One fact that Walter Isaacson’s biography on Steve Jobs makes crystal clear is that Steve Jobs = Apple.
Instagram should thank Steve Jobs for their astronomical acquisition
Instagram‘s sale to facebook for $1 Billion – that’s $ 1000 000 000. Folks that’s a looooooot of money!
While countless people have given countless reasons for the astronomical price of a seemingly simple app – an app that applies filters to photos before sharing with others, I am not going to give mine. I may agree that Facebook may have felt threatened that their core element that engages and binds their users together, photos, may soon be hosted and owned by another company.
Ironically what made Instagram popular are facebook users. People sharing photos on facebook using their smart phone cameras and Instagram app. What if the smart phones had a built-in app to share photos with facebook? iPhone decided to integrate twitter and it killed many and any such apps for twitter but it did not integrate facebook and Instagram filled that void with amazing grace.
If smart phones had integrated facebook with their system, I don’t think facebook would have bought Instagram for $1 Billion or bought it at all!
This doesn’t work. Again.
I have problems with my iPhone 3Gs. It drops calls and signal is week is many spots. But the initial charm of the phone kept me holding to it. There were moments when I just wanted to switch to another phone. Droid came close but it failed to charm me.
iPhone 4 was huge. For me it meant the “phone” part of iPhone finally taking hold. But it flopped even before I received it. Apple tried to address the ‘rumor’ about drop in signal strength with a frivolous suggestion that “you are holding it wrong”. I have lost the enthusiasm I had when I pre-ordered iPhone 4 – now that it has arrived for me – I am giving it a pass.