Why Apple will lose the Google-Apple war

The were rumbles about Latitude, but the battle of Google Voice made the Google-Apple war public. Now it's a cliche ...

How Apple and Google's Romance Turned To Hate - Apple - Gizmodo

.. They happily worked in the iPhone's 2007 launch. Google gave Apple their maps, their search, and their mail, and Apple gave Google the best spot in their new shiny device. Apple put YouTube into the iPhone and Google made YouTube to work nicely with QuickTime, moving all videos to the h.264 standard (so Apple could avoid that nasty Flash kid). Google even optimized their web apps for the iPhone, and Apple smiled....

I like the prospect of Google-Apple competition, but this is too much. It won't end well for Apple.

Apple has brought me some very good things over the past few years, but Google makes me smarter. There is a major economic and productivity advantage for working with Google. In the medium term, on a global scale, this means Google will win.

If the iPhone doesn't have full access to Google's productivity boosting powers it will lose. No, web apps are not the answer -- the Google Voice web app is pathetic (partly this is because Google is only marginally competent at building client software -- they need to buy Palm for the engineers).

Maybe Jobs will step down. Certainly Eric Schmidt needs to go. One way or another, I hope this war ends soon.

Update 3/13/10: The NYT coverage makes it seem personal - particularly between Schmidt and Jobs. Both have enormous egos, but Schmidt is completely and trivially replaceable. The world would be better off if Schmidt were to retire.
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