Mac fans and bloggers are outraged over Apple’s announcement that it has taken resources from its Mac OS X team to help finish the iPhone on time, compromising the scheduled release of the next version of Mac OS X, code named Leopard, which now won’t be out until October.

Apple says that Leopard won’t be released at the Worldwide Developers Conference in early June as planned, instead developers at the conference will receive a “near-final” beta copy.

Apple’s spin doctors tried to present the situation in the best possible light. This is what they had to say about the iPhone being on time:

“iPhone has already passed several of its required certification tests and is on schedule to ship in late June as planned. We can’t wait until customers get their hands (and fingers) on it and experience what a revolutionary and magical product it is.”  

And here’s what they had to say about Leopard being delayed:

“While Leopard’s features will be complete by (June), we cannot deliver the quality release that we and our customers expect from us. We now plan to show our developers a near final version of Leopard at the conference, give them a beta copy to take home so they can do their final testing, and ship Leopard in October. We think it will be well worth the wait. Life often presents tradeoffs, and in this case we’re sure we’ve made the right ones.”

It’s so reassuring that Apple’s spin doctors reminded us all that “life presents tradeoffs”; I would have thought that something like “he who fails to plan, plans to fail” would be more appropriate in the cut throat world of business.

I don’t buy Apple’s story, and it seems that many Mac fans and bloggers don’t either. For example, Tom Keating of TMC Lams wonders whether this is all just PR spin:

“I have to wonder, is this just a PR move so Apple doesn’t suffer the same criticisms that Microsoft faced when they delayed Vista.

“While I don’t doubt Apple’s sincerity that they did move resources around, I have to wonder if they knew they weren’t going to meet the target date and then moved resources around so they’d have a good excuse.”

And how about this interesting observation from 73 de Jeff:

“The bigger story may well be that earlier this year at MacWorld Jobs announced that the name of the company he co-founded was changing from Apple Computer, Inc. to just Apple, Inc. That, he offered, would better identify the Cupertino, California firm as a consumer electronics company and not just another “computer” manufacturer.

“As it turns out, the Mac faithful didn’t need a company name change to see the obvious — that Apple is now only in the computer business to support its consumer electronics business; and that will be forefront in my mind when I replace my Powerbook later this year.”

How about this cutting observation from Paul Thurott:

“So, first Leopard was going to ship before Vista. Then it was going to ship around the same time as Vista. Then it was Spring 2007. Now, October. Sad. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: Apple is two companies. One makes iPods. The other makes Macs. The iPod company is more important to management and more relevant to the future of the company. Obviously.”

Paul Kedrosky also smells a rat:

“…moving people at this late date from Leopard to iPhone doesn’t augur well for the status of iPhone’s software. You don’t put on a crash completion program on a soon-to-ship software product (iPhone) unless you are really, really desperate. After all, adding more people to a late software project almost always makes it later.

“Finally, Apple’s release today is strange. It feels rushed, as if something changed and the company was worried the news was about to leak. We have a “statement” on the company’s Hot News subsite, but nothing yet in the press releases. Puzzling.”

My colleague Triston McIntyre recently wrote a piece Are Vista’s failures the boost Apple needs to get ahead in business? where he speculated whether Vista’s shortcomings might help Apple sell more Macs to business.

Well the truth of the matter is that generally “business” takes a dim view of computer companies that divert resources from building computers to building boy toys like the iPod. I don’t recall Microsoft diverting resources from Vista to build the Zune, for example.

In January Apple announced a $1 billion net profit for the previous quarter. Surely some of this money could have been used to hire more staff if the company really felt it needed more resources to finish both Leopard and the iPhone on time.

Perhaps if Apple managed the announcement of the delay of Leopard a little more professionally, rather than issuing a rather sickly-sweet, awkward press release, people might be a little more understanding.

I think it’s become clearer where Apple’s priorities lie and it’s not in making computers. All I can say is thank goodness we will still have Linux to provide some real competition to Windows.

Related:

Apple shareholders unwilling to swallow any more iPhone and Leopard delays

Will Apple really delay Leopard to accommodate Vista integration?

Microsoft, Apple play time-strategy in Vista, Leopard released

Asus confirms Apple Mac tablet PC

The ultra portable Mac is here: Leopard on Asus EeePC

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Entry was posted on Friday, April 13th, 2007 at 12:02 pm under Apple, Opinion.

Read more entries by James Cornelius.
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