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Attack of the Leopard

Entry 730, on 2008-04-01 at 18:18:59 (Rating 3, Computers)

I have a picture on the window of my office which I sometimes see people who pass by stop and look at. Its difficult to say what they think about it but I hope it makes them think. Of course, I might be being too geeky here and pretending the subject really matters but, in my area of work it does. The picture is of a leopard chewing on a box containing Windows Vista. It symbolises the way Apple's latest operating system (Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard) has "mauled" Microsoft Vista and I think its quite effective.

Its not just me who thinks that Leopard is the world's finest OS. MacWorld reports on a survey of corporate satisfaction with operating systems and shows that Leopard is significantly in front of the others: 53% of Leopard users reported they were very satisfied with it compared with 40% of XP users and 8% (yes, I said 8) of Vista users. (Here's the MacWorld article).

Of course, there could be methodological problems here because only a small fraction of corporate computer users use Macs and they could be the ones doing the more interesting, creative work. And maybe the corporate environment hasn't adapted very well to Vista yet. On the other hand I think its more likely that Vista is just a piece of junk - like all the other Microsoft products.

The satisfaction ratings are the good news. The bad news is, that despite corporate people loving their Macs, they are still being forced into using PCs. Only 7% of companies buying laptops in future will buy a Mac. Oh well, I prefer to use the best OS rather than the most popular anyway!

Another survey, by Morgan Stanley, shows 40% of US college students intend to buy a Mac. This is a stunning result if its true. University graduates move into the work force and they will want to use the platform they are used to. In the past this has been mainly Windows PCs but obviously Macs will feature more prominently in the future. Of course, corporate culture (is that an oxymoron?) will force many of them to use Vista but the pressure to use Macs more will be there and will gradually bring about a change in attitude. (Here's the campus demand MacWorld article).

The problem with most big corporations is that they don't adapt well to change. No matter how good Macs are the corporates still won't use them and that is frustrating to Mac supporters. But I think the long term looks good for Apple. Microsoft's brand power is in sharp decline according to another study (although I'm skeptical about whether brand power really means anything) and Apple is the logical alternative to Windows based PCs. (Here's the IT World article).

So I say let the attack of the leopard continue! Apple can gradually chew away at Microsoft's dominance and hopefully in the near future Apple will reach a point where it has a healthy market share (around 20% to 30% would do) and be a serious contender without being the new monopoly leader itself.

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