them and they did not have the draw backs like they had. They could start fresh and not worry about losing everyone. RIM for example is limited on what they can do to the OS because if they change it to much they would loose there customer base. Apple had no base so they could move straight into it with much fresher ideas and no limitations.
Great way to take advantage of the smart phone taking off in the consumer market.
iPod Touch- iphone spin off. Most of the R&D was already done for the iPhone so it was a cheap easy product to get out the door and people wanted it. Cheap and easy profit.
Mac Book Air -- not the first unltra light computer. Just saw that is what other companies were doing and people like them. Apple did the same and look for ways to cut even more weight and make it smaller. Changing the battery was the biggest help and offering Solid state hard drive helped as well.
In 2001, Bill Gates predicted that the pending Microsoft Tablet PC would become "the most popular form of PC within five years" (EDIT:
source). Microsoft have not only been in this market for years but if they're at all sensible then they've had an opportunity to learn some serious lessons. I therefore wouldn't write this off.
That said, until they fix their idiotic backwards approach to typography there's no way I'm using one of their devices for serious reading. They need to at least kill the aggressive hinting and learn to pair kern. Though hopefully their device will be of the 160+ppi range, at which point at least the former stops being so much of an issue.
If you know much about Microsoft R&D you learn pretty quickly they are really good at out pacing technology. They hardware requirements for what they want to do just are not up there yet. A good example is WinFS. Microsoft came up with the idea and had a lot of the research done on it way back in 1995. Problem was the processing power was no were close to what was needed to make it work well. Hell when Vista came out the processing power for it was not even there yet. That puts an idea from microsoft well over 10 years ahead of hardware and that is just one of the more well known ones. I have talk with people who have met some of the R&D staff at private presentations of the projects they were working on and they told me that some of the stuff is jaw dropping at the time and is years a head of its time. The problem they run into is hardware limitations. That had PDA ideas that we see now days that back then we just lack the battery power and CPU power to make it workable and marketiable.
It been describe to me that Microsoft R&D department is more like a University than a business R&D. that mains big budget projects that might will be years long and decade to more before it is even feasible for it to be put into production. You have people with Doctor degree working on pure research and nothing more.
I think back in 2001 the tablet idea was well a head of its time and really only now are we getting to the point were the hardware to make it work well is becoming economically feasible.
