Sherlock's suspicious moves
Apple has been touting the e-commerce features of Sherlock 2 -- the Internet search software built into Mac OS 9 -- as proof of its determination to get ahead of the curve when it comes to exploiting the commercial potential of the Web. It's ironic, then, that Apple's treatment of third-party developers of Sherlock plug-ins is more reminiscent of the straight-arm tactics the company employed in the bad old days of the Mac market.
For those readers who haven't been following the story, the current David-vs.-Goliath dust-up focuses on the placement of ad banners within Sherlock searches. When it first launched Sherlock with Mac OS 8.5 in October 1998, Apple encouraged Mac-savvy Web developers near and far to develop custom plug-ins that would extend Sherlock's capabilities across multiple search engines.
Plenty of devout Mac Webmasters jumped aboard the bandwagon, adding Sherlock capabilities to the search features of their own sites. What were these little guys getting out of the deal? There were two primary benefits: increased traffic to their sites thanks to targeted searches and increased revenues thanks to Sherlock's ability to display ad banners within the search results tapped by the plug-in.
Fast forward precisely one year: Apple has released Mac OS 9 with Sherlock 2, an upgrade that the company said adds a plethora of online shopping capabilities to Internet searches, including the ability to sniff out relevant online auctions and comparison shop.
However, Apple has been less outspoken -- silent, in fact -- about another aspect of the upgrade: Unlike its predecessor, Sherlock 2 will only display ad banners from Apple and a select group of plug-in developers whose wares are included with the software.
Meanwhile, the majority of plug-in developers who hustled to support this new Apple standard find themselves out in the cold. Is it any wonder that these mice are roaring?
Given its history, Apple is especially vulnerable to complaints about its support for the developers it needs to create critical mass for its new technologies.
Remember OpenDoc, the component architecture Apple pushed throughout most of the '90s as the future of third-party applications and its secret weapon in the Cold War with Microsoft Corp.'s erstwhile Object Linking and Embedding? Plenty of die-hard Macolytes got behind that one, too, before Apple pulled the plug, leaving them twisting gently in the wind. I could also cite numerous other examples of aborted Apple efforts, including the Newton PDA, the Copland OS and the QuickDraw GX imaging model.
In fact, I'll leave those sleeping dogs to their slumbers, especially since today's Apple has shown a far greater capacity for follow-through than it did during its lost years. I'll simply note that any trust Apple has cultivated with third-party developers since then has been hard-won indeed.
Providing additional revenue streams via ad banners to small developers who endorsed Sherlock was a nifty way for Apple to win the loyalty of a significant number of Mac-driven Web sites. Choking off those streams with no warning may make sense on paper, but the ill-will such an arguably underhanded move engenders threatens to undo all the progress the original release inspired.
Matthew Rothenberg is director of online content for Mac Publishing LLC, which publishes MacWEEK, MacCentral, Macworld and MacBuy.