At least, that’s the impression you get from its latest move: dropping Mac applications from its Apple Design Awards, presented during the its Worldwide Developers Conference. In 2009 there was an OSX developer Showcase alongside the iPhone Developer Showcase. This year? Well, iPad is here, and three’s a crowd, one had to go.
While the Apple Design Awards are a tiny insignificant detail in the grand scheme of things, this is still a clear pointer for anyone who had not yet noticed, that Apple is keen to focus on its locked-down devices ahead of its computers. It’s better business, because a mobile device yields multiple revenue streams: money from the device sale, money from the mobile contract, money from app sales via the only permitted route, the App Store. There is also an argument that it is better for the user, since a locked-down device is more secure and less likely to be break, though you have to set that against loss of freedom, and the impact of a single-supplier market on price and competition. It also fits with bigger industry trends, where devices are mobile and data is in the cloud, that are shaping the computing landscape.
Reading too much into something you define as “tiny” and “insignificant”.
It amazes me that people are so irritated that Apple makes money on the App Store, when the fact is that developers make more money there and consumers pay less there. It truly is a win for everyone except the companies who use to box, ship and over price the boxed product.
IMHO
Well I don’t think that three is a crowd. While the iPhone & iPad are great Apple should never push OS X to the back of the line at least IMHO.
“Nope” according to Steve JObs. Apple still loves Mac developers.
In fact, the underlying OS and the development tools for the Mac and the iPhone are the same. Thus, every iPhone developer is potentially also a NEW MAC OS X developer! And there are THOUSANDS of iPhone developers – more developers than there are for simply Mac OS X applications. Thus, attracting these developers to Mac OS X via the developer’s conference would greatly improve the number of applications developed for Mac OS X.
IPhone supports Mac. And Mac supports iPhone. It’s that simple.
All this whining reminds me of a little kid who complains that his sister gets cake and ice cream on her birthday, completely forgetting that he’ll get cake and ice cream on his birthday, too.
Mobile is big now. The iPad is new and just took off. Big iPhone and iPhone OS updates coming out soon. in the desktop, OTOH, Snow Leopard is just fine. There are few, if any, recurring complaints that need to be fixed (other than perhaps a few bug issues that will be addressed in point upgrades). Why rock the boat? When 10.7 is ready, then they’ll be talking more about Mac OS X.
Just enjoy your sister’s birthday and realize that yours will come around, too.
+1 for Joe on this one.
However I’m looking forward to find out what’s really gonna happen to Java 7 development on the Mac. “Apple making its own JVM may not be the best way to do it” was quite a bullshit. Why I’d chosen the Mac for development was Apple’s own implementation of the standard JVM. I doubt that with Open JDK 7 for the Mac, they will succeed.