Can $100m a year keep Google on the iPhone? A new report says that Apple has over one hundred million reasons not to dump Google from the iPhone and replace it with either Microsoft Bing or its own made-in-Cupertino search service. According to a source "familiar with Apple's operations" speaking with Silicon Valley Insider, the rumor that Apple will launch its own …
I must confess, I didn't believe the $50bn claim. I thought he meant market capitalisation (the total worth of the company) but that's actually $180bn.
Point of order, though. $50bn is the projected revenue for Apple for the year ending September 2010. Revenue for 2008-9 was 'only' $35bn, but that comes with pre-tax profits of $8bn. 22% of revenue going straight to profit is a huge amount, which should make it perfectly clear quite how overpriced Apple's products really are...
Steve gets a halo icon though, because this dig at him comes with admiration at pulling off such a feat.
//Yahoo! search is also supported, but you have to dig into Safari's search-engine settings to make the change//
so at worst its
1) Press the "home button"
2) Optional: Swoosh to Setting Icon (if not already on that home page)
3) Press Settings Icon
4) Swoosh down to Safari
5) Press Safari Icon
6) Press Search Engine "Google"
7) Select "Yahoo"
8 Press Home Button
it sound more onerous when listed out above, but itsall only takes a couple of seconds
its not exactly greping and awking your way around unix via command line
or
setting the show and print "hidden text" options on a word document,
Please stop making the assumption that Google gets its money from searching. It does not, it gets the money from the little ads that show each time you search for something.
Apple is almost there with iTunes, but not quite. This is why they are fighting over search. Search is a service, not a business. But the collaterals have proven to be so profitable for Google that Apple wants to have a similar revenue source.
Sorry, unless Google manages to pull off a small miracle this year, Chrome OS is going to be a direct competitor to absolutely no-one (not even Windows). Read the interview with the lead developers at Ars Tech last month and you'll see that its development is an absolute cack-handed mess of conflicting priorities that they haven't even begun to sort out. They shouldn't have even started the project before they got the fundamentals nailed but in true Google fashion they are forging ahead before they are even half-ready. Their track record also doesn't inspire any confidence: has there been a single product from Google in the past 5 years that hasn't been a half-baked, me-too effort at launch? Wave, Android, Buzz, Docs, etc have all been major let downs at the get go. Chrome OS is clearly another effort that is going to fall into the same category.
If anything, this competition should be good for customers in the end - more innovation, more choice.
"We did not enter the search business. They entered the phone business. Make no mistake: they want to kill the iPhone. We won’t let them." said Jobs, CEO of Apple, a phone company since 1901.
It always amuses me how they sell iPhones and Macs with completely contradictory ad campaigns. They emphasis the number of apps on the iPhone, ignoring the pitiful number for the Mac in comparison to a PC (or even Linux). Hopefully the competition from Android will force them to open the iPhone a bit, otherwise it will be a repeat of the mac vs PC wars, locked-down vs freedom for all, and we all know who won that (at least up to 10 years ago).
I don't understand why the quantity of applications on Windows is seen as a good thing, when you consider that 95%+ of them will never been seen by 99%+ of users, and most of them being copies of existing applications rebranded by another vendor, a lot of the time very badly implemented and if they're "free" they typically come with some difficult to remove adware (which if you even manage to remove it, cripples the app itself).
This is usually where somebody points out that Apple keep going on about the size of their app store, but what you need to remember here is that Apple are promoting it's growth to both users and developers, it doesn't matter that a lot of the applications are useless rubbish (fart apps anyone?), what does matter is that they're pushing developers to get creative and some outstanding apps are being produced and sold. What do we have on WinMo? The same old crap we had on Win95. The developers have lost interest in Windows Mobile.
Apple looking into a developing their own search and actually planning to introduce search function of their own are two very different things. Apple likes to have back-up plans if the status quo changes. They did this when they changed to Intel chips. They had a separate Intel compatible OSX version ready to go if they needed it. I'm sure the same goes for search (and maps). They may be exploring it if they need to take that route, but they will only do it if they have to. Apple wisely likes to stay as simple and focused as they can. They won't add unnecessary complexity to the company unless they have to. Google is the one upsetting the Apple cart here. They weren't content with the domination they enjoy in the search / ads and mapping, they had to get into phones, browsers and now operating systems - moves that destroyed their good partnership with Apple. Google's actions now require Apple to explore getting into the ad business and maybe search - a departure from their business model of mainly getting their income from hardware sales. Google, however, has left them with little choice. In the end, I think that Google overly aggressive tactics will be to their own detriment.
Apple looking into a developing their own search and actually planning to introduce search function of their own are two very different things. Apple likes to have back-up plans if the status quo changes. They did this when they changed to Intel chips. They had a separate Intel compatible OSX version ready to go if they needed it. I'm sure the same goes for search (and maps). They may be exploring it if they need to take that route, but they will only do it if they have to. Apple wisely likes to stay as simple and focused as they can. They won't add unnecessary complexity to the company unless they have to. Google is the one upsetting the Apple cart here. They weren't content with the domination they enjoy in the search / ads and mapping, they had to get into phones, browsers and now operating systems - moves that destroyed their good partnership with Apple. Google's actions now require Apple to explore getting into the ad business and maybe search - a departure from their business model of mainly getting their income from hardware sales. Google, however, has left them with little choice. In the end, I think that Google overly aggressive tactics will be to their own detriment.
I don't think google has much to worry about they are far better company in terms of the quality of the product they produce and the price point, or lack of in many cases. the companys ethics are also much better apple will.continue to be a locked down company and are destined to lose in the mobile market.
From Google's ten things: "Our users trust our objectivity and no short-term gain could ever justify breaching that trust."
The ubiquitous Nexus ads seem to indicate that we can not trust Google's objectivity. And the short-term gain by placing Nexus ads everywhere in order to make MONEY with their unoriginal phone breaches our trust.
"We did not enter the search business," Jobs said in reference to Google. "They entered the phone business. Make no mistake: they want to kill the iPhone. We won’t let them."
That's a bit rich, when Apple entered the phone business it was hardly their core business. I'm sure Nokia et al, were pretty peeved when the iPhone came out, but they didn't feel the need to start making MP3 players and overpriced PCs!
Andy
"A two-one-hundredths per cent drop in revenue would hardly be noticed..."
Actually 100 millions is twenty hundredths per cent of 50 billions.
A two-one-hundredths per cent would be 10 millions.
I can only hope that my finances ever get to the point that such a
difference would be unnoticeable...
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