Source: Apple Considering Licensing iPhone OS, Multitouch?
- March 13th, 2007
- Read 2447 times
- 27 Comments
There’s a very large lake in Northern Utah that has almost as much salt as should be necessary for this rumor, but as it comes from one of our people from Apple behind the lines, there’s a chance that we might see some of these details in the future. While checking the validity of a totally different unsubstantiated rumor, our contact dropped something of a bomb on accident. When asked if he or she could confirm our rumor (which we’ll get to later today), he or she responded that he or she saw something about it in an email, but didn’t read it, as it didn’t pertain to his or her job, and was late for a meeting at the time. I asked what kind of meeting, and he or she said, “Licensing for the iPhone.”
At first I figured it was for accessories to use the “Made for iPhone” tag, like many iPod accessory makers, but something was odd, so I probed with, “For accessories?” He or she said, “Naw, we don’t do hardware anymore. It’s a meeting about multitouch and the OS and stuff.” Wait a minute.
Now many things could be inferred by that statement, but to these fanboy eyes and ears, it sounds like Apple might be working on iPhone as a platform. Imagine to yourself what would have happened with Apple’s marketshare if it had licensed Mac OS back in the DOS days. The reason for Microsoft’s success is simply the sweet deal it worked out with IBM over DOS and later Windows to all the OEMs. If Apple took a similar strategy, you could be looking at iPhones made by Nokia, HTC, Motorola, LG, you name it.
That’s the idea, but is it logical? Steve Jobs has always maintained that Apple is a hardware company, and it’s no secret that iTunes is an incentive to iPod; Apple doesn’t make much (or sometimes anything) on the songs downloaded, but you sure as hell need an iPod to take them with you. On the other hand, Apple’s been stung in the past by the “big boys” who’ve eaten its lunch in the OS market, and with the allure of the iPhone so ridiculously high, it would be in a perfect position literally take over the smartphone market and further increase iPod/iTunes usage and OSX brand awareness.
Granted, this is all conjecture from a beer-addled Mac geek with a background in marketing, so I took up the issue with another rotten Apple contractor, and they said that while nothing’s been decided for sure, his team was tasked with figuring how to get the OS could run on other hardware. We like the sound of that, but again, we’re adding some salt. Take it for what you will.
>cough coughcough cough ;-)
Seriously, that some seriously serious BS! On the BS-o-meter that would hit 190 on a scale of 0-100.
Licensing multitouch? How to license something generic that is not possessed?
Sounds rather made-up to me, but if there’s any validity the logical conclusion to draw is that Apple would be discussing licensing third-party development for OS X Mini — not OS X Mini itself. Duh.
This is the dumbest interpretation ever. Apple will not license their OS again, ever. Stop it. Just stop it. No! I said stop!
Licensing for the iPhone means they are discussing the technology they are licensing from other companies to make the iPhone. They are never ever ever going to license the iPhone, the hardware or the OS. Never.
I said stop, right now!
Licensing for the iPhone NOT licensing of the iPhone. English folks.
Apple may have 200 patents in the iPhone, but they will be licensing more than a couple of technologies from other people, not to mention the name from Cisco.
so if they did licence mini osx?? let’s say nokia buys into osx mini smartphone market and will support it and even cooperate with apple on services such as Itunes. Nokia has cooperated with apple before. the new browser in the latest flagship nokia series phone is made by nokia and apple… So i feel it’s way more credible to be discussing who will get the first exlusive 6 months rights to launch one or more osx mini smartphones.. I belive it will be US market centered in the first phase but world deployment is obviously in the works. they will not license osx for computers any time soon though… but when they do, it will change the PC/computer business for ever. and mac users will buy the mac experience as a combination of outragously powerfull hardware with the best design money can buy and the osx will be the common plattform keeping it together. All provided from apple of course. this is my take on this “rumour”.
Dumb. Dumb, I say! Jobs is the anti-licenser! What’s in it for Apple? Market share of the smart phone category? That’s meaningless unless it spells profits, and Apple loses their ability to price at a premium the minute they start to license. Plus Jobs is a control freak. Apple’s quality is guaranteed by owning the experience–from hardware to software–and having it work flawlessly together. Stop holding your cards to your chest and you lose all of that.
Whaaaaaaaaat?
Apple is way to proprietary to ever licences to any third party. Steve Jobs intends to keep Apple Apple. Are we even serious here? Licensing multitouch, it’s absurd to think they would let their brand baby run wild in the Tech wilderness.
190 on the BS meter
Well, I never thought Apple would switch to Intel, nor did I ever think I’d see Windows running on Apple hardware.
The beauty of the iPhone is that is has only ONE BUTTON ON THE FRONT!!! So, from an industrial design perspective, it’s nearly impossible to screw it up. If Apple says to vendors “okay, we’ll license the OS, but you need to make a phone that has 1 button and a certain size screen”, then the chances of screwing up the hardware is much less. At least, that’s what it seems. So it wouldn’t surprise me in the least if they decided to attempt to become the de facto mobile platform for the next decade.
this article reeks of so much bs . . . I agree with tommo, this one’s pretty high on the scale, right off the top in fact.
Regardless of what you or I think of the different possibilities of how Apple could play the whole iPhone-related experience out, this article doesn’t have or share any more information about it than already publicly existed. Take that whole mountain of salt as suggested at the beginning, folks.
To Sebhelyesfarku: I think that companies have been licensing and suing over “generic things that arent possessed” for quite some time. Think about the touch screens in windows mobile devices. that techonology is licensed to many phone manufacturers from about 2 different companies. another thing to think about is how sony got sued over the vibrating technology for the ps2 controller. vibration is also something generic, so i think that if a technology is able to be taken to court for, it is also licensable.
That is why it is called a Rumor. I don’t think Apple would risk their name.
However, i forgot to add, i dont think it will happen in this case though.
I don’t think they would license the OS to use in other iphone-like mobile phones from other manufacturers.
But it does make sense for other things… for example… let’s say BMW wants to put an iphone-like user interface on the computers inside their cars. Then it makes sense because Apple does not make cars or computers that go inside cars. ;-)
Now let’s say a bank wants to use the same iphone-like user interface for their ATM machines. Again it makes sense here.
But I really don’t know… I’m just going by common sense.
Well… it would make sense to license mini OS X for other things where Apple does not make hardware. For example, ATM machines around the world could use the mini OS X user interface.
Apple is the best! I have seen an article of a powerbook shot and it still worked! They will be coming out with flash hard drive technology and this muti touch stuff is going to rock the house. I have gone through and over heating gateway, an dull ass dell, and I would have to say the Apple has survived the thunder the longest. Its more innovative, easier to use and now even bullet proof. Apple keep up the good work…you are the best!
dont you think licensing “FOR” the ipod has to do with developers being able to put apps on the thing. and not the other way around. that would make the most sense. it would also keep apple in COMPLETE CONTROL of what goes on, and what does not.
This makes perfect sense. Apple is still a computer company at it’s core. The strength of the iPhone is not the hardware, it’s the OS and multitouch. What makes this idea plausible to me is the fact that when it comes to phones, carriers call the shots, Apple can’t make what it really wants cause they don’t have the leverage. When Motorola, Nokia, and Samsung corner the carriers with a dozen Apple powered models, Apple will dominate the space. Remember, the size of the cell phone market is far larger than the MP3 market, and Apple can’t dominate this space on it’s own - remember it’s locked down with Cingular for a few years. Way to use your mind-grapes Apple.
Uh, its pretty obvious that the guy was describing the license Apple is making this company sign in order to develop software to run on the iPhone platform.
Its not Apple giving them a license to sell the iPhone or iPhone software– but Apple setting the terms under which Apple will let them develop software for the iPhone platform.
@Sebhelyesfarku
Please, if you’re going to make a public comment, at least get yourself generally familiar with the topic. The claim that the iphone is generic is asinine, wishful thinking of socialist who think that any invention should be free for the taking.
Apple will not license their OS ever again. They did with mac clones many years ago and it sucks. No Go for this.
I’m waiting for IPhone. But this is more than great too…
I’m calling BS on this…..nuff said.
I mean, it’s not like Apple haven’t done this before right? They licensed iTunes to Motorola to help it sell RAZRs, why not OSX mini?
Apple has never and shows no likelihood of ever licensing it’s software. It’s part of the beauty of Apple products that the software works so well with the hardware because both are produced by the same company. It’s likely that Apple’s benefits in the computer arena would be lost if it licensed OSX to any Intel hardware. However since cell phones are largely walled gardens, the licensing of the OS on cell phones might work for Apple.
I for one would LOVE to see the Mac OS licensed to third parties even though I doubt it would happen. I’d rather see Apple keep it’s control of the hardware / software connection and instead open the iPhone OS to third party developers. Here is a place they could really make a difference and make the iPhone explode! I work for Versadial, a company that makes software ( http://www.versadial.com/call_monitoring_pda.html ) for Windows based smart phones and PDAs and we’d love to port that to the iPhone. I’m sure our company is not alone in wanting to develop for the Mac mobile OS. However it’s going to take a huge public demand to get that in the same way Bootcamp was brought about by public demand. (And some dedicated hackers) So spread the word and let’s get Apple’s attention!
A very informative article. I wrote about it in our site. Here’s a link: http://apple.qj.net/Rumor-Apple-to-license-iPhone-OS-/pg/49/aid/86237
It’s pretty obvious, as a few have pointed out, that they’re talking about licensing FOR the iPhone. This is the story everyone who’s been following iPhone news has been waiting to see, and you managed to fuddle it up. Everyone’s been waiting for news that Apple will allow third-party software development, and here is a rumor that points almost directly to that, and you went with the most preposterous theory imaginable?
I, for one, definitely see this as that inevitable scenario where Apple begins to allow third-party applications to be developed for the iPhone, predictably licensing software houses rather than releasing an API to the public. Apple wants to protect the experience, so a public API would not be practical, no matter how desirable it would be. This is the closest we’re going to get to applications on the iPhone outside of hacking it; however i do not see this as a bad thing. And perhaps in time, as the platform matures, they’ll eventually open up licensing more, or just open the platform to the public.
That’s my interpretation of the rumor. Perhaps I’m thinking too far ahead, but I can dream, can’t I?