Re:Xerox Considers Takeover Offer for HP
by ChuckMcM on Wednesday November 06, 2019 @03:53PM
(#21467112)
This was a key insight that I missed as well when I watched the debut of the iPhone. Much of the industry had wrapped their head around the idea that a "smart phone" was really just a personal digital assistant with calendar, email, and notes grafted onto a phone. After all, Palm was super successful with their Pilot and Blackberry dominated this market with their "phone with a keyboard for email."
The iPhone vision of a hand held computer that happened to make phone calls was way broader than I could get my head around at the time. I remember predicting that there were maybe 10 apps that would ever make money on such a device :-).
They thought the iPhone was just a phone, and judged it in those terms. A massive mistake that allowed Apple to walk away with over 90% of the profits of the entire industry right under their noses. Their network effect advantages didn't help them, because they were obsolete. It's like hoping the network of stables, fields, saddle makers and horseshoe manufacturers will save the horse drawn carriage from the car. The network effects that matter to smartphones are app stores, app developers and services for apps.