The Impact of Steve Jobs

Wednesday, 12 October 2011 05:09

Written by Resti Reyes. Jr.

Upon learning of his passing, President Barrack Obama declared…

"The world has lost a visionary. And there may be no greater tribute to Steve's success than the fact that much of the world learned of his passing on a device he invented."

The man’s passing triggered countless tributes in cyberspace among his legion fans. He has been compared to Leonardo Da Vinci and some have claimed that he is the Thomas Edison of our generation. Mind Wars had not intended to add any more virtual ink to the already enormous amount of accolades heaped upon Steve Jobs, but when the local parish priest based his homily last Sunday on a quote from the Apple founder… let us just say, it cannot be helped. We must acknowledge the influence this man has wielded on such a large part of modern life that it is almost unthinkable to imagine the 21st century without some reference to Jobs and his cool gadgets. For instance, is living in today’s world conceivable without the iPod? – that 21st century equivalent of the Walkman. Without meaning to, Jobs also reinvented the way music is marketed – with the introduction of iTunes, he singlehandedly rewrote the rules of music marketing and distribution.

He is regarded with such reverence that even his competitors bowed and withdrew their planned introduction of a new product the day after he died. Samsung Electronics announced that it had delayed the launch of a new smartphone based on Google's latest version of the Android operating system while the world was mourning the passing of Apple co-founder Steve Jobs.

Samsung had planned the new product to be launched based on the Ice Cream Sandwich operating system, which would unite the Android software used in both tablet PCs and smartphones, during their Mobile Unpack event in San Diego only a few days after the death of Jobs.

"We decided it was not the right time to announce a new product while the world was expressing tribute to Steve Jobs's passing," a Samsung spokesman said.
From the very first Mackintosh desktop computer, Jobs had openly and flagrantly displayed a decidedly stubborn disdain for conformity. Even though Apple never had more than a practically negligible market share (less than 10%) compared to the IBM-clone PCs that ran on Microsoft’s Disk Operating System (DOS), the forerunner of Windows, the strong bonds that held loyal followers to the Mac system was almost like a religion.

He believed most of his customers didn’t know what they wanted till they saw it, or to be more precise, till he shows it to them. This could not be more true than in his latest innovation, the tablet PC, better known as the iPad. The more technically correct term would be “media tablet” – as opposed to other near-similar product formats, specifically the e-reader, such as the Kindle from Amazon.com and the Nook from Barnes & Noble which are also shaped like a tablet; as well as the erstwhile wonder product of the previous two years – the netbook.

It wasn’t too long ago when the computer universe, or at least the consumer sector of it, had a fairly simple classification system: permanent fixtures on office desks were that – desktop computers; and portable devices were propped up on one’s lap, hence the popular name, “laptop” (a smaller edition was called a notebook). Then with the growth of internet connectivity, the netbook was born – it was smaller and therefore more portable, and was meant to be a quick and simple internet connectivity device that would allow users to get connected to the net with minimal baggage. The first few models did not even have real hard drives, only about 4GB of space – just enough to run the OS (operating system). They were ahead of their time because such a design would have been perfect for the advent of cloud computing – where data storage and application software can be accessed and operated remotely instead of being housed in the actual device that you tote around. Incidentally, Apple’s latest innovation was supposed to be the iCloud – their version of cloud computing. Steve had already mentioned it in his presentations, but was not quite ready to sell it. Of course the arrival of the iPad has changed the game altogether, and the netbook is now considered a passé concept, a dead design.

Nobody is developing a new model of the netbook. Instead, all the major manufacturers are racing to bring their version of the tablet to market, ready or not. Motorola hurriedly introduced their Xoom based on the then latest available OS, the Honeycomb, but the market felt it was overpriced and not as cool as the iPad. The same goes for the Blackberry Playbook, plus it is hounded by poor reviews because it used a proprietary Operating System that is just plain and simple not as good as Apple’s iOS or Google’s Android. HP even hired Manny Pacquiao to launch its TouchPad, but abandoned it only days after introducing it. Asus introduced a neat and practical alternative, the Transformer – a tablet that doubles as a laptop by attaching to a dock that becomes the keyboard lower half of the clamshell design. Not a bad idea for something that sells for P30,000. Samsung so far has the best iPad-look-alike model in the Galaxy Tab II. So close is it to the iPad that Apple is in fact suing them for copying it too closely. But the most interesting and promising contender would have to be the new Kindle Fire from Amazon – it is as good a tablet as it is an e-reader, and best of all, it has a US$199 price tag.

Meanwhile, and on a parallel front, the more ubiquitous mobile phone was also becoming more sophisticated, and had already evolved into the smartphone concept. Smartphones are more than just telephony devices. They are actually little computers that also offer telephony features. But as handheld computing devices, they had terrific promise for further advancement while keeping their attraction as totally portable devices. The quintessential business device coming out of this development was the Blackberry – it had the most useful and convenient of a computer’s features: a web browser and a proprietary email client. It was functional and efficient, yes. But it was ugly and it wasn’t fun (especially the first few models).

Contrast this with the iPhone. This cool device with the really neat design could also surf and do email… and more. And it could do it in style – hip and cool like no other mobile handset before it, with a revolutionary touchscreen user interface that would become the universal standard for all such devices henceforth. Pretty soon this new shape and this new interface would dictate the shape of future things to come – particularly the android league from Google. The impact of this new development is such that the erstwhile universal market leader for mobile phones – Nokia – had declared it is abandoning its own proprietary operating system (the Symbian) and will instead adopt Microsoft’s Windows OS. Its market shares dropped accordingly, along with its stock price and the brand’s equity values.

Apple had battled with IBM and Microsoft in its earlier days. Now it is up against Google. But Apple has already won this battle. As of the latest tracking, Apple had already dislodged Google from the top position as the most valuable brand in the world (tech brand or otherwise). And Apple achieved this in the same year that it lost its founder.

For better perspective, here’s a look at one of the earliest Apple TV commercials....