It’s more than 23 years since the Mac was introduced. How will the next 23 years be?

In That Product Transition John Gruber says what I think must be obvious to us - that iPod touch will be subscription-accounted, and that this, along with iPhone price drop is the “product transition” Oppenheimer couldn’t go into on the last conf call, that explained low guidance.

If Apple TV and iPhone are subscription accounted, then iPod touch must be too. And they are all OS X devices. But how is it a transition; what is the destination? Will Mac, Pod and Phone categories eventually merge into a single subscription-accounted “personal communicator” product range? Mace looks forward to the day when OS X devices will be given away free, and Apple is the all-powerful conduit through which paid-for content is delivered.

Where does that leave pure device vendors (Palm, Moto, Dell)? How long does it take for the OSX platform (including pods and phones) to eclipse Microsoft’s platform? When will those browser stats show aggregate Safari access exceeding IE? 3 years, 5, 10, never?

edit: note that, in just two months, iPhone/Safari is already ahead of all Windows Mobile browser activity. It’s just the PC market left to conquer.

I see OS X-based devices (iPhones, Macs, etc.) overtaking the base of Windows devices in the ten to twenty year time frame. I see Windows steering toward the end of a technology cul-de-sac. OS X is no longer only about the Mac.

I said not ever . . . that is unless Apple decides to license OS X to other manufacturers.  Perhaps this only needs to be done in the handheld segment, but without that move it could never hope to compete on raw numbers with Windows.  And unless another desktop OS comes along, what are all those low cost computer makers going to use - surely there not going to roll their own.  I don’t consider any linux distros as competing in this space.

Personally I don’t care to be number one in total numbers.  I prefer to retain some cachet.

I chose 10-20 years. Windows is so dominant I just can’t imagine it happening any time soon. Yet Windows will not last forever, and if Windows loses favor Mac OS X stands to become the dominant system. At least for a while. It all depends on how Apple plays its hand. “Never” is also a possibility, but I prever never to say never.

Of course Apple is likely to consider licensing when/if they are over 40% market share.(Google?)

4 or 5 cellphones are sold for every PC. If these become mainly “music phones” or better, and OSX migrates down to the nano, there could easily be as many net connected OSX devices as Windows devices.

Already the world’s largest supplier of digital cameras is Nokia, not Canon. The highest selling smartphone platform is Symbian (11 times Windows Mobile sales). Windows is far from 90% market share in this larger market.

Web 2.0 is capable of breaking the enterprise PC upgrade cycle, replacing PC’s with a greater variety of lower cost devices, not locked to Windows.

That’s how it would happen.

[quote author=“sleepygeek”]4 or 5 cellphones are sold for every PC. If these become mainly “music phones” or better, and OSX migrates down to the nano, there could easily be as many net connected OSX devices as Windows devices.

Agreed.

The $399 iPhone will now sell into the tens of millions.

6-9 years.  I believe this is the target set by Apple.  10-20 years is too long, competitors and potential young turks have sufficient time to develop better idea.  Less than 6 is a tough call since entrenched competitors (PCs, handsets) have deep pockets to R&D aggressively and engage in price wars.

Recall I don’t believe Apple would launch iPhone in 2007?  My mindset then is Apple management may not have the will and resources to compete aggressively in an industry where there are many entrenched handset makers (NOK, MOT, ...) and powerful telecom service providers that are regulated and still view by many government as nation-threatening if controlled by foreign entities.  Recent events demonstrate Apple has the will, bold and well-prepared.

If Apple dares to compete in the telecom industry, isn’t safer to compete in the PC market?  When SJ announced iPhone in MWSF 07, it dawn on me that handset market is an oligopoly whereas Wintel is a monopoly.  Is bigger.  Mobile is where the puck is going.  Telecom is lucrative because of the service contract.  PC hardware is a commodity market.  Please note cable TV service is lucrative - aTV is there but not very active - waiting for a good opportunity to lunge.

I often think that the contributors to this forum are much too myopic, and optimistic about Apple’s position (no offense intended).

I just don’t see a day when Asia and Africa are all tethered to legal copies of an American companies OS (no racism intended).

Please don’t take this as any suggestion that Apple is not a great company with great products, with a decade of superb growth ahead for its shareholders . . . I just don’t see total world domination in the picture.  And if I’m wrong then I hope that we don’t become like every other company that’s achieved that goal.

I agree with Mace about shorter estimates.
I disagree with those that advocate for Apple to license Mac OS. It is faulty thinking that since MS became so large by being open - this is the only way to go.
Open license of software by MS to hardware makers is both the blessing and the curse of MS.
This allowed them to become big, but at the cost of complicated poorly functioning and consumer unfriendly devices.
Apple is THE ONLY COMPANY in the world that has both advanced OS and hardware production abilities and decades of experience.
This makes it immune to competitors (the demise of Japanese electronic giants is largely due to the fact that there is no major OS from Japan).
It is Apple’s ultimate edge. Moreover, these days there is no need to license OS to make affordable products. If anything, Apple is better than competitors at cutting costs.
Thus, the era of affordable consumer friendly high quality device powered by Touch/Mac OS is coming. I think within 7 years Mac OS can become dominant OS in the world. I mean all OS based devices - mobile phones, car on-board computers/navigation, PCs, music and video players, in-home entertainment systems, and other electronic devices that we yet to see.

[quote author=“jimlongo”]I often think that the contributors to this forum are much too myopic, and optimistic about Apple’s position (no offense intended).

I just don’t see a day when Asia and Africa are all tethered to legal copies of an American companies OS (no racism intended).

The question was not: “when will Apple dominate the world”; it was “when will OSX platform outnumber Windows platform”. I was aware, of course that they might both be minority platforms by then, outnumbered by free solutions. Equally, both Windows and Mac OSX might by then be “free” (i.e. financed by service renvenues).

OTOH, suppose Apple sold an OEM phone/communicator based on OSX to Google, who gave it away in Asia and Africa, to be funded by ad revenue and content sales. This could easily be the winning “one laptop per child” for the third world.

[quote author=“sleepygeek”]
OTOH, suppose Apple sold an OEM phone/communicator based on OSX to Google, who gave it away in Asia and Africa, to be funded by ad revenue and content sales. This could easily be the winning “one laptop per child” for the third world.

As i originally opined, licensing is the only way to beat Windows.  After all it is the method they used to gain such prominence.

[quote author=“jimlongo”][quote author=“sleepygeek”]
OTOH, suppose Apple sold an OEM phone/communicator based on OSX to Google, who gave it away in Asia and Africa, to be funded by ad revenue and content sales. This could easily be the winning “one laptop per child” for the third world.

As i originally opined, licensing is the only way to beat Windows.  After all it is the method they used to gain such prominence.

The poll was about outnumbering Windows, not “beating” Windows. Although I optimistically voted 3-5 years to outnumber Windows, I do not believe OS X will ever, even with licensing, “beat” windows in the way that Windows beat Mac OS in the original OS wars.

IMO it’s more like a healthy young tree next to a large and gnarled old one; the younger can outgrow the older, leaving them both living side-by-side.

[quote author=“jimlongo”]I often think that the contributors to this forum are much too myopic, and optimistic about Apple’s position (no offense intended).

I just don’t see a day when Asia and Africa are all tethered to legal copies of an American companies OS (no racism intended).

Please don’t take this as any suggestion that Apple is not a great company with great products, with a decade of superb growth ahead for its shareholders . . . I just don’t see total world domination in the picture.  And if I’m wrong then I hope that we don’t become like every other company that’s achieved that goal.

OS X’s penetration over the next decade will come more from devices (iPod, iPhone, etc.) than from Mac sales.

I see the PC gradually fading in market importance. Windows will soon hit a technology wall. I do see OS X devices in aggregate exceeding the base of Windows-related devices in time.

While the Macintosh might not become popular for the foreseeable future in emerging economies and certain regional economies, OS X-based devices should more than fill in the gap.

OS X devices will be Apple’s $400 PC, and, soon, $200 PC for the developing world.

I’m voting for 3-5 years as an optimistic possibility, because I think the iPhone and the like are going to get very cheap once Apple develops its mobile gaming platform and starts collecting licensing fees from game developers.  IF they don’t then 6-9 years.

2 cents.

iPhone has reached 1M sold 8 times as fast as iPod. So it should take about a year to reach 100M

I’m keeping this quote handy for June 28th, 2008.