Everyone has at least one story where someone they admired let them down. Faced with the reality of the situation, you can hear the rose-tinted glass shatter as the magic from the relationship slips away.
This happened to me recently; not with a person, but with a company. I never thought that I’d have to say that the magic is gone, but I can no longer sit idly by while this madness continues. I want to see the greatest television ever made, slick black surfaces that seem as though no human was ever meant
to touch them, and futuristic devices that change the world in ways that I didn’t know needed changing. In short, I want Sony back.
Just a few short years ago, Sony was making the Chevrolet Corvettes and Dodge Vipers of the electronics world. Everything was sleek, powerful and just plain cool. Now, despite a solid lineup of products,something is missing.
Call it magic, the wow factor, or any other appropriate cliché, but that mystic property that used to separate Sony products from the crowd just doesn’t seem to be there anymore.Instead, Sony has become a consistent follower, a member of the crowd that once tried to emulate every move the company made. Instead of being an industry leader, they’ve allowed themselves to stagnate.
Many analysts are beginning to ring the death knell for the electronics giant, a sight that many would never have dreamed of just a decade ago.I just can’t share that belief. Despite all of the issues plaguing Sony, I believe that some of that magic is still there. I am not writing this as a farewell to the company, but a challenge.
It’s time to break out of the shell that Sony has built around itself since the turn of the century. It’s time to make television sets that consumers can only dream of, computers that scream with lightning speed and products that make consumers drool.
For a company like Sony, mediocrity should be known as a fate worse than death. It’s time to come out with all guns blazing, to take back the market that it once dominated.Unleash every last strategy and let every engineer enter into the most creative period of his or her careers.
It’s time to stop reminding people about Trinitron TVs and Walkman Cassette Players, and time to start making products that outshine their past output. The time to end the cycle of failure is now. Eliminate unnecessary products, kill anything that isn’t spectacular and make something cool.
Sony still means quality, but a quality product at a low price just isn’t exciting. Don’t just be solid, be spectacular. Analysts and competitors are predicting the death of Sony-it’s time to show them that they have angered a sleeping giant.
It’s time to show the world what Sony means, not what Sony meant.
Sell the dream, the magic, and the product. If you slap an Apple logo on something, it’s nearly guaranteed to sell. If you slap a Sony logo on a product, it should do the exact same thing.
Put down the conservative playbook and take a risk. Don’t settle for mediocrity, consumers are tired of it. I’m tired of it. I don’t want the family sedan of electronics; I want the Corvette of electronics.
Don’t just sit idly by and fade into obscurity, don’t remain a sleeping giant forever.
Perhaps now more than ever, it’s time to wake up.
