Bill Gates vs. General Motors: The $25 car.

At a recent computer expo (COMDEX), Bill Gates reportedly compared the computer industry with the auto industry and stated, ‘If GM had kept up with technology like the computer industry has, we would all be driving $25 cars that got 1,000 miles to the gallon.’

In response to Gates’ comments, General Motors issued a press release stating:

If GM had developed technology like Microsoft, we would all be driving cars with the following:

1. For no reason whatsoever, your car would crash… Twice a day.

2. Every time they repainted the lines in the road, you would have to buy a new car.

3.  Occasionally your car would stop in the fast lane of the motorway for no reason. You would have to pull to the side of the road, close all of the windows, turn off the car, restart it, and reopen the windows before you could continue. But this would be acceptable behaviour.

4. Occasionally, executing a manoeuvre such as a left turn would cause your car to shut down and refuse to restart, in which case you would have to reinstall the engine.

5.  Apple would make a car that was powered by the sun, was reliable, five times as fast and twice as easy to drive – but would run on only 50 percent of the roads.

6. The oil, water temperature, and alternator warning lights would all be replaced by a single ‘This Car Has Performed An Illegal Operation’ warning light.

7.  The airbag system would ask ‘Are you sure?’ before deploying.

8. Occasionally, for no reason whatsoever, your car would lock you out and refuse to let you in until you simultaneously lifted the door handle, turned the key and grabbed hold of the radio antenna.

9.  Every time a new car was introduced, car buyers would have to learn how to drive all over again because none of the controls would operate in the same manner as the old car.

10.  You’d have to press the ‘Start’ button to turn the engine off.

Steve Jobs Countdown to Death Website

If you’re reading this and you haven’t seen it, then please don’t go onto Google and look for it, but somebody has put a website together with an Apple ‘countdown to iPhone’-style timer to Steve Jobs’ supposed death.

I know it takes all types to make the world go round, but seriously, was that really necessary?

Steve Jobs has revolutionised the world of personal computing, as well as online and offline music and most recently mobile communications. His retirement is sad enough.

I can only imagine how I would feel if someone did something like that to me.

Can Apple Survive Losing Steve Jobs?

Apple’s share price has dipped by more than 10% after it was announced that CEO Steve Jobs is to take a medical leave of absence from running the company.

Does the brand really rely that much on the man at the healm.

Sure, the way that people work, live and play (communicate, listen to music, exercise) has been revolutionised thanks to Jobs, whose leadership has paved the way for innovation and inspiration – the Mac II, the pizza-box LCs and Perfomas, the Twentieth Anniversary Macintosh (which is still worth $1,000 second hand), the iMac, Powerbook, iPod, iTunes and not least the iPhone.

But will Apple survive?

Of course it will. After all, the competition is Microsoft.