FAT AND BORING -- THAT'S WHAT THE Mac has become. During the past decade, I've watched the Mac community devolve from a bunch of jazzed-up fanatics into a staid bunch of conservative do-nothings. Now, with the release of Windows 95, we're about to witness the final death throes of the old empire.
Windows 95 is like a barbarian horde ready to sweep down from the rainy steppes of the Pacific Northwest. It's the most aggressive new product ever to come from the most aggressive computer company ever to exist. And its No. 1 target is the Mac.
I've been writing about this confrontation ever since my first glimpse of Windows 95, but my previous observations were based on scant use and beta code. That's over. I have long since installed the full-release version of Windows 95, and I use it routinely.
Believe me, I have no interest in helping the Microsoft juggernaut run wild, but run wild it will do -- for the rest of this year and deep into the next. I cringe as I say this, since for the past year, I've watched in disgust as one observer after another has predicted that this would happen, based solely on Microsoft hype and bluster. I preferred to wait and see what would actually ship. Now that the plain reality of Windows 95 can be added to the incredible hype Microsoft has generated, it's safe to say that we're about to witness a software phenomenon. The result will be a dream come true for Microsoft shareholders.
Unfortunately, Apple shareholders are more likely to get a nightmare. Apple's traditional stronghold has been the graphics community. This is not a market; it's a niche -- and with the Windows 95 battering ram poised at the gates, it wouldn't last long either if Microsoft decided to target it. Apple's only real hope is that Microsoft might spare certain niche markets in order to keep the Justice Department off its back.
More important, however, Apple risks losing new users as well as the education and home markets. Windows 95 is already aggressively looting the home and new-user markets. If Apple ends up with only the graphics and school markets, developer interest in Macs will wither and Apple civilization as we know it will be unable to survive. The Dark Ages of the PC will have arrived.
What to do? What to do? Maybe it's time for Apple to start over from scratch. I'd like to see a complete replay of the original Macintosh revolution of 1984. Too bad Apple has run out of the weird magic that allowed the Mac to come into the market with 128K and no software and be a success! I honestly believe that this exact scenario could have been replayed with the PowerPC, but Apple decided to manage the transition to Power Macs as though they were a 68040 upgrade and IBM was too scared to do anything with the chip except continue its use in the company's RS/6000 workstations. Fact is, nobody has the guts to do anything daring, because too much is at stake.
On top of that, Apple has taken to worshipping the false idol called market share. Apple has been losing market share in computers for years and years. This gauge of success assumes that all computers do the same things and that Macs are just another type of PC. Macs should be spun off this list, because it just doesn't apply. Although it's true that the Mac has a lot of crossover applications with the PC universe, it's hardly the same as a PC! Apple needs to give up on the me-too mind-set and reestablish the Mac as something unique. Otherwise, even though Mac sales continue to increase, the Mac will still be perceived by the larger crowd of PC mavens as a loser! Why? Because it's ceding overall market share to Pentium-based machines.
Decline and Fall
There's no shortage of theories about the decline of the Apple empire. Apple kept the Apple II alive too long when the Mac was the perfect home/school machine all along. Apple has dropped the ball with its developers by failing to deliver them new machines and the kind of aid they got in the mid-'80s. And don't get me started on Apple's failure to license its operating system until Bill Gates' horde was already galloping into view.
Then again, maybe this is all part of a maturing process that can't be stopped no matter how much moaning and groaning we do. Let me finish by just reminding Apple of a unique sales pitch it once had. It used to compare the huge amount of ink (free press) that it received to its sales. The disparity was phenomenal -- evidence that the Mac's influence far exceeded its market share. Maybe Apple should compare the amount of press it now gets with that received by Microsoft (a much smaller company).
