Do you Diss the competition?

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  davidhensel01/23/08 Report as spam
  1

  Steve Jobs has often dissed his competitors

  If you've watched many of his keynote speeches, you'll have seen Steve Jobs take
  MANY jabs at the competition.
  
  In fact, I think the first time I noticed was back when my Apple shares were at
  $18, and then the next year when they were at $54, and then the next year just
  before it hit another record high, and then again recently just before it neared
  $200 or something a share...
  
  Clearly this man is an idiot who must be stopped.

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  Geoffrey James, Sales Machine01/23/08 Report as spam
  2

  Don't confuse...

  ...correlation with causality.
  
  You're assuming that Job's catty remarks are responsible for his company's success, but I defy you to find a causal connection.
  
  In fact, one could argue that one reason Apple is so successful today is because Jobs finally stopped taking potshots at Microsoft and Intel, and started working more closely with them.
  
  What does Jobs gain sniping at Amazon and Google? Nothing, in a business sense, because neither company is a direct competitor, and both companies are Apple partners. I'm sure he got some personal jollies out of it, though.
  
  Jobs would be more effective as a CEO if he showed a little more class and personal restraint. His company is successful in spite of his self-indulgence, not because of it.

•  
  FELDMAN3100@...01/24/08 Report as spam
  3

  Jobs is not an idiot. He is a lousy businessman.

  Youhav almostidentified the real mistake whichJobs has made over and over again.
  
  David Sarnoff was CEO of RCA while Television was being invented. He supplied funding to all the players who were developing the components which ultimately made TV work. As a result, RCA owned all the key patents.
  
  Instead of making everyone buy RCA TVs, Sarnoff licensed Philco, Motorola, Zenith, Westinghouse etc. to use the RCA picture tubein their own brand of TV. Sarnoff leveraged themarketing efforts of all those"competitors" to greatly increase the sale of RCA picture tubes!
  
  Jobs is a very creaive product man, but a foolish businessman. He refused to license other hardware manufacturers to use the Apple operating systems with the GUI technology. Bill Gates duplicated that GUI feel, and licensed all the hardware manufacturers with the Microsoft Operating system.
  
  Steve Jobs is very rich. Bill Gates is the richest man in the world. Jobs is the better product designer. Gates is the better businessman.
  
  Thank You,
  Lee Feldman

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  Geoffrey James, Sales Machine01/24/08 Report as spam
  4

  Succinct and to the point.

  Lee:
  Excellent analysis and summary of the Apple/Microsoft dynamic. Thanks!
  Geoffrey

•  
  davidhensel01/24/08 Report as spam
  5

  Um, actually...

  ...I'm not confusing anything. I'm simply making the point that Jobs has often
  taken shots at the competition in one form or another, and Apple has
  continued to do just fine. Obviously there's no correlation - it's a joke (with a
  point), not business analysis.
  
  It strikes me as odd, though, that to you these lame little potshots Jobs takes
  at Amazon and MS and the like indicate such an egregious lack of "class and
  personal restraint" on Jobs' part ? while at the same time you praise someone
  who stifles innovation, subverts laws, bullies business partners, repeatedly
  disappoints consumers (not to mention shareholders like myself), etc, etc. No
  doubt there's a lot to admire about Gates, but what kind of standards are
  setting here?
  
  For THAT kind of moral misdirection, I'll stick to FOX News...

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  Geoffrey James, Sales Machine01/24/08 Report as spam
  6

  Gates

  You need to research the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. They're doing more to save lives in Africa than all the world governments combined.
  
  Whatever Microsoft may have done in the past (and I've blasted them plenty in this blog), Gates himself has become a major force for good in the world.
  
  As the father of two children born in Africa, I've seen what conditions are like there. I've seen, with my own eyes, the children who are dying of starvation and preventable disease.
  
  Gates stepped up to the plate -- and he brought Buffet along with him. What has Jobs done that's even roughly comparable? Founding Pixar? Give me a break.

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  davidhensel01/24/08 Report as spam
  7

  Golly

  Again, you've missed the point. (Hint: it's kind of like one of those "cast the
  first stone" points.) We're all guilty at one time or another. But there are sins
  and then there are capital-S SINS! when it comes to how you treat your
  competition. If we're going to call someone petty and vindictive, I'd simply like
  to have a bit of a higher standard in terms of judging his [business] character.
  
  [FYI, the B&MGF is about a quarter-mile from my office. I've even applied for
  a job there. I think the man is more of a saint than Mother Teresa for what
  he's doing today in this world. But thanks for the lecture!]

•  
  upshift01/24/08 Report as spam
  8

  Diss the competition

  I agree that you should not diss the competition in most circumstances, but in this situation Jobs is preaching to the choir and reminding the flock not to pay attention to the devil..whoops competition.

•  
  davidhensel01/24/08 Report as spam
  9

  Still, there's dissing the competition and then there's, well, whatever...

  http://www.informationweek.com/software/opensource/184428873
  
  "Nicholas Negroponte responds to Bill Gates' recent criticism of the $100-laptop
  Negraponte is developing for poor children, asking rhetorically why one of the
  world's leading philanthropists felt the need to make highly sarcastic remarks
  about the project's hardware, which will run Linux instead of Windows."