Any ideas what this was referring to? "We know from painful experience that letting a third party layer of software come between the platform and the developer ultimately results in sub-standard apps and hinders the enhancement and progress of the platform." ???
I think this whole thing has more to do with Apple's philosophy about user experience. Apple likes to control its user experience as much as possible (witness the fact that they're handling creative for the first ads on the iAd platform, which isn't a particularly popular move with ad agencies). By owning hardware, software, and all layers of the dev environment, as well distribution (Apple retail stores and the iTunes/iBooks/App stores), Apple is able to ensure exceptional user experience. That's always been their philosophy, though they've held more or less true to this vision depending on their own leadership, financial position, and the outside market.
I don't know if you've ever read The Innovator's Dilemma by Clayton Christensen (which is a great book, btw), but I agree very much with Christensen's theory that for any product or service, closed ecosystems win when the user experience is not 'good enough', and open systems win once the user experience reaches that point. With closed ecosystems, where you have a high level of vertical integration, you're always going to be able to create a better user experience for the product or service, because you control every aspect of it. But once people are generally satisfied with the user experience, the benefits of an open ecosystem, in terms of cost, flexibility, etc. trump.
It's happened to Apple before, certainly in the desktop space, and it will happen again in the smartphone space. The mistake Nokia made was to try to push open standards on smartphones before the user experience was 'good enough'. In doing so, they completely lost track of the user experience (hello, Symbian?). Only after Apple created the first smartphone that was actually 'good enough' did Nokia wake up to this. But ultimately other smartphones will catch up enough in terms of user experience that the magic that Apple creates just won't be much of a differentiating factor. My hope (as an Apple fan) is that Apple will be tackling the next market where the user experience isn't 'good enough.'
"We know from painful experience that letting a third party layer of software come between the platform and the developer ultimately results in sub-standard apps and hinders the enhancement and progress of the platform." ???
I think this whole thing has more to do with Apple's philosophy about user experience. Apple likes to control its user experience as much as possible (witness the fact that they're handling creative for the first ads on the iAd platform, which isn't a particularly popular move with ad agencies). By owning hardware, software, and all layers of the dev environment, as well distribution (Apple retail stores and the iTunes/iBooks/App stores), Apple is able to ensure exceptional user experience. That's always been their philosophy, though they've held more or less true to this vision depending on their own leadership, financial position, and the outside market.
I don't know if you've ever read The Innovator's Dilemma by Clayton Christensen (which is a great book, btw), but I agree very much with Christensen's theory that for any product or service, closed ecosystems win when the user experience is not 'good enough', and open systems win once the user experience reaches that point. With closed ecosystems, where you have a high level of vertical integration, you're always going to be able to create a better user experience for the product or service, because you control every aspect of it. But once people are generally satisfied with the user experience, the benefits of an open ecosystem, in terms of cost, flexibility, etc. trump.
It's happened to Apple before, certainly in the desktop space, and it will happen again in the smartphone space. The mistake Nokia made was to try to push open standards on smartphones before the user experience was 'good enough'. In doing so, they completely lost track of the user experience (hello, Symbian?). Only after Apple created the first smartphone that was actually 'good enough' did Nokia wake up to this. But ultimately other smartphones will catch up enough in terms of user experience that the magic that Apple creates just won't be much of a differentiating factor. My hope (as an Apple fan) is that Apple will be tackling the next market where the user experience isn't 'good enough.'
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