The iPhone Halo

Much was said about the iPod halo effect when Mac sales initially started to rise in the wake of the iPod. The connection between the two products was marginal. iTunes ran better on the Mac, but that was about it. So “halo” was probably the right metaphor. The fact that the iPod was a neat product reflected light on the Apple brand and provoked some interest in the Mac.

The iPhone halo is much bigger and to be honest, less of a halo and more of a technology overlap. The iPhone runs OS X and also runs applications that are native to the Mac; Safari, Mail, iCal and the Address Book. It also provides access to Mobile Me, which is the same service Apple sells to Mac users to enable data synchronization between multiple Macs. If the iPod helped to sell Macs then the iPhone will undoubtedly help to sell a lot more of them.