It’s not every day you read a blog post predicting the “biggest announcement in the computer industry in the last decade or two”.
In his post Windows applications on Macs without Windows George Silverman at Word of Mouth is predicting that Windows applications will now run natively on Macs and that Steve Jobs will announce this at MacWorld on Tuesday, 9 January.
Here are my predictions: Next week, on Tuesday, January 9th at MacWorld, Steve Jobs will announce that the new Mac operating system called Leopard, OS X 10.5, will directly run Windows applications without needing Windows. That’s right, you will be able to install and run any Windows program directly into the Mac without having a copy of Windows on the machine!
According to George it’s likely that Mac has “the best word of mouth of any present product”, so coupled with this new capability a monster is about to be unleashed.
I further predict that this will produce the biggest word-of-mouth blowout in history. Combine the pent up positive word of mouth of the Mac with the negative word of mouth toward Microsoft, Windows, the Windows PC makers like Dell, viruses, adware, spyware, malware, etc. and you have an explosive combination. This will be the most interesting test in years of the unleashing of word of mouth. It will demonstrate to the entire marketing community what happens when you follow my marketing approach of Blockbusting: find the decision blocks, bust ’em up, and you will see exponential growth.
…To my knowledge, I’m the only one predicting the landslide success of Mac in the next year. It probably won’t be immediate, but as the snowball gains momentum, it will grow exponentially…
…By the way, I was among the first to predict that a way would be found to get Windows to work on the then-new Intel Mac. It caused a lot of WOM among the tech savvy and a lot of sales, but not among the corporate people who would have to use it seamlessly at work. Now they can. Now we’ll find out that a lot of corporate IT people have Macs at home.
This announcement also caught my interest for personal reasons because I had to work on Macs for years and love using them. But I’ve always had a PC at home purely for convenience. So if George is right, I’ll definitely be making the switch at home!
And if he is right, won’t the next 12 months be interesting as we all watch the power of WOM at work.
It’s just after 10pm on Tuesday evening as I write this, which means America is just rising to greet the new day. So let’s see what happens.
Well, I was wrong. See the update on my article.
At least Virtualisation does a decent job of running two OSs…
Bummer!!
gotta love that new iPhone. Wow but the only downside is the fact that you’ll never truly be alone 😀
You can also dual boot (or triple boot) a PC or MAC to run multiple OS’… so you could run OSX in a PC right now. Cheers… good to see you writing again Dani,
Luc
Coach eh?… well thats cool 😀
Thats the problem with being a Computer Geek… you know far too much and gadgets 😀
Luc
Hey Luc!
Thanks coach 🙂
I think I would need one-on-one personal training for the iPhone! …cheers, Dani
Bad predictions!
I’ve been a Mac user since the beginning in ’84. It never ceases to amaze me how PC useres simply can’t get that using a Mac is a pleasure. After all these years I still get asked can I get my programs for Mac? Even when I tell them that the new Intel Macs NOW run Windows, it still takes a bit for them to get it.
This is the only area in marketing that I think Mac is missing it. I love the commercials, but I think they are so clever they entertain without educating.
Even if Windows programs could run on the Mac today without Windows loaded, I don’t think average PC users would get it. I hope I’m wrong because I would love to see Mac rule the world. (if for nothing but never having to see another lame presentation done on Power Point).
Hey Ed,
Yeah I agree, Macs really are a pleasure to use. And OS X is just so much fun 🙂 YOu’ve got to hand it to them when it comes to design.
In terms of marketing I think a big part of the problem for the Macs is their market positioning. From what I understand, the rise of desktop publishing (and graphic art) as a profession saved the Mac from extinction. It was an excellent strategy (with a bit of luck thrown in I believe), but the long-term effect has created a highly targeted niche market. I know they say in marketing that this is a really good thing, but perhaps it can also be a bit of a trap because I think to a large extent Apple have alienated much of the market who don’t fit into the “arty” or “techie” group. Also, I think another side effect is that it has created a sense of mystery around the Mac. They’re almost like the forbidden fruit (ha ha)! Could there be an advertising angle in that? 🙂
On top of that, Macs are significantly more expensive than PCs – in Australia anyway, I’m not sure about the US, but I’m guessing it’s the same. Which gives people another reason not to buy them. Actually, I read an article yesterday about how the intense advertising and popularity of the iPod has had a flow on effect with other Apple products and Mac sales are up. Interesting.
You know a couple of months ago I was playing with one of the new MacBooks and fell head over heels in love. They’re seriously sexy. Have to save my pennies for one of those 🙂
Cheers, Danielle