Death of the Apple Halo Effect?
August 3rd, 2009
Every iPhone and iPod Touch owner I know hates iTunes. Apple should take notice.
I think iTunes has become the main interaction platform for Apple. Given the popularity of the iPod line and iPhone, combined with iTunes for both Windows and Mac OS X, I’d bet more hours are spent using iTunes than Finder every day.
As with the App Store, Apple seems to be stumbling over itself with the iTunes experience. They need to slow down, reset, and rethink the experience promised by the Apple brand.
We know that iTunes is slow. The UI is inconsistent. The store feels completely alien to the main UI and experience. The app does far too much, plays too many roles too slowly. iTunes is more Wal-Mart than Apple Store.
People tolerate iTunes because it isn’t unbearable. It does work, after all. We all know the flaws I’ve mentioned and begrudgingly accept them because iTunes is the only choice we have. Another case of Software Stockholm Syndrome, I guess?
But here are two new (to me) insights.
- iTunes focuses on multiple mobile devices paired to one computer rather than treating all Apple machines as peers. If nothing else, Apple should invert the model they currently use. Instead of one machine and one or more peripherals, they should focus on the more common case of one device and multiple computers.
- Syncing a device to iTunes gets more painful every day, pushing users away from iTunes. Syncing a single podcast from iTunes to an iPhone takes fifteen minutes. It’s painful. This is a big threat the the Apple halo effect.
Mobile devices are for mobile people. Most of us operate in at least two computer-focused environments: home and work. Apple lets us buy, download, and sync content (apps, podcasts, audio, video) on a single computer, but on multiple iPhones or iPods. We still can’t easily add content – with or without DRM – to our devices from work and home. Aside from risky hacks to trick the phone into seeing multiple libraries as one, there are no practical ways to keep the whole digital lifestyle in sync.
My wife has stopped plugging her iPhone into her computer. In fact, she’s stopped opening her computer, save for writing posts on her blog. I asked why.
“I can do everything I need to do on the iPhone. I can get podcasts and music and apps, and iTunes freaking sucks, so why bother?”
The Apple lifestyle brand and experience is amazing when it’s strong, but like so many other things, it’s a bubble. iTunes is a thorn. Apple peripherals once caused a halo effect, but as they get better and iTunes gets worse, the iPhone and iPod Touch might cannibalize the Apple (desktop, laptop) computer market for lifestyle users.
