Comments on: An Apple in the White House?

By: Bill Mosby

Bill Mosby — Fri, 23 Jan 2009 15:50:53 +0000

It was kind of like a Windows that wasn't quite all there, from a UI standpoint. It would take me about 15 minutes to remember how to get around in it, as typically one would only made 3 or 4 trips a year to get data out of those systems.

By: Lou Paglia

Lou Paglia — Fri, 23 Jan 2009 13:49:31 +0000

OS/2, blast from the past. I remember, when interning at Time Life, a debate with a systems engineer where he believed OS/2 was going to beat Windows in the long run. That was all that ran on the computers of the tech group.

By: Bill Mosby

Bill Mosby — Fri, 23 Jan 2009 08:49:36 +0000

I know a few places where OS/2 was in use until a couple of years ago: three locked cabinets, one each in Novouralsk, Seversk, and Zelenogorsk, RU. Ran parts of systems that monitored uranium blend-down operations.
Any other copies still working anywhere?

By: Karl Katzke

Karl Katzke — Fri, 23 Jan 2009 00:42:35 +0000

They don't spend billions marketing the iPhone. Apple is in the business of producing products that match their image and that sell themselves by working well.

The iPhone has passed RIM's entire product line as of Q4 2008. Why spend millions in engineering costs for what is essentially a marketing ploy to gain a further incremental market share improvement for a product that is already the market leader? It makes no fiscal sense, period, unless Apple has engineers sitting around with their thumbs up their arses. I guarantee you that they don't. Anyone who says "Apple should produce X for Y" (without being an Apple employee with inside knowledge of their expected product roadmap) is in need of a clue.

By: Doug Ludlow

Doug Ludlow — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 23:43:44 +0000

Karl – Apple wouldn't of course make a special iPhone for you or I – it wouldn't make sense at all.

However, devoting resources to building a secure "Obama iPhone" would result in one of the greatest marketing coups of all time. Regular news images of President Obama conducing diplomacy on his iPhone would result in positive publicity that billions in advertising expense couldn't buy.

By: Brad Feld

Brad Feld — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 23:35:11 +0000

Ah – lucky them. Windows 2000 – now that was a bitchin' OS.

By: Brad Feld

Brad Feld — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 23:34:47 +0000

Nope – I said the way they do it is archaic and stupid. "changes the stupid, archaic, and limiting rules about archiving communications within the White House. "

By: DCX

DCX — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 23:05:37 +0000

More developments on the Presidential Blackberry front.

By: Bob Rose

Bob Rose — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 20:27:32 +0000

Re: "(or say, a board member with deep White House ties)," that would be my boss man Eric Schmidt! I think it's a great idea. Um, maybe GPhones instead of iPhones, ok?

By: dick costolo

dick costolo — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 18:45:33 +0000

windows XP? they wish. the current white house computers are running window2000.

By: Martin Edic

Martin Edic — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 18:03:48 +0000

First, RIM is a foreign company (CA) and they house the data in their own datacenters. That won't fly. Obama's people are already all Apple users. I'm guessing procurement is through competitive bidding so scratch the inside deal with Apple.
My real question: What will Apple do with $28 billion in cash? That's a lot of dough. And Microsoft's numbers are very bad.

By: Karl Katzke

Karl Katzke — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 17:16:13 +0000

Well, yeah, but why bother? It doesn't fit their business model.

There's a lot of things that Apple COULD do, but by saying they could do something like serve a particular market, the implication is present that they SHOULD do something to service a particular market. Why expend the effort when it doesn't fit their business model?

Considering how far behind most of the federal government is in communications, data security, and other modern business innovations … I think that the new administration will produce significant forward motion.

By: DCX

DCX — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 17:05:27 +0000

In addition to the "Secure Blackberry" mentioned in the zdnet article above, the new President can also choose from this fine assortment of communicators approved for classified use.

By: Derek Scruggs

Derek Scruggs — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 16:43:22 +0000

Karl, you must run into a lot of straw men in your daily life. Brad didn't say it would be easy or that Apple wanted to, he said he bet they could. You're talking about the company that spends more money on advertising than Microsoft. They have the resources. Doesn't mean they should, but it does mean they could win the bet.

By: Steve in DC

Steve in DC — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 16:05:03 +0000

Did you just say that archiving White House communications is archaic and stupid? Wow, you sure don't know much about this stuff, do you? Even though I'm a happy iPhone user, I would be VERY worried if the new administration thought this is even remotely a good idea.