[Ti] Re: IBM introduces new PowerPC processors

[~flipper]

Henry Kalir wrote:

>>Apple has done well selling a product you couldn't get anywhere 
>>else, and charging a premium price for it.
>
>Chris...stop it! Apple has NOT done well.

Henry... look at stock market comparisons: Apple has done just fine. 
Lots of cash, no debt to speak of... a gadget called the iPod that 
will equal their entire computer division's top-line revenue in the 
next 18 moonths...i mean, come on, they aren't hurting at all.

I hope you're right about the idea that Dell, or someone, could move 
in the direction of the powerPC chips, later. That's a comforting 
thought, as far as i'm concerned.

Your idea that people are overwhelmingly using Windows is accurate in 
most respects, but bear in mind a large chunk of the so-called 
Windows 'installations are machines sold with Windows 9not by choice) 
and then loaded with Linux, after the fact.

If you look at the history of computers and their development, you 
see a pattern: adoption in scientific circles, then the military, 
then the Computer Sciences in big schools, and, finally, the 
population, at large.

I believe Dennis ritchie is on the staff over here at Syracuse... 
what you want to bet he isn't teaching courses in Windows server 
optimization? At the starbucks, near the university, it's all iBooks 
and Dells... meanwhile, in the labs and classrooms and hallways... 
it's linux, whether you like the idea, or not.

Military, same story...  do work for those guys, on a Compaq, but 
it's all SGML that will end up on hardened linux and OS X servers and 
stuff... they don't trust MS OR Windows any more (if they ever really 
did).

Apple has 'dropped the ball', before. Remember when the Army bought 
200,000 iMacs for part of their civilian workforce a few years back? 
Apple stock ramped up, immediately. Same day, actually.

If they'd ditched the old OS, it would be OS X on the mars rover, 
instead of the backup systems next to all those guys' Linux boxes. It 
takes foresight and the ability to take 'risks', and stellar 
execution in order to 'lead' a market. No doubt.

Risk, strategy, execution.

Want to see what happens when a crappy idea is executed perfectly, 
vs. a great idea executed poorly?

Look at Microsoft and Apple, and see if you can guess who did which.

brian s