I have been reading much of the hoopla surrounding the Cult of Steve (or the Mac). For the uninitiated, I mean MacWorld.
The big announcement–which Apple attempted to downplay–was the unveiling of two Apples using the Intel processor platform. The most important was a powerful new laptop–the MacBook Pro. As most pundits predicted–including me–Apple was going to produce their Intel hardware before their "announced" April timeframe.
My thoughts on the MacBook: nice looking and thin. For an Intel-based laptop, however, it is still expensive. SC said it nicely in his earlier post. To be honest, I have always admired the aesthetic quality of Macs, but I have never liked their intentional dumbing down of the software running on that hardware. I can hear the Mac zealots now coming forth to claim their place as the innovator of the graphical user interface and how much better OS X is from a human-interaction standpoint. I have always found the various flavors of the Apple and Mac operating systems to be simple in their approach to the end user, but I digress.
Now that the MacBook runs on Intel, guess what you can install on them? That’s right, other operating systems built around the ix86 platform. So, now I can have my shiny piece of hardware and the operating system I want running on it. I can slap Windows on it, and I can slap Linux on it. From my reading of the technical specifications, this should also work easily as the hardware support should be contained in both operating systems. I would contemplate buying one merely for the joy of firing it up in some coffee house or conference and seeing some Mac meathead come over to check my machine out and then faint from seeing Windows running on it. Besides, Apple is not doing anything to prevent me from doing so. 
My larger problem with Apple, though, is actually summed up in something Dave Winer said yesterday:
10:52AM Pacific: Looks like the keynote is over. I’m not interested in an iMac desktop, and I’m not going to rush to buy one of the new laptops. What else? Sure sounds like they plan to dump the non-Intel apps pretty soon. Scary stuff. I should ignore Steve Jobs and just use the machine. I really don’t like his style. So commercial, so arrogant. Mac isn’t that much better than Windows, the software is more colorful, and the viruses haven’t hit the Mac yet, he really shouldn’t gloat so much.
There is an amazing amount of arrogance within the Mac community. There are exceptions to the rules, as I have a few Mac experts who I count as friends. Nonetheless, the fact that most of the Mac zealots are arrogant, just like their leader, is plainly obvious. Looking at some of the comments, it is amazing to see this arrogance.
I think this arrogance is on display in iTunes. Everyone raves about how easy iTunes is to manage their music. The few times I have used it I have found it to be an incredibly bloated piece of software. As a result, I refuse to run it on any machine I own. Don’t even get me started on some of its UI problems, as others have complained greatly about it.
I could go on for a long period concerning minute technical detail, but that is besides the point. Apple products–for all their beauty–are not the best out there. The loud shouts of a throng led by a megalomaniacal leader be damned!
#1 by eXtra heavy on January 11, 2006 - 7:23 pm UTC
You are my hero. Well said.
The Acer Travelmate 8200 vs. Macbook (god I hate the name) is going to be a slobberknocker.
Cheers
#2 by Jason J. Thomas on January 12, 2006 - 11:16 am UTC
I saw the post about the Acer Travelmate 8200, and I have to admit that it looked real nice. Even better, though, is its price and feature set. I just wish it did not say Acer
Personally, I have been eyeing up the Alienware laptops. I keep wanting to pull the trigger, but I keep talking myself off the ledge every time I get close.
Like I said, Apple’s products are well-designed. I will even give them credit for the way they made a UNIX OS approachable to the masses. Nonetheless, you pay a heavy premium for those machines.