The Dismantling of the Windows Hegemony

This piece by Horace Dediu explains — perfectly — what I was talking about this week with my iPhone disruption piece. Except what Dediu shows is that the disruption started in 2004, three years before the iPhone shipped. But the introduction of iOS accelerated this disruption dramatically.

Bottom line: In 1984, DOS PCs outsold the Mac 6-to-1. By 2004, the ratio of Windows PCs to Macs sold peaked at 56-to-1. Today it’s under 20-to-1 and still dropping — but if you include iOS devices, it’s down to 2-to-1. Staggering.

Dediu’s graphs are the best illustration I’ve ever seen of the waxing and waning of Microsoft’s Windows hegemony.

★ Wednesday, 4 July 2012