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Gruber: The OS Opportunity

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Re: Gruber: The OS Opportunity

#31

Post by leej »

leej wrote: post #5

Classic Apple fanboy-ism at best with missing knowledge here and there. If OS does matter that much first Google couldn't be such a success and second Apple couldn't enjoy its current success because first 2 (even 3) Mac OS X releases were horribly slow and have very little app support!

i must say i'm puzzled by the downvotes. coming to the main debate articles' points are signs of the "word" i used which i shouldnt. even if i wrote without that intention but i sounded rude. sorry for that. thanks for pohl and mechanical_fish for the comments.

Re: Gruber: The OS Opportunity

#32

Post by tumult »

Raphael_Amiard wrote: post #12
tumult wrote: post #2

Read this earlier. Dead on. Any company which cannot build decent software does not have a bright future. Not just in computers -- probably any field. Software is becoming a more pervasive part of life every year. The many who cannot adapt will be easily replaced by the few who can. And with software, it really is easy for one person or company to replace thousands in a single stroke. For now, though, this effect is…

I don't see how that is the case, since the main software supplier in the world today that is microsoft, is totally dependent on hardware manufacturers. I don't see Intel, (ok easy example) or any other hardware manufacturer dying anytime soon. The only one who 'could' die are those whose job is only about assembling hardware components together. And even them have a role in the low end market that will be very hard…

Intel makes some very good software -- for example, their compilers.

Car companies that cannot produce good software are indeed dying. The next generation driving systems rely heavily on a software component (traction control, user interface feedback, gas management and hybrid drive, Tesla's power management, etc) and those which cannot make the leap to produce software in tandem with their car hardware are facing irrelevance.

Re: Gruber: The OS Opportunity

#33

Post by blasdel »

ugh wrote: post #30
mechanical_fish wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your safest bet is to simply never use the word "fanboy" except to refer to yourself. It's name-calling, and is therefore both rude and a sign of bad rhetoric. (I would say ad hominem , but that's a cliche phrase on HN, so I do so with reluctance. ;) As for the rest of your post, here is Gruber's thesis statement: PC makers who want to succeed should create their own OSes Your statement that "Google succeeds without…

“The iPod, of course, is successful because of iTunes.” Really?! Now maybe. But five years ago? I have a very hard time believing that.

You've got it backwards :)

Right now, with the iPhone and iPod Touch, you don't really need to connect them to a computer at all. When I bought my first iPod in 2003, that was absolutely the case, and all the existing PC software for organizing your music sucked ass. I had to use fucking Musicmatch Jukebox to sync my iPod, and the alternative library programs were even worse.

The release iTunes for Windows was a godsend to me -- sure it's pretty resource hungry and has only gotten moreso, but it's pretty fucking fantastic at just getting the basic library management stuff right. Being able to easily rip to AAC was gravy, as it meant that I no longer had to have some of my albums as lossless (MP3's psychoacoustics shit all over gravelly voices). I switched to a Mac a few years later.

Re: Gruber: The OS Opportunity

#34

Post by ugh »

blasdel wrote: post #33
ugh wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“The iPod, of course, is successful because of iTunes.” Really?! Now maybe. But five years ago? I have a very hard time believing that.

You've got it backwards :) Right now, with the iPhone and iPod Touch, you don't really need to connect them to a computer at all. When I bought my first iPod in 2003, that was absolutely the case, and all the existing PC software for organizing your music sucked ass . I had to use fucking Musicmatch Jukebox to sync my iPod, and the alternative library programs were even worse. The release iTunes for Windows was a god…

See, iTunes never mattered that much to me when I first got a iPod. And I do actually like iTunes.

But everyone I know who ever got a iPod absolutely loathed iTunes. iTunes was not the reason, the hardware was. I have seen that change with the iPhone. Of course, no data, just anecdotes.

Re: Gruber: The OS Opportunity

#35

Post by MaysonL »

GeneralMaximus wrote: post #14

I was born in 1990. The first computer that I could call my own was a custom built PC with Windows XP. This was in 2003. I cannot express in words how sad that makes me. I've heard older programmers talk fondly about the BeOS, the classic MacOS, Amiga Workbench (IIRC), NeXtStep and even Win3.1. Even older programmers talk about computers built by Tandy and the BBC, and the legendary machines built by Atari and Commod…

I was born in 1946. I didn't get a computer I could call my own until I was 33. Stop whining.

(You could also buy some antique computers, restore them, and explore their OSs).

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