Cathie: Steve Jobs is truly an amazing creator of electronic gadgets.
Elliot: Coming from a diehard “I’m a PC” that is quite a statement.
Cathie: Well, the latest device, Apple’s iPad gives new meaning to the term “consumer electronics.”
Elliot: Now it is your turn to be enigmatic.
Cathie: Look, he and Apple designed the iPod…
Elliot: …Yes, an MP3 player...
Cathie: …No, a music consuming device, a device that, in concert with the iTunes store enables consumers to consume music… enormous quantities of music.
Elliot: Yes, Apple’s iTunes store sells more music than any other store in the world – more than even WalMart.
Cathie: People see the iPod as a music playing device, but Apple sees it as a music purchasing device.
Elliot: And the iPhone is a…
Cathie: … an application purchasing device.
Elliot: But look at the jobs that Apple has created with its iTunes App Store.
Cathie: Absolutely! It is wonderful what Apple has enabled –
Elliot: …they created a whole new marketplace for software developers …
Cathie: … and all those young developers like the students in your smartphone programming class at UMich…
Elliot: … absolutely – those young-in’s don’t know they can’t fly so they create all manner of incredible, provocative, stuff!
Cathie: iVeryRudeNoise - provocative?? Well, provocative or not, Apple takes a nice chunk of the price for merely providing digital shelf space…
Elliot: …that costs Apple virtually nothing. So following your line of thinking, the iPad is a media purchasing device!
Cathie: Ah, your keen sense for the obvious has returned.
Elliot: I am resistant to your taunts; my clothes are made of kryptonite!
Cathie: Oh, so that’s why you are dressed so badly.
Elliot: Oh oh oh -I don’t have a chance… So, what you are really saying is that Apple is actually trying to be the largest retailer of digital media and entertainment in the world – bigger even than Amazon.
Cathie: Well, remember when Apple Computer, Inc., dropped the “computer” from their name?
Elliot: When Apple, Inc. was selling music on their iTunes store.
Cathie: Bingo! For Apple, selling computers is merely a means to an end.
Elliot: Apple creates devices…
Cathie: …that they sell for premium prices…
Elliot: … that consumers use to purchase more stuff from Apple.
Cathie: The iPad enables consumers to consume books, magazines, newspapers, video and games.
Elliot: So, when will Apple change the name of the iTunes store.
Cathie: Never! iTunes has become iconic for a retail media store in cyberspace.
Elliot: Cyberspace? Very clever - an antiquated term but one that is most appropriate in this context!
Cathie: So, I wonder what Apple will think up next?
Elliot: The iPlate.
Cathie: Oh boy, here he goes…
Elliot: Yes, the iPlate so folks on diets can purchase iFoods .
Cathie: Yup, that’s the end of this blog posting!
Elliot: Hey, I was warming up.
Cathie: Couldn’t tell by me…. Oooops!
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