JT,
I'm not suggesting PC owners are going to rush to Mac hardware. The good news is that the new OS strategy offers a migration path to the Mac OS, with a possible migration to the hardware in the future. Given the speed increases and the price reductions, this is a real possibility. Just think. If Rhapsody is as cool and powerful as I believe it will be, then PC owners can try it out for the price of the software without additional risk and without giving up their old system. If PC owners began to see the truth about Apple's superiority in software, I think they'd be more inclined to look at the hardware the next time they needed a new system. Especially if the performance continues to outpace Intel/Cyrix/AMD etc. Meanwhile, current Mac users and new users would be more inclined to purchase Macs if the operating system was receiving good press. Gil has called this a 3 year plan. I think things will be looking good well before that, but in 3 years, the computing world could be turned upside down. And of course, it could turn out that Apple's revenue base could end up shifting to software sales over time, but I doubt it. Apples current crop of hardware is hot and getting hotter.
I was around preaching Mac in 1984 at a time when IBM PC users would laugh me out of the room when I maintained that they would someday be using a mouse and that menus, icons, long file names and windows were brilliant ideas. The typical answer was "Never!". We'll, we all know who had the last laugh. The main thing that has kept them away from the Mac experience all these years has been price and ignorance. With the new OS strategy and current prices, those barriers will no longer be in place.
By the way, if that Aloha means you're in Hawaii, then your one lucky guy.
Regards,
Scott |
