Tick-Tock, Tick-Tock

August 30

It's funny. The nuttier the MacJihad get - the thicker the irony. In this case, it's straight from the files of the MacMarines - own pussy digest where they are now crying in their beers over the Navy's decision to only buy Intel and Windows for all computer allocations at their China Lake operations. Quote - "they have outlawed any and all purchases of anything not Wintel". Well fucking duh - the entire government overall has stopped giving a dead horse like Apple the time of day - from Nasa to the military. Don't expect any major change or deviation from this policy either after the CIA was stuck with a shitload of stinkburgers all with the NeXT logo on them. Same goes for the Air Force which had to justify to the taxpayers why they paid a ton of overpriced recs for NeXTstations and overpriced software that didn't work worth squat. The fallout from these bombs is that Steve Jobs is about as popular as gays in the military - and worse in the rest of the goverment sector. And in spite of Steve Jobs' mis-hyped turnaround of Apple, don't expect a ton of interrest outside of the private sector because buying a computer that has no back-up supplier for parts or basic units is bad enough (with the clone builders now deader than the nearest doornail) - it's another thing to have a pariah selling computers that made them the IT laughing stock with boat-anchor black cubes a mere 6 years ago.

August 31
Reutters reports that during a pricey seminar attended by over 500 high-end graphic professonals, the question was posed regarding whether Apple love-fest developer Quark should merge with multi-platform developer Adobe. Not a single person raised ther hand. Aside from reinforcing the idea that anyone who isn't in bed with Apple (let alone prancing on stage with Steve Jobs like a sell-out puppy) is more preferable to throw money and investment dollars at - it's clear that Quark has made even more friends with the publisher user-base. So many in fact that their always more pissed off than not user base is now openly hostile to the fuckwits that would otherwise screw up a good thing like Adobe. On the other hand, it's the first time in a while that I've seen the computer revolution openly resemble a revolt. Way to go Quark - you can now go back to kissing Steve Jobs' ass instead of fucking things up for the rest of us. 95% of the rest of us in fact. Go back to the minor pissant leagues please and let us feed money to more deserving companies. Not an Apple sycaphant.

September 1

Sometimes I wish there was a holiday like April Fool's for the first days of every month because BOY there's a plethora of suckers being had. In this case it's the people who at first rushed out and bought an iMac, and then rushed back and returned it at CompUSA. According to the Macpussy's incarnate - the MacMarines - more than 5 in a single day had been put into the used computer isle due to disatisfied customers. Of course - the pussies - blamed the whole fiasco on people who weren't aware of it's shortcommings - like the lack of a floppy drive amogst other basic things. I would differ that while it's easy to set up - as easy as a ThinkPad anyway - it's sucky as shit to get working with the average ISP. Of course even if it is relegated to the floppy drive, the last pompous act of a misninformed company is to blame the customer rather than doing the simple and compelling thing - which is SELL TO THEM WHAT THEY WANT. But instead Apple and it's enthusiasts want to condem the goddamn public that they should be selling to. What a bunch of pussies! I mean here's people who want to buy a Mac, then finding out that it doesn't mean they're able to do what they want it to do - and then they're condemmed for being - as the MacMarines quipped - "dumbshits" - and yet the true dumbshits are the assholes who both can't design a computer with the basics - and those that worship defunct hardware. Lovely.

September 2

You know, with all the talk about Quark and Adobe - that is still headline material on their own damn websites - you gotta wonder. Is this the last great battle that might make Apple and the Mac fade into oblivion forever? I mean get this - say - Quark does deep six Adobe and cuts off it's nuts for all it's worth much like they did mTropolis and all that jazz. Great. Peachy. Wonderful. The rest of the computer industry will move onto other publishers to meet their needs instead of Quark's buttfucking approach to substandard support of their software. IE: pay 2 grand sucker-boy, the mac die hards paid through the nose for our shit, you should to - and fuck your customer service. Well have I got news for you. Wintel people don't like assholes - and considering that 95% of the planet likes to use the platform not favored by assholes - it only indicates that if Quark becomes the Apple love-bird of graphic arts and the only outlet for the publishing community - that most of the publishing communtiy will either re-invent itself fast, or will migrate away from the desolate greedhead dustbin that is the Mac platform. So go for it Quark. You've got the front row seat and first choice of gun in the duel of the decade - and might possibly prevent a slow death march from occuring. Instead we could see Apple implode faster than even my wildest dreams. Just think.

September 3

Speaking of Quark's bad to the bone - boneheadedness, they now claim that selling off K2 and related programs would otherwise grease the wheel of the DOJ to keep them out of any SEC nonsense like a monopoly or whatever. Well have I got news for them. Fucking another company over - stripping it's assets and telling the user base to fuck off is not exactly kosher with the system. Of course what else do you expect logicwise from an also ran in the Apple developer camp. Not me. I expect them to get the word on nice things like poison pills - hostile reactions to hostile takeover bids - pissed off shareholders, and a goverment that is looking for money from the software publishers of america that are playing grab-ass outside the law with such bravado that they're doomed to get a healthy dose of reality in no-time. Personally if they did something so asinine as this, I would be setting up the civil lawsuits myself. Because where there's pissed off shareholders at Adobe - there's a ton of money to be made placating their concerns with the DOJ. Just ask Sun microsystems and NetScape. They've been playing the DOJ like a bunch of patsies for a shitload of stool-pigoning about the word "monopoly". Is Quark setting themselves up for a fall? Perhaps, because there's a lot of people out there getting pissed from all of this nonsense, and I'm sure other software companies - and their former employees that have run up against Quark in the past would love to tell their side of the story in a court of law. Tune in next time for the continuing episode of as the ego turns.

September 4

Another interresting note in the news, Apple has released updates to the system software for the iMacs to address nightmare problems involving printing to USB printers let alone all the crappola that's been going on with the modems not being able to hook up to ISP's worth a damn. The always amusing thing on this is that while the MacJihad was going pussy-apeshit about Windows 98 drivers - their "perfect" OS was incapable of doing the most simple tasks like PRINT - and DIAL A MODEM. Now perhaps of course the USB standard is a bit flakey, and the concept of usable drivers got past those who were on the iMac product teams. Well, either that means that Apple is playing their consumer base as betaware patsies - yet again - or that they're just releasing whatever they can to the loyalists in the hopes they will keep their mouths shut about all the early bugs that are in the system until they can work it all out. It certainly worked great for NeXT's early adopters with system releases like 0.8 and 0.9, as well as the hopelessly underpowered Cube that wasn't anything other than a glorified paperweight until the 040s were released by Motorola. Interresting that no one who actually bought these dogs actually said anything. And yet, with the USB nonsense, the lack of basic hardware, and flakey modem problems - this "retail" computer seems to be making a comeback for Apple alright. Right back to the return desks of retailers.

September 5

iMacworld and EmediaWeekly go crazy 8 bonkers again talking more about what Steve was wearing during his Seybold speech than what the hell he was actually talking about. Either this is fanboyism run amok from the piles of laundry manning the keyboards at those publications, or perhaps Steve Jobs just didn't have much noteworthy to say? Well I'm betting on the latter of the two because that particular pile of retrograde fashion did nothing but go on about Apple's new computer that no one in the design communtiy would actually bother to use since they haven't had to suffer working on screens less than 17 inches since 1988. Well obviously Steve was trying to sell computers and the idea that the company has a lifeline of somekind. This was echoed by all the CEOs that were on stage with him puckering up all over his ass - except perhaps MacroMedia CEO Rob Burgess, whose egg sucking was overshadowed by the fact that Authorware for the Mac OS has been dropped due to a lack of interrest from the multimedia market in dying tech, dying platforms, and dying companies. Adobe seems to be agreeing with this because they have also dropped any development of PhotoDeluxe 3.0 for the Mac OS because of equal non-interrest and non-profitability that comes with spending time with passe technologies and the companies that make them. So in spite of what Steve was wearing onstage it seems that the clothesline is getting pretty thin for Apple regardless.