LEM Home Page, iBook & PowerBook Page, iMac Channel, Power Mac Page, Mac Daniel's Upgrade Advice, MacUSB, My First Mac, My Turn, Online Tech Journal, Road Apples, 56k Page Editorials DeStefano: Mac Metamorphosis, Guha: Apple Archive, Knight: Mac Musings, Moore: Miscellaneous Ramblings, Ploudre: Back & Forth, Rodrigues: Tangerine Fusion, Rumsey: Low End Mac Gaming, Taylor: Mac to the Future, Van Esch: Mac Scope
	Other World Computing: 9.1GB Apple ROM SCSIs only $175.00, Sonnet G3 starting at $126.50, G3/400mhz only $197! Check Out These Deals and More at OWC! Only $5 for FedEx delivery too. Click Here! Norton AntiVirus and Norton Utilities for Macintosh: Protect your Mac from viruses and repair disk problems quickly and easily with our award winning products. Click for a FREE trialware download of Norton Antivirus! Berst Misses the Boat Again Stephen Van Esch August 2, 2000 If the PC press can't see it then it doesn't exist In the wake of the success of Macworld, Jesse Berst felt that he had to get his digs in somehow. I quote: "Apple is painting itself into a corner and the latest releases prove it." According to Jesse, Apple is sticking with the status quo desktop while the whole world moves over to the PDA/phone market. This focus on the desktop will spell Apple's demise. To round out the first quote we have this one: "If Apple wants to break out, it must make a play for the next generation of computing hardware and services. So far, I've seen no evidence that Apple understands that." OK, so Jesse doesn't see any evidence of Apple making a move into the PDA/phone market in either their hardware or their software offerings. This, of course, means that Apple has no strategy for the PDA/phone market. Brilliant deduction I must admit. If we use this reasoning, then it would be fair to surmise that Apple has nothing prepared for the desktop market. I don't see any evidence that Apple understands the way the desktop market is moving. Really, no sarcasm intended here. I see no evidence of future products and hear hardly anything about future products. The main difference between Jesse Berst and me, however, seems to be that I don't expect Apple to release its product plans for the next 2 or 3 years to the general public. I don't even expect Apple to get me to sign a non-disclosure agreement so that I can take a look at their product plans for the next 2 or 3 years. If you pay some attention to Apple (or at least Steve Jobs) you'll notice that surprises are the order of the day. Foisting new products on an unsuspecting public is a regular occurrence. I'm sure that all that free advertising from the Mac and regular press is just an added bonus. I personally think that Apple's approach to new products is much better than the typical computer company approach. Normally, products are announced a year or two in advance of shipping. This, of course, lets the press sit on the sidelines slamming the company for missing deadlines. If there's anything Apple doesn't need, it's bad press for missing deadlines. Just the fact that the dual-processor G4 is seen as a stopgap measure to chip problems (which it is) means the press would be all over the delay of an Apple PDA. I'm convinced that Apple does have several strategies to meet whatever demand they feel they can fill. Whether that's shoehorning OS X into a PDA or simply creating the backend software to allow people to deliver information to PDAs and handhelds is anybody's guess. I'm sure, however, that Jobs is most likely just playing his "spring the surprise when they least expect it" game. So to the PC press wailing that Apple's strategy is way off base, quit whining. Just because you don't have a clue what's up doesn't mean there isn't something going on. <this article available in a printer-friendly format> Biography Steve Van Esch is a regular contributor at osOpinion and runs The Text Pound, a small corner of the Web that tries to find a place for homeless or abandoned articles. Steve loves the Mac and is bilingual, since he's also fluent in Windows and French. Recently on Mac Scope Be thankful for Apple secrecy, 8/16/00. There really is a good side to Apple secrecy. Mac users, the only true computer enthusiasts, 8/9/00. We buy Macs for looks and performance, not just a powerful engine. Berst misses the boat again, 8/2/00. ZDNet's Jesse Berst just doesn't get Apple -- he thinks all is lost because Jobs hasn't unveiled a PDA or phone. Macworld: Looking on with Envy, 7/17/00. We all wish we could go to Macworld Expo -- but not this year for Van Esch. more articles on the Mac Scope index page Elsewhere on Low End Mac Born Again: It Works!, Dan Knight, Online Tech Journal, 8/23. Yes, you can run Mac OS 8.1 on some 68030-based Macs. QuickCam + PowerBook = Webcam, Manuel Mejia Jr., Mac Daniel, 8/23. How to set up an older Mac (in this case, a PowerBook 145) with a QuickCam and use it as a webcam. Troubleshooting FileMaker Pro, Dan Knight, 8/23. How to prevent and recover from data errors in FileMaker Pro. An Old Friend, Somewhere in Boxes, My First Mac, 8/22. "My first computer was the Quadra 660AV. It was the first computer I had ever owned." Quest for a User-friendly Hub, Joshua McKinney, My Turn, 8/22. If USB is supposed to be plug and play, why do so many hubs make that difficult? When to buy new, Dan Knight, Mac Musings, 8/21. The publisher of Low End Mac admits that it sometimes makes more sense to get a new computer then keep upgrading an old one. Making Macs listen and obey, Evan Kleiman, Mac Daniel, 8/21. A brief introduction to using Speech Recognition to control your Mac. Screens of plastic could be fantastic, Charles W. Moore, Miscellaneous Ramblings, 8/21. New technologies could make flat panel displays far less costly. New @ Low End Mac: Receive email information on new articles. Mac Scope ©2000 by Stephen Van Esch. Low End Mac established April 7, 1997. This page, the entire Low End Mac site, and all subsites of <lowendmac.com> copyright ©1997-2000 by Dan Knight unless otherwise noted. All rights reserved. LINK POLICY: This site allows and encourages links to any public page, so long as the linked page does not appear within a frame that prevents bookmarking the linked page. Low End Mac is an independent publication and has not been authorized, sponsored, or otherwise approved by Apple Computer, Inc. Apple, the Apple logo, Macintosh, iMac, and iBook are registered trademarks of Apple Computer, Inc. Additional company and product names may be trademarks or registered trademarks of the individual companies and are hereby acknowledged. LinkExchange Member	Select content available in AvantGo format for Palm, WinCE users. 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