More Thoughts On Steve Balmer Leaving Microsoft

This is only a preliminary thought on the news that Steve Balmer will be stepping down as CEO of Microsoft.

• He screwed up Surface bad and the board wants him gone.  He had number opportunities to compete against the iPhone and Android and he failed to deliver.  With Windows and the PC market in a critical condition and at an inflection point, Windows 8 was worse than Vista ever was.  And Windows Phone is gaining shares but only because Nokia is selling devices at a loss or break-even.
• I'm excited that Microsoft might bring in someone who will rejuvenate the company and put Apple and Google on notice.  A product guy who gets it.  Not another sales guy like Balmer.  

However, I also wonder if it's too late for Microsoft.  Think Palm.  Dell.  HP.  And now more recently, think Blackberry.  Turning a company around isn't easy.  Having said that, Steve Jobs did.  When he took over at Apple, it was weeks from going bankrupt.  

Microsoft is in an infinitely better shape with billions in the bank and continues to make more money than most governments and companies.  But the new CEO has to play offense, get rid of death weight, and, more importantly, care less about making friends or Wall Street happy and willing to piss people off.

Microsoft And Batman: Every Had A Morning When You're Not Sure If You're Gonna Have A Good Day or Not

Have you had a game where you woke up in the morning, and you're not sure if it's going to be a good day or not? I have one of those mornings today. I woke up at 5 AM. As my custom, I reach for my Nexus, and I opened up my RSS feed reader.

It's a Friday. Nothing happens on Friday. Are so I thought. Still only 5 AM.

I was greeted with two headlines that I thought was a joke.

The first one was that Steve Ballmer, Microsoft CEO, will be resigning within 12 months. I mumbled to myself, "Nah, this is wrong. He's never going to go. Microsoft is life".

However, it's got to be true. That's because I checked another source. Like Steve Ballmer or not, him leaving Microsoft is a good thing for us mobile warriors.

The second headline, that's the one that had me thinking my Friday might be not a good one.

The next Batman is none other than the man who ruined Daredevil and Tom Clancy's iconic American spymaster, Jack Ryan. Jack Ryan, who was played masterfully by Harrison Ford, will never rise again.

To all my favorite characters, one by one man, and now he's going to ruin the third. And Batman is my favorite of all of them.

This man is none other than Ben Affleck.

So you can see, it's a good Friday because Steve Ballmer is leaving and Microsoft if only be rid of someone who has been choking it to death. This is good for mobile warriors because whoever Microsoft brings as the next CEO has the opportunity to provide an iconic American company and rejuvenate consumer and business technology.

Again, it's a good Friday. I think. Again, it depends on who is the next CEO of Microsoft.

Again, it's a bad Friday. I'm sure. Because Batman is about to be ruined.

- Posted using Mobile

Champagne (Gold) Color iPhone 5S or 6 - Could Apple Charge More for It?

I wonder if Apple could get away with charging more for the new gold hue, champagne, that will be joining the white and black for the new iPhone, iPhone 5S or 6 depending on who you talk to.

 

I'm guess specs and storage for specs and storage, Apple probably would get chastised for trying to cater and gouge users just because it can by pricing the gold iPhone higher.

 

However, there is one way Apple can avoid charging more for the gold version.  What it can do is offer the gold version at 32 and 64 GB - forcing the affluent or those who might want to appear rich to pay $100 or $200 more.  They would still get something out of it - bigger storage whether they need it or not.

 

And here's the thing, an extra 16 GB isn't going to cost Apple much and most of the $100 extra are just pure profit anyway.  

 

And trust me, the rich will have no problem paying for it.  My guess is that most of them already shell out for the 32GB or more already anyway.  

 

So, Apple might only offer the new color for the 64 GB iPhone version. 

Chinese Are Rich - Will To Shell Out Nearly $500 For Next iPhone

Source: Business Insider Via Dave the Mobile Sage.

I'll be honest with you.  I'll willing to shell out the full retail price for an iPhone only because I refuse to give carriers the satisfaction of overcharging me and then I take the phone and use the cheapest plan I can find.  And luckily, I save all year or two for one.

Now, living in Southern California, I see a lot of rich folks.  But the new Chinese immigrants are especially affluent.  So, when I read how they're willing to shell out nearly $500 for a new iPhone Color, I was not at all surprised.

In fact, there are many who speculated that a new color, champagne, for the iPhone 5S or iPhone 5 could be aimed squarely at the rich in Shanghai and other major cities that affluent lives.

While the new iPhone Color could be a boom for Apple, I still don't think it'll be enough to allow Apple to gain significant sales there only because the gap between those who can afford to pay $500 for a phone is so wide and much of China are still poor.

iPhone Color, While Important to Apple, Is Only One Part of Apple's Greater Mobile Strategy and Ecosystem

ZDNet has hits and misses with their posts, particularly about Apple.  In this post, I generally consider it a good post because, while I don't agree with most of it, it's a good analysis of why Apple would release a high end iPhone as well as a mid-range one with different colors.

It's worth a read to get at what Apple is planning.

For the most part, Apple doesn't play defense.  It play offense whether it releases a new revolutionary product and moves into a new market, improves on existing ones, or when it allow one of its products to cannibalize another as the iPad is doing to Macs - just as long as it is taking up PC share as well.

Even with the iTunes ecosystem, Apple continues to add new contents while it works on improving its hobby, the Apple TV.

The thing is you cannot take each product unto itself and focus on it.  You have to sit back and see the various pieces within Apple's mobile strategy and how to work to expand Apple's size of the market.

There is one segment in the post regarding dumb phones and how Apple will try to capture that big part of the cell phone market with the iPhone Colors.  I just want to expand on that a bit.  Apple is not just after anyone else who have not bought a smartphone just yet.  In fact, I wager that while Apple would like anyone who has never own a modern mobile device like the iPhone or an Android device, Apple's color iPhones are also meant to be an assault on the rest of the smartphone market as well - those who bought into the cheaper lower spec Android or Windows Phone segments of the market, those who are looking to the iPhone.

As far as momentum of the iPhone, I'm not worried about that at all.  Apple continues to expand iPhone sales and chip away at the rest of the mobile market a few percentage at a time.  The color iPhones will only serve to hasten Apple's expanding market share.

Then again, it's not so much that that market share is important to Apple as it gains the right customer base who can appreciate its ecosystem and capture as much of the mobile profits as it can.  So, while iPhone Color will be the newest Apple mobile device, it will still be only one of the many moving parts of Apple's mobile philosophy.

"Steve Jobs" Schools - Dutch Innovation or What? Worth Keeping Close Eyes On

Apparently, Steve Jobs' attitude towards schools and the rigidity of the educational systems has not only be captured in history but now also in practice. O4NT, or Onderwijs voor een nieuwe tijd (Education for a new era), is looking to put an iPad into the hands of a young student and provide them with a virtual school that allows them the flexibility to new skills - communication, collaboration, problem solving and creativity, and, of course, school subjects as well.

This is their Website - I'll let you click through to see more of what they offer.  Recommended.

Just recently, the Los Angeles Unified School District, signed a deal, the biggest of its kind, to provide its students with iPads.  And I just hope that someone at LAUSD is watching this as well.  The concept that I love about O4NT is that with the iPad, it's possible to have school all year round as they'll likely be carried around by the students.

Even during summer months when students go off and do summery stuff, they also tend to forget things they learned the previous school months.  And the iPad offers an opportunity for the child to embrace learning that's fun and keeps them engaged.

The idea is ingenious.  It makes learning less of a chore and more like projects and that isn't teachers lecturing at the students and putting them to sleep.

This is one of those Think Different ideas that Steve Jobs and Apple has inspired that could well change the world of education as well know it.  For too long, our educational system has been a drag on the students despite the great amount of resources that have been poured into failing schools.

I look forward to see how O4NT works out and whether iPad-based learning at the LAUSD makes any difference or not.

Candy Colored iPhones To Be Apple's Mobile Drug Into Its Ecosystem - It Worked with the iMac

Steve Jobs once said that Apple made the icons in OS X look so good that you want to lick them.  He wasn't joking.  Okay, he was but you totally get what he means if you've been in Apple's sphere of influence for any number of years.  The thing is, Apple paid great amount of attention to designs of its hardware and software that is unmatched by anyone else in the industry.

I'm sure there are a few who wanted to lick their colorful iMacs and iPods.  Now, it looks like Apple wants you to lick the next iPhone as well.  There is a model that Apple will introduce on September 10th that will sport a variety of colors, maybe around five, no one know for sure how many and which colors.

The point is, these colorful iPhones will be Apple's gateway drug into its ecosystem.  That's not all.  Apple will price them low enough to entice some mid-market users but not so low that it dilutes the iPhone brand.  And that's in 2013.

In 2014, Apple will likely to continue this trend with additional color changes as it tweaks the colors by adding or getting rid of some to give what the market wants.  And furthermore, even possibility of lowering the prices as well while also adding new features held over from 2013's top of the line iPhone also to be introduced on September 10th.

Apple has always maintained that the market-share isn't what it wants to go after.  It wants to make the best damn product it can and let the market settle things.  Well, it looks like Apple does want a bigger piece of the piece.  Have a mid-range iPhone with different colors would further differentiate itself from its competitors while taking customers away and locking them within the fine walls of the app store system.

It'll be interesting to see how Apple will try to position these iPhones, market them to the users, and what type of mobile users they'll attract.