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Quickly Intuitive (4/19/98)
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We feel slightly less upset about Intuit's recent decision to cease development for Quicken for Macintosh. It sounds as if they will reconsider their strategy when (if?) Apple starts targeting the consumer market again, but until then, it doesn't make financial sense for Intuit to release a new version of Mac Quicken every year. MacCentral's exclusive interview with Intuit spokesperson Adam Samuels somewhat smoothed over the rough edges of our righteous indignation.
Here's Intuit's excuse: sales of Mac Quicken have fallen for three straight years, but the number of Mac users with internet access has increased in the same time. Therefore, rather than waste resources developing yet another yearly upgrade, they've decided to sink more resources into improving their web-based extension to Quicken; Mac users who have Quicken and an internet connection will be able to use the frequently-updated functionality at quicken.com to do things like apply for mortgages and buy insurance. Intuit will continue to sell and support Quicken 98 "for as long as customers demand it."
No, we don't buy this whole excuse-- we're not that gullible. (In fact, it reminds us a lot of when Power Computing announced that it was going to start selling Windows computers "in order to grow the Mac OS installed base." Puh-leeze.) Intuit is obviously more concerned with their own profitability than with keeping the Mac platform viable-- as well they should be. But Quicken 98 will still be sold, and its feature set will be updated and expanded via quicken.com. And we think Intuit's statements at least reveal that they're not anti-Mac, which, these days, almost qualifies them for sainthood.
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SceneLink (642)
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 | | The above scene was taken from the 4/19/98 episode: April 19, 1998: An embittered Gil Amelio recounts his days on the cast, and wishes he'd get some credit for the recent turnaround. Meanwhile, Intuit gives its official reasoning for why it's ceasing Mac Quicken development, and Apple continues to ignore the potential advertising gold mine known as the "Year 2000 Problem..."
Other scenes from that episode: 641: Don't Get No Respect (4/19/98) Ex-cast member Gil Amelio continues to get press about his recent tell-all memoir, On the Firing Line, My 500 Days at Apple. Although a Nando.net article reveals an Amelio that outwardly claims to be "ecstatic" about Apple's recent financial improvements, we sense an undercurrent of jealousy and injustice, and a man who honestly thinks he laid the groundwork for Apple's turnaround but isn't getting any credit. To be fair, yes, it certainly sounds like Amelio did a lot of work during his year and a half that led to many of Apple's current strategies... 643: Not Quitting Our Day Jobs (4/19/98) Being primarily Mac users, we at AtAT don't spend a whole lot of time worrying about what's going to happen in the year 2000; after all, the Mac's designers were perfectly aware that computers would still be around in the 21st century...
Or view the entire episode as originally broadcast... | |  |
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