My ire would like to respond, point by miserable point. Below is the complete, much talked about article from zdnet.com, a site as many of you know, that has long enjoyed the ire of the Mac populace. My ire would like to respond, point by miserable point.
Time for truth: Why Apple's new iMac ISN'T 'flat-out cool'
David Coursey,
Executive Editor, AnchorDesk
Tuesday, January 8, 2002
Apple Computer on Monday introduced a new desktop computer with a flat-panel display attached to the 22-pound system unit by a short articulating arm, allowing the screen to be moved into a variety of positions.
That's the news--at least the unvarnished gist of it. And now that you've heard it, let me ask you this: Did it blow you away? I'm betting it didn't.
>>> Pay up Mr. Coursey, you lose.
Yet that is precisely what got Apple a Time magazine cover with the headline "Flat-Out Cool!"
>>> "Cool" was the first word I uttered upon my first sight of the new iMac. Me --and if you're still accepting bets-- probably thousands of others.
I HATE TO CONTRADICT America's most-respected newsmagazine
>>> Sure you do. That's what you get paid for. Also, many magazines in America I'm sure would disagree with you that Time is "the most respected."
--well, it used to be, anyway--but the cover looks to me like it has more to do with AOL Time Warner wanting Apple's business than anything to do with journalism.
>>> Your article is obviously not journalism, granted. Still, your article has more to do with having an ax to grind (As we all shall shortly see.) than with true editorializing.
Worse, in order to do the "cover story for exclusive access" deal with Time, Apple had to jerk around the rest of the media to protect the secret.
>>> Quite a number of accusations for one sentence. Commendable use of space, but meaningless, cowardly, and unsubstantiated.
And then it spun its own hype machine into overdrive.
>>> What do you call all that noise Microsoft made with the introduction of XE? Read any Oracle press release and it's full of hype. Open the movie section to your local paper recently? Enough with the hype-harping. Companies hype. Politicians hype. Advertisers hype. Baptist ministers and Indian gurus hype. Big deal. It doesn't bother me in the least. In fact, I ENJOY Apple's hype! It's half the fun of every Mac Expo.
It's sad that I feel almost like I need to diss the new iMac in order to offset the hype.
>>> Boohoo. Hand me a tissue. We all really feel your pain. (Here, David Coursey reaches into closet and pulls out ax.)
But it isn't fair to judge the child merely by the sins of the father--even if he's Steve Jobs.
>>> Sound of grinding ax...
So I will try not to.
>>> But not very hard.
The new iMac is attractive, and the ability to move the screen around is nice. It works better than it looks in the pictures.
>>> Attractive? Nice? Somebody mail this guy a Thesaurus.
Burying the system unit into the base, which is about the size of half a very large cantaloupe, is a neat trick. But doing away with the wires necessary to connect the keyboard and mouse would have been neater.
>>> Yes, it would have been "neater," and they probably will do just that eventually. Besides, how many PCs out there in the same price range employ wireless keyboards and mice? I wonder. (Let the whining begin!)
APPLE ALSO MISSES the point by not allowing users to have two drives. I find it very convenient to be able to copy files from one CD to another without having to copy them to the hard drive first. Apple's unwillingness to support this is a major shortcoming.
>>> Whine. Again, how many PCs offer dual superdrives in this price range? I wonder.
From a PC user perspective, the new iMac screen alone is a nice design. If someone offered me that screen--without a computer hidden in the base--I'd consider it a neat mounting scheme.
>>> "Nice." "Neat."
Whine, whimper, mewl, pule, bleat. See, I have a Thesaurus. Where's yours?
>>> So wait, let me get this straight. You like the screen and the base, you just don't want a computer built into the base? You want a chunk of plastic to hold it, and then a big ugly box to set along side, or under your desk next to the wastepaper basket? Ohh, right. I see, brilliant.
But having the large PC system unit hidden under the desk isn't a big deal for me, especially since it gives me easy access to multiple USB, serial, and 1394 ports, something the new iMac doesn't offer.
>>> If it is "hidden" then how do you hook up those peripherals so quickly and easily? It's not hidden. It's sitting right THERE, and your foot (when it's not in your mouth) is always banging up against it. But maybe the lovely beige color hides the scuff marks, huh? Also, I know the iMac has more ports than I or most anyone I know will ever use or need. It's a ?consumer' computer, remember? It's for most of us, not ALL of us.
So what we end up with in the new iMac is another case of Apple telling users to "have it our way" and expecting the faithful to genuflect enthusiastically.
>>> More grinding of the ax. Who are you, Lizzie Borden?
BUT HERE'S THE KICKER: Despite Apple's reputation for innovation, its most outrageous designs don't sell.
>>> Huh? A minute a go you called it "attractive." Did you mean outrageously attractive?
Steve Jobs's cube-shaped CPUs from two years ago reportedly still fill warehouses (those that haven't been scrapped),
>>> Prove it. Besides, every producer has duds. Sony, one of the greatest tech trailblazers in history has had its duds, too. What's your point? A company is supposed to give up because of an occasional flop? Tell that to Microsoft!
and iBook sales didn't take off until the machine was redesigned to look like a traditional laptop.
>>> Baloney. The iBook was consistently in the top 10 best selling laptops. In Japan it was in the top 3.
Jobs's original NeXT hardware, said to be what he had wanted the Mac to have become (optical media before there was optical media for the masses and no floppy drive), may have been visionary, but it stiffed in the marketplace. And I won't mention Lisa, the machine that became the Mac, or any of the zillions of design projects that, wisely, never made it to market.
>>> Zillions? Send this man a calculator with that Thesaurus while you're at it. Imagine if this guy was head of a company's R & D. The company wouldn't produce a single product.
The original iMac was quirky, to be sure, yet still familiar, and made Jobs a hero after his 12-year exile from Apple. But while the transparent case was new, the overall form factor wasn't all that different from previous machines.
>>> Oh brother. So, let me get this straight, "quirky, to be sure" = "not all that different"? English teachers of America, take note! So, um, you're saying then that would make every Wintel PC produced over the last twenty years nearly identical with each other? Well, okay, you'd be closer to correct because they nearly are.
WITH THE NEW IMAC, Apple is expanding on other companies' failures. Even if you think a micro-sized system unit connected to a flat screen is cool, and that Apple has done a good job, you must admit one thing: Flat-panel based computers, whether they come in one or two pieces, haven't really sold well.
>>> Dumb. Only recently have flat panels reached a price where average people could even consider buying one. Most likely, three years from now you won't be able to buy a CRT if you wanted to, and not only will these coming computers be FPD, but probably not too unlike the basic iMac design of today.
Compaq, IBM, NEC, and Gateway--just to name recent examples--have all toyed with this basic form factor.
>>> They look nothing like the new iMac.
But while many people oooh-and-aaah over it, nobody seems willing to buy.
>>> In case you haven't heard there has been a recession going on.
Apple may break this trend, but not, I suspect, in a huge way.
>>> Double or nothing? You've already lost one bet.
And by the time the real selling season--back-to-school and Christmas 2002--rolls around, PC makers will have seen how well Apple has or hasn't done with the new machines and be able to react accordingly.
>>> And if they do wait that long they will miss that selling season. Apple said it took them 2 years to develop this computer, and they are all in house. Michael "Apple is doomed" Dell and his minions will probably come up with something, but it'll be boxier, heavier, and--if the past is any indication--a whole lot of ugly.
It says something about Apple that it releases its new consumer models a little more than a week after the buying season for such computers has ended.
>>> They know what they are doing. They most certainly wanted TO GET IT RIGHT, and figured a rush job could prove disastrous. 2001 was a goner anyway, yet Apple still posted decent earnings 3 out of 4 quarters (I think), increased their cash, continued to invest heavily in R & D, and did all this without having to lay off hundreds of employees unlike most PC makers.
In order to protect Time magazine and its exclusive, Apple clamped an especially tight lid--even for Apple--on the announcement. Last Friday, Apple PR flat-out lied to me--and apparently others--saying no one had been briefed on the new iMac and that even the usual leak to the Wall Street Journal wouldn't take place.
>>> Ah-hah! The ax in all its glistening glory!
Boohoo, pal. After reading your article I'd lie to you too. I don't know if I've ever read one of your articles before, but I'm willing to guess you've never been a fan of Apple. I wonder if Apple has EVER briefed you on an important announcement. Doubtful, so why should they start now, huh?
>>> "...and that even the usual leak to the Wall Street Journal wouldn't take place." And apparently it didn't, so that was no lie. The only one really lying so far in this article has been you.
THAT WAS PROVEN UNTRUE when Time's Canadian Web site posted its exclusive on Sunday, thus telling the whole world what the big secret was. A few hours later, but after CNET's News.com posted a story based on the magazine report, Time pulled the site, but by then the damage was done.
>>> Grrr-grrr... (Sound of one ax-grinding)
It is usual industry practice for companies to work with reporters by providing advance information in return for the reporters' promise to honor an "embargo" on release of the information until the formal announcement takes place.
>>> Oh, so now you're a reporter? So I can take back my use of editorialist earlier and substitute reporter? Ow, I think the only ones that should be embargoed here is the department of journalism at your alma mater.
Apple said it would not do this for me, and apparently others, because it wasn't doing it for anyone.
>>> I hate to tell you this, but they ONLY said that to you.
Anyone except Time magazine, of course. And then Time blew the embargo, both on its Canadian Web site and by distributing copies of the printed magazine in advance of the announcement.
This has angered many journalists, especially among the crowd that covers Apple, because they like the company and its products.
>>> I'm sorry but I can't hear you over the sound of your whining (Thesaurus please) sniveling, sniffling, blubbering...
Next.
AnchorDesk's readership, for example, is predictably below average on days when Apple appears in the headline, which is consistent with the company's overall market share.
>>> Huh? Explain this to me, somebody. Also, explain to me why I should care about the size of AnchorDesk's readership.
THE FLAP over how information about the products was released is rapidly becoming at least as interesting as the products themselves. I've been asked to do interviews with several publications, including the Wall Street Journal, to talk about this.
>>> Aren't you special. But don't get your hopes up, because unlike Zdnet, most publications have taste, scruples, and dozens of other writers they would go to first.
Time, for its part, will live to regret its "Flat-Out Cool" headline and the fawning "Exclusive: How Steve Jobs made a sleek machine that could be the home-digital hub of the future" subhead.
>>> No, they won't. A month from now no one but you will remember, which is about 28 days longer than I will remember your article.
As for Apple, this is another example--and it is famous for this--of the company hurting its friends more than its enemies.
>>> I consider myself a friend, and Apple has never hurt me. I've been a Mac user for nine years and have enjoyed the experience thoroughly. I've owned a number of Macs and not a single one has ever given me more than a lick of trouble. I've never even had to do a single re-install. Nine years! Maybe I'm lucky, but from what I hear from my Wintel friends, a Mac user with bad luck is still far luckier than a Wintel user with good luck.
>>> As for Apple's friends in the world of journalism, Apple has many who have seen it all, been there through thick and thin, and who understand Apple, what Apple is trying to do, and what it is up against. They 'get' Apple. You never were such a person, will be, or could be.
>>> To those people out there who whine and complain with the passing of each Expo that Steve Jobs didn't live up to his or her expectations, I just roll my eyes and think--ya ingrate, ya big baby. Personally, I'm amazed that Apple does as many of the cool things they do. I do not doubt for an instant that Steve Jobs and Apple are giving 110% to try and make the best computers in the world, AND stay in business. It isn't an easy thing to do.
And these are people Apple will have to deal with, long after the world realizes that the new iMacs, while interesting, will never be "Flat-Out Cool."
>>> Coming from a guy who admits to actually preferring to own and keep a block of computer the size of an Imelda Marcos suitcase under his desk, I nor millions of others are worried about your idea of cool.
>>> Whew. Can I go now?
-Benjamin |
