| The wonderful thing about industry standards is that | | | | with my industry standard Wi Fi router, so I started |
| they give companies an easy way to add value to | | | | asking people about it. I asked all of the Apple fans I |
| their products and they give the consumer a stamp of | | | | knew, and none of them had any idea what Wi Fi |
| approval that all is well and that products will work | | | | was. I asked the techies I knew, and they said "there is |
| together. A few examples include Wi Fi, USB, Firewire, | | | | a good chance it will work, but I'm not sure." I went to |
| and Ethernet. The downside of industry standards is | | | | the Apple website and searched for 802.11b and Wi Fi |
| that they quickly become checklist items on a feature | | | | and found nothing. Then I went into an Apple store and |
| list - everyone includes them and this allows for no | | | | asked a salesperson - he had never heard of Wi Fi |
| differentiation. | | | | and had no idea what I was talking about. |
| A few companies try to get around this by attempting | | | | In this case Airport worked against Apple in a big way. |
| to brand industry standard features. I recently had two | | | | The second example has to do with Sony. My wife |
| experiences with new products that pointed out why | | | | and I bought a new digital camcorder from Sony. It has |
| doing this can work horribly against a company. Both | | | | been a great product and far exceeded our |
| were with major brands, Apple and Sony, and both | | | | expectations. So much so that I decided to try doing |
| are a good example of how a company can become | | | | some digital video editing. After all, I had just bought the |
| disillusioned into thinking that their power and influence in | | | | G4 Mac for my music studio and it is supposed to be |
| the industry is beyond what will matter to their | | | | THE premier machine for editing video. |
| customers. | | | | I tried to determine if the video camera (which is a |
| The first experience was with Apple. I recently built a | | | | fairly new model) would work with the Mac. No |
| digital recording studio using Pro Tools from Digidesign | | | | mention of it anywhere. I had read the Sony manual |
| and a dual processor G4 Macintosh. Years ago I was | | | | and it talked about connecting to a computer, either |
| the Product Manager for the Finder and Human | | | | using USB or in some cases using a computer that |
| Interface at Apple, and in the digital recording world it is | | | | supported Sony's ilink fast transfer technology. I tried |
| well-known that Macs are the best platform for | | | | USB. No luck. I knew the Mac had industry standard |
| working with audio (less hassles, better software, etc.), | | | | Firewire built in, but there was no mention of firewire |
| so I thought that going with a Mac was the right thing | | | | anywhere in the Sony documentation or Sony's |
| to do. | | | | website. I finally gave up. |
| I'm not a Mac guy anymore - I switched to Windows | | | | As it turns out, I mentioned this to a tech-savvy friend |
| back in the mid 90's, so I had to do a lot of footwork | | | | of mine. He had gone through the same thing. He |
| up front to determine which model to buy and what | | | | enlightened me that ilink is FireWire (had I known to |
| features I wanted. Part of my requirements were that I | | | | look for the mentions of IEEE 1394 standard |
| needed to be able to use the machine with my home | | | | compatibility all would have been fine). I hooked up the |
| Wi Fi (802.11b) network. | | | | camera and got it to work within minutes. |
| Now Apple a few years ago decided to brand Wi Fi | | | | I'll take the blame for not knowing Firewire was also |
| and call it Airport. This would provide wonderful | | | | referred to as IEEE1394. But if I don't' know that, and I |
| differentiation for them, and the loyal Apple masses | | | | work in the tech industry, imagine how confused the |
| certainly liked it. (At least four or five times I had Apple | | | | rest of the world out there is about whether Sony's |
| fans tell me that Airport was easy and great). | | | | ilink products are compatible. |
| But here's the problem. For the rest of the world | | | | How much money, time and effort did Apple spend |
| outside of Apple's customer base branding Airport | | | | branding Airport and Sony spend branding ilink? I don't |
| creates uncertainty, doubt and an obstacle in the | | | | know. I'm sure it seemed like a smart idea to their |
| buying process. | | | | marketing people at the time. |
| I wanted to make sure that Airport was compatible | | | | Was this Marketing Brilliance, or not? |