The timing may be suspicious, but the OS looks more to Google than to Microsoft
"Apple Speeds Mac 'Mountain Lion' to Take On Windows 8" Bloomberg Businessweek
"Steve Jobs is gone, Windows 8 is coming and Apple panics" betanews
As predicted, the tech press spent much of the rest of the week trying to make sense of last Tuesday's news that the latest version of the Mac operating system, Mountain Lion, is due out before the end of summer.
Most of the speculation had to do with the way Apple (AAPL) handled the announcement, privileging some reporters with previews and not others. (Why MG Siegler, who doesn't usually write reviews? Why not Andy Ihnatko, who does?)
Many wrote it off as Apple's way of keeping the press firmly under its thumb. "Access isn't an entitlement," Ihnatko tweeted philosophically. "I've gotten things early, I've not gotten things early. I can only do my job, day to day."
Some, as the headlines quoted above suggest, smelled something even more Machiavellian in the annoucement -- the first time in memory that the press got to test a Mac OS before Apple the Mac development community could. According to betanews' Robert Johnson:
"Apple more typically announces a new OS version months before it's made available to anyone, typically during their Worldwide Developer Conference. But with 10.8 things are different. The timing allowed Apple to preempt the release of Windows 8 Consumer Preview, which Microsoft announced in January would be the end of this month."
Was Mountain Lion announced prematurely to take the wind out of Microsoft's (MSFT) sails?
Click to enlarge. Data: Wikipedia. Chart: PED
The timing is curious. Even if Mountain Lion's release doesn't happen until the last day of summer, developers will have less time to prepare for it than for any OS X since Panther in 2003. (See chart.)
But as John Gruber and John Siracusa pointed out in Friday's The Talk Show podcast, the new features being added to OS X -- messaging, notifications, app synching, etc. -- are all about integrating the Mac more tightly with iCloud.
Google (GOOG) is the master of cloud-based computing, not Microsoft. So if Apple had any competitor in its sights with last week's Mountain Lion announcement, it's Google.
A lesson in access journalism in the wake of the New York Times' Foxconn series
"An Apple spokesman said no executives were available to comment."
That sentence, appearing 12 paragraphs into a 14-graph story by Brian X. Chen in Thursday's New York Times, speaks volumes about how Apple (AAPL) deals with press coverage it doesn't like.
For more than a week, the company had been seeding selected media outlets with early access to its next MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Feb 17, 2012 7:18 AM ET
How the news of the Mac's next operating system -- Mountain Lion -- got disseminated
Source: Techmeme
The top tech news story Thursday, apparently, has nothing to do with working conditions in China, or who owns the iPad brand, or even the fact that Motorola (MMI) may have to remove "slide to unlock" from its smartphones.
No, the top 135 stories on Techmeme this afternoon are all about the next version of MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Feb 16, 2012 3:50 PM ET
Net Applications shows a 25% increase in Apple's global desktop share in fiscal 2011
Data: Net Applications. Chart: PED
"Mac gets back-to-school bump" is the headline of a brief report Saturday in Net Applications' September survey. It notes that Apple's (AAPL) share of desktop usage, as measured by visits to its clients' websites from machines running OS X, rose 0.42 percentage points in September to a record (for Apple) of 6.45% MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Oct 1, 2011 8:16 AM ET
The two-hour video is available here. It gives you a far better view of Monday's proceedings than was afforded most of the people -- including yours truly -- who were there. If Apple (AAPL) had provided it as a live webcast, it would have saved me a lot of typing.
Apple PR has also issued three press releases that cover the days' main developments.
Apple Introduces iCloud
New Version of iOS Includes Notification MORE
Screen grabs from the staff's new iPads suggest it will matter more to them than to us
Source: 9to5Mac
"Everything feels a bit different," reads an entry in the Daily Download, the new internal publication for Apple (AAPL) retail employees that fell into the hands of 9to5Mac's Seth Weintraub Thursday night. "Switching to RetailMe on iPad is like switching from a PC to a Mac."
But from the topics covered in Issue MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - May 20, 2011 7:21 AM ET
We'll be watching Apple's live video stream from the comfort of our home. You can join us.
Image: Apple Inc.
If you want live blogging from reporters who actually traveled to Apple's (AAPL) Cupertino campus for today's event, there are plenty of sites to choose from, including Macrumors, MacDailyNews, TUAW, All Things Digital, Engadget, Gizmodo and ArsTechnica.
We're content to watch it from home. You're welcome to watch it with us. Click MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Oct 20, 2010 12:44 PM ET
Image: Apple Inc.
UPDATE: Join us here for our live commentary.
From Apple (AAPL) PR:
Apple® will broadcast its October 20 event online using Apple's industry-leading HTTP Live Streaming, which is based on open standards. Viewing requires either a Mac® running Safari® on Mac OS® X version 10.6 Snow Leopard®, an iPhone® or iPod touch® running iOS 3.0 or higher, or an iPad™. The live broadcast will begin at 10:00 a.m. PDT MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Oct 20, 2010 9:42 AM ET
In this episode of Techmate, Jon and Michael compare Apple's (AAPL) closed-system strategy to Google's (GOOG) more open approach.
Mason Cohn, Producer - Mar 31, 2010 1:04 PM ET
A federal judge rules in Apple's favor in the Psystar copyright infringement case
Psystar's $600 Open Duo. Photo: Psystar Corp.
Nearly a year and a half after a Miami company called Psystar announced that it was selling "Open Computers" pre-installed with Apple's (AAPL) Mac OS X Leopard -- and 17 months after Apple sued Psystar for copyright infringement -- the case has come to its all-but-foregone conclusion: a federal judge in MORE
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| Company | Price | Change | % Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Bank of America Corp... | 7.95 | -0.16 | -1.97% |
| Microsoft Corp | 31.27 | -0.17 | -0.54% |
| Ford Motor Co | 12.28 | -0.25 | -2.00% |
| General Electric Co | 19.39 | 0.17 | 0.88% |
| Citigroup Inc | 32.36 | -1.00 | -3.00% |
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| Dow | 12,938.67 | -27.02 | -0.21% |
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| Treasuries | 2.00 | -0.04 | -1.96% |
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