$681.32.
"Our God's
fall was but a mighty one. We did but make his pedestal tall and
narrow."
The life of future Microsoft style monopolies is likely to be
shorter. Either they can't keep up the rate of 'innovation' in patent and
trademark protection after saturating a commodity space, or fickle customers
will move on unimpressed by the discarding of values that made their products
desirable in the face of their dominating the marketplace.
Being a Silicon
Graphics alumnus I can't help but think of a John Bell aphorism to the effect
that an orangutan could lead a company in an expanding market (it seemed to
strike close to home at the time).
How Apple acts when they've started
sliding off the pedestal will be most telling. "I've seen marks like these on
the shoulders of drowned men before. They're made by the distinctive cleats of
fisherman's boots when trying to climb up on each others shoulders to reach the
surface."
Using intellectual property protectionism as a means to insure
market domination by repressing competition is bound to be a short term
solution. It places them entirely at the mercy of product perception. "You're
holding it wrong" or "Dings and nicks are to be expected" can only hold off
customer product perception so long. Instead of diversifying Apple appears to
be trying to dominate their present product niches. It seems incompatible with
the values that drove their products to high regard.
The quality of iOS
maps or perceptions of Siri usability foreshortening from original claims are
examples of strong negatives. There's a product quality pedestal, too. You
can imagine the size of product manuals will start growing again as Apple's view
of how to do things dominates and functionality becomes more cryptic (again).
Look to Apple's internal Skeuomorphic Design schism. "Sometimes a cigar is just
a cigar". What happens when they rely on artificial distinctiveness?
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