This series of posts is about enabling sustainable businesses on the App Store. In Part 1, I discuss why Paper and other productivity apps may not be doing as well as you might think. Part 2 explores why casual games, in contrast, are a sustainable business, but not a differentiator for platforms (I added a […]
Waze Winners and Losers
Google acquired Waze earlier this week for a reported $1.03 billion. This is an interesting deal for a few different reasons with a clear set of winners and losers. Big Winner: Waze This is an incredible exit for a company with only ~17 million active users and negligible revenues. Waze is a great product – […]
Tim Cook is a Great CEO
Perhaps my favorite Steve Jobs keynote moment was one of his last, at the iPad 2 introduction in March 2011. The last demo of the day, just before Jobs introduced the idea that Apple existed at the intersection of technology and liberal arts, was GarageBand for iPad. The demo was truly spectacular, and it clearly […]
Why TV Has Resisted Disruption
The structure of the TV businesses and exclusive content has helped the industry escape disruption. For now.
Two Bears
There are two Apple bear cases; only one applies to Apple, though, and the other applies to Samsung.
Observations on the App Annie Index
App Annie posted their quarterly app report this week, and there were three big-picture trends that jumped out at me. 1. Google Play is getting over the monetization hump, and it’s likely due to in-app purchase From the report: Over the past quarter, Google Play has achieved higher growth rates than the iOS App Store […]
Apple, Samsung, and the Parable of the Model-T
Steve Jobs was famously fond of the Henry Ford adage: “If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses.” It’s true! New products – new categories – require vision and an unflinching focus on the job to be done (i.e. transport), not simply enhancing or extending solutions that already exist […]
Apps, People, and Jobs to Be Done
I read two great interviews tonight, and its the combination of the two that really captures why I’m skeptical about Facebook Home.1 First off was Mark Suster interviewing Clayton Christensen. The interview – as is the case with most things Christensen related – is fascinating and instructive, and well worth a read. However, I want […]
The iPad and the Disaggregation of Computing
In the 10 days this blog has been online I’ve spent a lot of time on mobile, and understandably so! It’s the biggest business in tech, and the entry point to computing for much of the world. But, like many geeks, it is traditional computers that have always been closest to my heart, and what […]
Facebook’s Mobile Failure: A Compare/Contrast With LINE
Facebook is in the news for an imminent Android-related announcement; speculation is heavy that this is fabled Facebook phone. Techcrunch: Facebook just invited press to an event at its headquarters on April 4th to “Come See Our New Home On Android”. Sources tell us it will be a modified version of the Android operating system […]