Thomas Fitzgerald on How the Electronics Industry Still Fails to Get the iPod

Thomas Fitzgerald:

Electronics firms are not going to respond to the iPhone, because in their eyes, the iPhone couldn’t possibly be a success. Just like when the iPod was released, they will sit back absolutely convinced that device will to fail to capture the market.

He makes some good points here. Rather than try to compete with the iPod in terms of experience, consumer electronics companies have stuck to their traditional “feature count matters more than experience” design model. (Microsoft’s Zune may be the only exception.) The iPhone doesn’t do more than other phones; it just does the same things way, way better.

★ Thursday, 18 January 2007