Apple's Tick-Tock Strategy

A lot has been discussed about how Apple products, and in particular the iPhone, seem to be following Intel’s Tick-Tock strategy.
Apple appears to be doing the same (or something very close to it) with OS X as well.

On episode 11 of Accidental Tech Podcast, Casey Liss asks John and Marco if they think iOS is following the same pattern. I completely agree with Casey: to me iOS 3 and 5 were -from the user standpoint- bigger than iOS 4 and 6.
This is not to say iOS 4 and 6 were not big: truthful to the Tick-Tock strategy they provided amazing features for developers and refinements to the users.

But here’s where I think it gets interesting with a unique Apple twist:

• Tick versions of iOS came with the S versions of the devices (iOS 3 with the iPhone 3GS and iOS 5 with the iPhone 4S).
• On the other hand, big hardware releases such as the iPhone 4 and iPhone 5 launched alongside Tock releases of iOS (iPhone 4 with iOS 4 and iPhone 5 with iOS 6).

This to me shows the unique position Apple is in, and how they are innovating even in this process: by leveraging their hardware and software integration, they have multiple Tick-Tock strategies running in different phases and effectively yielding a Tick breakthrough every cycle instead of every other one. Even more, their Tick devices come paired with rock solid Tock iOS versions, that add great features for the developers, enabling them to better support the new device features.

I’m tempted to end this post with my speculation on iOS 7, but I think it will be missing the point.
I expect iOS 7 -as a Tick release- to be big in terms of user facing features (and reports seem to agree), and be later paired with a “minor” ¹ update to the hardware.

Hello World

This is the blog I’ve been intending two start for at least two years now. It took me a lot of courage to get started, and it’s taking me more time than I expected to put in writing the ideas I have on my mind.

Why in English?

Having been born and living in Buenos Aires, Argentina, I feel I need to address this first. I have to main reasons:

1. Most of my reading (and listening) is in English. I’d like to think some of the people I read might at some point be interested I what I write. For that, I need to remove any language barrier.
2. It’s an amazing practice for me. It’s hard to be a developer without having to read English (and if you want to be a good one you need to be able to write in English as well).

My modest goals

I hope I can be consistent with this endeavor. I think it will help me grow profesionally, and as a writer.

I look forward to the experience and to get feedback from anyone coming across to this site.