Tick-Tock, Tick-Tock

November 2

Where I work, there are several other veteran employees from Apple Computers. And while we were getting drunk at the F.A.C., celebrating the shipment of a new release version of software that took over 5 years to emerge, we came to the same conclusion on our travels around the world of Steve Jobs. It was a con-job. Everything from the "change the world" motto chanted endlessly from Cupertino, to the new "Think Different" message that is being huckstered out from TBWA Chiat-Day. Both of these messages have little to do with what Apple has done, or is trying to convey. The strategy for today is to sell out what will be the last major release of the Macintosh until the NeXT OS can be shipped on Intel, or NC clients. This has nothing to do with making the current Mac crop feel empowered against the tide of Wintels that now hold most favored computing platform with most people. What is has to do with is milking the last of the Mac market for all it's worth to make way for the new version of the NeXT strategy. Changing the world in the old days, meant changing the rules of what was a reasonable margin of profit for a computer to something out of a traveling medicine show from the wild west. The things both have in common is the sucker factor. If you can convince enough people to buy a product, under the guise of being cool, then you can support the rampant greed operating behind it. This is in stock contrast to a market based on affordable computer components, and cheap OS prices. People who get sucked into the former model often say things like "afford it? schools can't afford not to". This was the words of one of the nation's higher-education institutions that actually bought NeXT cubes for their labs. The rest of the schools got behind the platform that was actually being used by business and the rest of the professional world. It's no coincidence that the graphic-design community has refused to budge from the Mac, because how in the hell would they fly in the face of Picasso posters decked out with Apple logos? Well Disney is, because unlike most small graphic shops, they understand the merits of the "pen is a pen" argument. The bottem line is that where there is a lack of momentum, there is no chance to change anything. And when your marketshare is around 2.7%, to proport anything otherwise is merely farting in the wind.

November 3
Staying with the con-job argument for a moment, one sure sign that you're part of a mass delusion is to look at the tactics employed by the chairman of the board. Steve Jobs loves the routine that he has carved for himself so much that he's hardly changed it in 12 years. First, get a catchy-yet abstract slogan that could really be applied to anything. Looking back we've had "why 1984 won't be like 1984", "The computer for the rest of us", (leaving Apple and going to NeXT),"The day computing changed forever", "Interpersonal computing", (back to Apple) and lastly "Think Different". The best one's are the ones that actually say the word "computer". Those are the best because they are the most far-flung from the truth. Something for the rest of us, is a great idea until you realize that businesses want something that works with the rest of the existing base of computers. Something different, often works out to become something of a pain to administrate. So that was a feckless message to throw out to a growing industry that was seeing the birth of real standardization since CPM was the OS-of-the-day. When the first NeXT cube computer was unveiled it was supposed to be something as stunning as the unveiling of the light-bulb by Thomas Edison. Forgetting the fact that this is one of the "Think Different" images used today, the phrase "computing changed forever", was idiotic since no one other than Universities could even buy the damn things. How this was supposed to even have a blip of an impact on the real-world is beyond me, let alone change anything period. The most half-baked of the bunch and the grand champion of smoke and mirrors for the computer industry had to be "interpersonal computing". I've still got T-shirts and Turtle-Necks emblazoned with that one. Aside from sounding like a perverse relationship with a machine that could get any politician thrown out of any presidental race, it was supposed to indicate the idea of group-productivity with computers in a network. That is, unless you network was something not exclusively NeXT machines. It became obviously ironic that this model of interpersonal computing was actually very impersonal to the rest of your network of Wintel, NT and even Macintoshes. NeXT users will rail on me for that last line, but I'll remind them that Appletalk support was unbundled from NeXTstep 3.1 - so shut the hell up. The reason that all of these slogans and mantras for the marketplace are so far-fetched and even a flat-out contradiction from the truth, is that the man behind them actually had very little understanding of what he was trying to sell in the first place. Trust me, Steve never put together a functional database, but instead shuffled the same demo of of the DB toolkit to the same script year after year at the various NeXTworld Expos. The fact was, that he rarely even used the NeXTs that he was selling, apart from doing e-mail and throwing together slides for trade shows. Even then, he often had to call his own NeXT-minions late at night when the whole mess came to a screeching halt. So it's not hard to understand how these messages would fail to move the machines. Because the people who got stuck working with them suddenly realised that they were duped. Perhaps not the users who plunked down what amounted to a car's worth of wages, but certainly the IT administrators could smell a pile of bullshit. In these cases, it wasn't a personal investment of capital that bound them to boosterism of a stinkbuger of a computer, it was looking out for thier paycheck that caused them to wave off any hype in favor of a system that would actually fill their needs. Not look cool in the Smithsonian.

November 4

The day computing changed what when a single platform and approach reached enough acceptance in the marketplace that numbers like 80%, 85% and 90% were broached. Instead of arguing the merits of 45rpm, 78rpm, 16rmp, and 33rpm records, everyone could go out and get a CD and just enjoy the music. Enough people are now slaggering away at keyboards and are running the risk of tunnel carpel syndrome that real changes with the internet, and computing in general that both have become real marketplaces. This couldn't have occured until the general public got in the swing of things, rather than a group of elitest nerds. One enough generic Joe's got their hands behind the keyboard, the marketplace could see what they were doing and respond accordingly. The fact that AOL is easier to get onto during the Super Bowl and Seinfield should tell you something. It tells me that instead of being a niche pastime, real progress is being made in publishing, information creation, and the eventual idiom of the information based economy are actually being realized. This is why the reason the world changed has nothing to do with a rainbow apple logo, but the amount of people using Microsoft software. The reason they got so big in the first place was that instead of being hip and overpriced, it was cheap - and worked. Henry Ford - in yet another image being used in the Think Different ads - changed the world by getting out what worked in volume. He never claimed anything apart from how the things were built. Just call Steve Jobs the Tucker of the computer industry.

November 5

Until the IBM PC emerged, there were no standards in the late 70's and early 80's. Apple had it's II, Atari was selling it's flavor, Commodore, Texas Instruments and Tandy and dozens of others all sold little doorstops that did simple home financing, and very basic word processing - that is when people weren't playing games on them most of the time. The fact is, that while these computers created a massive influx of cash for Apple and hundreds of other companies, they were all toys for all practical purposes. The data that the software made wasn't shared, and only the slowerst of modems even allowed them to talk to the outside world. Interconnectivity? File servers? Real-world applications? Are you kidding? What was missing from the toybox was any set standard for how most people were going to do anything. And apart from a minor spurt with Visicalc, there wasn't anything businesslike going on from all these toys of babble. It was IBM's stamp on an otherwise Apple IIish design that legitimized the personal computer and allowed it to spread beyond hobbyiests and home users. It was this reason that Apple was in trouble in 1985 when they foisted yet-another format. The difference between now and then is now the Justice Department can cry foul when anyone agrees on a standard platform for getting things done, Apple's can claim that everyone is wrong for trying to standardize in the first place, and people can still hold little geek arguments on which needle belongs in the record player. Much like NeXT discovered when they were small and vunnerable, the world can't tell the difference between a start button and an apple menu. They can tell the difference between a 4500.00 Mac, and a PC that runs pretty darn decent for 1200.00. The bad news for Apple is that these cheap PC's aren't going to get more expensive. In fact given the latest push for a PC on a chip, these suckers are going to fall in price even faster till they are the same price as a Commodore 64 circa 1983 - including the monitor. While Apple remains poised to introduce next week new and speedier Macs, I seriously doubt the general public will notice anything but the latest Compaq that is selling at Best Buy for 750.00. It's prices like that which makes me feel like a dupe for spending nearly twice that for a laptop a year ago which is slower by a large margin. But it means that no matter how fast Apple portends to have the high-end sewn up, Compaq, Dell, IBM, and many others will continue to pummel the beejezus out of Apple on the low end. It will be truly sad once they release NC's because I have no doubt that by then people will be wondering why they have to pay more for a dumb terminal - when their PC runs circles around it now. It will be sad because instead of regaining their mantle of technology leader, they will look like a blast from the past. But then, that's what you get with retrograde 80's figureheads at the helm.

November 6

As soon as I get and finish the latest tome on Apple's blunders and general history, I'm going to put up a bibliography section and review of it, and several others, that are great reads to unbrainwash yourself from the myths that are now infesting Apple worse than cockroaches at Stuckies. The latest, "Apple", while having an unimagintive title, is dead on with more info on what the hell happened in the John Scully years. These were the years at Apple where they instigated the now famous world's longest corporate lawsuit that claimed that they were first and most important with GUI's and everyone else could take a flying leap. I'm hoping it also mentions what kind of idiot company would actually RAISE prices on their already existing product line while the PC compatables were entrenching beyond Bill Gate's wildest dreams and were falling in prices like mad. This was around the time of 1991 when the Mac IIfx and assorted boxes were being sold, if memory serves. It was Apple's contention that the cost of memory was making them cost-prohibative to market at their current price-levels. For almost a year, they actually jacked them up! The dirty little truth was these greedheads didn't want to sacrafice their 50+% profit margins for the sake of getting more Macs out and changing the world. They wanted more first class seats for their engineers, and more lavish holiday parties staring large-name rock stars in a setting that was already becoming retro-80's Wall Street. Later when Windows 95 was rolled out, all manner of excess was exhibited there too. But at least they didn't try to pay for it on the backs of jacked up prices on Microsoft applicaitons and OS boxes. They made their money first and spent it later. The fact that Apple is bleeding at an alarming rate might not be so tragjc if they had decided to look at the market in a long-term view and licensed instead of going for the fast buck.

November 7

Amazon.com assures me that the books should be here Monday. I hope so, because there's a wonderful little preview in Wired. 15 pages worth. It describes in more detail how Bill Gates pleaded with Scully and Gasse to get off their ass and license the OS to get more sales going. Something that was previously mentioned by Steven Levy of Newsweek. Who broke this memo first, I have no idea. This obviously wasn't done out of the goodness of Microsoft's heart, they spent a ton getting around 60% of the company to code applications for these Macs and, dammit, they wanted more application sales. The irony here is that this is the same screw-up that Microsoft has taken advantage of time and time again. Microsoft sent IBM to Digital Research for the first version of DOS to seal the deal with Microsoft and languages. Kildal dropped the ball, Microsoft picked it up. The fact that Apple would do the same thing in the same decade is beyond mornic, but this is what Apple effectively did. We're talking fumbling the future on a scale that Xerox was only given staus for when Steve made is legendary trip to PARC. The fact that Gates' personally set up meeting and had AT&T and others ready to roll out the presses and start making clones to saturate the market against the IBM and Intel juggernaught, only to be snubbed by Scully at the last minute indicated to Gates that he was - once again - going to have to do the right thing himself. The right thing in this case was make as many cheap computers to run Microsoft software via the OEMs that were suddenly shifting into high gear. Apple had their chance to change the world and blew it. After the Apple II, their efforts would be mired by greed, and lost against a background of affordable boxes that people really wanted to use, but didn't want to spend the cost of a small-size car to own. boy I'll tell ya, if this is 15 pages worth, I can't wait to see what else is in that pulp-sucker. Yippie!

November 8

Ya know it's funny. Choice is always a good thing, but when education is measured in terms of real-world work skills, a little bias goes a long way. In this case, the bias is screwing our kids to the wall. Another teacher on the EvangeList was calling 1-800-wah because the school she taught at wanted to phase out the aging Mac based computer lab in favor of Wintels. Howls of sympathy was begged to be showered to her in case studies to prove that she is right, and the school district is wrong. Well, here's a clue. I don't give a fuck, and Johnny doesn't give a fuck. The fact that there's an avalanche of games out their for Windows 95 should tell you that Johnny can get his way around anything as scary as a PC. In fact, when I was Johnny's age, I was bashing around on numerous command-line style computers of several brands, and getting into all sorts of mayhem with modems and fledlging piracy software. Heck, everybody did it. The difference now, is that while my skills ended up not tied around Radio Shack's basic programming language, Johnny's just might be tied around how well he can call up basic productivity applications running on Wintel. Back then, we always joked about how students spent more time running the clock as lab administrators since the teachers often couldn't tell when something fishy was going on. 20 years later, those same teachers are acting just as clueless every time they spend taxpayer dollars on something that does less to get Johnny current with real-world skills, but does more to subsidize failed corporate greed. Because all you have to do is open the paper and look at all the ads for Wintel experience to see how Johnny is going to fare in the real-world marketplace, if he decides that he doesn't need to unlearn everything Apple has taught him. Thank god Apple never claimed to have invented a better version of basic math