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Peeve Farm
Breeding peeves for show, not just to keep as pets
  Blog \Blôg\, n. [Jrg, fr. Jrg. "Web-log".
     See {Blogger, BlogSpot, LiveJournal}.]
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Tuesday, November 12, 2002
16:35 - Yet another perspective...

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Today in the seminar, during the breaks, Chris and I were able to check e-mail and do other random online work through a bit of OS X geekery. He linked his TiBook and his Handspring Treo together and used the Treo as a wireless modem; then he turned on AirPort and Internet Sharing, and I was able to attach to his wireless network and surf through his cellphone/PDA seamlessly. As could the guy with the HP laptop running XP, if he'd so chosen. (And assuming it had a wireless card.)

One side note: What is it with people who buy PC laptops and then never remove the market-fluff decals from the handrests? How much fun can it be to use a year-old laptop with labels declaring TAKE YOUR MUSIC TO GO-- Rip MP3s! Burn Customized CDs! and 1 month of free Internet access included with purchase! plastered all over the exposed flat surfaces? Do people just not realize they can remove these things, or do they actually like the way they look? Do they think it improves the resale value-- if they leave the decals on, the machine will fetch a higher price on eBay even if they keyboard is covered with finger gunk?

And to think I thought it was bad when people left the little foil Intel Inside <insert logo chime> stickers on their computers.

(He also had his laptop on what looked like a little black bun rack-- a wire grille that kept the laptop elevated from the desk, for airflow purposes. Now, I know the iBooks and TiBooks can get nice and toasty... but apparently this guy's HP can be downright hazardous if you don't take proper heat-conduction precautions.)

ANYway. After we had done our quite visible net-geek thing a couple of times, and shown it to the instructor who looked at the rig with what seemed like sincere appreciation, he then started up a new segment of the class with the statement: "Now, I know some of you Mac people might disagree, but most people buy computers for usability, not for functionality. In other words, most people don't go for the whiz-bang features; they go for what's easiest to use."

The implication being that Macs are groovy from a feature-set standpoint, but dad blast it, compared to Windows, they're just too hard to operate.

To say I was caught off guard would be to put it rather mildly. But if that's a popular sentiment, well... Apple's certainly got a lot of battles to fight, don't they?

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© Brian Tiemann