No, you did read that right. But it’s not a new rebadged tinned pork or Viagra with a shiny coating. It’s what Apple is doing in the technology market.
The other day you may have heard a story about their launching a new product, the iPad. It was only a minor tiny little story that hardly received any press. Nobody noticed and the world moved on without ever realising it had happened.
At least that would have been the case if it had been announced by any other technology company. But this was Apple and as such the hype was enormous, with coverage on the internet, television and in the press for days, even weeks before and every day afterwards.
Now you can draw your own conclusions about the iPad and I’ve already written about my thoughts on it at Windows7 News so I won’t repeat them here. I want to talk about the golden child. Apple has become a company so hailed, so revered that they could literally rebrand a tin of processed meat and within a few months we’d all be eating it.
This is an excellent thing, up to a point. Apple have been able to reinvigorate whole technology markets with MP3 and mobile video players, and smart phones. They are sure to do the same with the tablet market. This gives all of us fantastic new ways to interact with technology and the world around us, and opens up new opportunities for all.
But how are they doing it? If you look back at their products from the first iPod onwards they’ve not innovated one bit. At no point have they actually introduced a new technology. Every single time they’ve just taken something that already existed, put it in the shiny case and BAM! The whole world goes nuts for it.
Apple has risen to the level of success it has on nothing more than some clever design. It’s really quite remarkable.
So why haven’t other companies learnt from this. Sony used to be the master at clever design but nowadays when they launch a new product nobody bats an eyelid. In fact I can’t think of a single technology company anywhere in the world capable of getting the attention that Apple does.
So what’s the point of Apple? As a technology company, regurgitating old ideas, they’re okay with the design but they’re not offering anything spectacular or even new. What they ARE doing though is performing a valuable public service, and allowing all of us to experience the world in ways we never even dreamt of before.
For this I think the company deserves a medal, and certainly has my praise. All hail Apple, long may they continue revamping the ordinary.
