iMania
I feel like I’m slowly being surrounded by the iPod people.
Seriously.
Maybe its the announcement of the iPhone, or the craziness around Microsoft Vista, but Apple (and the AppleNuts) are really pouring on the “Macs are better than PCs” tripe.
(and that is what it is, Tripe.)
Now, any long time reader of this site knows I’m far from a Microsoft Advocate, but I’m equally far from a Macintosh Disciple.
Full Disclosure (again), I have an iMac Desklamp on my desk at work, but its an unconventional one.
And I am one of the iPod People. (But not the same iPod people above)
But, I’m really getting tired of hearing how great Macs are.
Yes, they are easy to use.
Yes, they are pretty.
But, better? No they are not.
I was chatting with my Ciscofornian colleagues, the following was mentioned:
I sit down at a mac, and I have no idea what I’m doing. I think if you know anything about how computers work, you cannot use a mac, because it is no longer intuitive. However, if you know nothing, the Mac platform is superb.
I agree with that statement, and if you look at it from that light, I can see why there are such dedicated mac users out there. Its THEIR platform. They picked it up with little or no training and everything is just peachy. What is more empowering than that?
You see, an savvy computer user experiences the opposite sensation. They are disempowered, hands are tied, made inflexible, and in a sense, chained to a very imposing paradigm.
I once equated computer platforms with painting. For a computer user to go to a mac, it is like going from a palette of 3 infinitely mixable colors to being given a palette of 1000 unmixable colors.
Where a user could create to his own needs, he now has to fit into a set of a wide array of standardized, unchanging options. The user is given the illusion of customization, but really is being restrained to a specific behavior.
Now, I’m not letting Windows off the hook. Vista looks like a PC version of the Mac, and I’ve pointed out already that Vista is gradually putting the same subtle restraints on the user. What am I talking about? Watch the dissapearing command line.
(For you mac users, you lost the command line when you went from Apple to Mac)
A growing, but still unpopular, third option is the Linux Platform. Its hardly been standardized, and (at least 5 years ago) had to be written, by the user, to their own specifications. You need to use an unsupported hardware? Better write your own driver.
And even in the digital music realm, the iPod is not that intuitive, to a savvy user: It is essentially an external hardrive, but it is controlled by the application on the mother computer. The index is written by the application, and controlled by the application. The iPod itself only works on that externally maintained index.
Other mp3 devices behave more like a harddrive would. But iPods remain in their own quirky realm.
Some would argue that PDAs work this way, but from a PDA I can manipulate the local storage. From an iPod, you cannot (at least not by default)
So, I said all that to say this:
So which is really better?
If I wasn’t hearing so much misinformation from the macies, I would not be as irked.
- Macs don’t crash, ever :: Lies. I’ve crashed several mac platforms HARD.
Macs are reliable, they don’t get viruses, ever :: Lies. They do, you just don’t hear about them because no serious scriptkiddie wants to waste his time such a small user base. And there are a plethora of security holes in the mac platform.
Macs are so customizable :: *scoffs* Yeah, BEFORE you buy them. Try to customize one after it lands in your hands. You need a degree in Cupertino to break into the case.
You see, there are those of us who don’t fit into the “user friendly box”, we frown at safeguards, and while we see the need to protect a user from opening harmful attachments in their e-mail, we are not as click-happy.
If we’re installing a piece of hardware, or software, we know where its from, and do not need the PC to warn us it might be harmful.
We know the system folders are special, and we want to add to their specialness. So create the harmless folder, please, without prompts.
Yes, deleting a shortcut is not deleting a file.
Yes, deleting a file is not like deleting a short cut.
Yes, Playing a four-three defense is less flexible than the 3-4 (Oh, wait, that’s football, not computers)
Yes, I’m sure I want to format that disk.
Yes, I know the secret handshake, just let me do it.
So when an OS, like a Mac, or a MSVista brags it is so great, and throws up all these defensive perimeters, I get irked.
I guess I’m getting tired of all the echochamber cheerleading. In the end, its just marketing (on both sides).
I guess what I’m trying to say is: If you have your mac, and you like it, that’s great. Quit pushing it on me as if my life depended on it.
(and I wont hack your Root password – OSX, I’m looking at you!)
(And that goes for you too, Windows!)
PC’s are a kitchen full of raw ingredients, pots, pans, sharp knives,and a gas range. If you don’t know what you’re doing, then what you make will suck and you may hurt yourself.
Go to MACdonalds. The food may be mediocre, but it always tastes the same and doesn’t require any work or knowledge to make it.
Comment by Cisco — January 24, 2007 @ 12:42:14 PM
Preach on, Reverend Jeremy. Same as all the other * vs. * stuff out there…Dell or HP; Ford or Chevy; Coke or Dr. Pepper; Blonde or Brunette… it comes down to what works for you and makes you happy. I’m just thankful we live in a world where competition keeps pushing the envelope on product development…and keeps prices down (what will $750 get you in a computer today compared to 20 or even 10 years ago?). Well said.
Comment by Beast1624 — January 24, 2007 @ 12:51:20 PM
Here’s presents what I see as two pet peeves of mine:
1) The perception that everyone should be able to use a computer. Computer and software companies see a huge market (see #2) and so misrepresent their product as easy to use in order to make a buck. I equate this perception to everyone thinking they can defend themselves in court, or do surgery. They can’t.
2) We are doing quite well economically as a nation. There is a huge amount of disposable income in the hands of morons. This wasn’t the case until recently. But just look at how much money people are willing to spend on cell phones and cell phone plans. I’ve seen 7 year olds with cell phones. And homes purchased by people there previously lifelong renters. And so a huge new market is created. So a computer company sees it can make X amount of money from “computer savvy users”, but 100 times that from the unwashed masses. To capture that market they have to dumb down their product (the Mac). Windows has to follow suit to stay competitive. Is there still a market for the computer savvy user? yes, but it is much smaller by comparison so products for them would cost much more. And savvy computer users, being also notoriously cheap, will opt to buy the dumb-downed product and complain about it.
I hate capitalism. And democracy.
Comment by Cisco — January 24, 2007 @ 1:54:18 PM
I agree with that Cisco, but I don’t hate America as much as you do.
I saw this coming with Windows 95. It was confirmed with Windows 98, and Windows Me.
Vista is only more of the same.
Macs, however, have built their empire here. The netpliance era is upon us.
Comment by Jeremy — January 24, 2007 @ 4:12:35 PM
Also let it be noted that I was the FIRST on my block to hate i-tunes, and to this day remain a strong anti-ponent. Although my enthusiasm for the hate has been beaten down lately, and if you look closely at my registry you may actually find i-tunes actually installed on my machine. But I don’t use it, honest! I was forced to use it once when I was trying to get a podcast [shudder] from Audible.com. Ok, twice. But no more. Really.
Comment by Cisco — January 24, 2007 @ 5:31:19 PM
I am going to a “lunch and learn” next week on Microsoft Vista and will post a vodcast on their presentation the link of which I can forward to you if you would like. Just let me know. In the mean time I wanted to show you a video I made at the Microsoft Alumni Network’s “After the holidays party”. I think Microsoft makes an interesting anthropological subject:
http://pugettown.wordpress.com/2007/01/23/is-there-life-after-microsoft/
Comment by Heather Flanagan — January 24, 2007 @ 10:00:03 PM
Idiot.
Comment by vyktorhea — March 2, 2007 @ 4:22:53 PM
I don’t know about you all, but I don’t know what an iDiot is. Some new Apple product?
Comment by Jeremy — March 2, 2007 @ 4:57:39 PM
1440×960… those “iDiots” have quality visuals. And she’s succinct!
Comment by Cisco — March 2, 2007 @ 7:14:08 PM
Well, the idea that PC users are “disempowered” at first on a mac is both obvious, due to the simple fact that it is unfamiliar to them, and equally true in reverse…
I had my introduction to computers via the Apple IIe and used macs until Win95 dropped … I switched because the hardware was more affordable and I stuck with Windows through WinXP before swiching back a Macbook as my primary machine.
I am a developer and routinely use Windows, OS X and Linux on a wide variety of hardware. I don’t consider myself a “fanboy” of any one platform but, honestly, the Mac gets much more right than any of the others. The only downside for desktop users, aside from a learning curve upon switching (which is really an *unlearning* curve), is the fact that some of the bazillion Windows apps have no complement on the Mac. However what there is is most times more than sufficient…
If I switch again it will most likely be in order to focus my time on Linux … which has more possibilities (and is more free in every sense of the word) than OS X or Windows.
… oh yeah, and I agree that platform maniacs are annoying, reagrdless of their allegiance.
Comment by s0nspark — October 3, 2007 @ 7:58:01 AM