Do you know what the real difference is between a Mac and a PC?
It’s not just the OS. A platform always stands or falls on third-party development. The difference is that Mac software tends to be well designed, and Windows software tends to suck.
The question, then, is why don’t all the Mac developers simply port their stuff to the more popular platform and make a mint? Because Windows users don’t value well designed software like Mac users do. They’re more likely to choose a product based on its feature list and price.
Here’s the thing, though—we can’t compete on either of those fronts. The reality is that engineers in other countries like Russia and China are getting better all the time. Any piece of innovative, well designed software will have a crapware knock-off pop up from overseas, where they can sell software for half of what we can and still come out ahead, such is the dispairity of our economies.
The reason all the quality software is on the Mac is that the Mac is the only platform where users care enough about quality to make building it worthwhile.
Fifteen years ago we fought the desktop wars, and we lost, but we weren’t destroyed. We sat, huddled around the last bit of heat from our GPUs, and kept moving the platform forward, despite its abysmal market share.
Now we’re fighting again, only this time the battle is in your pants. Every one of these little trouser Macs represents a victory in the next big wave in personal computing.
The trouble is, iPhone is not Macintosh. iPhone’s users are not Macintosh’s users. Right now, millions of users are getting their first taste of this new platform and deciding whether they value quality. There’s only one answer we can afford to accept, because to lose this battle is to lose the war.
Addenda 
Amazing comments on this entry. I really shows the power of Lemur CATTA! To wit:
Mike
I have to disagree about that battle in your pants. To say that the sentiment I’m about to express is unpopular is understating things hugely. But I seriously do believe that each trouser Mac is a defeat, not a victory, in the next big wave of personal computing. Every iPhone purchase is an implicit statement that people don’t care if they own the devices they purchase, that they don’t mind a nanny state, that Steve’s dream of total control is perfectly swell. I don’t want Apple sitting with a kill switch for all of my products, and to me that takes precedence over convincing people to pay for quality.
I have to disagree about that battle in your pants. To say that the sentiment I’m about to express is unpopular is understating things hugely. But I seriously do believe that each trouser Mac is a defeat, not a victory, in the next big wave of personal computing. Every iPhone purchase is an implicit statement that people don’t care if they own the devices they purchase, that they don’t mind a nanny state, that Steve’s dream of total control is perfectly swell. I don’t want Apple sitting with a kill switch for all of my products, and to me that takes precedence over convincing people to pay for quality.
Random Lemur
Eep!
Eep!
Davide
I totally agree, but how do you fight this battle? I mean, how do you educate to quality millions of users who have been fed crap for ages ? I believe that refusing to lower the quality of your apps is the only stand Mac “born & bred” developer can take, but I am not that sure it will be effective...
I totally agree, but how do you fight this battle? I mean, how do you educate to quality millions of users who have been fed crap for ages ? I believe that refusing to lower the quality of your apps is the only stand Mac “born & bred” developer can take, but I am not that sure it will be effective...
Yoz
Way to kill the “Mac fans are elitist wankers” stereotype!
UI design consistency is where the tightly-knit Mac dev community excels. If it was the only attribute of software quality, I’d buy your argument. Trouble is, apps seem to bomb out just as often on my Mac as they did on my Windows box (before I switched two years ago).
Developers on a minority platform are more likely to obey the tenets of that platform’s culture. UI quality is the most obvious attribute of Mac culture, which is why many (but not most, let alone all) Mac apps do well there. But as the developer and user bases expand, the culture gets diluted.
You may consider this heretical, but there’s plenty of quality software on Windows too. Admittedly, it’s not that easy to sift the great stuff from the shovelware. If you think of any good ways to solve that problem, please keep them in mind, because if the Mac developer base ever approaches the size of Windows, you’ll need them. OS X can do some fantastic things, but I very much doubt it can beat Sturgeon’s Law.
Way to kill the “Mac fans are elitist wankers” stereotype!
UI design consistency is where the tightly-knit Mac dev community excels. If it was the only attribute of software quality, I’d buy your argument. Trouble is, apps seem to bomb out just as often on my Mac as they did on my Windows box (before I switched two years ago).
Developers on a minority platform are more likely to obey the tenets of that platform’s culture. UI quality is the most obvious attribute of Mac culture, which is why many (but not most, let alone all) Mac apps do well there. But as the developer and user bases expand, the culture gets diluted.
You may consider this heretical, but there’s plenty of quality software on Windows too. Admittedly, it’s not that easy to sift the great stuff from the shovelware. If you think of any good ways to solve that problem, please keep them in mind, because if the Mac developer base ever approaches the size of Windows, you’ll need them. OS X can do some fantastic things, but I very much doubt it can beat Sturgeon’s Law.
Martin Pilkington
I think the world is changing to help us with this. People are moving from looking just at features to start looking at implementations and are starting to value implementations more and more. This is part of the reason the iPod and iPhone are doing so well, despite not having the longest feature lists on the playing field.
During the 80s only those with a clue used computers, during the 90s the whole world and his wife used computer. The problem is that they didn’t know much about computers, and when you don’t know much about something you default to the “bigger numbers are better” state, which is fairly reliable. As people become more knowledgeable with computers they start to appreciate the quality of implementation more and more. These are the people who are switching to the Mac.
As for how to win the war, it’s simple really. Use the same tactics as on the Mac. Cocoa isn’t easy to learn and when you do learn it, it actually makes it harder to make a truly crap UI than to make a good one. We have this weapon over other platforms. We also have the aforementioned weapon of caring about quality.
However, the most important weapon is the developer community. There is nothing on any platform that matches the Mac developer community. If we can bring that over to the iPhone then it is an unstoppable force. We then turn from many small boats all over the sea into a fleet. Unfortunately this is being prevented by something that starts with F and ends with UCKING NDA.
I think the world is changing to help us with this. People are moving from looking just at features to start looking at implementations and are starting to value implementations more and more. This is part of the reason the iPod and iPhone are doing so well, despite not having the longest feature lists on the playing field.
During the 80s only those with a clue used computers, during the 90s the whole world and his wife used computer. The problem is that they didn’t know much about computers, and when you don’t know much about something you default to the “bigger numbers are better” state, which is fairly reliable. As people become more knowledgeable with computers they start to appreciate the quality of implementation more and more. These are the people who are switching to the Mac.
As for how to win the war, it’s simple really. Use the same tactics as on the Mac. Cocoa isn’t easy to learn and when you do learn it, it actually makes it harder to make a truly crap UI than to make a good one. We have this weapon over other platforms. We also have the aforementioned weapon of caring about quality.
However, the most important weapon is the developer community. There is nothing on any platform that matches the Mac developer community. If we can bring that over to the iPhone then it is an unstoppable force. We then turn from many small boats all over the sea into a fleet. Unfortunately this is being prevented by something that starts with F and ends with UCKING NDA.
John Muir
Piracy!
That’s the elephant in the room. Most WIndows users don’t even bother to buy any software. The same kid they turn to for tech advice will be the one who has the warez disc with umpteen thousand dollars worth of pirated apps on it, hot from BitTorrent.
The same happens on the Mac too, but to less of an extent. Mac users are wealthier for the most part, and more of them care about their Mac, the platform, and therefore the wellbeing of the devs.
The iPhone meanwhile: all but piracy free. Jailbreaking will be the only way from here on in, and the jailbreak community aren’t (to my distant understanding) so big on piracy anyway.
The iPhone could well be the very best place for software’s quality to shine through, since almost everyone will be paying for it instead of stealing. Balance this against your valid point about iPhone != Mac users, and we have an experiment on our hands!
Piracy!
That’s the elephant in the room. Most WIndows users don’t even bother to buy any software. The same kid they turn to for tech advice will be the one who has the warez disc with umpteen thousand dollars worth of pirated apps on it, hot from BitTorrent.
The same happens on the Mac too, but to less of an extent. Mac users are wealthier for the most part, and more of them care about their Mac, the platform, and therefore the wellbeing of the devs.
The iPhone meanwhile: all but piracy free. Jailbreaking will be the only way from here on in, and the jailbreak community aren’t (to my distant understanding) so big on piracy anyway.
The iPhone could well be the very best place for software’s quality to shine through, since almost everyone will be paying for it instead of stealing. Balance this against your valid point about iPhone != Mac users, and we have an experiment on our hands!
Random Lemur
I think that’s part of the problem with the App Store review issues. Alot of iPhone users are carrying their PC mentality with them when give negative reviews for a well designed app that dares to charge a whole .99 - “* GR8 APP - SHOULD B FREE”.
I think that’s part of the problem with the App Store review issues. Alot of iPhone users are carrying their PC mentality with them when give negative reviews for a well designed app that dares to charge a whole .99 - “* GR8 APP - SHOULD B FREE”.
Raavi
So... what’s the solution to the crApp Store? How do we ensure that we win this battle and the war? People seem to be annoyed with the current level of control that Apple is exercising (ie. rumoured killswitch and the I am rich $1000 app being pulled etc). But the only solution I can think of is for Apple to exercise even more control of the apps they let into the store - to ensure that people’s first experience of the platform matches that of desktop/laptop Macs. If Apple did this they could stop the eBooks and torches and tipulators from getting into the store - but at the same time a million angsty blog articles would appear indicting Apple for their Big Brother level of control etc... I’m not sure what the answer is that both prevents crapware AND doesn’t make Apple the Grand Poobah of Gatekeeping - any ideas?
So... what’s the solution to the crApp Store? How do we ensure that we win this battle and the war? People seem to be annoyed with the current level of control that Apple is exercising (ie. rumoured killswitch and the I am rich $1000 app being pulled etc). But the only solution I can think of is for Apple to exercise even more control of the apps they let into the store - to ensure that people’s first experience of the platform matches that of desktop/laptop Macs. If Apple did this they could stop the eBooks and torches and tipulators from getting into the store - but at the same time a million angsty blog articles would appear indicting Apple for their Big Brother level of control etc... I’m not sure what the answer is that both prevents crapware AND doesn’t make Apple the Grand Poobah of Gatekeeping - any ideas?
Bart
I absolutely don’t agree with many points you make.
The reason Mac software tends to be better designed (UI-wise) is because the developers themselfs chose a platform to develop on, which has a smaller target market. The reason they choose this platform is because they love the user experience of it themselfs, and thus are more sensitive to bad UI design and user experience. I don’t believe for a second that it’s normal “users” that ask for it - they tend to accept flaws in software very quickly, just look at Windows. I don’t count the more technical crowd as ‘normal users’, they’re always more critical and on Mac at the moment this is probably a larger part of the total users than it is on PC, and they’re just as vocal.
Also on Mac well designed software has to integrate with the entire operating system to archieve this user experience which is so important. This makes it impossible to port it to PC, simply because the Windows platform simply lacks some of the basic user-experience features which OSX has. That’s the main reason mac developers don’t port software to PC - simply because a lot of it is impossible or very hard to do on that platform.
Then offcource the current PC-software market is massively bigger than the Mac market. The moment the Mac-software market becomes significant for even smaller PC-developers - you will see a shitload of crap-applications for Mac too, all ported from PC - integrated? No. Just look at the applications currenty on mac which were direct ports of the Windows or Linux versions. Take Opera or Firefox as good examples - on Mac they suck. Why? User experience due to the lack of integration. The moment more ‘windows software’ is ported because the Mac market grows - the more bad applications you’ll have. OSX is very ‘multiplatform development’ unfriendly - which is it’s power, but also has huge drawbacks.
The iPhone has one advantage - to develop on it, you need a Mac, limiting the developers mainly to people already familiar with the osx platform. It’s again not the users you need to convince. If a user finds an application without alternatives which does what he wants it to do, but which is actually very bad - they will still use it. Only a small part of these users will actually critisize the application, unless it’s lacking something they’re ‘used to’ from their old phone or on their PC since the iPhone offers a lot of functionality they also have on that.
I absolutely don’t agree with many points you make.
The reason Mac software tends to be better designed (UI-wise) is because the developers themselfs chose a platform to develop on, which has a smaller target market. The reason they choose this platform is because they love the user experience of it themselfs, and thus are more sensitive to bad UI design and user experience. I don’t believe for a second that it’s normal “users” that ask for it - they tend to accept flaws in software very quickly, just look at Windows. I don’t count the more technical crowd as ‘normal users’, they’re always more critical and on Mac at the moment this is probably a larger part of the total users than it is on PC, and they’re just as vocal.
Also on Mac well designed software has to integrate with the entire operating system to archieve this user experience which is so important. This makes it impossible to port it to PC, simply because the Windows platform simply lacks some of the basic user-experience features which OSX has. That’s the main reason mac developers don’t port software to PC - simply because a lot of it is impossible or very hard to do on that platform.
Then offcource the current PC-software market is massively bigger than the Mac market. The moment the Mac-software market becomes significant for even smaller PC-developers - you will see a shitload of crap-applications for Mac too, all ported from PC - integrated? No. Just look at the applications currenty on mac which were direct ports of the Windows or Linux versions. Take Opera or Firefox as good examples - on Mac they suck. Why? User experience due to the lack of integration. The moment more ‘windows software’ is ported because the Mac market grows - the more bad applications you’ll have. OSX is very ‘multiplatform development’ unfriendly - which is it’s power, but also has huge drawbacks.
The iPhone has one advantage - to develop on it, you need a Mac, limiting the developers mainly to people already familiar with the osx platform. It’s again not the users you need to convince. If a user finds an application without alternatives which does what he wants it to do, but which is actually very bad - they will still use it. Only a small part of these users will actually critisize the application, unless it’s lacking something they’re ‘used to’ from their old phone or on their PC since the iPhone offers a lot of functionality they also have on that.
Any piece of innovative, well designed software will have a crapware knock-off pop up from overseas. Photo credit: imediaman.com
Tuesday, August 19, 2008
Why Quality Matters
