Tick-Tock, Tick-Tock

October 4

This isn't really an indictment of Apple - as much as some situational humor. Back in the early 90's my NeXTstation would occasionally seize up - even though this kind of behavior wasn't supposed to happen with a Mach Unix kernal system (nor will it with Mac OSX one would presume). This wasn't all that odd, because the NeXTcubes did the same thing back in 1989 - mostly because the hardware wasn't isolated vey well until NeXTstep 3.0 was released. The "odd" thing was that no amount of "finger salutes" or what-not would bring the thing out of it's seizure. The solution was the same idea reached in that now-film-classic, Hardware-Wars, "you pull the plug". So you had to get down on all fours and yank the plug from the wall or flip the switch on the power-strip. Nearly 10 years later, we get to do the same thing again with advanced Apple tech. iMacintouch reports that three finger reset salutes don't work on the iMac if it freezes all too often - hence people have to bend over to pull out the plug. Which makes me wonder if prisons will be adopting the iMac anytime soon. At least soap wouldn't be the only source of worry anyway. Ew!

October 5
In spite of the CEO of Quicken sitting smack dab in the middle of the Apple board of directors, their "Check-Free" service has gone well into the deadzone mode for the iMac according to user complaints from iMacintouch. James Holloway claimed, "after using Check-Free for 6 years - he sits at a dead end". This whole mess is again attributed to the substandard modem and driver configs Apple has bundled with the iMac which in spite of their video tapes depicting 8 year olds and dogs - seems to be giving plenty of users fits. At least more fits than I've had with Wintel architecture anyway. So, one one hand, I think I'm getting the gist of this whole "Think Different" thing. It's really the difference between simple tech that works on Windows for the internet, vs the intermittent-failure that users are being faced to deal-with on a daily basis with Apple. Putting up with these problems with a smile and still believing that the platform has a form of superiority behind it, matches up quite nicely with Orwellian double-think. On the other hand, I wouldn't be too hard on this one example of a Quicken user having difficulty with a single application that has made up the majority of his at-home use, because there's a simple solution available that he's overlooked. All he has to do is call Apple-Tech support and have them send over an 8 year old kid and a dog.

October 6

MacEvangelist readers are falling over themselves chuckling over the average PC mean rate of failure that has been spotlighted (out of context and incorrectly in most cases) within some of the lamer corners of the AP wire service. Although the highest mean failure rate cited was 13%, with most manufacturers coming well under that figure (like Dell's 9% - what the hell does "an average" mean guys), the highest numbers has the MacJihad rolling in the aisles. Of course this is fine since general failure rate for any tech always hovers around 10% since video games were marketed to consumers in the early 70's. What's overlooked in this love-and-humor fest by the Jihad is that the iMac is approaching a mean failure rate of 22%, and Apple has always had the highest numbers for DOA hardware for the last decade - consistantly over 15%. Nothing like dodging logic for a good laugh I guess - even if it does make you look like a complete and utter moron. But if ignorance is bliss, then there's plenty to go around the Apple camp suffice it to say since it just goes hand in hand with many of their myths about; the invention of the GUI, the alleged ease of use, the cost of operating expense, the not-so-dire software situation (go out and get Mac Quake II, and check back with me when you find it - I've got a decade to kill), the superior non-kernal OS, the lack of hourly seizures, the....

October 7

I think I've found a new online news source that beats the band for both Apple news, and general customer satisfaction reports. It's MacWeek.com's letters column. Each week they have new and sparkling reports of consumer trials and tribulations from people who were idiotic enough to hand their money over to Apple - and the inevitable results. Many of the results are overlooked by the pop-press for about a month on average, but most are so on target, that they do get repeated by Don Crabb and other columnists within a couple of weeks. Still, it's the best damage report out there - so lets see how the cars piled up on this one shall we - regardless of what the MacMarines think is right or wrong. Customers of Power Computing machines are spitting bile after noticing that they're missing several front teeth after their OS options are chucked out the window in the upgrade column. Educators take notice of the lack of support from CompUSA in their weekly advertising inserts in the paper - and wonder what this exlcusive store within a store crap was really worth in the first place. People wanting to get their hands on Mac OSx are pissed off that it will only run on G3's and not those Power Macs that they shelled out a ton of money for less than a year ago for. Looks like backwards compatability took a nose-dive on that one. G3 laptops are still nowhere to be found - as far as five plus months after being ordered. Seems that the iMacs have been chewing up just a tad too much industrial complex time for the serious user base that falls outside of 8 years olds and german shepards. Gamers are jonesing for a lack of anythin fun to do with their Apple computers - against a cry of Jihad'ers that are still claiming the "software" situation is an endless parade of lies. Tell that to the people looking for sports games from Electronic Arts which is available for every game system and Wintel comptuter out there. Speaking of falure rates and consumer computers, seems that the one's from the last Apple push that ended in 1997 - the Performa line - are coming up deader than doornails. Customers stuck with 5600's are noticing that it will cost 750 dollars to replace a motherboard for a computer they paid 1400 dollars for. They also noticed it only costs 250 dollars to replace a Wintel motherboard - as well as other components. Other users are wondering if the new cheaper Apple means crappy service. Well aside from having great service for my el-cheapo ThinkPad from IBM, I don't think having crappy service and support is limited to the cost of hardware - as much as the company that provides it and their health. A recent G3 buyer notices that Apple is hiding the true cost of PCI in the form of the various configs that you need to have for "breakout boxes" to accomodate the cards that you needed to wedge into 9500's and the like. More horror stories about corporate purchases and how Apple doesn't seem to know the meaning of the phrase "Purchase Order" - even though the Wintel suppliers seem to jive with business demands with narry a problem. Makes you wonder why Apple can't even get it's foot in the door with corporate America doesn't it? Actually NeXT was even more outrageous on the mass-purchasing side of things - so let's move on. The last letter had an interresting soundbite about how "if Dell or Gateway was doing what Apple did - they'd be out of business". At this point I have to toot my own horn and hint at what this little writing exercise is all about. The bottem line from this carnage-play, is that there's something interresting that manifests itself about a company that can have so many nits that have remained in the complaint columns for so long. In order to keep things going this way - in spite of years of similar feedback - one might conclude that perhaps Apple doesn't really care how it treats it customers on a daily basis. One also might wonder why they wouldn't. One finally might wonder how much longer the rest of Apple's minute marketshare will put up with this. One might also notice that Apple's marketshare in businesses slid to 1% this week after years of downward momentum. Gee I wonder why.

October 8

Mackido - ever the baston of maturity - get's the last word in it's perpetual "we can't shut the fuck up about something - and move on" column. In this case it's their cheesy rebuttle to ZDnet's retort that justified Mackido's existance in the first place. The upshot of the whole exercise is that Mackido still maintains that Apple inconsistant - and glaringly wrong - PR soundbites are still a good measure of reality instead of real-world tests. How they duck logic like this is possible grounds for commital into a mental institution, but suffice it to say that the general groundwork for such brain-bending is pretty much the usual terrain that comes with online snipping rather than conversation. You know the drill. Take a person's argument, and then dissect it line by line until the word "is" - is up for debate. This kind of bullshit is basically one step beyond "playground naysaying" and juvinile contradiction since it barely requires thought - or complete sentances for that matter. Naturally, I've always thought of Mackido as a group of journailistic wash-outs from the 7th grade yearbook staff - now I have confirmation of that fact.

October 9

Apple's Geek not Chic gets a mindbending workout with this site in Japan by the anime and pube set. While Apple - with Chiat-Day's assistance - tries to maintain the high ground with consumers filtering a message of taste and sophistication to match their industrial style push - some users in the Apple camp still don't quite get it. Probably because illustrated Japanese sexual fantisites are still the mainstay of their relationship quotient. Still it's pretty much a non-event in the broad picture (to coin a phrase) once you get past the freudian wierdness, the fanboyism running amok, and the sexual dissolutionment piled on a product from a computer company. Wierd for the rest of the world - status-quo for the Apple perverts.

October 10

Red Herring magazine - and their online varient - goes realist mode in an article by Jason Pontin headlined - "Drinking the Kool-Aid(tm)". It basically goes on about Steve Jobs and the current accolades twords the various PR exercises coming out about Apple, and their less than verticle nosedive into the ground. Of course he then tempers these observations by wondering "who cares". After all - none of the iMac sales or anything else Apple has done recently - has changed the fact that it's a niche player, with a dearth of software or relevance. Of course the MacMarines went full-goose-bozo over the whole thing and have begun a spate of spiteful e-mailers going defensinve and paranoid all over his ass. I'm sure there's going to be a follow-up piece from Red Herring about the dumbshits piling on the spam in an online retort. Personally - I'm hoping that this won't be the case since after all - Apple is a niche crowd, it's unfair to goad fringe wackos with feedback. It only gives them a feeling of importance.