Classified

I was rereading the essay “The Other Road Ahead” from “Hackers & Painters” and I was quite surprised by the following note (it’s number 14):

If the Mac was so great, why did it lose? Cost, again. Microsoft concentrated on the software business and unleashed a swarm of cheap component suppliers on Apple hardware. It did not help, either that suits took over during a critical period. (And it hasn’t lost yet. If Apple were to grow the iPod into a cell phone with a web browser, Microsoft would be in big trouble.)

This was back in 2004, mind you! And Apple announced iPhone in January 2007. “The Other Road Ahead” was originally published in September 2001, and is missing the part between the parentheses, but it turned out that Apple announced iPod one month later.

Most impressive.