On Sunday, January 19, 2003, at 07:29 PM, Jacques wrote: On Sunday, January 19, 2003, at 07:29 PM, Jacques wrote:
> Safari: > Trying it out. Not thrilled ... (deletia) > Others' views will differ. It's important to > find what > works for you. There's another side to Safari, though, and, as you pointed out, other's views will differ. Here's mine: 1. Like just about everything else that Apple does, as someone on the list recently pointed out so poignantly, it has to be damn near perfect or it wouldn't survive. Heck, even with near perfection, Apple is confined to the near marginalization. Case in point: I just got a Dell catalog in the mail, and besides having the same old boring products, the main selling features listed in the inside cover were "protection against hackers", "professional in- home installation available", "protection against having your personal data compromised by hackers" and "protection against viruses". So, by taking computer- buying advice, mouth- agape, from "Steve the Dell dude", this is what the overwhelming majority deems acceptable and what they want to throw their money into... erm..hokay. But, I digress. Safari, in its infancy has already captured the attention and default browser choice of much of the Mac- using base- after barely 2 weeks of beta. Instead of limping along or dragging its feet, there's already been an update and right away it was a viable and capable browser. If and when a pee-cee using sheeple wakes up and "switches", instead of some half- assed, crippled port of a windows "proggy", they'll find a smart, elegant and super fast browser. 2. Apple didn't just now decide to throw its hat in the browser ring. Its hands were tied by a deal made with Microsoft and Bill Gates' lawyers. When Apple was on the brink of insolvency in '97 and Jobs came back, he struck a deal with Gates to invest in Apple with the sale of non- voting stock, which, Microsoft later sold at a huge profit. In exchange for the investment which kept Apple afloat (and was no charity deal- Gates needed Apple's existence to thwart off monopoly/anti- trust/racketeering charges rom the government), Apple had to agree to drop copyright infringement lawsuits (which Apple would have clearly won had it the resources to pursue it) and, presumably among other concessions, drop its browser development (then, Cyberdog- way before its time- check out the TIL <http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=19475>). First, there was Mail offering a glimmer of hope, then, Safari was the icing on the cake. Those people at MWE keynote (and lots of us at home) weren't cheering just because Apple was offering a free browser to compete with iCab or Chimera. We were cheering because the spell was broken. The final shackles of the binding agreement were off. Not for Jobs or his supposed egomania, but for all of us who know better and for whom the future existence of Apple is something we have to consider on a daily basis. Unlike what so many win- trolls slander us as, I think most of us are pragmatists which is why the grim prospect of a world where our only choice or our children's only choice consists of "Windows 2010" or "Windows ZQ Home Edition" running on a Dell is something which makes us sick..and sometimes more vociferous than the great unwashed Windows- using masses. 3. You can't say that there's no browser that is everything to all people; that's why the option for a default is given. Personally, I despise having several browser icons floating in my dock- I don't want any. I made my choice for a default and Safari's what I use. If a website gives Safari trouble, I submit a bug report and find that I visit that site much less. If it's a commerce site, shame on them. I'll send an email to be promptly ignored by their webmaster and shop somewhere else. Don't get me wrong- and please, don't call me an idealist- if Safari didn't work with my OLB or online stock account, I wouldn't use it. But it does. And it does it faster and better than anything out there. If it didn't I'd keep submitting bug reports and trying back. As for the sites it doesn't work well with, well, looking at inane shockwave e- greetings mindlessly sent to me and everyone else in my pee-cee using friend's address book just doesn't rate very high in my list of priorities. Personally, I'd pay 29.95 right here and now for Safari just for the reliability and performance it's shown me at my OLB site- a resource I use and rely on everyday for split- second transactions. And that's saying a lot- I'm a very cheap SOB;) dave -- The iMac List is sponsored by <http://lowendmac.com/> and... 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