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  Blog \Blôg\, n. [Jrg, fr. Jrg. "Web-log".
     See {Blogger, BlogSpot, LiveJournal}.]
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Thursday, June 20, 2002
17:47 - John C. Qwerty

(top) link
Wow. Never in months have I seen this kind of reaction from across the Mac community to a column than to the John Dvorak one from yesterday.

As near as I can tell, he's saying that Apple is the only innovator in the entire computer industry, and that computers are only worth using if they from how they work currently. He's using your basic Shock Jock technique of yellow journalism to generate controversy (Oooh, I'll pick on Apple and people will yap for days about this one!). And, look, it's worked.

I'll say. Here's just a sampling:
Stepping back a bit, this can easily be seen as a microcosm of Mac Evangelism in general: What makes a columnist bash Macs? Even those who clearly have it in for Apple can't be entirely negative these days; some of the things Apple has been doing lately are just too undeniably cool for even the staunchest anti-Mac warrior to fail to concede. So is it just that people like Dvorak (who used to have a Mac-related column, for God's sake!) are bitter and resentful and desperately want some attention-- and are willing to take groundless pot-shots at what's currently stealing the limelight in order to get their own names into Google?

I've been taking some admonishment lately for simply being too much of a Macophile here in this blog-- which, considering that (as I've stated) I never intended this to be a Mac-centric site, I would have to agree has a point. Can't I just accept that Apple's fortunes will go whichever way they'll go, regardless of whether I take up the sword and try to rebut and counter whatever paranoid propaganda spews from the FUD-monkeys in the media? Don't I realize that no matter how much theory I quote or how many documented examples I give in support of my platform, all I'll end up doing is driving people further and further away-- because a zealot with facts backing him up is still a zealot?

On an unrelated note, Apple has posted another round of Real Stories on their site-- letters from users which I would be willing to bet are fully legally documented and traceable to actual humans (so any accusations of their being a "load of BS and “opinionated fact”" will have to be taken up with those people, not with Apple).

When I come home now I immediately start iTunes, which has my entire music collection. Then I begin working on photo albums. In fact, I started a business making iPhoto photo albums. It is amazing. I burn CDs and DVDs with photo albums for customers (in addition to the amazing print copies) set to music. I have even learned to touch up photos with Adobe Elements and iPhoto 1.1.

Look, what I'm trying to do here is celebrate what I see as a genuine force of good in the technology industry. If someone's willing to try to convince me that Apple is in fact a backward and stodgy company that stifles innovation and prevents people from doing great and creative things and whose extermination would in fact greatly liberate the computing industry, they're welcome to try. But if they're unable to convince me of that (and I promise I will make every attempt to listen with an impartial ear), then I will have to continue to do as I have been: when I see someone attacking what I consider to be a force of good, I have to ask what that person's motivations are. What could they possibly find threatening about a company that has less than 4% of the market? Is it purely the fact that almost everybody who uses a Mac loves it? Is that what's so menacing? The thought that something could exist that makes that many of its customers happy?

I'll say it again: I don't like zealotry (any kind of zealotry) any more than anybody else does. But I recognize when a company has something special going on for it, and as far as I'm concerned this is a Golden Age that I will look back on fondly after it's long gone. If that's because Apple is only a memory by that time, and if that's attributable to jealous and bitter columnists mercilessly flogging Apple for succeeding against all odds when it mattered most, then I'm going to be a very angry person later in life.

But I like to think we're better than that. This is America, isn't it?

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© Brian Tiemann