“One day, somebody will catch us napping…”
“One day, somebody will catch us napping,” writes Bill Gates in his book Business @ the Speed of Thought (1999). “One day, an eager upstart will put Microsoft out of business.”
He almost got it right. The guy who caught them napping was certainly very eager and was an upstart in his time, but not that young.
Graph showing that people use IE because they have to, not because they want to. Notice the downward spikes in IE usage on the weekend and corresponding upward spikes in Chrome and Safari usage? That’s people using Chrome and Safari on weekends when they have the freedom to choose their browser, after spending their weekdays being forced to use IE at work.
Sad.
(via Matt Cutts)
Grab a chair, as the buttons are here to tell their story
One of the things about closely following software UI changes is that, over time, they can give you hints about the thinking and planning that goes behind-the-scenes. As a UI enthusiast, I’ve been doing this for a long time and when I saw the latest Mac OS X Lion screenshots, it got me thinking and here is my theory…
The graphic says it all - as OS X gains market share and continues to want to gain market share, its target is now set squarely on the mainstream audience and as you can see from the graphic, OS X progress is now tracking the same paths Windows is - “great for none but good enough for everyone”.
For someone who first started up Photoshop 8 years ago, to complete that tutorial on “How to make Mac OS X style Aqua-esque pill buttons”, OS X Lion is a huge letdown.
The buttons have told us their story, a story about great fame and fortune. But when the story ends, only sadness lingers in its wake.
