Almost a thousand years ago, Canute the Great was the king of England, Denmark and Norway. As are most leaders, he was trailed by a retinue of hangers-on who praised him at every opportunity, often claiming that even supernatural feats were within his command. Canute grew weary of the hype and decided to cut it short with a graphic demonstration of the limit of his powers. He had his chair placed at the edge of the sea, and as the tide rolled in, he commanded it to stop. No luck, of course, on stopping the tide, but Canute managed to gain a respite from the clamoring of the crowd.
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In the meantime, however, RealNetworks is proving to be a real pain in Apple's side. In April, Real approached Apple about making the iPod compatible with Real's RealPlayer Music Store (RPMS). Request denied. This week Real announced the release of Harmony, a digital rights management translation service that will enable RPMS customers to play those songs on an iPod.
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Apple needs to recognize, as Canute did, that it can't stop the tide, and get back to ruling its digital music kingdom wisely. Excellent analogy... Steve Jobs' ego has dominated Apple's direction for a long time. Most of it has been dead-on w/ well timed choices and directions but I think he now needs to realize that to try to keep it all means to have none of it in the end. Real vs Apple |
