by Elizabeth M Young

Created on: January 28, 2012

The headlines are full of ideas about the battles between Google, Facebook, Apple, Firefox, Microsoft and more. The ideas are positively Shakespearean in their content: which will kill off the other? Will Facebook kill Google? Will Apple kill off Facebook? Someone even speculates as to how liberalism will kill off Facebook.

Why can't everyone just get along?

Forbes has analyzed the risks that each giant, Apple, Google, Microsoft and Facebook face. Other sources have looked at specific moves and products that threaten Apple. Finally, the Apple/Android wars are not panning out as Steve Jobs hoped and there may be a pathway toward truce under new leadership. 

Apple

The risks to Apple are led by the loss of Steve Jobs. The first time that Steve Jobs left the helm, Apple came close to bankruptcy. When he returned, he restored the company and took it further than it had gone before with the introduction of the iProduct line. With Tim Cook at the helm, there will be a need to stop trying to destroy Android and to move beyond the iProducts in order to diversify revenue sources. Apple also needs to go after more business opportunities, since Facebook is edging into the apps and iTunes markets.

But too much diversification could cancel Apple's biggest strength: focus on a specific consumer and pay attention to maximizing the quality all aspects of products for that consumer.

Google and Android

Thanks to Steve Job's obsession with destroying his competitors, Apple's war against Android has been a major fail so far. Three of Apple's claims that Motorola ripped off patents were tossed out, as were claims against HTC and Samsung. The only two claims that had weight were easily solved with minor fixes to hardware and software. The Android platform has beat out the iOS platform and Samsung beat out Apple to become the biggest smartphone maker in the world. The time for truce is now, while Apple still has some better bargaining chips than continuing lawsuits that may or may not pay off.

Google owns web ad revenue, the Android apps market, web innovation, web search, and the Android OS. With a steady, huge and guaranteed stream of revenue, Google tends to play around a lot, spending tons of money because there is always ad revenue coming in. Google's weakness is that the major income comes from ad revenue, which is not a real, tangible product. It would only take a major anti trust move, a competitive search system, or nationalization to bring Google down.

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