Intel's App Store Jumps the Shark

By Eric Bleeker | More Articles
January 12, 2010 | Comments (8)

Watch stocks you care about

The single, easiest way to keep track of all the stocks that matter...

Your own personalized stock watchlist!

It's a 100% FREE Motley Fool service...

Click Here Now

The following is a modified post from the Motley Fool Editors' Blog. You can see all the posts here.

You know those "a-ha!" moments, when you see something so ridiculous that you just know a corporate trend has jumped the shark?

Well, make a note in your dayplanners, investing world. Jan. 8, 2010 is officially the day that the app store craze reached absurdity.

Sure, apps are cool. Apple's (Nasdaq: AAPL ) App Store has more than 3 billion downloads, and it's become one of the key reasons for the iPhone's continued appeal. It's only natural that competitors Research In Motion (Nasdaq: RIMM ) , Palm (Nasdaq: Palm ) , Google (Nasdaq: GOOG ) , Nokia (NYSE: NOK ) , and Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT ) would follow Apple's lead.

Smartphones are closed systems where the browsing experience is usually suboptimal, thanks to small screen sizes, a lack of dynamic Web features (Flash, etc), and an inability to download and run most executable files (like games). Apple's App Store solution fixed most of this, and the iPhone's large targeted audience spurred developers to unleash a wave of innovation.

Apps took advantage of the unique strengths of smartphones, creating tools that were unnecessary on a personal computer. Cool innovations included programs that could detect a song being played, GPS-enabled programs that sought out nearby restaurants and stores, and even camera-enabled barcode scanners that could quickly look up reviews of products.

These apps aren't nifty because of their complexity; each generally serves a single, simple task. Instead, apps are impressive because they harness the strength of smartphones -- mobility -- to create shortcuts for everyday situations. On a PC, any of the above programs would be limited in utility. You're not logging onto a computer or netbook wherever you go.

Which makes Intel's (Nasdaq: INTC ) announcement of a netbook-based app store seem like, uh, not the brightest of ideas.

Everybody into the pool!
Maybe I'm just old-fashioned, but isn't the Internet one giant app store in and of itself? You can go to any number of aggregate sites to find free downloadable files. Plus, netbooks just don't create the same demand for these kinds of limited-use downloadable programs.

Besides, app stores from Apple's competitors have already had enough of a problem keeping their catalogs stocked. Simply put, aside from the iPhone (and debatably Android), developers haven't found it profitable to develop for app stores. Even with its enormous user base, Research In Motion struggled to hit 2,000 apps by the middle of last summer. There's no updated count, but I've used RIM's App World, and trust me, it's not very impressive.

Does Intel really think its "AppUp Center" can spur further innovation on netbooks? Given that platforms like RIM's BlackBerry phones, with 36 million active users forced to download apps only from one central store, still can't create a compelling product, what chance does Intel have?

Developers have limited incentive to develop for Intel's app store because:

They have multiple distribution channels on the Internet.
The limited breadth of apps on most also-ran app stores makes them less appealing to PC users.

Long story short, Intel's just creating an aggregator of applications that are already available from other sources on the Internet -- and that's the best-case scenario. I know that pushing computing beyond the confines of the PC is all the rage today, but you've jumped the shark on this one, Intel. Give it up.

The Steve Jobs Betrayal
You may already know that in the final year of his life, Jobs revealed a stunning betrayal — and told his biographer, "I will spend my last dying breath... and every penny of Apple's $40 billion in the bank to right this wrong." What was it that made Jobs so irate — and why could it make a few in-the-know investors some major profits over the coming months and years?

Enter your email address below to find out what made Jobs so enraged!

Eric Bleeker owns shares of no companies listed above. Intel, Microsoft, and Nokia are Motley Fool Inside Value selections. Google is a Motley Fool Rule Breakers recommendation. Apple is a Motley Fool Stock Advisor pick. Motley Fool Options has recommended buying calls on Intel, and a diagonal call on Microsoft. Try any of our Foolish newsletter services free for 30 days. The Fool's disclosure policy is presented in full 3-D, and unlike Avatar, it isn't just a ripoff of Disney's Pocahontas.

Read/Post Comments (8) | Recommend This Article (13)

Comments from our Foolish Readers

Help us keep this a respectfully Foolish area! This is a place for our readers to discuss, debate, and learn more about the Foolish investing topic you read about above. Help us keep it clean and safe. If you believe a comment is abusive or otherwise violates our Fool's Rules, please report it via the Report this Comment icon found on every comment.

Report this Comment On January 12, 2010, at 1:11 PM, InfoThatHelp wrote:

Intel runs in more computing machines than any other inventions in the history of mankind, including sliced bread and paper. The Intel instruction set, 8080 and its descendants, are more faithful servants than dogs and horses. Now that IBM PowerPC, Motorola 68xxx, AMD, and most other CPU architectures are dead, what other CPUs can programmers develop for? Intel is it !
Netbooks, tablets, mother boards, handheld devices are all nothing more than conduits for applications. Think deeper, what's the NASA Mars probe? It's not much more than a huge collaborative computer application running on top of several hardware. What will get us from homo homosapiens into gods of the entire universe are the apps which can perform god-like tasks, such as raising the dead, curing the uncurable, be at all places at the same time, create things out of nothing, etc. With the right apps, we can be gods, except in the case of the Intel App Store, we pay for the apps that make us gods.
Report this Comment On January 12, 2010, at 1:32 PM, InfoThatHelp wrote:

Nobody writes for Rim's App World anymore. Rim is a one-trick only email toy, what's there to write for? The Rim apps are truely pathetic toys unfit for professional usage. Blackberrys are toys fit for texting between teeny bops.
Report this Comment On January 12, 2010, at 2:46 PM, marv08 wrote:

Hm, I would say that such a concept could make sense, if it adds value for customers and developers. E.g. virus checking and testing applications could benefit consumers, providing a marketing platform could benefit smaller developers.
Just, looking at how badly even big companies with relevant experience (Nokia, RIM, MS) fail at creating a store that is at least attractive and usable, I do not see Intel pulling that. Intel has experience in dealing with OEMs, their end user support is abysmal and handling application developers is a different story altogether. It will be fun to watch, even if it will be pulled after the first season.
Report this Comment On January 12, 2010, at 2:50 PM, TMFRhino wrote:

marv08,
Good points, I could see how a virus checked environment would give consumers piece of mind. Although, the rigor of added testing could be up to debate.
In any case, it will be fun to watch. I'd agree with you, if there is a market, there's other companies that could pull off handling app developers much better.
Fool on,
Eric Bleeker (TMFRhino)
Report this Comment On January 12, 2010, at 3:09 PM, InfoThatHelp wrote:

The true power of computing lies in the instruction set designed and developed for CPU architecture families. Master programmers should develop in Assembly languages which take direct complete control of the hardware underneath the OS. Intel is at the heart of the CPU architectures as well as the instruction set. The push from 8 bit architecture to 32 bit architecture took 25 years, I heartily wish that Intel takes leadership in unharnessing its CPU architectures to 64 bits and beyond ushering in far more powerful instruction set commands than the MVC, CP, PUSH primitive instructions and allow us command over vastly more advanced and powerful hardware without which our industries and the economies upon which innovations can only thrive can come about unfettered from business concerns such as OS acceptances and UI dominance. Powerful computing come from powerful CPU and instruction sets. Intel, you are our only hope.
Report this Comment On January 12, 2010, at 6:03 PM, rfaramir wrote:

Sounds to me more like Intel is trying to get into the niche Apple is about to expand (re-create as viable): tablets.
I think Apple's tablet will be closer to an iPodTouch than a MacBook. So an App Store for it that leans heavily on the huge success of the existing App Store for iPhones and iPodTouches will have a huge leg up.
Report this Comment On January 13, 2010, at 12:33 AM, lucas091079 wrote:

Dear Eric
have you ever re installed windows?
ave you ever got a new pc and wanted to install all your previously purchased apps?
this is not only apps, this is a new paradigm of software provisioning defined by Apple: one-click-fire-and-forget downloads and installation. That's the way it should, and now, thanks to Intel, it's also available for PCs. This is not about apps, that's not up to Intel, that's developers business.
This is about not storing license keys anymore, this is about not keeping installers forever just in case, this is about not risking your credit card number for a 1 dollar app on every freaking web page you want to get software from.
And finally, this is not about Intel making money, appstores are enabling programs (even Apple looses money on it's appstore).
You just don't know what you are talking about.
Lucas
Report this Comment On January 13, 2010, at 5:08 AM, FormerBeetle wrote:

You ask whether the internet is not one giant app store, and then go on to say that in any case there's no demand for dedicated apps for netbooks. Huh? Is it possible that the apps arent being written because developers dont think there's a coherent channel to get them out.
I dont recall a specific demand for so many iphone apps until devs exploited all of the h/w and created them because they were possible. (and as Lucas points out about, super easy to provision them)
Netbooks offer similar opportunity for developers to explore the space that the hardware offers (and the fact that 40 million are out there already cant hurt either). If Intel is looking to developers to realize the full potential of netbooks (e.g., a single internet device that you'd carry in your pocketbook) then they'd be fools to not go down this path. What is their alternative? Who do you want them to rely on to spur innovation around here? Microsoft?

Add your comment.

Compare Brokers

Fool Disclosure

DocumentId: 1082825, ~/Articles/ArticleHandler.aspx, 5/27/2012 12:47:31 PM

Report This Comment

Use this area to report a comment that you believe is in violation of the community guidelines. Our team will review the entry and take any appropriate action.

Sending report...

Today's Market

updated 1 day ago Sponsored by:
	DOW	12,454.83	-74.92	-0.60%
	S&P 500	1,317.82	-2.86	-0.22%
	NASD	2,837.53	-1.85	-0.07%

Create My Watchlist

Go to My Watchlist

You don't seem to be following any stocks yet!

Better investing starts with a watchlist. Now you can create a personalized watchlist and get immediate access to the personalized information you need to make successful investing decisions.

Data delayed up to 5 minutes