Comment by sulam
4 years ago
Apple has tried to put Netflix out of business and so far isn't succeeding. They sort/of tried to put Facebook out of business and failed so miserably they may not get over it for another 5 years. They haven't even been able to beat Spotify, where they arguably should be dominant.
Apple is pretty pitiful as a services company. Yes, they're trying, and they may eventually figure out whatever structural issue it is that's keeping them from being successful here, but I think for every significant business Apple has successfully cloned (Evernote, maybe? What else?) you can come up with at least another where they haven't been able to despite trying, and another 2 or 3 where they haven't tried (yet).
Yes, many small startups watch WWDC with fear in their souls that Apple is about to disintermediate them. It's worth spending some time to understand the differences between those companies and companies that Apple has failed to compete with despite trying hard. I'm sure some obvious differences will jump out at you if you're willing to abandon the position that Apple is an unbeatable juggernaut.
According to Drew Houston, Steve Jobs offered to acquire Dropbox and when refused said he'd compete with them. iCloud is right about there at this point, I know people who turned off Dropbox and just use iCloud (or the Google offering).
So I guess Apple really put them out of business, right?
Oh wait, no, they’re worth $7.5B as of Friday. /s Definitely Drew should have taken the money and run. I mean, he’s only a single digit billionaire!