If one could survey all the content on the Internet for topic, one would find that a large percentage concerns Apple Computer. This takes various forms, but largely is one of two things...Mac users decrying the success of Windows and vice-versa, or press articles trumpeting the ultimate demise of Apple, the cultural icon.

Apple has always been an interesting company. Formed by two geeks in a garage, it was never really prepared to be a multi-billion dollar industry giant. Apple's corporate culture, long a topic of admiring discussion in business courses, has lately been identified as one of the culprits in the companies failing fortunes. I think this is short-sighted, and mean-spirited. Hip corporate cultures make happy employees, not disgruntled shareholders. Still, the prevailing winds have suggested that Apple broke the mold so much and so often that it simply outlasted it effectiveness. This may or may not be, but a few things are crystal clear.¹

Apple was...

Arrogant - In the mid-80's Apple, while riding a wave of good reviews for creating personal computing, was charging for a Mac 5 to 10 times the price of a PC. The PC was a miserable machine, limited, confusing, and worse than that...ugly. However, charging 10 times the price of competing technologies, even when those competitors are pathetic, is sheer arrogance. Establishing yourself as a defacto standard, something that Apple failed to do, is now a core level paradigm of modern business practice, particularly in the software industry. Microsoft, ever diligent and plodding, buying or copying every technology that they needed, was slowly but surely become the standard in desktop computers.²

Elitist - Instead of attacking corporate computing, Apple instead decided to focus on artists and designers. Apple created desktop publishing and revolutionized that industry, but Microsoft owned everybody else. Artists and designers were more creative and interesting than secretaries and typists, but the how many artists do you know versus secretaries? See what I mean?

Slow - When sales started to slump, Apple tried to copy their competitors. They created entry-level Macs, licensed their OS and began to run "Me too!" ads.

These things have been hard for Apple to fix. But a few positive developments are on the horizon.

Apple has...

MacOS 8 - Early versions of this software show it to be very similar for novice users, and much more powerful for experienced users. A difficult feat to pull off. Just look at Win95.

Rhapsody - This next generation OS will have all the power that modern users want. But better than that is the development paradigm that has been hinted at by Apple. That is Rhapsody on Intel. That's right, A Mac OS that runs on the Intel architecture. Even better is that developers can write once and simply recompile for 5 different platforms, something that is impossible today. I think it is no coincidence that the acronym for Rhapsody On Intel ROI, is the same as Return On Investment. Apple could win the hearts and minds of developers who spend enormous amounts of time and money porting their applications to various platforms.

Although I think it is difficult to see how a billion dollar company could disappear, it has happened before. It would be a sad thing to see. And more to the point, who will create the next great revolution for Microsoft to copy if not Apple?