Do Macs exist?
If a Mac article falls in a forest of Windows articles, does it make a sound?
I continually read how well Macs are doing, halo affect and all. But I hang around Apple news sites, like MDN, MacNewsWorld, MacMinute, MacRumors, iPodLounge, Apple etc. Get the picture? And even though those sites are sometimes quoting from Windows related sites, I’m getting a distorted view of the world - to me every second article in the world seems to be trumpeting the success of the Mac. Yet I doubt that the Windows sites are talking that much about Macs.
So I can’t help but wonder: “Do Macs exist at all in the minds of most people?” If Apple stopped making Macs tomorrow, who would notice? What non-Mac owners would notice? I suspect that 95% of the population wouldn’t notice - or even care. Especially those in the corporate world who probably account for 75% of Microsoft’s marketshare.
If you went to a non-Mac, non-techie person tomorrow and said “Hey, did you hear Apple are getting out of the computer business?” What do you think they’d say? Probably “Whatever” Although they’d probably hasten to add “But are they still going to make iPods?”. Why don’t you try it. See how many non-Mac, non-techie people you can find who’d care whether Apple keep making computers. But try telling them that from tomorrow they won’t be able to get Windows anymore. That would get a reaction.
You and I - and even the media and Windows techies - know how important Apple has been and continues to be to the computer industry. But to the rest of the population, I suspect Macs are largely invisible.
The Media - King Maker
The media made Linux - and continues to. They continually talk it up despite the fact for many years it has not been average-user-ready. As far as Macs go though, the PC press occassionally writes some nice patronizing story about how Macs are better - but do they ever tell you to buy one? Really tell you. I mean really tell you.
Case-in-point. A shootout of multimedia laptops in an PC Authority, an Australian PC magazine. They included the token Apple in their review - in this case, a 17” Powerbook. To summarize their conclusion, they said that although the Powerbook was a fantastic machine, you would have to weigh that up against the price tag and whether you needed a Windows machine. See, a couple of backhanders in there to discourage you. And “price tag”!! The winner of this shootout was $200AUD dearer than the Powerbook, and the only other recommended buy, some $700AUD dearer!! As I say, they don’t really mean it when they suggest you buy a Mac.
The PC media are not very politically correct. To them, it appears a PC is a personal computer running an x86 processor - and mostly Windows at that. It will be interesting to see if next year they finally welcome Macs into the fold.
Certainly the Macintel announcement has stireed up a little dust, with PC Authority devoting a WHOLE page to it in their news section. They also provided a small OS X vs Win XP compro - which they concluded was a draw. Further on they have a “pullout” on the Intel announcement in an article on BIOSes.
If I only hung around the PC media, the Mac appears to be a quaint footnote. There are articles about the Mac’s success but they’re buried in there, lost in the forest of articles about Windows - where they can’t be heard.
Are Macs really surfing a wave that’s gunna wipe out Windows? Or are they just paddling along in their own little pond?
Are we in the Mac world, getting a distorted view of reality? Are we believing our own publicity?
del.icio.us
Digg
Facebook
Slashdot
StumbleUpon
Comments
Maybe it’s not just Middle America who is backward, it’s Earth. Aliens apparently all run Mac OS.
Yeah, and look what happened to them!
Actually, they were probably running Windows. Goldblum just emailed them a copy of the Melissa macro virus.
As a professional writer, Mac helped me a lot. In fact I allways was ahead compared to other computer-users since 1989. At that time I would advocate Apple as the best solution available, but by 1990 Apple was considered to die soon. In fact, I’m now very happy that Windows is the main platform. As a consultant I’ve amazed Windows users, explaining simple tasks I learned in OS, and that are a bit more difficult in Windows. I like being ahead. I always say to WinUsers when they are in trouble, that those WinMachines are actually quiet good considering (the price). Please don’t switch. I would feel unhappy in a world where every Breebleboxer was using a Mac.
WAWA, are you sure all those Windows users are as impressed with you as you think they are?
I’m not a happy Windows user and I will switch soon. Apple new switch site really impressed me. I’m getting sick and tired with windows applications occasionally slowdown, fighting with spyware and adware. 2007 will be a great year. Leopard and Vista will fight each other and the winner will be my next platform.
In fact I allways was ahead compared to other computer-users since 1989.
but by 1990 Apple was considered to die soon
I would feel unhappy in a world where every Breebleboxer was using a Mac.
You’re a professional writer?
Bubblebotox, you did it again. Jumping to conclusions from your narrow-minded platform. Yes, I’m a professional writer.
However, I’m not an english writer. There are multiple languages in the world. You’ll probably would like that to disappear too.
English is not even my second language. Still, I even know that DEARER has nothing to do with Australian slang.
Dear Dogger Blue,
Actually they are. At my last job, I astonished them by saying it was not efficient to print 15 copies of page 1, and then 15 of page 2, and so on, and then spending one day separating all the papers until they finally got 15 copies of a 45 page script. It took me a while until I found the dialog box with the function Collate, however on doing that I saved them one employee / one day (every 3 weeks).
I know this sounds unbelievable, and this was not a small office. They had their own IT guy, who in fact doesn’t know anything except cabling things.
It was only a small deed, but everyone said «AHA» when I showed it, and then «Do it again» but the Company manager saw his deadline moved with one day! plus an employee freed! It’s not my job to impress every WinUser, it’s my job to impress the director of the company.
As my grandfather used to say: Some people are stubborn in stupidity, that’s how I make a living.
WAWA, out of curiosity, what language do you make your living in? And I have seen plenty of similar stupidities in both Mac and PC based business offices, here in Canada. With every value put on blind obedience and no value at all put on undirected experimentation, business hierarchies lend themselves very well to this kind of stupidity. If this kind of thing happens more rarely on a Mac, it is probably because you tend to find the Mac more often in non-traditional business office setting where individuality (and therefore experimentation) are encouraged. Because only (a) a geek who loves screwing around with the computer or (b) an employee who is encouraged to use the computer creatively without having to account for every minute spent, will discover something like the ‘collate’ option if it is not already part of the business’s routine.
I truly feel that Apple really doesn’t exist to the majority of the computer buying world. There were some unique circumstances that caused me to switch:
- A friend working with me on a project was using a PowerBook running Panther. I got to play around with it and was attracted to the “feel” of the OS and the computer itself.
- I stumbled upon reviews of the latest PowerMac G5’s while surfing for my next computer purchase.
- There’s an Apple Store 10 miles from my apartment.
Had any of the above not occured, I’d have a new high-end Dell at home. Apple simply had never been a consideration for me in past purchases. This ignorance had nothing to do with misperceptions about Macs… it was just plain ignorance.
Friends and family of mine that buy PCs simply check out what Gateway and Dell have to offer, and maybe run into Best Buy and Circuit City to look at other offerings.
This type of product range is dictated mostly by TV commercials and newspaper flyers. Look at the ads in a Sunday paper sometime… almost everybody is selling some kind of PC. Rarely, if ever, do you see an Apple product outside of the iPod.
It’s not a matter of convincing people to switch, it’s a matter of showing people the Mac products exist.
Dear Dogger Blue,
I think your conclusion is correct. But on a Mac, the function Collate -even if you have no idea what it means- will appear in dialog box n°1. So comes the day when you need that function, and you start thinking, ‘a’ computer should be able to do that, changes are that on a mac you’ll find it quicker.
However the point I want to make, is that in the discussion Win vs. Mac we tend to forget that most of the people lack the inquisitive attitude to work with whatever computer. Lots of educated people bought Video-recorders, but never managed to record anything.
As I experienced, just giving a Mac to somebody doesn’t guarantee anything.
If that person is computer-lazy a Mac doesn’t do anything for him. But when you get in the segment of people who really rely on their machine, you’ll find that most of them will go Mac. It’s like with cars. If you’re biggest concern is that it will start with almost 100% certitude you go for the ‘Mac’-car. Your neighbour might think you’re a fool, because he drives a car that costs only a fraction. OK, you need to check the oil before every start, wait until it’s heated, and clutch three times if you want to get from third gear into fourth, but he doesn’t care about that, it even makes him think he knows a lot more about cars than his snobbish neighbour.
I also think that people on forums like this could be presented with the most abject computer ever, they still would manage to do better than the average what-ever-user. That’s why forumWinUser and forumMacUser will never convince each other.
PS. Why would you want to know what my language is ? If you like to go further into this, (Why?) you can use my link.
WAWA, I was just curious. There is no nefarious purpose. It obviously has no bearing on our discussion. It’s not important.
Jumping to conclusions from your narrow-minded platform.[...]There are multiple languages in the world. You’ll probably would like that to disappear too.
Why does it not seem possible for the fanatics to criticize me without committing such utterly fantastical hypocrisy?
First you “jump to conclusions” about my feelings about the Mac (I use one every day and I like it). And that’s provided I actually jumped to conclusions. I simply asked you a question and all you had to do was answer, but I guess the blinding rage of your fantacism and feelings of superiority preclude you from doing that.
Then you call me narrow-minded, but since I like BOTH platforms equally, while you not only seem to hate the PC but apparently have little regard for PC users, I’d say that by definition makes you far more narrow-minded than me.
It took me a while until I found the dialog box with the function Collate, however on doing that I saved them one employee / one day (every 3 weeks).
If people in your office are impressed by the “collate” function (which PC’s can do, btw), then they are very easily impressed. All of your bluster because you figured out how to collate (and even then, it “took awhile”, not exactly something to brag about)? Please tell me there’s more. Maybe you also enlightened them on how there’s a magic button that turns the computer on and off?
Besides, I would hardly consider this a Mac vs Windows thing; it’s a non-computer person vs a moderate-computer person thing. It takes neither a guru nor a Mac user to figure out the collate feature.
Dear BeebleInTheBubbleBox,
— please read n°24 & n°26
— RE#28 “Are you a moron” can be regarded semantically as an even simpler question, however, the meaning of words is in their use, not their exact meaning. How would you feel if you asked someone, Can you open the door for me ? and he would respond by saying YES and do nothing. Yet he answered correctly on your very very simple question.
— RE# 29 I was not bragging. With this example I wanted to show at what level real life computing still stands. The people at that particular office were highly educated people and they suspected their computer should be able to do that. But in their acquired state of helplessness, they even didn’t bother to find out what function that might be, they were already happy that they could print.
I do have regard for WinUsers, I help them out on utterly trivial things, but I can’t help thinking that it is actually the platform itself that renders them helpless.
— Now, finally don’t get mad, the word is fanaticism, or were you using some Australian slang?
Finally, I’m happy to hear you have the user-friendly Mac. Now you’re a user, start being friendly.