Apple…. The #1 seller of PC’s???
Today I saw this headline in my notifications from Mashable.
Apple set to be the #1 seller of PC’s next year.
Thoughts of Wow! And Finally! And “They said it would never happen!” all flashed across the screen of my mind.
And then it hit me. Apple doesn’t sell PC’s. Wasn’t that Steve Jobs’ whole point?
“Think Different?”
It would be akin to the headline, “Pepsi set to be the #1 seller of Coke next year.”
If ever there were the blaspheming of a brand, this is it.
Could this signal the beginning of the end for the brand Jobs’ built? He must be turning over in his grave.
My take: Apple didn’t set out to win the “computer” war. Jobs created an entirely different game; one in which they were the only player. That, in large part, explains why apple owns the tablet market. There is no competition. This can’t be summed up as a blue ocean red ocean issue. It’s more like apples and oranges isn’t it.
How might you develop this kind of strategy in your business or on your blog? What about your church or non profit? How many churches operate with the mentality of competing with other churches. I work in higher education, an industry that constantly talks about “comparator” schools. Someone is going to completely reinvent the game soon, leaving the rest of us holding the proverbial bag.
My question: what would it look like to create a new game; one where you owned the playing field–because you were the only player? It takes a lot more imagination and ingenuity to do this. But it must be a whole lot more fun. I
Anyone got any analysis on this?
Ha! Good point. My thought: I wouldn’t think creating a game in which I was the only player would be cool unless, of course, I could get people playing all the other games to abandon them and pay top dollar to be a part of my game. Apple wasn’t like watching one basketball team instead of watching another basketball team. Apple was more like a personal jet-pack competing with being a couch potato.
JD, good thoughts, but you need to read the whole article…and I quote, “Canalys is projecting that Apple will overtake Hewlett-Packard as the leading global PC vendor sometime before the second half of 2012. Canalys, however, lumps iPad sales in with PC sales, which makes Amazon a player as well. The researcher predicts that total “pad” sales will reach 59 million units by the end of 2011, a category that includes the Kindle Fire and Barnes & Noble’s Nook Tablet.”
So the only reason Apple is taking over the PC market is because some marketing research company considers the iPad a PC.
If “PC” is defined as “Personal Computer”, then Apple has been creating PC’s all along and even had PC’s at least 5 years before IBM. Today’s Mac’s are more “PC” than ever, in the sense that they have the exact same components as a standard Windows PC (same processors and memory, etc.). They just have a different OS and charge more for the hardware.
But, I understand the point you are trying to make. Too many churches are trying to compete. If we are truly faithful to Christ, competition shouldn’t matter.
Having an open door to be creative would result in some amazing churches (or Christ following communities). There will be dangers and failures (There are a number of Apple products that totally tanked over the years: Apple III, Lisa, Cube, all come to mind). But they picked up and learned from those mistakes and continued on. A new creative church would have to be willing to do the same (if they did crash and burn).
I don’t know of any place in the Bible that describes the church as people facing forward with a single person up front preaching to them. Who says church can’t be in a circle, and/or a place where everyone gets the opportunity to “preach” or pray or sing. There are many other directions we could go with it. I wish more “churches” would “think different”.
Thanks for the comment. I think what I’m driving at here is that Jobs refused to let the industry define him. In his mind, he didn’t make PC’s. He made Macs. (those commercials captured it–I’m a PC– I’m a Mac.)
For Apple, a Mac is not a personal computer. It is a digital media hub. They didn’t make an mp3 player– but an iPod. They didn’t make a tablet computer but an iPad. Then there’s the iPhone–
They have created devices that have in turn created new worlds.