Apple Computer was once a shining example of the American success story. Having launched the personal computer revolution in 1977 with the first all-purpose desktop PC, Apple became the darling of the national business press and Wall Street. Yet by 1995, the company's change-the-world idealism had all but disappeared in a bitter internal struggle between warring camps. Raging internal mistakes, petty infighting, and gross mismanagement became Apple's hallmark, and today the company clings to a mere 3.7 percent share of the market it helped to create. Apple is the spellbinding account of what really went on behind closed doors, revealing the forces that dismantled this once great icon of American business.
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Book Description
Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com Review
Computer users who favor Macintosh products are truly enthralled with their machines. But after reading Apple: The Inside Story of Intrigue, Egomania, and Business Blunders, even the most zealous may be hard-pressed to defend the company that produces them. Here, Wall Street Journal technology reporter Jim Carlton chronicles the missteps that have befuddled the fallen giant of Cupertino between the initial and current regimes of cofounder Steve Jobs. Carlton combines a keen sense of observation with a slew of previously undisclosed facts to produce a damning history that will leave many wondering how the firm has managed to survive.
--This text refers to the
Hardcover
edition.
From Library Journal
How many companies were started in a garage by a couple of whiz kids, went on to a global presence with multibillion dollar sales, and within 20 years came close to bankruptcy? Meet Apple Computer. Wall Street Journal reporter Carlton follows Apple from when it produced the first Macintosh personal computer, designed for those with little or no technical knowledge. Sales rocketed and Apple became the darling of computer enthusiasts. But Carlton also points out lost opportunities along the way, involving insufficient licensing efforts, mergers allowed to fail, unwillingness to permit products to evolve, lack of interest in exploiting the Internet, and blindness to competitors. Carlton lays much of the blame with Apple's board of directors. An epilog on recent changes at Apple is being added at the last minute. Recommended for larger nonfiction collections and special libraries with an information technology clientele.?Richard S. Drezen, Washington Post News Research Ctr., Washington,
Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
10 of 10 people found the following review helpful
By A Customer
Format:Hardcover
As an Apple employee I liked Jim Carlton's book because of the behind-the-scenes glimpses at a company that I love. But, geez, I've never read a book that needed a good editor more... there are literally sections that repeat themselves word for word (and how many times can we read a gushing description of Steve Jobs' "long flowing hair and rock-star good looks"? Give me a break. I also disagree with people here who say that he gives Apple a "fair shake". I found his portrayal quite biased and one-sided. Carlton's history of Apple is one that is full of major blunders that would have saved the company (his view). The reality is that, for all its missteps, Apple did a lot of things amazingly well... but you won't find that history in this biased book.
18 of 22 people found the following review helpful
By Troy Dawson
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
Useful history and inside looks, but reading his 1998 back-of-the-hand dismissal of Apple's chances of survival is pretty humorous nowadays. His opinion that Apple should have licensed earlier is similarly wrong-headed and lacking in any technical appreciation of the downsides of licensing (dilution of brand,difficult QA processes, cherry-picking, loss of platform homogenieity ).
He similarly doesn't understand the silliness of Apple developing an x86 MacOS in the early 90's, and again reveals his technical ineptitude by failing to pursue the ramifications of an Apple-brand x86 offering (ie a Mac with an x86 CPU) vs a software-only offering like Windows or NeXT's Yellow Box.
He also repeatedly blows the 5300 battery issue out of proportion.
But I think the weakest theme in the book is that an alternative platform with less than 10% "marketshare" is automatically doomed to failure. While there is a strong positive network effect for the 'standard' and a negative effect for the alternatives, in his near-hagiography of Gates & Co he simply missed the bigger picture that the lamosity of the Wintel platform's inherent legacy issues is and was a countervening force.
5-10% of the total market is sufficiently large for Apple, given a) it's the top 5-10% and b) Micros~1 continues to [stink] as it always has.
8 of 9 people found the following review helpful
By tmex@qni.com
Format:Hardcover
Apple Computer, in its heyday, was one of the most respected growth companies of this century. As a devoted Mac user, it's always been hard for me to comprehend how Apple managed to take one of the most innovative products of our time, the user-friendly personal computer, and fail to compete effectively long-term in the mass market.
This book gave me the answers I was looking for...and more. Not a dry corporate history book, Jim Carlton has gone to the heart of what went wrong in Apple by focusing on the personalities that shaped this company...and later led it to the brink of ruin.
The leaders of Apple could have come out of a Shakespearean play. As Shakespeare knew, hubris, or excessive pride, is the undoing of man. In the swollen egos of Apple's leaders, we see evidence of hubris with a capital "H".
Although we may fool ourselves into thinking that technological prowess and All-American competitiveness has lifted us above the men of Shakespeare's day, Jim Carlton's Apple brings us back to earth and reminds us that, above all else, it's the human element that makes or breaks a company.
Most Recent Customer Reviews
4.0 out of 5 stars
Hindsight Is 20/20
If you had, in 1997 when this book came out, instead spent the $27.50 cover price on shares of $AAPL, today you'd have about three grand in the bank. Read more
Published 16 months ago by Jacob A. Walker
3.0 out of 5 stars
5 Stars on Information, 1 on Writing Quality
Interested in all things Apple, I obtained this book to add to my existing corpus of knowledge on the subject of Apple. Read more
Published on August 3, 2009 by Amazonman
4.0 out of 5 stars
Interesting to see the accumulation of "could haves"
While others have noted the writing style (tolerable - I've seen far worse), the book as a whole is rather thorough and interesting. Read more
Published on December 7, 2004 by Robert Pratte
3.0 out of 5 stars
It's OK . . .
Jim Carlton's "Apple" is a fascinating account about the growth, the fall, the rebirth, and the slow decline of one of Silicon Valley's original PC pioneer. Read more
Published on February 18, 2002 by macktheknife
5.0 out of 5 stars
Missed Opportunities
Carlton relates time after time after time (after time) how Apple rose to great heights of genius and creativity, and then threw opportunity away with both hands and ran the other... Read more
Published on February 15, 2002 by John S Comeaux
1.0 out of 5 stars
The biggest blunder is this book
I'm not a big Apple Computer fan, but I was very disappointed by this book. Covering the tumultuous period just before Steve Jobs returned to Apple, the book attempts to provide... Read more
Published on July 27, 2001 by Gary Pageau
1.0 out of 5 stars
Read a few pages at the Library before buying!
I regret wasting money on this book. I could not finish it. Apart from this book jumping around in time and repeating itself in various parts, it seems to take everything that... Read more
Published on March 8, 2001 by Gabriel Morales
1.0 out of 5 stars
Just get on with it!
OK, I admit it, I'm a Mac addict, but I'm not adverse to hearing the 'bad' stuff about the company. However, if I had to read *one more time* about how so-and-so left Apple to... Read more
Published on October 3, 2000 by Gabrielle Luthy
3.0 out of 5 stars
fiendish, negative reading, but interesting
Apple can't suck that much, but after I was done with this book, I couldn't believe that the company is still around. It's interesting reading, but seems awfully negative.
Published on December 8, 1999
5.0 out of 5 stars
A 'mostly' well-read history of the management of Apple
This book focuses on the business side of Apple Computer, from the departure and return of Steve Jobs. Read more
Published on November 5, 1999
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