Woz: Microsoft's innovation lead 'worries me greatly'
Apple cofounder Steve Wozniak worries that Microsoft may now be more innovative than the product developers at his former company. He also has a few harsh words for the management style of his fellow Cupertinian cofounder, Steve Jobs. Asked about Microsoft's innovation after he spoke at this week's TedX Brussels conference, …
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It's true that Windows 8 was "unexpected", but I'm not so sure it follows that Apple needs to worry yet.
without apple
Although Woz has my respect, i think no one would know who he is today if Steve Jobs wasn't in the picture.
Where was Woz when apple was nearly bankrupt in 1997 ? He was probably still happy to collect his monthly apple cheque but has he really contributed to the rebirth of apple? The answer is no. Everyone is talking today mr Woz and most talking like the one you're making has a cheap after taste.
Re: without apple
"Where was Woz when apple was nearly bankrupt in 1997 ? He was probably still happy to collect his monthly apple cheque but has he really contributed to the rebirth of apple? The answer is no."
Woz had basically left Apple as a full employee by that point. According to Wikipedia, in 1997 Woz seems to have been running his own company whilst getting a degree and teaching fifth-grade students. I mean yes, you may condemn him for not meeting the goals of helping restore Apple to glory, but would Woz agree with you that those were his goals at the time?
Flash! Fat guy who hasn't worked in thirty years declares Microsoft "innovative"
Roger Irrelevant Writes...
Yesterday morning on Radio 4 they ran a feature on how the Polish economy has benefitted from EU money, since the fall of Communism. They visited a factory which exports apples [the fruit kind] all over Europe and spoke to the CEO... a Mr. Wozniak.
I remember thinking at the time what a shame it was that I couldn't share the joy of this amazing coincidence with anyone else sad enough to appreciate it. So thank you [the real] Woz and El Reg for providing the tenuous excuse I needed.
In other irrelevant news: also yesterday I had my first sighting of WinPho 8 in the wild. Some woman on the bus was moving garish coloured tiles about on the screen of her phone. Of course, she might have been playing Tetris but the look of "how the hell do I...?" on her face suggested she was wrestling with a GUI.
Re: Roger Irrelevant Writes...
However, it may have been her very first Smartphone?
Re: Roger Irrelevant Writes...
No, it was her nth featurephone.
Re: Roger Irrelevant Writes...
You mean "My Very First Smartphone"
Woz is stupid
The guy hasn't done anything for decades and now he thinks people care about his opinion? Get a job fatty.
That or fuck off to Australia like you wanted to. Then you can get lost in the outback and we can live without the little nuggets of stupid.
Re: Woz is stupid
Ironic that an obvious, stroppy schoolboy tells someone to get a job...
one must admire woz
for his bravery in doing Dancing With The Stars
One had drive, the other didn't
I respect Woz, but it's clear Jobs had the vision and drive - and probably would've succeeded without Woz.
As for Microsoft and innovation, I guess it's all about nurture - clearly the big tech titans hire the best talent and it is from this talent where innovation arises. The important trick is to nurture that talent and take a gamble, rather than playing it safe.
That's what Apple did - they took risks. They hired the brightest talent, but more importantly, nurtured it.
Jobs was also ruthless in his pursuit of his vision - if you didn't make the grade, you went.
Lets not be naive about this - the same happens with all tech companies - it's the way Jobs did the hiring and firing that's gone down in legend.
Make no mistake, Microsoft have the talent and have had the talent to produce wonders, they just need to take more risks and nurture that talent. Both Apple and Microsoft had been working away developing touch tech long before Apple took the plunge with the iPhone - and that's where the difference lay. Risk - and spotting a gap in the market.
Windows 8
Windows 8 is really innovative and different. An acquaintance of mine who had troubles with Android phones really liked it on his Nokia. But, of course, on the PC, it hasn't been quite so well received.
Perhaps this is what's making Microsoft look more innovative? If so, Apple has little to fear; innovations need to be actually useful to someone to be worthwhile.
Cognitive dissonance
"Microsoft"... "innovative"..."Microsoft"... "innovative"...
No, it just doesn't work for me. Other similar conjunctions:
"Whale"... "needlework"...
"Alastair Campbell"... "sensitivity"
"New York"... "caring"
"Man Versus Food"... "vegetarian"
Re: Cognitive dissonance
You forgot...
"Tom Welsh"... "constructive argument"
Compare
Exchange
Sharepoint
SQL server
Dynamics
Xbox / Kinect
Windows Live / Skydrive
Bing
.net
Desktop Windows
Server operating system )file / print, AD etc etc etc)
HyperV virtualisation
Windows
vs
OSX
iTunes
iPhone plus slightly bigger iphone
Apple TV
To me, MS invent and update way more stuff then Apple, at least in terms of sheer breadth of scope. Apple simply need a slight shift in the waves of consumer fashion for their empire to evaporate, MS have a much more diverse portfolio, even if it isn't as trendy.
Re: Compare
that would be .NET << innovation by using CAPS to distinguish from the TLD .net
Re: Compare
That was supposed to be a list of innovations, not products (well, Kinect is innovative, but others weren't invented or first implemented by Microsoft).
Re: Compare
Thing is pretty much everything in the windows list is following markets while the main things in the apple side are creating entire markets.
Some of these they became emergant in the market (becouse the predecessor was expensive / rubbish / not fit for purpose) , if you look at it Microsoft hasn't really ever innovated simply looked at what was there and make something similar.
Exchange - was chasing Domino and traditional linux systems
Sharepoint - chasing the cms crowd.
SQL Server - chasing Oracle and IBM
XBox - Chasing PS2
Kinect - Chasing the Wii
Windows live - Chasing AIM and yahoo messenger
Skydrive - Chasing google and dropbox
Bing - chasing google
.net - chasing Java
- I'll give it windows Desktop, Server space.
HyperV - chasing Vmware
Only a very small number of people wanted smart phones until the iphone.
Until ipad almost nobody wanted a tablet.
By extension touch OS - these had no purpose until Apple created the markets.
Until iTunes came along nobody had managed to make a lot of money legally out of digital distribution of music.
Changing itself into a consumer electronic company that happened to have a software department.
You also failed to put in ios which runs a number of other devices and the os that runs things like the nano.
The problem for apple now is where can it go next, it'll never control market share of the user base (but will normally control the market share of users willing to spend money.) I doubt TV will bring anything new and interesting unless they can do with film and TV companies what they did with music and book companies.
The word is Innovation, look it up
It doesn't mean making crapware and trying to convince people to buy and use your crapware, it means developing useful products and services that people want, will use and will pay for. Microsucks wouldn't know innovation if you bought them a dictionary with the word "innovation" highlighted in gold leaf.
As far as Tim Cook is concerned I think he should donate his $700 million in annual compensation to the million slaves at Foxconn. Seven hundred million USD doesn't go as far as it use to, but I'll bet it could improve the lives of the million slaves at Foxconn, many of whom actually produce Bad Apple products. Tim would only need to skimp by for one year on his current $700 million vs. the slaves who have been dirt poor since forever.
Re: The word is Innovation, look it up
Nor does it mean taking something and making it look different. Or pretty.
Re: The word is Innovation, look it up
The clueless buy "pretty". Have you seen the pretty boxes that consumer PC power supplies, mobos, HSFs, etc. come in these days? The 13 year old hormone crazed little boys can't get enough T&A pictures on their GPU cards so now they are included on the hardware packages along with plastic carrying handles. Evidently these 13 year old boys carry their mobos to school to show their friends what Mummy just bought them? The real question is where do they store their PC toys in school and does Mummy know about their Laro Croft T&A poster, aka Angelina Jolie?
Kinect
Is the most innovative thing to come down the pike from any technology company lately. The only things that have made Apple stand out from MS in the past IMHO are their innovative marketing, sleek design, and painstakingly debugged user interface, iTunes not withstanding. Now, I truly believe they're slipping and have lost sight of why the average Joe bought Apple products in the past--the "it just works" phenomenon. Dropping Google Maps for their in-house created turd of an application out of spite is a good example.
I am not an Apple fanboi, quite the opposite. I will give up my Android phone when it's pried out of my cold dead hand. (well, unless the new Windows phones prove worthy at least) The iStuff phenomenon "ooh shiny!" has managed to infect the brass at the company where I do IT. Our Blackberry devices were phased out this year in favor of iPhones and (pointless) iPads. While Blackberry let the world pass them by, and their horrid OS and crippled browser used to make me want to skip the device across the nearest pond, I will grudgingly admit that they did a few things really well: email, telephone, and texting. Great battery life too. Or what you use a business device for 90% of the time. With our new iWonders, we have to reset the phones often, reload the software for email integration, and deal with a litany of other complaints. Personally Apple's awful (compared to Blackberry and Android) on-screen keyboard makes me want to cry in frustration when setting these up. I will say the hardware has at least been more reliable than RIM's.
As far as Woz goes, while he didn't "invent the personal computer", his comments seem to be to the point, even if not solicited by most. Woz likely would have been a brilliant but forgotten engineer at some tech company without Steve Jobs, and Jobs would have likely been a douchebag exec at some lackluster, soul-killing finance company without Woz.
Re: Kinect
Well, several years ago a friend of mine was astonished when he tried two-fingers-swipe-to-scroll on a MacBook. This is one very small innovation but it's incredibly useful, when compared to old Asus/Acer/Samsung/worl&dog approach (right side of touchpad as scroll area).
Re: Kinect
Speak for yourself. I found myself more confused than impressed by two-finger scrolling, especially when it goes off when you don't want it to.
That said I like to turn most of the "clever" off in software anyway. Mouse taps are what mouse buttons are for, FFS. The whole pad does not need to be a button!
What a joke
I think they hire Woz to speak now days for the entertainment factor and to show how removed he is from reality.
Seriously, the whole OS as religion thing has got to go. It makes more forum fun admittedly. But now its just slams and insults to anyone who won't tow the majority line no matter which party the majority is.
I enjoy a good argument and a spirited troll as much as anyone else, but there is no "one true faith" in tech. Its just getting silly, and as futile as arguing with baptists.
WTF
is the WOZ smoking these days? I think what he must really mean to say is that ... Windows 8, windows phone, and the surface are such bombs; microsoft MUST be doing any really interesting stuff behind closed doors ... as vaporware. By the way, I waited as long as I could for anybody to put out something worth my money and useful to me, I just bought a spanking new macbookpro.
Re: WTF
He's the Freak Factor used to appear intellectual.
"We"?
"Until Steve Jobs came back, that's what we were doing. We just had a formula for making money, and we kept running it, making the same machines."
Woz had left Apple in 1987 - 9 years before Steve's return in 1996. He was hardly part of "we".
While I fully respect what Woz achieved, his more recent soapboxing is not really that useful. Se seems to have got caught up in his own self importance and now belongs with , Eric Raymond, Steven Fry and Dotcom as noises best ignored.
Innovation is overrated
New technology, ideas and interfaces are all well and good if they're an improvement over what was there before. The iPhone for example was a game changer as nothing was really comparable to it before, now everything looks like an iPhone. Sure there are alternatives that have flashy graphics and a bagillion features but so what, I like the Mac/OSX interface on the desktop and the iOS interface on the iPhone, it's easy to use, sober and works. I never feel like these interfaces are getting in the way of what I'm trying to do. If Apple decide to be 'innovative' and replace the whole interface for something new then I've got to learn how to use it, try and get my apps and data to work with it and then suffer the transition period where bugs are fixed and software is adapted and updated to work, only to get me to the point I was before. The transition from OS9 to OSX was long, the transition from OSX-PPC to OSX-Intel was smoother but there were plenty of apps that got lost along the way. If Apple decide that OSX is old and need to 'innovate' again with OSXI then the whole upheaval starts again, but for what benefit?
Yes Microsoft have been 'bold' and 'innovative' to scrap the interface they've used since NT3, that everyone knows how to use, has software that works and isn't a bottleneck. So now I have to learn how to do what I could do before, learn how to get on with the new OS and have the upheaval of trying to get everything to work and as well as before. It's new, but why is it better?
If every time a new car came out it had a completely new interface it wouldn't be regarded as innovative or forward thinking, so why is it so for a computer device?
Software developers are under pressure to invent new n shiny, Apple have had a more than its fair share of innovative products that changed the way people use computers, hats off to them, but to be essentially forced to continually abandon what works, and works well, just to be new and different for me is just counter intuitive.
sh!tlisted
Instead of innovating, they're actively stifling innovation.
As long as Apple 'innovates' by patenting stuff like this http://mashable.com/2012/11/16/apple-page-turn-patent/
.. and claiming they came up with it, they'll be on my sh!tlist
Re: Woz for CEO
He'd trash the company in a year. The guys got no business sense.
Woz is a real mensch, and sweet person....but neither Steve nor Apple invented the Personal Computer
Of course that has not stopped the Apple history rewriters from trying to assert this unacceptable lie.
It's too bad since the truth is actually even better then the lie. The truth is that the Steve's made a product that for it's day was focused on the everyday person rather then a computer literate clientele.
And the biggest, most important truth that the combination of Apple II and Visicalc MADE A TURN KEY SOLUTION< AND IT MADE APPLE"S FORTUNE. Too bad Visicalc got screwed but then no one said Jobs wasn't greedy.
What I find amazing is that no one wants to give credit for the first desk top graphics PC which was being shipped before Apple was formed as a company. This million point display complete computer with integrated display, keyboard, digital tape drive, and ROM packs included a RS232C or high speed GPIB bus also was combined with one of if not the first PC board, and Mechanical design software applications years before autocad existed. The magic turnkey solution included a 48 inch digital roll plotter and small flatbed plotter (to prototype PCBs up to 8 inches). Could not sell enough of them in 1978 so the plotter company bought out the little Berkeley start-up and history was then written by autocad.
The Graphics computer Tektronix, the software company iCorp. iCorp also had a touch screen, touch pad pointing product it called the joypad or ipad which it tried to sell to the major pointing device user of the day Atari and all the small little start-ups, kentucky fried computers, and many others including a LATE comer named Apple. The guy in the front part of the little store front Steve Jobs said that he and his partner could not see any real use for such a pointing device or why anyone would need more then the character graphics offered by Apple that very day. Anyway, said Steve, their customers could always buy a real joystick.
So let's get it straight there was a visionary at Apple his name is Alan Kay and he left a long time ago.
Jobs could drive a mean team to completion in a mean way.
Woz is a great guy not a visionary then or now. However in no way am I saying he could not prove me wrong tomorrow and I really hope he does.
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