Hullo,
So many missives to catch up on. I've been busy.
As an artist hovering around the computer industry since High School I
find it amazing that AndrewC initially claims to be a non-expert, yet
sells computers he regularly builds. Andrew, you undercut yourself on
the credibility factor with a statement like that while admitting this
an ongoing business... I don't know too many in this area of commerce
who are not labeled "technical" by the majority of people and certainly
not ANY providers who survive long w/o leaning towards the technical -
how else does one troubleshoot? I do not understand what is gained
from such a pre-loaded frame on the conversation. That you bluster
with rudeness and intended insults reveals an arrogance I find
irresistible - where's my pile of throwing rocks and favorite sling?
As someone who took up the daunting challenge of hand soldering a Timex
Sinclair 1000, circa 1982, I allowed myself a wry grin and followed
this thread belatedly, with interest. I'll hold back my razor sharp
tongue and be positive in the face of gross ignorance and in the
interest of propelling the conversation forward.
Yes, if you're a blithering retard, as apparently you are. There are
no other words for it.
Let's see, on one hand you're comparing the length a machine can run
without breaking down, which is based largely on build quality.
Moreover, that mac largely is a sealed box, and you can't upgrade
parts, etc.
On the other hand, you're comparing the time a computer can be
connected to the internet, entire unprotected, before it picks up
nastyware. Which a variety of free firewalls and virus scanners
protect against.
Blithering. Retard.
It's not even elephant vs mouse. It's a piece of paper vs the
transdimensional ghost who inhabits your frontal lobes.
My initial emotions fade into bemused humor and assume you simply had
too much caffeine - or too many pints - at the time this was written
since your tone has moderated over time. Others have rebutted this
enough in detail, so I'll try keeping mine somewhere around the 50,000
ft altitude.
I am a confirmed Mac-centric developer who is ambidextrous enough to
know & appreciate the differences. Been there, done both. For reasons
of aesthetics {from OS architecture to casing product design} I've been
much more interested in the Apple-thang than anything else I've come
across from the very beginning. The Mac literally drew me away from a
career in architecture. Technically, the Mac has always been ahead of
most competitors {'cept for CPU wars of late} and one reason they could
get away with a closed box - it was always the market model and price
that irked so many, myself included. For instance, do you really care
if your iPod Nano isn't expandable {yet}? Damn things even look a tad
like the original Mac profile {and I think they missed an intro PR
opportunity by not building on that Susan Kare iconography}.
Products overseas were routinely 2x what they are here in America -
this has more to do with where the goods originated and the early days
of the industry than now where manufacturing & development is dispersed
wider and larger. Things are much better now and this is reflected in
how much cheaper even Macs have become around the world. I never
agreed with the initial $2400 retail price point Apple staked out for
the first few years they shipped Macs and as time has shown, a lower
price spreads the goodness much farther than something only the "Be$t
of Us" can afford - especially when the product is superior. Ask your
mother writing letters, sister ripping CD's, or cousin working at the
car repair what machine perks their interest and more often than not
they point at a Mac {OK, an iPod with Mac dangling behind} and there is
no doubt your grandfather will get more done with a Macintosh unless
your camped out at his house to nurse him through Bill's glitchware.
Gates lacks panache and real vision and only his immense wealth {buying
time and space to refine} raised the Windows UI to a notable level of
mimicry and smoothed over its ad-hoc internal architecture - and we
still see that legacy dragging it down the security bung-hole. Face
it: Gates has always been looking over his shoulder and paying off
spies to find out what Apple is cooking up. I'd call him more clever
{conniving} than smart {brilliant}: remember their workgroup chant,
"Windows isn't done until Lotus won't run"? I'll grant Bill certain
redeeming features now that he's giving away vast sums to real-world
causes, it's just too bad he had to chew up so many people under cruel
& degrading work environments and BORG-like/pedophile-style raids on
small companies to become such a wealthy respected elder gentlemen.
In reality you, Andrew, are heir to the mainframe and mini support
class of technicians who migrated out of the air conditioned
institutional monsters that required heavy technical support to a
decentralized personal computer model that required an army of
technicians to coddle MS-DOS/Windows 3.1 into a workable form busy
humans can use. I watched this transfer and heard the cackle of glee
from techies & compatriots who rubbed their hands at all the support
money they leeched keeping those rickety not-ready-for-prime-time
contraptions working. This is one big reason so many MIS departments
shoved Microsoft/IBM goods onto corporate desks: it {still} keeps them
employed and users grateful to get them running, again. Macs simply
didn't require such overhead, and still don't - relatively speaking.
Even under the old Mac OS it was rare I had to do a fresh install {even
as a developer} and since the advent of OS X it's even better as I've
only installed from discs when Apple issues a major upgrade - about
once a year. I am writing on a G4/500 mHz machine that certainly feels
it's age when I look at minimal reqs for current games, but I bought
this and the original Cinema Display in 2000 and expect to hand both
down to my son soon for yet more life. Similarly I have almost all my
original machines and they still run fine - I keep them around to run
projects that I worked on that couldn't migrate to modern systems since
I have a resume/portfolio to protect - but they all are useful even if
they use more wattage {especially screens} than current gear.
Those weekends of regularly re-installing XP sure show a smoking
productivity rating! With the newest machines the canard of Windows=
cheap / Mac=expensive is finally ground into the dust of history books
and stats like Mac longevity get their appropriate hearing on otherwise
long-deaf ears. Sigh, I sure don't wax nostalgic for DIP switch
setting and driver wrangling, do you?
Now, Microsoft has certainly come a long way on the UI - which is how
most people view their computer - and {finally} even made some
industry-wide improvements to PARCs' initial work, but I am in no way
ready to concede they advanced the industry except when forced kicking
and screaming... do you remember the "Don't Believe the Icon Con"
slogans in Dr Dobbs? As we see with the explosion of malicious digital
flora and fauna infecting the monoculture biz-tech plantation system
that is Windows there really is a high cost {to us} at the back-end of
how they organized themselves and you. Linux is interesting, but
hardly a household utility, so where ya gonna send grandma? Looks like
on an even-price playing field the market is responding: Apple gains
share every month.
In the end your only limiting yourself by denying the value others
readily find with this branch of the technical tree - there may be more
opportunity for you than you realize if you can tear your ego away from
the PC trunk w/o too much pain.
- Jonathan "Real Men Don't Use Backspace Keys" Gibson -
www.formanfunction.com
BTW - when and what are you going to do with that uplift site?
Something cool, I hope?
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