Is Apple like Sony?

By Hayley Tsukayama, Updated: Friday, April 27, 12:18 AM

George Colony, chief executive of the Forrester research firm, decided to stir a little trouble this week by publishing a blog post with a provocative headline: Apple = Sony.

The comparison to Sony — the once-great electronics giant faces a projected annual loss of $6.4 billion-- is striking as Apple just announced$39.2 billion in revenue for a quarter in which it nearly doubled its profits.

 

How could Apple be facing the same fate as Sony?

The post essentially argues that Apple is a company that not only revolved around Steve Jobs, but needed Jobs be at the very heart of the company.

Take the sun out of the solar system, he says, and the company is poised to “coast, and then decelerate,” as Sony did after its founder, Akio Morita, stepped down in 1989. Colony said Apple chief executive Tim Cook is a “proven and competent executive” but hardly the man to run an organization based on charisma. Instead, Colony suggests an Apple executive like Jony Ive or Scott Forstall, who he believes have a little more personality.

While Colony makes some compelling arguments, there are points to consider on on the other side.

For one, the Apple-Sony comparison — while interesting — is not entirely apt. Apple and Sony may have had similar leadership models, but Sony suffers from a lack of focus and poor integration of its products. But those are two areas where Apple excels.

As Cook told investors earlier this year, all of Apple’s products could fit on a single table and the energy of the whole company goes into improving them. And there’s no denying that Apple has defined a true ecosystem of products — one ID and password will let you access and link any Apple product or service.

That can’t be said of Sony, which is working now under the leadership of Kazuo Hirai to break down the silos between the company divisions and allow users to sign into multiple services using a single account.

Apple also has an advantage over Sony, Disney and other companies that Colony names in his post, in that the company was prepared for Jobs to step down. Cook had acted as chief executive in the past, and makes it a point to showcase other members of an executive team hand-picked by Jobs, to carry on all aspects of his leadership style.

Colony is also, perhaps, being a bit hard on Cook. Yes, Cook is quieter than Jobs and certainly didn’t have the same pizzazz that the late Apple co-founder did while introducing the latest new iPad. But they’re very different people. And if Cook had tried to pull off a glitzy show, he would have certainly set himself up for more harsh criticism.

It would also be remiss not to credit Cook with a large part of Apple’s success. As The Washington Post reported, Apple’s supply chain has allowed it to hit a sweet spot on pricing and propelled it to high profits. Cook himself is popular at Apple, with at least one survey showing he has a 97 percent approval rating at the company — two percentage points ahead of Steve Jobs. And he’s been coming into his own, showing some more personality on Apple’s latest earnings call.

The company’s fate, really, rests in the performance of its next big innovation, whatever and whenever that may be. Since Jobs’s death, Apple has continued to provide tweaks to its most popular products, and those changes have propelled the company to greater heights. But Apple — fairly or not — can’t afford a big product flop, and so will have to carefully develop whatever is beyond the pipeline that Jobs left behind.

Might Apple fall from the top of the world? Sure; there’s almost nowhere to go but down. But while Steve Jobs may have been Apple’s puppet master, innovation was at the core of his personality. As long as that focus stays at the heart of the company, it should be insulated against a Sony-like decline.

 Source: washingtonpost

Instagram users are young and Facebook users are old

A new study shows that the two social-networking sites serve different age groups. Could this be one of the reasons why more people aren't celebrating the buyout?
by Dara Kerr  April 10, 2012 5:40 PM PDT

Instead of exuberant rejoicing over the announcement of Facebook's mega-acquisition of Instagram yesterday, there's been a lot of woe-is-me chatter among the photo app's users. One of the reasons may be because the two social networks cater to different groups of people.

Instagram's users, on the whole, are quite a bit younger than Facebook's, according to a study done by consumer behavior research group Experian Hitwise.

"The audience for Instagram is relatively young, with over half of the visitors to the Instagram website are under the age of 35," research director at Hitwise Heather Dougherty writes in the study. "This is an interesting contrast to the visitors of Facebook's website, which reflects a more mainstream audience with a higher share of older users."

The study shows that over the last four weeks, the majority of Instagram users were between the ages of 18 and 34, whereas Facebook's two largest user age groups were between 25 and 34 and 55 and over.

When Facebook bought Instagram for $1 billion yesterday, the wildly popular 2-year-old startup had roughly 33 million users. User activity on the app takes place within the confines of a smartphone, while Instagram's Web site is secondary. Nevertheless, according to Hitwise, Instagram had more than 10 million U.S. visits in March, which shows a 1000 percent increase in site visits since December.

 (Credit: Experian Hitwise)

 Source:Cnet

 

Facebook宣佈以10億美元收購Instagram

Instagram在手機平台上，被稱為最有人氣的照片分享平台也不為過，現在有Android版本更是勢不可擋。如此有潛力的平台，當然會被其他公司看中，想不到這麼快就有人收購Instagram，收購的還要是Facebook。

Facebook總裁Mark Zuckerberg剛剛就在自己的網誌中宣佈，Facebook將會以10億美元收購Instagram。在收購Instagram之後，兩個平台之間會有更多的合作，對雙方的服務都有幫助。Mark Zuckerberg也承諾，Instagram的品牌和服務開發將會保持獨立，確保正在使用Instagram的用家不會受到影響。吸納了Instagram的Facebook，應該會能在一直不是強項的照片分享功能上有些改進，但實際上會有什麼變化，還需要再作觀察。

來源：Facebook

Apple’s Chilly Response to iPad Heat Complaints

MARCH 20, 2012 AT 7:58 AM PT

t’s not uncommon for Apple enthusiasts to start finding fault with their new gadget within a couple days of buying the latest and greatest.

In some rare cases — most famously, with the iPhone 4 antenna — Apple may end up acknowledging some validity to the griping.

But for now, at least, that’s not what’s happening when it comes to reports that the new iPad kicks out more heat than its predecessors.

Here’s their statement, via Apple PR’s Trudy Muller:

“The new iPad delivers a stunning Retina display, A5X chip, support for 4G LTE plus 10 hours of battery life, all while operating well within our thermal specifications. If customers have any concerns they should contact AppleCare.”

via allthingD

Facebook的社區營銷（1）：關於Facebook

相信在閱讀這篇文章之前, 您已經對社會媒體營銷及吸引式營銷有所耳聞，或許您曾經使用微博（例如：Twitter）或社區（例如：Facebook）來查看朋友的近況，告訴朋友您的近況，對某件社會新聞發表您的看法，甚至用它們來發起一次活動……所有這些似乎與您的工作沒有太大的聯繫。

 

但是，隨著吸引式營銷的日益流行，參與到網絡社區的交流漸漸成為最直接且有趣的接觸潛在客戶的方法。我們將以Facebook為例，向您介紹如何開展SNS社區營銷。

 

Facebook是當今美國第一的社交網絡服務網站，2004年上線之初主要為了滿足大學生之間的相互交流，以及日常生活的娛樂休閒體驗。至今已發展成為一個為任何用戶間進行對話，展現自我，表達自己個性化需求而提供平台的門戶網站。

 

僅僅用了六年時間，Facebook已經成為全美僅次於谷歌，流量最大的網站。隨著Facebook用戶的不斷增加，它的用途已不再局限於純粹提供社交服務，越來越多的企業已經開始通過Facebook來吸引客戶，並推銷自己的品牌。

 Facebook能夠幫助企業：

• 在用戶搜尋企業產品或服務時更容易被找到
• 與客戶及潛在客戶更緊密得聯繫在一起
• 為企業自身創造一個交流社區
• 能更直接的推廣企業所創造的資源

Apple 設計師 Jonathan Ive 爵士：對手的目標是完全錯誤的

近日倫敦媒體 Evening Standard 對 Apple 設計師 Jonathan Ive 爵士進行了採訪。

採訪中他談到了 2 個月前被授予新爵位的感受、倫敦成長環境對他的影響以及 Apple 的競爭者們無法戰勝他們的原因。他認為 Apple 的對手只是熱衷于「標新立異」而非「專注的把每一件產品都做到盡善盡美」，而這樣的目標是「完全錯誤的」。

而他和他的團隊在創作時不會被價格、日程、營銷方案等因素所束縛，尤其是最後一點，在他看來簡直是「對使用產品用戶的不敬」。

另外，他還認為用戶能夠感受到「優秀產品在設計中所融入的關懷」，同時市場上一些「利字當頭、粗製濫造」的商品也自然會遭到用戶的排斥。

而且對一些「喜歡賣弄」的設計師，Jonathan Ive 爵士表達了極端的厭惡。如果你想對這位 Apple 的設計大師有更多的瞭解，可以點擊來源閱讀採訪的全文。

引用來源