There have been reports that Apple is in negotiation with their old enemy Microsoft and the issue on the agenda would appear to be the new enemy for Apple, non other than the dynamic Google. More specifically it is Google’s bread and butter, their search engine but really the issue is far wider than that.
Apple is apparently considering replacing Google as the default embedded search engine on the iPhone and slotting in Microsoft’s Bing.com instead. Of course details from either Apple or Microsoft are scarce as to the validity of these reports or more importantly why Apple may be making the jump. Which as with most things Apple leave us with only speculation which naturally we are happy to provide.
But we’re getting ahead of ourselves here, let’s first consider the potential implications of such a move. Obviously if Apple is dropping Google on the iPhone it would surely follow then that other Apple products would follow suit. Currently Google is sitting pretty in Apple’s Safari browser for their desktop Mac’s as well so it really would be a blow for Google if they lost that business. Okay all Safari users for both desktop and mobile combined is a drop in the ocean for Google’s numbers but it would still be significant if they lost it.
It may seem a strange move for Apple, a company hell bent on making products ‘that just work’ to drop the world’s best search engine for a product from Microsoft, and let’s face it Apple and Microsoft have never really played very nicely together. In reality however discussions in the Mac Action office have for many months now predicted that 2010 would be the year of Apple and Google falling out, in fact I myself think they’ll basically go to war.
Google and Apple have been on a collision course for some time now with both of their broadening product ranges starting to encroach on each others territories. Microsoft of course will be all to happy to see these two IT giants go at it, they don’t even have to pick sides really.
So what exactly are Google doing to annoy Apple, well several things actually. One of the prime examples is Google’s drive into the mobile phone market with their Android phone and operating system. The mobile phone market for Apple is critically important, they are after all currently the most profitable mobile phone producer in the world. The two companies have for several months now also been competing on a corporate level with both acquiring other companies, the twist in the tail of that is that they have both been bidding for the same companies. Apple’s recent acquisition of a mobile ad company Lala Media which Google also reportedly had their eye on being a prime example. What happened in short was that Apple had been interested in a similar company called AdMob and were indeed in talks with them when Google swooped in and bought them. Apple then had to aggressively pursue Lala Media and Goole followed suit.
Really these are only a few examples of how Google and Apple are gradually coming into direct competition, and I for one am worried. Don’t get me wrong I am a fan of both Apple and Google but I find Google’s increased interest in behaving like a big corporation concerning. Sure they now have shareholders and need to make money but their level of integration into the digital world and by extension their level of integration into your digital life. And it is a fine line line between integration and control, and if we’re honest big corporations can never really resist control for lon
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