@Daniel Price: I for one look forward to the day when companies actually look around at other computer brands (include Apple obviously) rather than simply re-ordering cheap commodity machines [...] this won't happen until Apple targets the enterprise market
In theory, I agree that selling more Macs is good, but I'm not sure the folks that are looking for cheap, low-end commodity hardware are really potential Apple customers. There's a big difference between hardware that offers good value (which I think iMac/iBook do), and cheap hardware. No-name brands will always win on the second count.
In terms of Apple targetting the enterprise market, what do you think they should do? It seems not everyone agrees on what it should be. I can completely understand the end result (writing enterprise apps in Cocoa), but I'm not fully convinced this is a good business for Apple to be in. User experience doesn't seem to matter as much to committees as it does to individuals.
If anything, education has been Apple's enterprise, maybe because people are more sensitive to ease-of-use with children than adults.
While Apple has made huge in-roads into the home market, it's made little impact elsewhere.
I'm not sure that's true. Most of the impact has been in the home, but Final Cut Pro has (as far as I can tell) permanently changed digital media production. I think small businesses have started to catch on, too. It's fair to say that there hasn't been a lot of impact in enterprise, though.
The technologies are there to make amazing apps for OSX
I'm not sure really big business care about the "amazing" factor. The mindset seems to be if it stores the data and retrieves it, that's enough for most cases. That basically just leaves price as a factor.
by Scott Stevenson — Jan 02
In theory, I agree that selling more Macs is good, but I'm not sure the folks that are looking for cheap, low-end commodity hardware are really potential Apple customers. There's a big difference between hardware that offers good value (which I think iMac/iBook do), and cheap hardware. No-name brands will always win on the second count.
In terms of Apple targetting the enterprise market, what do you think they should do? It seems not everyone agrees on what it should be. I can completely understand the end result (writing enterprise apps in Cocoa), but I'm not fully convinced this is a good business for Apple to be in. User experience doesn't seem to matter as much to committees as it does to individuals.
If anything, education has been Apple's enterprise, maybe because people are more sensitive to ease-of-use with children than adults.
While Apple has made huge in-roads into the home market, it's made little impact elsewhere.
I'm not sure that's true. Most of the impact has been in the home, but Final Cut Pro has (as far as I can tell) permanently changed digital media production. I think small businesses have started to catch on, too. It's fair to say that there hasn't been a lot of impact in enterprise, though.
The technologies are there to make amazing apps for OSX
I'm not sure really big business care about the "amazing" factor. The mindset seems to be if it stores the data and retrieves it, that's enough for most cases. That basically just leaves price as a factor.