Tick-Tock, Tick-Tock

August 10

I'm still sitting on the sidelines of the tidal wave of hype that refuses me to comment on anything else but the scene of shock that sent the macjihad flying but lets continue to beat this horse into the ground. Here's something worth noting that only one other news source has noticed - Steve didn't talk word one about Rhapsody. Now isn't THAT interresting? By god you mean the big Steve was talking about System 8 and everything mac but didn't once spill his guts about all that NeXT tech that they gave him 400 million-plus-dollars for? What ever could this mean? Is he getting a clue that the marketplace doens't want this stuff? Well in fact if you read at least two news sites that are out there you discover Steve Jobs soundbites that say words to the effect "we're going to be putting NeXTstep features in OS 8 not the other way around". Good God! You mean Steve is not actually going to push a bloated unsucessful Unix based OS down everyone's thoats after-all? Stay tuned!

August 11
Covering up loose ends from last week, I noticed that Mr Crabby of MacWeek screwed up again. He was claiming that there was no satalite hookup between Gates and Jobs during the smoke and mirrors fest last wednesday. What ever he's been smoking I'd like some since Time only had a lacky following Steve around for 2 weeks and even noticed him talking into a cell-phone about the live hookup's status. Why would Don try to imply otherwise? Because there's no way that he can bring himself to think that Apple would really be so chummy with Microsoft as to actually let his larger than life live vissage into the hollowed halls of the MacExpo floor. Heavens no! I still wonder if he and hundreds of others that were actually at the event can even assimilate what the hell they saw. Yes Apple actually recognized something that Mac users would be loathe to admit. Without Microsoft, Apple would go down in flames just like NeXT, the Amiga, and the Atari ST. You see when you have 95% of the OS's on the desks of America, all running Microsoft Word, and Excell you'd better be damn sure that these same apps are on your platform otherwise there's little more use to the thing than an expensive doorstop. That's probably why Steve was scolding the masses with the words "we like Microsoft software". I personally would have loved to seen Bill cringe his nose at the response and say - oh well never mind then, we'll watch you die a slow death instead. If you really think that Corell Wordperfect would stymie a death march of market share at Apple, then you're more in denial than those at the expo.

August 12

I'm a little worried about the whole back to the future strategy thing at Apple. Sure everyone remembers 1984 and the Mac as being the golden years at Apple. Or do they? I still wince when I here Windows 95 and Mac 87 jokes. There's one hell of a gap there from when the Mac was actually introduced and when it was actually glorified by the jihad. Why? Because until 1987, the Mac sucked more than it does now. There's a reason that the board of Apple kicked Jobs' sorry ass out of there because he was running the company into the ground. Chiat-Day wasn't much better. The only reason the Mac 1984 spot ran once wasn't because it was such a great campeign that it could only run once in the 3rd quarter of the Super Bowl, it ran once because Apple tried to kill the ads before they aired. They had 2 slots reserved and they couldn't sell the suckier 3rd quarter slot. So it ran, and won tons of accolades if for no other reason than Riddly Scott made something that had nothing to do with computers interesting for 30 seconds. I've worked for TBWA Chiat-Day, and I know what Lee Clow smokes all the time. Go try to find him at a lecture sometime and see if he hits the podium without red eyes. Well that same smoke must have really been great, because Lemmings-the second Mac ad tanked so bad that the nail was in the Mac coffin for another year after insulting it's entire business customer base. Now that they are back in action I can't wait to see how they insult us this time around.

August 13

Getting back to the future, lessie what was doing then and what's being done now. The Mac was an expensive underpowered system. Seems to be the same now. The Mac was closed architecture and was not licensed to any clone vendors to make a dent in the market and insure IT agents job security by allowing them another vendor to throw orders at. With the current leech comments and the withholding of OS 8 it's deja vu there too. Scully couldn't hold himself up against a rampaging Steve Jobs who refused to believe that the public wouldn't acutally buy the Mac until his back was against the wall. With Steve's new buddy-buddy board of clubhouse friends it's a late night repeat there too. Rather than position the Mac at a wide audience and secure a toehold in a real market, he trumped the slogan "the computer for the rest of us". All 5% of us. In his closing remarks he pointed out that the Mac users have always been a "special breed". Hmmm looks like he's still not intending for the general public to buy these things or take Macs seriously. Looking at how they did when they were a much smaller company, with much lower overhead, and how fast they were loosing money then, I'd hardly think that all of the above ideas would be great now that they have much more in the way of expenses to cover. I wonder how long it will take for Steve to get thrown out this time? Same as it ever was, same as it ever was.

August 14

Man oh man. If I hear one more Mac jihad member tout something to the effect that Microsoft just ripped off Apple, I'm going to smack the next designer that I work with for no good reason. It's obvious that Gates was ripping off Apple, because one is on the financial rocks and the other is considered a sometime threat by the FTC. Riiiiiight. If Bill took every idea, then why aren't they on the ropes too? Because those ideas came from Xerox people. Get a friggin clue! Actually the best bits of info I've come across in some of the new Bill hardcover profiles mentions that Gates pleaded with Scully to get a clue and license, and would even help them do it. Did he listen? Nooooooo! Much in the same way Gates got stuck doing the OS for the first PC - when all they wanted to do was make languages - Microsoft couldn't just sit by and watch everyone else make mistakes. Gary Kildal of Digital Research screwed-up twice. Microsoft then picked up the ball and ran with it. Then they even offered to help Apple stop cutting it's own thoat. But only for so long. After OS2 became moot with IBM Bill finished Windows 3.0 and marched on. Quick quiz for all you jihad memebers. When did Windows 1.0 come out? Give up? 1984 - the same year as the Mac. Now if you think they moved THAT fast and knocked off Apple you have to be reading flat EKGs out of your head. Fact is, both companies knocked off Xerox at the same time. But even with Gates telling Apple to do something rational, to help keep his investment in Mac software development secure, Apple refused - and then sued them. Man!, now that's a brilliant sequence of events. I think in this case it's safe to say that only one group of people ripped Apple's ideas off. The Kamakazis.

August 15

A lot people are still being stymied by the shockwave of the piddling Microsoft settlement, it would be interresting to note that all of the above hype is doing something very important for Jobs. It's keeping people from noticing that nothing significant has really happened at Apple, no real new products have been produced, the OS 8 system sales - while decent - don't provide the margins needed to support a bloated obsolete company. The point? Nothing that transpired at MacWorld, for all of it's melodrama, actually changes the fact that Apple is still loosing momentum, marketshare and money hand over fist. In fact, the new marketshare numbers have been put out showing how much momentum they have. It's now down to 2.7 percent. Of course all of the hype has been diverted by the floorshow so no one's even noticed how much Apple has continued to slip into the abyss. To be continued.

August 16

During all of the above forays into the sponge that is soaking up the melodrama, it seems even the Goverment is pretending to have a clue about the computer industry. During the day of the announcement - even Clinton himself - commented that until the Department of Justice renders a verdict in it's monitoring of the preceedings he wouldn't comment. What the hell? The people we're paying tax dollars to are investigating the significance of a mere 150 million dollar non voting share investment into another computer company? That's money well spent. Lemmie get this straight. You have non-voting stock money going to another company and this is somehow going to violate SEC laws? Gimmie a break. The only thing questionable about the stock fundage is the fact that after the announcement the price of that same stock nearly doubled. Which means that when Microsoft farts, they can double their investment profit. Obviously for the government, it doesn't pay for a technology company to have any brains. At least not when Novell continues to slide and pushes their Mormon lobbiests onto Capitol Hill. Pennies from Heaven if they succeed in screwing up the comuter industry for the most of us.