AirPods Are Becoming a Platform?
This seems a little far-fetched.<p>There&#x27;s a great quote from someone whose name escapes me right now, about the definition of a platform being when revenue generated by software running on the device far outpaces revenue generated by sales of the device itself. I&#x27;ve always liked that definition, and it seems accurate to me based on historical evidence (PCs - definitely a platform. Smartwatches - definitely not).<p>In this test, the airpods fail abysmally - not only do they not allow for revenue generation today, they don&#x27;t even allow for third party developers to use their hardware features in any capacity. In fact, the main use-case for airpods appears to be efficiency and convenience when combined with Siri. All three &quot;sources&quot; described by the article fail to define for me the benefit users will gain from airpods as a platform, and instead have done an excellent job of convincing me that users will benefit far more from treating airpods as a product.<p>Compounding this is the fact that most computing platforms are primarily visual in their interactions with their users - this is clearly no coincidence. Visual interfaces allow developers to surface many pieces of information at once, and they allow users to absorb information at a pace that is variable (based on context) and comfortable to them. Aural platforms don&#x27;t have this capability, and the context that they assume is often wrong. For example,  I&#x27;ve been driving a lot these past few days, and one of the worst Apple-built experiences I&#x27;ve ever had occurred when I needed to stop for gas. Not only was I directed to a gas station I had already passed (driving on the freeway), but when I wanted to navigate to another gas station there was no way (obvious or not) for me to tell Siri to find me a gas station ahead of me. In fact, there was no way to confirm where any of the gas stations Siri found me were in relation to me, without looking at my screen.<p>One more thing: Aural platforms are exclusively serial. They surface one piece of information at a time, and in fact they would be less usable if they surfaced any more than that (or surfaced each piece of information any quicker). This alone, I feel, makes them unsuitable platforms in today&#x27;s world.<p>Edit: randall found the quote, by Bill Gates: &#x27;Gates said something along the lines of, “That’s a crock of shit. This isn’t a platform. A platform is when the economic value of everybody that uses it, exceeds the value of the company that creates it. Then it’s a platform.”&#x27; [1]<p>[1] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;stratechery.com&#x2F;2018&#x2F;the-bill-gates-line&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;stratechery.com&#x2F;2018&#x2F;the-bill-gates-line&#x2F;</a>