While some might find individual examples to want to pick apart and myopically focus on, I see the bigger message and agree completely. When I became manager of a real estate company, I couldn’t manage it the same way I’d managed a chocolate manufacturing company. Sure, core competencies of management still applied. Yet I needed to learn to apply them in new ways.

When I do SEO, I can’t use keywords based on my understanding of someone’s products or services or the clients’. Sure, I can use those to start, yet I need to also step into their client / customers shoes as well, and build on that.

So too, in life, I find it’s critical to open my mind to other points of view. Had I not done that in every area of life I’d never have grown as an individual. Even when I THINK my way works, it could be that, sure, my way DOES work. Yet oh – wow – it turns out sometimes that another way works more efficiently / inexpensively / effortlessly…

And as far as core competencies go, whenever I’ve strayed too far from those, it’s been more painful than it’s worth. When I’ve built on them instead, I’ve flourished.

Software distribution in general, is not at all the same as music distribution, and the wrangling with that industry to make it happen, was not at all business as usual for Apple. The iTunes store was a seismic shift in music distribution and I disagree that it was simply Apple extending its business model; it created an entirely new one.

I would also argue that News Corp, in its wholesale acquisition of MySpace, gained not only the significant user base, but also the institutional knowledge that could have (should have?) made it a success, if it was truly in a position to become a greater success based on those assets.

Ultimately though, I think we’re saying largely the same thing – except that you see it not as a problem of perspective but of people not sticking to what they know best – and I see it as people applying what they know best to a situation that requires a broader perspective or different tactic.

A quality article written by someone I highly regard.

I didn’t want to hijack the comments extolling Android but it was brought into the fray within the article based on N1 sales numbers.

I noticed the trend of your arguments & counter points firmly based on these numbers, mostly centered on sales, which is logical & tangible, these 2 qualities are often not a factor in consumer behavior & the marketing that propels it.

But as you point out in that article if your perspective is narrowed simply to overall numbers & trending then you miss the overall outlook such as with MySpace & AOL.

This is the widened perspective I see with Android as a narrow perspective looks at individual devices (like the Nexus One) rather then the sum of its parts, as one can do with an individual PC in comparison to a Mac.

Just as then the intangible of mindshare becomes the determiner of those tangible numbers you often point out.

This mindshare overcarried both MySpace & AOL which I feel the iPhone is now exhausting for record sales numbers & waiting in Apple opening day bread lines as continual iPhone / iOS 4 user issues mount.

These issues as with MySpace & AOL at their peak shift opinion to the ease of use & revolutionary features that mindshare was built upon.

Android like PCs dont pretend to be perfect but does have inclusiveness rather than exclusivity, choice over dictation, and with its relative freedom can get ugly just as with governments… but its a perspective that I prefer.

BTW It can be argued the best UI on phones is not the iOS on the iPhone but WebOS (had poor marketing & devices with Palm) whose director incidentally went to Android recently.

It could also be argued that Apple has been doing software distribution for most of their existence and all they did was use that expertise to start distributing data files that contained music. Again, not really outside of their skillset as a corporation.

Apple didn’t so much step outside of their box as the figured out a way to expand those product lines while using their strengths.

Apple is a great example of a company that has split its core business (desktop/laptop computers) into many different product lines and has been incredibly successful with each. iTunes is really the best example of this. Apple was computer hardware/software consumer products company that essentially fixed the electronic distribution woes of the music industry (whether they wanted them to or not). And arguments of being tied to the Apple line of hardware products aside, they’ve done a terrific job and have provided a steadily increasing revenue stream – for the music industry as well as themselves. The iPhone also – pretty much revolutionized the smart phone industry – which had entrenched, dominant players (Palm, MS), who are now all vying to catch up.

If Apple were to have just “stuck with what they’re good at” we’d not have the iPod, iTunes or iPhone. And those supporting industries (music and mobile) would be the less for it – as would consumer choices.

Likewise, NewsCorp’s background in newspaper, magazines, television and music production didn’t automatically qualify it as being able to run a social media site. MySpace still had a lot of potential on 2005. The real downfall here is NewsCorp had no idea how to compete with up and coming Facebook’s better ideas.