Yes, we love Apple and their products...but they are still thinking "local" and it is going to cost them dearly.
From the ability to carry around all of our music IN the iPod to the neat way of running applications ON our phone, Apple has clearly nailed this strategy...
However, this is their downfall.
Content and computing are shifting from being ON the device to IN the cloud and when your business depends on selling high end consumer devices, that is going to be a very big problem going forward.
Adding a camera was a pretty big step for the mobile phone. Then the creation of the app store and all of the wonderful things you could now do with a phone, was a boom for many people/industries.
Where are we going?
It is called cloud computing because the computing is done on the cloud, not the device. The applications and content will be accessed and run in the cloud and not on the device.
So when you're selling a phone for $800, when YOUR COST is $200, but the true cost of just the hardware is $25, that's a very problem for your business.
Apple, and others, should look very closely at Google and their Chromebook to see where the future is headed. The number one selling laptop isn't a laptop at all, it's simply a connection to the cloud.
Indeed Microsoft sees the future and thinks it can give the Chromebook a run for its money with the recently announced partnership with Qualcomm
The next "must have" mobile phone will be a "cloud phone", or something very similar to Chromebook capability in a mobile phone size. A simple device, costing under $100 that just accesses the cloud for your content and applications. You drop it or it gets stolen, no big deal. The battery life will be days now that unnecessary applications dont need to be running constantly. The bandwidth used will shrink (telecoms will love).
I can have access to IBM's Watson and high powered graphics, there is NO point in keeping the computing on the device any more.
The days of different app stores will be a thing of the past and Apple's iTunes gold mine will end fast. Why do I need to download the Facebook app from several stores for different devices? App stores are just glorified browsers and who pays for those?
In 2007 I discussed how Apple could introduce an iTunes browser and become an ecommerce powerhouse, Amazon beat them to it.
In 2010, I stated how Apple could turn their iTunes into the "killer platform" and be a cloud pioneer, but they sacrificed future for device revenue.
The shift from websites to apps that run websites fragmented many industries..that all changes. One app that runs on all devices. Period.
Kodak didn't see the shift from analog to digital. Apple isn't seeing the shift from local to the cloud.
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