>What worries Apple fans most of all is not knowing where the company is headed.
As a former Apple fan, I actually find the iPhone's hemorrhaging of market share and Apple's uncertain future extremely encouraging. I always attributed the things I liked about Apple to their struggling underdog status. They lost that with the iPhone, and they've never been the same since.
It will be fascinating to see if some of the old Apple shines through in the years to come.
If you look at the general course of Apple, they've generally been quite consistent in their road map. I think the incredible success of the iPhone might cause a slump for a while, but then they'll just continue what they've been doing for a while: releasing good, high-end and profitable products and comfortably occupying multiple niches.
Alternatively, they might create a few more iPhone- and iPad-like successes and continue ruling new and existing product categories.
In both cases, they'll keep 'shining' for quite some time. If that stops, it'll suck for people like me who are fully invested in their ecosystem. That said, I switched to a Nexus 4 recently and it was surprisingly painless.
As a former Apple fan, I actually find the iPhone's hemorrhaging of market share and Apple's uncertain future extremely encouraging. I always attributed the things I liked about Apple to their struggling underdog status. They lost that with the iPhone, and they've never been the same since.
It will be fascinating to see if some of the old Apple shines through in the years to come.