Most Wall Street analysts have been negative on Apple for the last several months, with some issuing negative comments and downgrades on Apple’s stock. Some have even gone so far as to specifically state that the Mac is heading towards obsolescence. This is, of course, why we have put together the Apple Death Knell Counter, which is even now sadly in need of an update.
Enter Tom Yager of InfoWorld, a mainstream tech magazine that caters mainly to the Intel world. Mr. Yager has penned a piece that questions the negativity on Apple, and cites some specific areas where Apple is doing quite well. From the article:
I read a lot for my work. I inevitably run into material, such as the SCO Group’s lawsuit against IBM, that makes me bang on my desk. Not only is it bad karma, it’s unforgivably bad "lawyering" — the filing document contains so many factual errors that I could make a career out of refuting it item by item. I also ran into a story in a business publication I generally respect, warning Apple that it faces an uncertain future if it doesn’t innovate soon.
For some analysts, I predict a bright future writing horoscopes and fortune cookie truisms. Is Apple really in danger because it hasn’t made a major new product announcement in the past 30 days? If that’s true, the industry is on a tighter release schedule than I thought. There is no lack of innovation at Apple; most competitors fare poorly by comparison. Apple is sticking to its message (dare I say “vision"?) with such focus that it drives some paid observers crazy. A steady, consistent drive to push technology forward does not make headlines.
Mr. Yager specifically cites Apple’s recently announced fan trade-in program among the things Apple is doing right, along with "X11, Safari, IDE storage, 802.11g, the 17-inch PowerBook, iLife, .Mac, and client-side Java." Following that with:
What do I think Apple’s getting wrong? The exclusive deal with Sony Ericsson on syncable mobile phones, developer training, and documentation, and the lack of a strategy by Apple to get hardware vendors to create OS X device drivers come to mind. There is plenty more in both categories.
There is more in the full article, which we recommend as a good read.
The Mac Observer Spin:
It is interesting to see some of the bizarre things to be said about Apple by Wall Street types who don’t seem to understand Apple’s business model. It’s nice to have a mainstream columnist say that. While we pride ourselves at TMO in offering a balanced look at Apple and the Mac platform, we won’t pretend for a second that mainstream opinions that echo our own opinions don’t carry a lot more credibility than ours.