Last decade, people queued around the block to buy the latest version of Windows, today no-one cares. What next for a market that has become commoditised?
When you visit a website your browser reports, among other things, what type of system you’re using. Net Applications – a US based web monitoring company who analyse online browsing statistics – keep a regularly updated list of what people are using when surfing the net.
On their latest statistics, Windows XP finally fell below 50% in September 2011, just on ten years after it was released. Windows 7 is taking over from XP while Apple steadily gain market share.
These statistics show how the operating system has become irrelevant, only really dedicated geeks really care anymore about their version of Windows or whether a computer is running an Apple Mac or Microsoft product.
As most computer users are drifting to cloud computing services and consumers are increasingly using their PCs to access online games and social media sites, it doesn’t really matter anymore what systems are used as long as they work.
For many in the computer industry, this is a problem as they desperately want to sell a product in a market that has become commoditised. It’s another example of the PC industry’s broken business model.
It’s not just the computer industry with this problem, the 3D TV hype of 2010 was a desperate attempt to sell new television sets in a market that had stalled; recession hit consumers had no desire to replace their perfectly good TVs that were less than a decade old, just like Windows XP users.
This year’s Consumer Electronics Show that launches in Las Vegas this week will see similar desperation as the various PC and mobile phone manufacturers trying to generate excitement about their new products.
For the journalists and PR folk at the CES the problem is customers largely don’t care anymore. As the failure of 3D TV illustrates, consumers aren’t buying the hype.
Just as with operating systems, most customers want something that works, if you’re going to get them to replace older proven technology you’ll have to show where the new product adds value.
The era of products flying off the shelves because they are new and shiny is over – just ask Microsoft about it’s operating systems.