I keep hearing folks in the blogosphere talk about how Apple is better and how Microsoft can't ship software.
Then I read Robert Scoble get on a roll here and here talking about the great software Microsoft is shipping today. So far, most of the comments and feedback are negative. Robert must feel lonely.
I remember working at a company with a mixture of Macs, PCs and Sun Sparcs back in 1997. The word around the geek water cooler then was Apple was dead, irrelevant and Microsoft was much better. I remember thinking I should buy Apple stock, since it was trading for less than $5 for most of the year and never peaked above $7. My thoughts were perhaps those few, lonesome souls saying 'Apple still matters' know something I don't.
Alas, I didn't buy.
A $1,000 investment in Apple stock at its maximum price in 1997 ($6.703) would be worth over $6,500 today. The same $1,000 investment at the lowest price in 1997 ($3.422) would be worth over $12,500 today.
According to USA Today, Microsoft stock is trading at 16 times earnings while the average for the software industry is at 24 times earnings. Do I work for a below-average company? I don't think so.
I'm choosing to be lonesome with Scoble this time around.