Steinblogger

Apple’s quarterly results put some muscle behind my theory that it is gaining on the strength of the Mac’s full compatibility with Windows and the result that it can participate in the Windows Network Effects and benefit from being a competitor in the same compatibility space. These guys think that it’s one of five reasons Leopard will be a tipping point for Apple. I think Apple is already past the tipping point with Leopard being the lynchpin to hold it in place. An 8.1% share of the US computer market is strong evidence. Yes, the halo effect is working. But the key part for the Mac sales increase is the ability to run Windows, without it the halo effect wouldn’t succeed. Whether or not many people actually use Windows is an open question. I suspect many don’t, but it’s the comfort that you could if you had to that lead people to switch to the Mac.

When I tried to print thirty separate Word documents at school today, I found that the printer I chose to send my document to was not working – and all that time I spent printing from Word seemed wasted. Ugh.

When  you print on OS X, it opens up a printer queue that lists the files you are printing. If the printer is not working, the files just sit there in the list, teasing you. First, I thought that maybe I could find where those files were stored. But then I thought, hey, maybe I can drag them to another printer queue…yes! You can drag printed files from one printer queue (in this case, the one that wasn’t working) into another printer queue, and it will print! No re-printing necessary.

This also led me to figure out a trick to printing secured PDFs that force you to print to the default printer (and not to a PDF writer) so I can read and highlight the text on my computer, and not print it out. (I leave it to you to figure out how I do that, as I’m fairly certain it breaks a user agreement or two.) Thanks, Apple!

Wil Shipley has an excellent post on Apple and it’s recent anti-consumer business decisions. I hope they read it. (thanks to dfbills for the tip)

I’m going to keep updating this post with links for the different iPhone app management sites’ links to comixology.com’s iPhone interface.

addfone.com

touchtip.com

iPhone Application List

I’m one of the “early adopters” stung by Apple’s price drop on the iPhone, which adds up to $400 in my family. Apple’s $100 store credit gesture is nice, but necessary only because the early adopters of the iPhone are mostly Mac owners.

Apple is competing in a new category and needs to compete in a new way, while its core early customers for the iPhone are Mac users that expect Apple to act like Apple Computer, Inc. rather than as a cell phone producer. If Apple behaved like Apple Computer, Inc., it would keep the prices fairly static, shipping new models with new capabilities to keep the prices in place. At the least, it wouldn’t drop prices by a third within the first year or so.

The Motorola RAZR is a great example of how the cell phone marketplace works differently than the computer marketplace. According to the NY Times, the RAZR was released at $499 (yes the same price as the original 4GB iPhone) and was $199 six months later (about 60% less). Within 12 months it was $99. That’s a perfect illustration of how pricing works in the cell phone world. Don’t expect to see iPhones for $99 anytime soon, but don’t expect Apple to give a gift certificate every time they drop the price, either. That’s a one-time gift to us early adopters.

Personally, I’ve gotten at least $100 of value from my iPhone in the last two months. So, I’m good.

I discovered a great iPhone shortcut by accident. While in the email list view, slide your finger left-to-right over the message title and description. The delete button will appear. That drops a click from the deletion process (no need to click edit).It’s fun to discover little touches like this after 7 weeks with the iPhone.

Apple’s new Numbers software doesn’t support custom number formats. That means you can’t use a real value of 10,000,000 but display it as 10M. This is a deal-breaker for me. Hopefully, 1.1 will fix this missing feature. (I’d also like to see full AppleScript support. Heck, any AppleScript support!)

I received my first AT&T bill yesterday. It was a whopping 61 pages long! On top of that, because of all my trials getting the phone activated, AT&T had me down for three accounts with my number and one account for my wife. My heart stopped when I saw the total: $456.99!

I also received my last bill with Sprint. We were very careful about our Sprint accounts, making sure to not renew them so we could switch, pain-free to AT&T. In fact, I called Sprint in May to complain that they surreptitiously renewed both of our accounts. They agreed it was a mistake and confirmed they had removed the renewal. Yet they still charged us a $350 penalty for leaving them! It took over a half hour on the phone to get it rectified.

AT&T only took about 20 minutes. We’ll see next month if we’ve resolved all of it. Part of the shock is that they pre-bill, so I received both July and August. To their credit, they finally heeded my request to give us back our activation fees.

Sprint vs. AT&T, who comes out ahead? I don’t think I’m any worse off than before. So, AT&T comes out ahead simply for being smart enough to get iPhone.

This is what Network Effects are all about. Compatibility. Mossberg calls it versatility.

I already stopped by the Apple Store Soho to pick up iLife and iWork ‘08. They didn’t have it yet. I want to get my hands on Numbers. Finally, Apple is fully back in the business game. The only reason I use Word and PowerPoint is for group projects (and only when I have to share files). Most group presentations I do in Keynote now, because the people who work with me understand what a superior presentation they’ll get if they allow me. Let’s see if Excel stays in my regular stable of applications. I kinda doubt it.

Now all I need is a Keynote viewer for Windows…