Jobs Raked Over Coals By Lilly
06.19.07 - 01:34pm
When Apple CEO Steve Jobs stood up to deliver his keynote last week he introduced to the world the new web browser Safari. Upon its introduction he showed a pie chart depicting Microsoft’s Internet Explorer and Safari with no other browsers depicted and stated “this is what we’d love.”
This graph and statement has caused much ire in John Lilly, Mozilla’s CEO, who defined the statement to mean that Apple wanted to create a “duopoly” of browsers and take over Firefox’s market share and any others.
Lilly wrote in a his blog stating that the graph, “betrays the way that Steve, and by extension Apple, so often looks at the world.”
“But make no mistake: this wasn’t a careless presentation, or an accidental omission of all the other browsers out there, or even a crummy marketing trick. Lots of words describe Steve and his Stevenotes, but ‘careless’ and ‘accidental’ do not. This is, essentially, the way they’re thinking about the problem, and shows the users they want to pick up.”
Lilly says the problem isn’t them targeting Firefox but in trying to create a duopoly. He wrote, “It destroys participation, it destroys engagement, it destroys self-determination. And, ultimately, it wrecks the quality of the end-user experience.”
Lilly also pointed out that it is now a world that has moved away from the sole control of big corporations as with the rise of Wikipedia, Creative Commons, Linux and Firefox.
“Today’s connected world is no longer constrained by the monopolies and duopolies and cartels of yesterday’s distribution — of the publishers, studios, and OS vendors,” Lilly wrote. “That Apple doesn’t feel this, even within the familiar reality-distortion-field confines of Moscone Center, illustrates much of the problem.”
As to whether or not Jobs really meant a “duopololy” or was just trying to say Apple wanted to take Microsoft’s share of the market, as with their famous Mac vs PC ads. The reasoning behind the graph is something only Jobs and the other higher ups can know. Maybe whoever made the graphs was simply too lazy to bother adding any others or maybe Lilly is right and Jobs was purposely taking a shot at destroying participation.
Perhaps Jobs will post a reply on the Apple website but I think probably not as he usually doesn’t bother responding to jibes and probably simply considers the whole fiasco free press for Safari.
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