Finally, Apple Gives In
For the longest time, Apple always prides itself and makes its users feel superior. This could be observed from products they design and make, marketing campaigns and services they provide. Their products are always more expensive, people buy Apple products because it makes them feel good; their marketing campaigns always put itself at a higher status and makes the competition look cheap; and their services were unique to and only Apple users. However after WWDC 2015, everything has changed. Apple finally gives in and admit they are not as superior and as unique as they want themselves to be.
Apple’s iOS had been the most advance mobile operating system until Steve Jobs left. Since then, Google’s Android OS improved and became much smarter which already surpassed the advancements of iOS these few years. iOS 8 and the just announced iOS 9 is playing catch up to Android and still way behind. The proactive Siri is still not as useful and smart as Google Now, even Cortana is smarter than Siri. The little improvements in iOS doesn’t make people “wow”, except those “unconditionally-supporting” fanboys. Apple now feels stagnant and boring and they know that themselves, they know that they cannot survive anymore without opening themselves up to a wider range of audience. They gave in and made 2 major decisions, making their programming language, Swift, open source, and publishing not 1 but 2 Android apps, Apple Music and Move to iOS (what a desperate name).
Apple’s superiority is diminishing gradually quarter by quarter. Their market share and user base isn’t as big as few years ago. Opening up themselves is a reasonable move however this actually upsets both their supporters and haters. Apple’s supporters are those who believe they are more superior than the others, such as Android users, and they are not willing to share their superiority with others. On the other hand, the haters, will never use Apple services, there are too many great alternatives to Apple’s solutions. As a result, Apple falls into a dilemma, whether to open themselves or keep providing unique experiences to Apple users.
Other than their mobile OS, their desktop OS and wearable OS is also playing catch up to other market competitors. Their marketing bluff during WWDC keynote is just misleading and false. Since Jobs left, Apple never had the most advanced OS on any platform like they said. They never had the most customizable smartwatch on the market and they never provide innovative and evolutionary products after the first generation of iPhone and iPad.
The general public should know the fact that Apple is a marketing company, not a technology company. They should start educating themselves how to differentiate innovative features against features that they copied from other companies’ products. Copying and stealing great ideas is not solely wrong, however misleading people in believing that these “innovations” are created by them is not moral and there’s no integrity at all.
Apple creating Android apps is just their first step to give in, they could no longer survive in their own closed ecosystem. Apple fanboys should take a look around, there is a whole new world around you. It’s never too late to leave Apple’s circle and find something that could give you more for less. My comments and complains on Apple only applies to their morality and integrity, it has nothing to do with the quality of their products and services.
