Not Just The Name That’s Better

Scoble:

One thing I totally agree with Joe on is that Apple is WAY WAY WAY better than Microsoft at coming up with names. “Apple Front Row” certainly beats “Microsoft Windows Media Center Edition 2005.”

It’s not just the name that’s better though, it’s the fact that Apple is shipping it with every new iMac. I have no idea if the software is better or not but at least people know about it and will try it out. Geeks seem to know about Windows Media Center but few other people seem to. Everyone who buys a new iMac will know about Front Row and will probably use it at least once.

Now to be fair, Microsoft can’t do this – they don’t make the hardware. Even so, Microsoft could have bundled the media center features into the standard version of Windows. Some may claim that the anti-trust lawsuits would prevent this, but I don’t think they would if it were an optionally installed component. Internet Explorer is not an optional component, neither is Windows Messenger as far as I know. IIS is optional (and not installed by default these days) and I haven’t heard of any anti-trust rumblings about it.

Amusingly, Apple is quite possibly doing to Microsoft what Microsoft originally did to Apple (though they are unlikely to achieve as dramatic a success). I don’t know for sure which product is better, but I suspect at this point that Microsoft’s media center is probably the better option, even if Apple’s offering does turn out to be easier to use, purely because Apple’s offering is young and is probably missing some important features. Note: I’m totally guessing here. The interesting part is that it probably won’t matter too much. Apple is getting their software out to users much more effectively than Microsoft is, even with Microsoft’s monopoly power. Maybe the XBox 360 will change this, but for now Apple has the distribution channel and Microsoft is going to struggle to keep up even if they have the better product. The downside of this for Apple of course is the huge reserves Microsoft has so that they will just keep working at it and probably eventually succeed, and the XBox 360 which looks like an excellent way to deliver media center functionality – in fact it looks a lot better than Apple’s method.

It’s also interesting to note the diametrically opposed approaches here.  Apple is bundling media center features into a standard PC, because Apple’s strategy is all about the PC as a digital hub. So instead of releasing a set-top device for a media center, Apple bundle it into the iMac.  They didn’t even bundle it into the Mac Mini. Why? Because Apple want people to replace their TV with their computer. Crazy but quite possibly very effective, a lot of geeks already do this. What about the big screens? Ever noticed how TVs are LCD and Plasma screens these days? Ever noticed how your computer has been using LCD screens for years? The reality is that HDTV requires better resolution from TVs, which computer screens already have, requires digital IO, which computers already have and requires digital decoding techniques, which computers already have. With HDTV your TV will be a computer, the question is, do you want a TV that has limited computing facilities or a real computer? (Related question: can computers be made user friendly enough that they can provide TV facilities to the unwashed masses?) 

Microsoft on the other hand, are providing a new device that is designed to plug into your TV and make it do more. ie: Make the TV more of a computer. This has the advantage that people automatically go out and buy a TV, usually before they think about buying a computer for the house. So it’s better leveraging the installed base of TVs as well as the common thinking about TVs. It has the advantage for Microsoft that for the first time, they are in control of the software and the hardware – a major component of Apple’s secret sauce. The downside is that the XBox is mostly marketed as a gaming device and that a significantly smaller target market than TV watchers. I suspect it’s also a smaller market than people with a PC at home, but I’m not at all certain of that.

It should be very interesting to watch the different strategies pan out (assuming they do pan out this way). If there’s anyone who can make a computer work simply enough to replace the TV, it’s Apple. In fact, Apple made a point of showing how much simpler Front Row’s remote control was to a standard TV remote – they may actually make something that’s simpler than current TVs. Let’s not forget that a huge number of people can’t program their VCR today and most people never work out what all the buttons on their TV remote does, let alone how to hook it up to their VCR, digital camera, etc. Having said that, Microsoft’s ability to leverage their Windows installed base is huge, and they look like they’ll get some big wins here with the XBox 360. They really just need to find a way to start marketing the XBox 360 as a home media device instead of a gaming device with media functions without losing the war with Sony and Nintendo.

Fun times ahead.