Dumbest Apple Predictions of All Time

From the Wired Blog Network

The iMac Will Fail


"The iMac will only sell to some of the true believers. The iMac doesn't include a floppy disk drive drive for doing file backups or sharing of data. It's an astonishing lapse from Jobs, who should have learned better... the iMac is clean, elegant, floppy-free–and doomed.” — Hiawatha Bray in the Boston Globe, 1998.

Give the Money Back


"I'd shut it down and give the money back to the shareholders." — Michael Dell in October 1997,as an immediate prelude to a renaissance that would see Apple ultimately eclipse Dell in size.


Coming Soon:
Apple's Subnotebook/Tablet/UMPC/Newton 2


"UltraPortable PCs from Apple using Flash memory to be delivered as early as Macworld San Francisco 2007." — Benjamin Reitzes in June 2006.


In Reitzes' defense, the fellow scried the Mac Mini three months before it appeared. And here's Gene Munster with the same thing, just a few days ago. Someone will eventually get the timing right. Right?


Gamers Will Flock To Macs


"Gaming will be an important part of Apple’s focus on the consumer market. ... By the end of calendar year 1999, the Mac platform will have the best gaming machines available to the general consumer." — the usually-wise Robert Paul Leitlao, in 1998.


Apple's Post-iPod Era Decline Proceeds Apace


“The biggest long-term problem with moving to an Apple platform is that the company is in decline." — Rob Enderle, in October 2003.


iPhone, The Bomb of 2007


"The iPhone is nothing more than a luxury bauble that will appeal to a few gadget freaks." — Matthew Lynn, in Bloomberg after the January announcement.


iPhone Revolution To Kill Subsidy Status Quo?


"Wolf also notes that he expects Apple to sell the phone as an unlocked device through the Apple Stores, allowing people to choose their own carrier." — Charles Wolf, paraphrased by Barrons' Eric Savitz in January. In reality, to quote one AT&T executive, Apple ultimately "bent" for them.


Hewlett Packard iPod To Be a Winner


"The expectation on the iPod is that HP's version will probably outsell Apple's version relatively quickly." — Rob Enderle, quoted in MacObserver in August 2004.


Sony To Buy Apple


"Within the next two months, Sony will acquire Apple. ... Sony will be the white knight who will step into the picture." — former Apple VP Gaston Bastiaens, in January 1996.


A Range of Click-Wheel iPhones


"Prudential analyst Jesse Tortora said the first and slimmer of Apple's initial two cell phone models will look like an iPod with a small screen and a click wheel interface." — Jesse Tortoya, paraphrased by MacRumors.


The Goose is Cooked


"Apple as we know it is cooked. It's so classic. It's so sad." — Stan Dolberg of Forrester Research, quoted by the New York Times in 1996. See also Fortune's "By the time you read this story, the quirky cult company…will end its wild ride as an independent enterprise," from the same year. Time: "Certainly No Future."


Microsoft's Nathan Myhrvold couldn't even predict the present: "Apple is already dead," he said after Jobs' return.

AppleTV's Features and Impact

"Apple's iTV will include features beyond streaming content and could have an impact on video similar to what the iPod has done for music." — Andy Neff of Bear Stearns packs several failed prognostications into one sentence.


Jobs, Shjobs!


"The idea that they're going to go back to the past to hit a big home run . . . is delusional" — Dave Winer, quoted by the Financial Times in 1997.


Self-Mutilation or Sale Is the Only Way Forward


"[Apple] seems to have two options. The first is to break itself up, selling the hardware side. The second is to sell the company outright." — The Economist, Feb. 1995


Shut Down The Primary Source Of Revenue


"Admit it. You're out of the hardware game," — Us, in 1997. Of course, the rest of Wired's 101 Ways To Save Apple list is packed with suggestions that turned out to be chillingly accurate! ("We’d all feel better ... if we could get a tower with leopard spots.")

Invention of the Year: The iPhone

From Time.com
By Lev Grossman

Wednesday, Oct. 31, 2007


Stop. I mean, don't stop reading this, but stop thinking what you're about to think. Or, O.K., I'll think it for you:


The thing is hard to type on. It's too slow. It's too big. It doesn't have instant messaging. It's too expensive. (Or, no, wait, it's too cheap!) It doesn't support my work e-mail. It's locked to AT&T. Steve Jobs secretly hates puppies. And—all together now—we're sick of hearing about it! Yes, there's been a lot of hype written about the iPhone, and a lot of guff too. So much so that it seems weird to add more, after Danny Fanboy and Bobby McBlogger have had their day. But when that day is over, Apple's iPhone is still the best thing invented this year. Why? Five reasons:


1. The iPhone is pretty
Most high-tech companies don't take design seriously. They treat it as an afterthought. Window-dressing. But one of Jobs' basic insights about technology is that good design is actually as important as good technology. All the cool features in the world won't do you any good unless you can figure out how to use said features, and feel smart and attractive while doing it.


An example: look at what happens when you put the iPhone into "airplane" mode (i.e., no cell service, WiFi, etc.). A tiny little orange airplane zooms into the menu bar! Cute, you might say. But cute little touches like that are part of what makes the iPhone usable in a world of useless gadgets. It speaks your language. In the world of technology, surface really is depth.


2. It's touchy-feely
Apple didn't invent the touchscreen. Apple didn't even reinvent it (Apple probably acquired its much hyped multitouch technology when it snapped up a company called Fingerworks in 2005). But Apple knew what to do with it. Apple's engineers used the touchscreen to innovate past the graphical user interface (which Apple helped pioneer with the Macintosh in the 1980s) to create a whole new kind of interface, a tactile one that gives users the illusion of actually physically manipulating data with their hands—flipping through album covers, clicking links, stretching and shrinking photographs with their fingers.


This is, as engineers say, nontrivial. It's part of a new way of relating to computers. Look at the success of the Nintendo Wii. Look at Microsoft's new Surface Computing division. Look at how Apple has propagated its touchscreen interface to the iPod line with the iPod Touch. Can it be long before we get an iMac Touch? A TouchBook? Touching is the new seeing.


3. It will make other phones better
Jobs didn't write the code inside the iPhone. These days he doesn't dirty his fingers with 1's and 0's, if he ever really did. But he did negotiate the deal with AT&T to carry the iPhone. That's important: one reason so many cell phones are lame is that cell-phone-service providers hobble developers with lame rules about what they can and can't do. AT&T gave Apple unprecedented freedom to build the iPhone to its own specifications. Now other phone makers are jealous. They're demanding the same freedoms. That means better, more innovative phones for all.


4. It's not a phone, it's a platform
When Apple made the iPhone, it didn't throw together some cheap-o bare-bones firmware. It took OS X, its full-featured desktop operating system, and somehow squished it down to fit inside the iPhone's elegant glass-and-stainless-steel case. That makes the iPhone more than just a gadget. It's a genuine handheld, walk-around computer, the first device that really deserves the name. One of the big trends of 2007 was the idea that computing doesn't belong just in cyberspace, it needs to happen here, in the real world, where actual stuff happens. The iPhone gets applications like Google Maps out onto the street, where we really need them.


And this is just the beginning. Platforms are for building on. Last month, after a lot of throat-clearing, Apple decided to open up the iPhone, so that you—meaning people other than Apple employees—will be able to develop software for it too. Ever notice all that black blank space on the iPhone's desktop? It's about to fill up with lots of tiny, pretty, useful icons.


5. It is but the ghost of iPhones yet to come
The iPhone has sold enough units—more than 1.4 million at press time—that it'll be around for a while, and with all that room to develop and its infinitely updatable, all-software interface, the iPhone is built to evolve. Look at the iPod of six years ago. That monochrome interface! That clunky touchwheel! It looks like something a caveman whittled from a piece of flint using another piece of flint. Now imagine something that's going to make the iPhone look that primitive. You'll have one in a few years. It'll be very cool. And it'll be even cheaper. 


Find this article at: http://www.time.com/time/business/article/0,8599,1678581,00.html