Tick-Tock, Tick-Tock

January 11

Some people wonder if I'm harping on Steve Jobs too much, and why I would have a problem with him in particular instead of just the rabid followers of him and over-zelous nerds ranting about their Macintoshes. The reason that we have over-zelous nerds ranting about their Macintoshes isn't merely for the same reason that we had them back in the AmigaJihad days or even the Atari 800 days. It's all Apple, and it's all Steve Jobs. He singlehandedly invented the concept of emotional attachments to computers much in the same way automotive makers suceeded in making emotional attachments to cars. But except for rednecks, most people grew out of their attachments to cars around the time the cost of insurance got prohibitavely expensive, parking and traffic jams took their toll, and even the staunchest automotive boosters loose their edge around the time they end up shelling out more than 1000 dollar for a major portion of the drivetrain when it goes south. Around this time, we hear references to junkers, piece of shit cars, or boats. This never happens with computers because, if you can put up with encroatching obsolecance, slow speed and dire software availability, you can pretty much run them forever. At least as long as you can stand it anyway. Today most of the computing public replaces their computers every 4-5 years, much like the owners of cars. That's probably why they are perplexed why there's so many victims of Apple demintia surrounding them every time they poke their heads into an online discussion and find some MacJihad raver crowing his head off how we're all idiots - not unlike Babtist street crazies telling the city dwellers that they're all going to hell. No one gives these annoying preachers the time of day, because just doing what they're doing, precludes any argument about whether hell even exists. This is where the parallel ends however. Mere annoyance isn't as pervasive as the fact that these MacJihad members are all victims of very calculated marketing experiment that is now, time-tested as a way to huckster false (or distrubing) emotionalism about computers. It's this kind of emotionalism that rears it's ugly head at the Exploding Mac Site. The fact is, that the makers of the site could have probably just as arbitrarily chosen a television set to quaf their pyromaic tendencies. And who would care? Once a TV set stops working, who cares what you do with a heavy box of glass and plastic since it's now intricate land-fill fodder. No one goes around arguing online - at least not in force - whether people who watch General Electric televisions suck compared to those that watch Sonys. They wouldn't give a damn if some fire-freaks took some propellant and blew up a 27" Trinitron straight to hell. But if you check out the Exploding Mac Site, you'll find tons - and I mean TONS - of pro-mac "we hate your guts" rants all over their comment section. This wans't a cocker-spaniel puppy that was blown sky high, it was a box with a bunch of wires and a picture tube in it. It was something with a logo on it though. A logo that was cared for, and developed by one man who decided that mundane boxes of technology were not just a way to get work done, but a symbol for his ego - and it's place in history. There's many examples of egomaniacs who have convinved people in the past that they should shelve common sense and civility for an icon. Sometimes those followers and the egos behind them do rude, incredulous, and inhumane things. That's why there needs to be a change in the Apple logo to reflect the dammage spawned by it on the psyche of so many computer users - all from the ego of Steve Jobs. That logo is going to be used next month on this site and can be viewed here.

January 12
Speaking of out of control zelots, they're out in force again at Ziff Davis' John Dvorak's latest online column about his take on the MacWorld expo. He noticed pretty much the same thing that I did last week, that the turnout was smaller, nothing new was announced, and it resembled more of a platform - boosterism exercise for a dying computer. I don't know if he was just doing his usual schtick that he's been famous for, playing devil's advocate for the computer industry as he did while he wrote for MacUser magazine, or if he was looking for a ratings spike for his online column. I almost suspect the later, but if you look at the rantings from the MacJihad that have infested the comments list at the end of the column, you find that they're not listenting to word one about what he's actually doing, and why he wrote the column to begin with. He's providing real-time actual evidence for something that was a major point to his story "MacWorld Expo 98 - The End". The point he was making amongst others was, Apple users can no longer accept criticism of any kind. Even when that criticism might otherwise help a dire situation by asking the faithful to stop eating all the bullshit and take a hard look at the situation at hand and demand better. Instead they're content to be spoon-fed by Steve Jobs that everything he's doing is "the right way" and anyone that claims otherwise is a moron and an agent of Bill Gates. This is sad because instead of having what looks like a userbase of throughtful and market concious people, they all come off looking like spiteful, religious zelots. But the fact is, this isn't a religion anymore, it's a movement of deluded morons that are following lock-step rules of conduct within the relm of a cult-of-personality. The real tragedy is that aside from Steve Jobs, the personality isn't a person at all. It's a machine. In some respects, we've seen the darker side of computing that techno paranoids back in the 60's used to make in television and sci-fi movies. A socieity that worships computers and servers their makes much in the same way the German public served the Nazi party and the way that truck bombers serve the extreemes of party poltics or uncompromising religion. The nostalgic techno-paranioa was dismissed as merely an extension of the monotlithic power and expense of encroatching mainframes that were almost exclusively the domain of faceless enterprises that were ripe for conspiracy fantisies. Once computers started appearing in homes and were doing dippy trivial tasks, they became "safe" and "user friendly". But after hearing testimony on this site of shattered car windows, death-threats and denial of service attacks on those interrested in free-speach instead of technological idiology, you realize that perhaps all the retro-parnoia wasn't that far off. Welcome to the future of terrorism. Brought to you by Apple Computers.

January 13

Another side-note from the MacWorld expo, that's been picked up by at least 3 news services is that there was no real dialogue given about Rhapsody or Newton. The latter is not really that odd because it's visibility was really a public relations exercise by John Scully. Now that's he far out of the picture with LivePicture, there's really no chance that it ever will be as far in the meda forefront as it was in the first half of the 90's. In the case of Rhapsody, the picture is far less clear. You really have one of two scenarios playing out. On one hand, pehaps they're downplaying the technology as it's not really applicable to a mass-user base but will be shoe-horned as a high-end enterprise niche solution for large corporations which have been slow to turn onto any solution that is represented by a "personal computer" manufacturer. They like mainframes, big hulking enterprise networks, and databases that would make anyone scream audibly trying to fathom the complexity and volume of data being juggled. On the other hand I'm guessing that they're actually throwing the secrecy hype wraps on this project - much in the same way that NeXT's hardware was only unveiled from a shroud of contrived hush-hush exercises until the media was like putty in Steve Jobs' hands. When the NeXT hardware was introduced, they even bumped major network coverage from the roll-out due to a shortage of seats. The coverage that was provided to the media was under the strict control of Steve right down to the single camera-man that was provided by NeXT. This is neo-classic Steve. Because the story of Rhapsody is going to be his, and it's not the classic two guys in a garage story that we've all heard over and over again. It's going to be the story of a middle-aged egomaniac that's trying to relive his former glory. If you don't believe me, watch what happens later this year when Rhapsody is finally rolled out and how the press is manipulated into giving it more exposure than it's due.

January 14

Surprisingly the final figures disclosed from Apple weren't that far from their projections. How far they're being taken by the Mac faithful is only shy of conduct becomming of dupes. The final profit tally was 47 million profit on revenue that declined 24% from a year ago. What wasn't known before now is how much their product shipments had slid on these depressing sales statistics. 31% was the drop in units shipped - 635K compared to 923K from a year ago. This is not good because the overhead is still high, and the sales need only drop another 40% before the drama that is bankrupcy begins to rear it's ugly head unless they lay off over half their remaining employees. Of course I'll be tracking the numbers that indicate the traditional 2nd quarter pummeling that Apple always endures like clockwork, and more importantly how the MacJihad will try to do PR-spin control after now deluding themselves with how this is an indication of a "great turnaround" and how they'll carry the momentum forward into subsiquent quarters. This is laughable because even though the first absurd claim is straight from the lips of Steve Jobs, even Steve has - as mentioned earlier - already admitted that they'll probably be in for a pounding next quarter. But the MacJihad have one tradition up their sleeves that allows them to paint such pretty pictures. It's a dellusion commonly referred to as "seeing through rose colored glasses".

January 15

More university math software vendors have turned their back on the Mac. In this case SPSS inc., and Mathworks have both discontinued making software for the Macintosh as reported by Don Crabb. You know, for a Mac advocacy person - he's never failed to come through in a pinch to remind me just how dire the situation is for Apple. I mean get this. University minds pretty much made modern computing. Whether it's all the alumni behind the scenes at Xerox PARC including geniuses from Washington University in St. Louis to the goverment subsidesed research at MIT in the 60's. The history of the computer owes it's legacy to the University and the military that funded it. When the University turns it's back on a platform, it's total doomsday for that OS. I mean come-on, colleges and universities are in their own little world. They don't have to cost-justify purchases and development in the same manner that most businesses do. What drives their purchases is if the software that they need to run on their labs is available. Seeing that there's plenty of coders available in these circles, it's not hard to find some way to get what you need done, and to justify buying new Macs for existing labs. But when all the hard-core basic uses for computers dry up - math being as basic as you get with computers in the first place- you've got a Possiden Adventure in progress. You really know how seriously to take a computer, when a bunch of esoteric professional students decide that a Mac isn't worth their time anymore. This is ironic because both the Mac, and later the NeXT were both force fed to Universities first. But I guess the old axiom holds true. First in, first out. It looks like the Mac is dropping out of school.

January 16

I've been noting more news on the Microsoft DOJ case, and what really hits me as interresting is that Microsoft is pissing everyone - including the judge - off as much as possible. This isn't hard to do when you have a legal staff behind your efforts as large as a small army. In this case what I predicted last year is comming true. After 10 years of bullshit with the lobbied to death DOJ bugging Bill Gates every year, he's declared war. And you don't want to have Bill Gates declare war on you because this is a person who'se not only stinking rich, but is competitve to the point of neurosies. My favorite news-nugget concerns the special advisor who is playing judge for all intensive purposes Larwence Lessig from Harvard. Besides the irony of both Bill and Mr. L being alumni from Harvard, I generally have mixed feelings about Lessig's role in this affair. Lessig is good, very good. He's been an outspoken critic on the Clipper and V-chip as well as the general attempts to legistate the internet. So on one level this guy knows his stuff. On the other hand, he's an idiot with a Macintosh who had trouble running a basic installer program for IE and bitched about his experience in an e-mail to Netscape about the whole lame affair. Granted, Microsoft pulling this punch was pretty petty, but what the hell is this person who is sitting on the right hand of the Judge doing talking to Netscape? Talk about the man behind the curtain, this is akin to a special advisor on football plays acting as a consultant during the OJ Simpson trial. And this guy isn't tainted? Trust me, it's not because he dared complain about computing - I do that every day. It's because he's a Mac user who is in communication with NetScape. People can bitch about Microsoft all they want, because often than not, they have to use it every day they see a computer. Bitching to NetScape is a little too backroom for my tastes. But then, I don't expect a run-of-the-mill federal Judge to comprehend Silicon Politics. I just hope Microsoft pours on the heat, because I'd like to see the US free itself of it's shoot-business-in-the-foot that we excel at so we can continue to compete with Japan where industry coddling is the status quo for the government.

January 17

Speaking of Japan, they raided Microsoft's offices last week in an effort to open their own showy investigation into Microsoft business practices. Besides sounding trite to the DOJ probe, it's more akin to the 1 week bru-haha that Europe laid on Microsoft. This ended in nothing uncovered, and some new agreements made between Microsoft and the EC. Besides the overall whoop-de-shit argument, the Japan thing is loaded with irony. First, Japan hates American enterprise on their soil. That's why technology and farm-products are as popular in Japan as the bubonic plaugue. The fact that they would decide to pull a "raid" is as predictable as them holding up American rice imports for more than a decade in the harbor. It's even more ironic because the Japanease hold legitamate many things that would make the SEC decend on your offices faster than threatening the President of the US in front of the Secret Service. Legal corporate espoinage and bribery being the norm for a society where Masushta, Sony and Mitsubishi pretty much dicates what is the normal business practices for Government legal controls on Japanease business. Besides allowing inflated domestic prices for goods to subsidize overseas dumping there's a long list of trade practices that make our worst list of corporate offenders sound like a group of playground bullys. Japan's corporate ballplayers are the fricken mafia - or yakuza in this case. The idea that they would be offended by Microsoft's business practices means that Mr. Rogers is probably regarded as public enemy number one by the national police arm of the Japanease government. Of course, the MacJihad now have a new thing to crow about in their quest to demonize Bill Gates. The fact that none of them probably have clue-one about Japanease poltics or business practices is almost a given. So what else is new.