quote.bloomberg.com— Microsoft Corp., the world's largest software maker, as early as 2003 considered a partnership with Apple Inc. or creating its own digital music player to rival Apple's dominant iPod.
Jan 20, 2007View in Crawl 4
All this partnership would have meant was that Windows Media Player and WMA files would work with the iPod in addition to iTunes and AAC. In otherwords it would have been something good for consumers. Of course Apple never would have gone for the deal since they had no incentive to do so. It is still baffling to me how Microsoft and it's music/movie/tech industry partners managed to all lose against Apple alone. I can't understand why most consumers would choose the most restrictive of all the DRM based music services (the only one that requires official Apple mp3 players) and one of the few music stores left that doesn't even offer a subscription service. People investing heavily into iTunes content are essentially saying they will use Apple products for the rest of their life. Even though MS was late and the WMA music stores were a little late to the market, I think the main culprit for why they appear to have lost was the lack of a sexy stylish piece of hardware. I still don't think it's too late to take down the iTunes/iPod complete domination. I think the cellphone companies and mobile phones have been chipping away at the iPod and mp3 player market in general and I think that Sandisk has given Apple a decent fight in the flash based mp3 player market. I think that Microsoft's current approach is all wrong. A less attractive iPod with 1 or 2 new features is not the way to beat Apple. They need to provide a piece of hardware which is leagues better and truly impressive. But MS is not a hardware company and so the ones at fault are really the electronics companies that failed to market a product that made the iPod feel obsolete. I think the reason that Apple has jumped into the cellphone market is because of the threat that the mp3 player is facing of simply becoming a feature rather than a device. (Same thing that happened to Tivo.) I think that the iPod was starting to lose some business to the fashion phone industry (ie. Chocolate Phone), so Apple did what they had to do. Unfortunately for MS what Apple did (making the iPhone) is what MS should have done instead of Zune. MS should have put all of their focus on working with the 4 major cellphone carriers and working with the fashion phone manufacturers who have shown some modern tech competence (LG, Motorola, Samsung). Instead MS only focused on the business smartphone industry (HTC) with Windows Mobile and provided no software solutions for average consumer. This is the one area where MS maybe still has a chance, the one weak point where they can beat Apple. The iPhone has been priced out of the consumer market and as a first generation device it is guaranteed to have some major short comings. iTunes still has no subscription capabilities. MS needs to have a sitdown with companies like T-mobile and Danger or Sprint/LG/Samsung/Moto and talk to them about how they're going to deal with the iPhone/Cingular problem.
Unless I'm missing something the article said the Microsoft considered a partnership, it doesn't say that Apple was interested.I'm sure many companies would love to partner with Apple, but Apple seems quite confident doing things on their own...
kenvsryuJan 21, 2007
A supercompany everyone would love to hate. I like competition.
waterdragonJan 21, 2007
If they had merged, they had already agreed on a name to represent both companies: Crapple.
cool8manJan 21, 2007
All this partnership would have meant was that Windows Media Player and WMA files would work with the iPod in addition to iTunes and AAC. In otherwords it would have been something good for consumers. Of course Apple never would have gone for the deal since they had no incentive to do so. It is still baffling to me how Microsoft and it's music/movie/tech industry partners managed to all lose against Apple alone. I can't understand why most consumers would choose the most restrictive of all the DRM based music services (the only one that requires official Apple mp3 players) and one of the few music stores left that doesn't even offer a subscription service. People investing heavily into iTunes content are essentially saying they will use Apple products for the rest of their life. Even though MS was late and the WMA music stores were a little late to the market, I think the main culprit for why they appear to have lost was the lack of a sexy stylish piece of hardware. I still don't think it's too late to take down the iTunes/iPod complete domination. I think the cellphone companies and mobile phones have been chipping away at the iPod and mp3 player market in general and I think that Sandisk has given Apple a decent fight in the flash based mp3 player market. I think that Microsoft's current approach is all wrong. A less attractive iPod with 1 or 2 new features is not the way to beat Apple. They need to provide a piece of hardware which is leagues better and truly impressive. But MS is not a hardware company and so the ones at fault are really the electronics companies that failed to market a product that made the iPod feel obsolete. I think the reason that Apple has jumped into the cellphone market is because of the threat that the mp3 player is facing of simply becoming a feature rather than a device. (Same thing that happened to Tivo.) I think that the iPod was starting to lose some business to the fashion phone industry (ie. Chocolate Phone), so Apple did what they had to do. Unfortunately for MS what Apple did (making the iPhone) is what MS should have done instead of Zune. MS should have put all of their focus on working with the 4 major cellphone carriers and working with the fashion phone manufacturers who have shown some modern tech competence (LG, Motorola, Samsung). Instead MS only focused on the business smartphone industry (HTC) with Windows Mobile and provided no software solutions for average consumer. This is the one area where MS maybe still has a chance, the one weak point where they can beat Apple. The iPhone has been priced out of the consumer market and as a first generation device it is guaranteed to have some major short comings. iTunes still has no subscription capabilities. MS needs to have a sitdown with companies like T-mobile and Danger or Sprint/LG/Samsung/Moto and talk to them about how they're going to deal with the iPhone/Cingular problem.
Closed AccountJan 21, 2007
That must be the "Big Mac" you had earlier.
getgregJan 21, 2007
Unless I'm missing something the article said the Microsoft considered a partnership, it doesn't say that Apple was interested.I'm sure many companies would love to partner with Apple, but Apple seems quite confident doing things on their own...
whistlerproJan 21, 2007
I like how your comment pleases both apple and microsoft fanboys - clever. Very clever.