Lo market share is badge of honor for Mac-heads

JEK

Senior Insider
Low market share is badge of honor, as far as Mac faithful are concerned

By Mike Langberg
Mercury News
Here's a multiple-choice Apple Computer trivia question:

How much has the Mac's share of the worldwide personal computer market increased since the beginning of the second Jobs era? Choose from:

A. Market share is up 50 percent.

B. Market share has doubled.

C. Market share has tripled.

OK, pencils down. The correct answer is:

D. None of the above.

Oddly enough, that's OK.

Steve Jobs returned to Apple's helm in the summer of 1997, after being forced out 12 years earlier, and revived the Cupertino company he and Steve Wozniak founded 30 years ago next Saturday.

Apple is now more successful than ever. Sales and profits are setting records every quarter. New models of Apple's Macintosh computers appear on magazine covers and make cameo appearances in numerous Hollywood movies and TV shows. Apple's iPod is bringing new acolytes into the Mac fold.

Yet despite well-deserved acclaim for design and ease of use, Apple's share of the worldwide PC market has tumbled from 4.6 percent in 1996, the year before Jobs returned, to just 2.2 percent in 2005.

Microsoft's bland and virus-prone Windows operating system continues to grab more than 90 percent market share.

Apple has pursued a deliberate strategy of appealing to a narrow audience of computing enthusiasts. These enthusiasts, the Mac faithful, understand the value of what Apple offers. They are willing to pay more than buyers of what hard-core Macophiles snidely dismiss as ``Windoze.''

Apple's main consumer desktop computer, for example, is the new iMac with an Intel processor starting at $1,299.

It's possible to get a Windows desktop computer and monitor for as little as $399, after mailing a bunch of rebate coupons. Such a system offers much less performance and fewer features than the Mac, but it's good enough for the vast majority of computer users.

Apple is thriving by not worrying about being a low-price leader. In comparison, the two biggest manufacturers of Windows PCs -- Dell and Hewlett-Packard -- do little better than break even at best on PCs they sell to consumers.

The Mac's tiny corner of the market is sufficiently lucrative to support continuing state-of-the-art innovation in the Mac OS X operating system and related software such as iTunes, iPhoto, iMovie, Spotlight and Safari.

So there's no immediate reason for Apple or Mac users to fret.

Meanwhile, the two research firms that track computer market share -- Gartner and IDC -- are in close agreement on Apple's decline.

Gartner puts Apple's 1996 share at 4.6 percent, IDC at 5.1 percent. Market share in 2005 was 2.2 percent from Gartner and 2.3 percent from IDC. According to Gartner, Apple's market share peaked at 15.8 percent in 1980 -- four years before the Mac was introduced.

``It's a puzzle for sure, to the average Mac user,'' says Leander Kahney, author of the 2004 book ``The Cult of Mac'' and an editor at Wired News in San Francisco. ``They are baffled that more people don't use the Mac.''

Apple is somewhat stronger in U.S. consumer market share, with Gartner giving Apple 5.8 percent in 2005 and IDC at 2.9 percent.

It's also worth noting that Apple's worldwide market share did move up slightly last year from 1.9 percent in 2004, according to Gartner, or 2.0 percent, according to IDC.

That's because Mac sales are exceeding industry growth rates. Apple shipped 38 percent more Macs in the fiscal year ended Sept. 24, 2005, than in the prior year, and shipments were up 20 percent in the last three months of 2005.

The Mac mini, introduced last year at $499 and now starting at $599, is no doubt stoking the trend by giving newcomers an inexpensive way to join the faithful.

Sales could get another boost later this year when Apple is expected to introduce an upgrade of its aging iBook consumer notebook computer, and from Microsoft's decision last week to delay the launch of the consumer version of its new Windows Vista operating system into early 2007.

Ultimately, PC market share may become irrelevant. As shown by the iPod's success, Apple looks to be reinventing itself as a digital entertainment company, and could introduce future consumer products that use the Mac operating system but aren't regarded as computers.

In the dark days before Jobs came back to rescue Apple from heavy losses and listless design, however, Mac believers often felt beleaguered and defensive. But now the clouds have lifted.

``Apple's always had a small market share,'' says Maureen ``Mo'' Langdon, a Mac systems administrator and chairman of Macruzer, the Santa Cruz County Macintosh User Group. ``So you just carry on. And you have that knowledge that, by George, it is a better computer.''

``People don't look down on you -- `You're still using a Mac?' -- like they did five or six years ago,'' added Steve Bellamy, an advertising agency executive in Menlo Park and president of the Stanford/Palo Alto Macintosh User Group.

Kahney, who regularly writes about the most devout of Mac true believers, concludes: ``Mac users are very confident these days. They're hipper and smugger than ever. Low market share is a badge of honor. It shows exclusivity.''
IV and I agree!!!
 
Re: Lo market share is badge of honor for Mac-head

Apple could easily have gone out of business if Jobs hadn't come to an agreement with Gates regarding support for MS Office. That said, techies love Apple for its comprehensive hardware and software approach to stylish, intuitive computing. Microsoft, by comparison, seems clunky and hard to use. They can't be like Apple because a) they don't make the hardware and b) with dominant market share, they need to support all their previous legacy applications and vendors. Some would add c) they have no taste.

The small market share allows Apple to do things that Microsoft wouldn't dare to do like give up on their previous customers by totally changing their operating system to OSX or changing the chips they support from IBM to Intel. Also, the face of computing is changing away from OS and spreadsheets and toward internet and entertainment. Hence, Apple is changing the Mac Mini which will become a home entertainment system for storing all of your digital photos, songs, videos, etc. The iPod will plug into it for easy portability and maybe grow wireless connectivity.

The decades-long battle between Steve Jobs and Bill Gates continues. It had been said that Apple is a regulated monopoly - regulated by Microsoft. But the worm is turning and Apple is beginning to look like a dominant player in the entertainment future.
 
Re: Lo market share is badge of honor for Mac-head

All that and more. Think of all the technologies that emerged first on Apple:
Plug and Play networking (Appletalk)
Firewire IEEE1394
USB
WiFi 802.11(a/b/g)


Can't wait for the next wave!
 
Re: Happy 30th Apple

Long story short is that Windows is a cheap (well, not so cheap) knockoff of Macintosh. I actually had PCheads try to tell me Back In The Day how "using MSDOS is REAL computing while Mac is just video games".

Uh, yeah, uh huh.
 
Low market share is badge of honor, as far as Mac faithful are concerned

Assuming Steve Jobs is a Mac faithful, do you think he feels low market share is a badge of honor? That would certainly make for some interesting Monday morning sales meetings.
 
Re: Happy 30th Apple

Long story short is that Windows is a cheap (well, not so cheap) knockoff of Macintosh. I actually had PCheads try to tell me Back In The Day how "using MSDOS is REAL computing while Mac is just video games".
yes but here is the deal..at least on a business level...I have a ton of money invested in PC's and Windows programs etc...and there is no way I could afford to get rid of it all in every shop, and at home, and at the office, and start all over again.....no way....now it seems to me that if Macs are so much better and all and I would absolutely change over if I could see first hand how much better they are...then it would behoove the Apple people to maybe have a small business conversion program, i.e. give me one to try out and if is far superior, as they say it is, to what I have...then work a sweet deal for me to convert....in the long run Apple will have a lifetime customer and make more then enough money off me to equalize the initial deal where they didnt make so much money off me.....that is the only way you are going to get Ma/Pa businesses like myself to even consider switching over......


btw..Apple stock is down 25% for the year so far....so something is going on out there
 
Re: Happy 30th Apple

Miker: Apple now does have a way to convert a LOT of that stuff over seamlessly. Of course, your Microsoft Office stuff IS already converted - you use it crossplatform without a glitch. I use Office on my PC at work, email whatever I am working on to myself at home and use Office on my Mac at home. Other than the Mac version being a little better (Bill Gates admitted that the Mac version has more bells and whistles) the two versions are identical.

MANY programs are now being made in dual-platform and Apple has a way to transfer all that stuff - without the viruses and other nasty things - into a nice fresh Mac at the push of a button. So, yes, you can make the switch with minimal to no effort.

As to the stock being down, Apple is in court in France and London fighting The French Government and Sir Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr, Ms Harrison and Yoko Ono. After the grand runup last year with IPODs, the stock price taking a breather makes sense in light of current litigation.
 
Re: Happy 30th Apple

I realize it can convert..I'm talking about the enormous expense of replacing equipment.. equipment that is essentially, at the current time, working well, on the theory that something else would work better....thats a lot of money to fix what aint broken....so incentives are needed here....very good incentives.

I believe the stock slid way before all that happened
 
Re: Happy 30th Apple

but if they dont care to capture me as a customer....then I dont care to throw my money at them....Business 101
 
Re: Happy 30th Apple

its got more to do with budget constraints then how I "spend it as I choose"....you of all people should understand that concept....I've spoken to many other small business owners about this very thing and the overwhelming response is...."I cant afford it and Apple sure as hell doesnt go out of their way to make me think about it at least".....if it ends up being an elitist product for those with big budgets,...so be it....life with the programs we run now aint all that bad to begin with...what we dont know wont hurt us....its no big deal
 
Re: Happy 30th Apple

Whatever works works.

As such, if you are happy with your current product, there is no need to pursue others.

If Mac is the Rolls Royce of computers, that doesn't mean that Mercedes is not a good car.
 
Re: Happy 30th Apple

yup....if I was starting up a business and had no equipment, I certainly would look at Macs and compare performance vs price, etc.....but as an established biz with IBM style PC's.....no can do without huge incentives......and that is a significant market that Apple is simply not going after...which probably at least partially explains their low market share, which I suppose, makes them "cool"...so....whatever
 
Re: Happy 30th Apple

I think the characteristics of PCs vs Macs reflects the personalities of Bill Gates vs Steve Jobs. One cares more about market share ("our fair share - 100%") while the other cares more about esthetics.
 
Re: Apple Number 1 on BW 50

no thanks..I dont buy any tech stock with a PE higher then 20 .....at 37, its too speculative....and I've already rode this puppy up once from 24 bucks.....whenever one goes back in for a second helping....thats when you get burnt to a crisp
 
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