4 posts tagged “ipod”
Well now that my holiday vacation is officially over, it is time to get back to work my friends. I really like what Apple is doing with the Macbook Air product. I am sure that the movie and music industries will love it because it prevents the ripping of DVDs and CDs. The Macbook Air has been critiqued by many because it does not allow one to do these very things. However, this machine was not designed to do that, it was designed to be a different kind of machine for people who hate carrying around heavy laptops for meetings, for travel and for college. The MacBook Air also offers colleges and universities a chance to distribute content through iTunesU via iTunes without having to worry about infringement issues that have seen many universities sued by the music industry. The fact that it is so light and stylish many women may buy one to supplement their PCs or their existing Macs. I say this because I witnessed a similar thing occur in the late 90's when lighter digital cameras and pro-sumer cameras began being rolled out by Sony and other camera manufacturers who made a business decision to appeal to this valuable market. All one has to do is to witness what Apple did by creating multi-colored iPods and smaller versions of the iPod like the mini and the nano.
On another front, I loved the fact that the iTunes Store has added movie rentals from all of the major studios at reasonable prices. I think that Apple should offer a movie subscription plan too, if they want to solidify their position in this market and take on NetFlix. Apple should consider offer subscription plans for music and television shows as well. It will be free money, and it will still give folks and option to buy. In fact, subscribers may be more interested in buying after viewing or listening to a movie, a show, an album or a music track. If Apple is going to remain customer driven it will have to do this.
This drives me to the real beneficiary of all of Apple's new efforts: AppleTV Take 2. Steve Jobs admitted that Apple did not get the job done with the original AppleTV, and he was right. This product needs to be where Apple needs to direct its energies for the foreseeable future because it will act as a centerpiece for all of its offerings because of its storage capacity and its ability to tie the computer, the iPhone, the iPod and iTunes together. Apple needs to create its own original content development line and create exclusive deals with the writers once the strike is settled. This will give the writers a chance to develop, distribute, and produce their own products, so that the studios cannot use their heavy-handed tactics on the industry, on electronics makers, and most importantly on the public.
Two of the best examples of this are Apple's distribution of podcasts, and especially its iTunesU content. Apple has not really begun marketing its iTunesU content likes it need to do because if it did Apple could drive iPod and Mac sales through the roof because of all of the concerned parents who want their kids to succeed in the classroom. The Duke iPod project provides hardcore research on student performance that will only serve to justify parents' buying more Apple products. Now that I have digressed, I will return to the importance of original content and why it is important for the Hollywood writers to cut individual and collective deals with companies like Apple. The writers will not win this strike no matter how great of deal they get unless they create their own content distribution centers on places like iTunes, YouTube, AmazonUnboxed, NetFlix, Facebook, Google Tv and Zune Marketplace. All of these online entities desperately need their own original content that is independent of the studios, the networks, and the cable companies.
Why? Have you witnessed the vendetta that NBC Universal has exercised on Apple by pulling its offerings from YouTube, starting HULU, and cutting a deal with device maker SandDisk which is a good manufacturer but they are not in the Apple class, and they are not where the customers are. The customers reside with Apple, and even a Microsoft deal by NBC will not solve this problem. This is like a manufacturer saying I will not put my products in WalMart because I do not like how they operate. NBC does not understand retail, and it is showing. A basic tenet of marketing is that you have a place or distribution where customers can easily buy your goods. How do you throw aware $15 million in profits, and try to play the pimp game by asking for iPod profits like the music industry tried to do to Apple and they failed badly too? Just because Bill Gates and Microsoft caved into the music industry's shakedown by giving them portions of their profits from their Zune media player out of desperation for any market share does not make the industry behavior questionable. If there was real enforcement by the FTC and FCC, there might have been anti-trust investigation into these kinds of deals. If the movie and music industries want all the profits, they need to create their own devices. Oh that's right Sony is doing that and Apple is still dusting them up royally. HULU and rthe rest of the industry owned sites are digital immigrant efforts from digital immigrant companies who are fighting against digital native companies like Apple and Google who understand digital natives and concepts like ease of use. It will take another decade for them to get it right so that the new blood is in charge. Steve Jobs is not Bill Gates! Steve Jobs is an old school player, a real baller and shot caller as the hip hop generation says. NBC made the mistake of trying to pimp a baller, and they got played. Viacom is trying to do the same thing with Google about its YouTube copyright violations even though CBS has a huge YouTube presence.
The writers are the X factor because they can even out the playing field, sign their own individual deals through a special emerging artists and producers program through Apple. If Apple leads, Google, Microsoft and Amazon will follow! It will provide writers, the true content creators, the opportunity to get paid as producers, and to get their worth. This is America, and its the MLK holiday, so why not have a little justice in the industry for a change. Finally, I will keep advocating that Apple develop its own open social network that could act in concert with an AppleTV network of original content just like Fox is doing with MySpace. Google could handle the advertising, and Yahoo could help with the email and other features. Could you imagine all of the Mac, iPod, iPhone, AppleTV and iTunes customers having their own social network? It would instantly be a game changer, and it may make Microsoft wonder why it spent so much money for the Facebook deal. It would also give Google a chance to fire back at Microsoft for taking its Facebook and Digg advertising business away from it. It would also give Google a chance to become a real player in the game. Remember, Yahoo still has the most viewed online news among key demographics that advertisers love. So Steve what is taking you so long to make this happen? Think different again! Make it happen! You can keep the .Mac for pro users, and save it at the same time! Let's here your take, do you agree or disagree?
I love it when the mainstream media, also known as the MSM on the net, finally grasps a concept that I have known in my professional, my academic research, and my professional research: convergence has not only linked the world it has transformed the world. The United States literally went wild this year with the introduction of the iPhone, the iTouch iPod, the classic iPod, Google Apps, the Wii and new marriages of Digg and Facebook with Microsoft. In fact, the iPhone was named the invention of the year by Time Magazine as the first massively adopted convergence device that has an ease of use and innovative features like touch screens, iTunes and You Tube with the Mac interface. A report by the USA Today demonstrates the power of convergence worldwide, and how it has already conquered Japan and people are turning to handhelds like smartphones, handheld media devices like the iPod, gaming devices, and cell phones instead of personal computers.
Experts like Tapscott & Williams, (2006); Steve Jobs, (2007); Bill Gates, (2007); Marc Prensky, (2006); Henry Jenkins (2006); James Paul Gee, (2003, 2004, 2005); and others have been predicted the convergence avalanche. The recent development of the Internet, the iPod, the personal computer, and web-based tools like You Tube and Facebook into single convergence devices that can held in one's hand is the clearly the future of entertainment, learning, government, commerce, home, and work in one device with a quality web camera and video camera with note taking and large memory capacity (Gates, 2007; Jobs, 2007; Pavlik, 2000; Tapscott & Williams, 2006).
The personal nature of cell phones has now extended past the traditional web experience provided by the personal computer. Personal computers, like laptops, are portable, but lack the personal portability and the ability to make calls on the run. Increasingly, our cell phones are becoming portable handheld electronic extensions of our minds, our personalities and our core beliefs and values. McLuhan (1967, 1968) suggested that would occur in the 1960's that we would live in a connected electronic global village and that the medium would be the message.
To be sure, we are moving closer to Star Trek than any of us ever could have imagined more rapidly than most people could have ever thought.
Here is the USA Today article below.
http://www.usatoday.com/tech/products/gear/computing/2007-11-04-japanpcs_N.htm?csp=Tech
In the final analysis, Apple needs to prepare for the day that Steve Jobs is dead and gone literally and figuratively just as Microsoft is doing now. Sales are great now, but Apple has created a lot of professional jealousy and competitive enemies along the way and they need a makeover now to handle all of its recent success and missteps. If Apple does not develop a social network to help drive more consumers to its computers and devices, and does not build out and market its AppleTv brand it will quickly find Microsoft gaining and even surpassing them with its Zune brand coupled with its Xbox gaming platform which is a sexy Microsoft brand. Don't believe me, ask Sony's gaming division. All it takes is having a product that is great but too expensive for consumers and then someone else develops a cheaper alternative with similar features like the Xbox and Wii. Does this sound familiar Cupertino? File this lesson under don't let this happen to you because it can if you start believing all of your own press too much.
Apple cannot afford to take this success for granted and think that things will always be this way because it will not unless their is immediate action taken along with long term planning and action. Apple is already forging alliances with game makers for the iPod. However, I think Apple should create its own gaming portable gaming system that uses touch based technology and interactivity so that it can combine the iPod media with the gaming experience with fitness. This device could work for professional gamers, fitness devotees, casual gamers and even kids. Sony is making the PSP more a true convergence device and Apple needs to create its own portable gaming device that directly take aims at the PSP and make it seamlessly work alone or with any other member of the Apple device or computer family. Apple could use this as an entry to a full scale gaming system that would utilize the Mac interface, touch screen technology, and interactive technology that competes with the Wii and the ability to download, transfer, work in tandem with and communicate with other Apple products. This would be the killer device and it would be perfect working with the AppleTv which in reality could become that device with some tweaking. All of these devices should also incorporate WiFi and WiMax technology for full online capability and even portablilty.
To be sure, Microsoft is on the move, but Apple needs to take notes for the long haul and learn from Microsofts struggles aned success during this decade because Apple is now like Microsoft was at the end of the 1990 and being hunted is harder than hunting. Remember, Microsoft was only saved from being dismantled as a monopoly by the George W. Bush's election when the government was more cooperative. Apple has now heard the whispers of monopoly from sovereign nations like France, Norway and others internationally. In fact, some of these countries passed anti-Apple laws and France was the first country even though Jobs cleverly came back with DRM free music and a brilliant op ed piece aimed squarely at the true villains of DRM abuse: the music industry and now the movie studios. Apple needs to declare victory with the media companies and let them fail if they raise prices too high. Besides if you own an iPhone or a more pimped out iPhone iTouch you will be able to watch network shows on the Internet for free too.
AppleTv has not sold well because the HD, storage capacity and DVR capabilities have not been exploited full by Apple and it has not been marketed properly either. In fact, there are three companies who are actually in business to exploit these three features, and at least one the companies is in Northern California, A social network would ber a perfect place for Apple to market its devices, its brands and its services. The social network could be called the iTunes Network and it could use cloud based applications of iMovie,iChat, iPhoto and Garageband for short clips to get people to buy more Macs. AppleTv would be the Tv network online that shows continues shows with ads included in them with hosts and Apple could also develop original content of its own so that this could turn into an online television network of its own for professional content providers, up and coming content providers, and consumer generated content. Apple's logical partner would be Google because Google can sell all of the advertisements and push its search and YouTube brands. Besides the GoogleTV brand has not set the world on fire and it could benefit as the for-profit version of YouTube where legal user generated content could be sold or rented. If Apple gets these things rolling it can also get its on-demand movie rental service and its movie download business a boost by having independent, old and some features as advertiser based movies.
Apple could then create a mobi-version of this network for iPhones for people on the go that could run through the iTunes Network and AppleTv. However, the real coup for AppleTv would be when AppleTv ran iTunesU programming through televisions for students and professors with ads attached as billboards, icons throughout like soccer games or through straight up advertising and allow the school to choose the advertising as a revenue generator. Naturally, all of this programming would run through the iTunesStore and the iTunesNetwork and AppleTv. Finally, Apple needs to invest in the spectrum with Google and get its own space on line and partner with Cisco, its iPhone partner, and Intel on creating the cloud based system. Quest, which need a partner any partner to be relevant after being dissed by the government and other telecomms for not working with the government on domestic spying, could be its telecom partner for billing purposes if it decides to enter the residential or corporate side for its computer sales, future iPods with limited calling and iPhones.
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