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One Down, Forty-Nine To Go (12/3/01)
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Remember back when Apple first rolled out the current iBook design, and Steve announced that the school system of Henrico Country in Virginia had just bought 23,000 of the little white goobers? Remember how that was being touted as the "largest portable computer sale to education ever"? Well, it's time to recalibrate your sense of "largest," because that deal was just the beginning, and today it's starting to look like small potatoes. When Apple said the iBook was its secret weapon to start recapturing lost education market share, it clearly wasn't making idle threats. How, for example, do you suppose Mike Dell feels now that the Maine Department of Education just out-Henrico'd Henrico by about 15,000 units? (We imagine he's making a face sort of like Daffy Duck about five minutes into Duck Amuck, but that's just a hunch.)
Okay, it's important to note that the Maine contract still isn't a done deal; if Apple and Maine are "unsuccessful" at negotiating mutually agreeable terms, then the state may "enter into negotiations with the next highest scoring bidder." However, given how hungry Apple is for market share in the education arena (and how badly we imagine that Steve wants to burn Mike Dell on this deal), we strongly suspect that the company isn't going to let this contract slip away; in fact, we wouldn't be surprised if Maine can manage to squeeze some pretty hefty concessions out of Apple-- free t-shirts?-- just by suddenly flipping through a Dell catalog while at the negotiating table. After all, Apple needs this sale; as faithful viewer Lykle pointed out, MacInTouch indicates that the deal is worth "38,600 iBooks" at a cost of $43 million.
That is, if we may say so, a big honkin' motherlode of consumer portables-- and indeed it has to be, because Maine wants one for every single seventh- and eighth-grade student and teacher in the whole blessed state. Think of it: an entire state's worth of public middle schools, all using Macs. That's precisely the kind of coup that Apple needs to pull off to get squarely back into the game; kudos to the company for (so far) pulling it off. Oh, and all you junior high Mac fans out there: it may be time to consider asking your parents if they'd mind moving to the upper reaches of New England for at least a year or two. Sure, the winters are occasionally a little challenging, but hey-- free iBook.
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And Now For A Word From Our Sponsors |
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 | | The above scene was taken from the 12/3/01 episode: December 3, 2001: Apple officially announces stores number 25 and 26- and inadvertently reveals store 27 right around the corner. (Um, our corner.) Meanwhile, G5 rumors go kablooey with the craziness and the contradictions and the hey hey hey and the nice LAAAAA-dy, and Apple (mostly) wins a deal to sell some 38,000 iBooks to the state of Maine...
Other scenes from that episode: 3426: Retail, Retail Everywhere (12/3/01) You'd think we'd be bored with all of this retail hoo-haa by now, and believe us-- we're as shocked as you are that the ongoing Apple grand openings can still get us all charged up. After all, it's not exactly "A-list" material anymore; whereas the earliest store openings prompted the Mac-centric media to publish week-long sneak previews of the blessed event (complete with artists' renditions of the predicted interior, innumerable photos of the dumpsters outside, and incisive interviews with the mall janitorial staff), these days a grand opening is more likely to win little more than an obligatory blurb beneath the day's shareware release listings... 3427: The G5: All We Almost Know (12/3/01) So what mood are you in: reckless optimism, or cautious skepticism? Because we've got something for everyone, today. If you feel like continuing the headlong plunge into the rampant G5 frenzy that currently has a sizeable portion of the Mac community foaming at the mouth, be our guests-- and go check out the recent articles at Architosh that faithful viewer William Bonde sent us...
Or view the entire episode as originally broadcast... | |  |
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