Return of the Mac
paulgraham.com
paulgraham.com
Interesting to note pg pointing out Apple's openness. I don't really consider them all that open these days, but I suppose they're better than many companies. I guess my perception of their lack of openness is more due to their treatment of the iPhone/iPad/iPod Touch than that of their laptops.
Apple is open when they think that can make them money, closed when they think that can make them more money.
Seriously, it's about getting a job done -- use what works. Who cares what the name of the OS is? I don't care whether I'm using a Dewalt drill or a Black & Decker. I care whether the drill works. Why is a computer any different?
Not so much a problem for people who use this site, but a problem for the layman.
Whenever I hear people getting uptight about or tightly espousing one OS/Platform over another I'm baffled. The differences I can perceive are miniscule and marginal.
That said, Umberto Eco's 1994 essay on the Mac vs. Dos Holy War [http://www.themodernword.com/eco/eco_mac_vs_pc.html] does resonate with me to a certain extent.
Most people (not to mind hackers), have no problem
switching between both OSs or using both concurrently
Note the article is from 2005, before Apple started that stuff with their iphone/ipad/ipod touch.
Things have definitely changed. I hope this is a far as Apple is willing to draw the line in the sand, otherwise... well, I don't even want to think about that.
But I'm an edge case at best.
But when decision time came, I just couldn't find the justification for shelling out for a Macbook ... and I bought an Acer Timeline.
Cheaper than the cheapest Macbook classic, the battery lasts longer, the hardware is more capable, bigger display, slim, stays cool, decent design. Have both Windows 7 and Ubuntu on it. Works great.
And I did own a Macbook Pro a year ago ... broke down when I spilled coffee over its keyboard. By contrast, my Dell Inspiron took a coffee bath quite well.
If you hire even one programmer their salary cost exceeds that within a week.
Even if we are talking personal use, I can understand that line of thinking for poor students- not so much for well payed software engineers.
Well yeah, why pay more to get less?
And I also work hard for those few hundred dollars ... at the end of a productive day I'm so tired I can barely speak. Few hundred here, few hundred there, oops, there goes the fruits of my labor.
> If you hire even one programmer their salary cost exceeds that within a week.
Maybe in Silicon Valley, but not where I live.
The argument was, of course, that you will get more.
> Maybe in Silicon Valley, but not where I live.
In silicon valley we'd be talking thousands per week, not hundreds.
Let's make the unlikely assumption that a software engineer has a 40,000 usd/year salary cost (which is significantly greater than the salary the employee get) where you live.
40000 / 12 / 4.3 = 775 usd/week.
This isn't my experience or my argument, and I even explained why.
> 40,000 usd/year salary cost
Personally I'm doing contracting on my own, and that's approximately my monthly income. It's a pretty decent salary considering that the cost of living here is also low (I own my own apartment, if I'd want, I could live on $300 a month).
Regardless of salary, I was arguing that you get less for more money ... and I won't throw money on a product just because it has the cool factor.
I guess this is where we are at a disagreement, although I can understand where you are coming from (6 years ago I lived on $500 a month - today I'll probably have to pinch some pennies to live on less than $2000 a month).
My most recent mac purchase (a mac mini) probably cost about $300 more than a pc with a similar configuration (cpu, ram, hdd).
In return I get a computer that is much smaller, totally quiet, looks nicer and runs an os I like. For me that's worth the extra money.
After suffering from a lot of hardware problems with my last 2 pc laptops (acer & dell) I've decided buying the cheapest thing out there isn't worth my time & frustration.
It's too early to tell how relaible the mac mini will be, but if it would be as reliable as the previous 3 macs I've owned (all lived >=8 years) it'd definitively be worth the higher cost.
I owned a Macbook Pro, and I was quite happy with it. Their design is indeed awesome.
Until one day I spilled some coffee on its keyboard and it fried (well, the quantity of coffee spilled was reasonable :)). A friend had a similar experience, only lighter ... his keyboard stopped working. So it bothers me that it's kind of fragile.
By contrast I also spilled coffee on my 2 years old Dell (yeah, I have a habbit :)) which is clunky, loud, the battery lasts for one hour, overall a piece of shit that still works.
Nothing happened. I also spilled some Coke on it ... half the keys got sticky, but I could take it apart and clean it. Still works.
BTW ... Minis are awesome, but I need laptops.
I suppose this was meant as criticism, but isn't it often the right thing to do for a company? You could argue the same statement applies to Google; they're open where they think it will please devs or where it may lower development cost, but they're certainly not giving away their custom server OS, or the secret sauce of search... and good for them.
Certainly founders and investors want their companies to grow, whether it's in share of their current market, or branching out into new markets. But is it really that awful to settle for a little less -- still successful by any measure -- but be able to sleep at night?
I guess I'm also something of an aesthete, and I absolutely love Apple's product design. Not saying it's for everyone, but I'm willing to spend a bit extra for something that I'm genuinely happy to look at.
Just curious: has the Mac percentage continued to increase? My perception is that All The Cool Kids are using them these days but that might just be my gratuitous stereotyping.
OS: 1. Macintosh (49.60%) 2. Windows (26.23%) 3. Linux (11.81%)
Browsers: 1. Chrome (33.5%) 2. Firefox (29.55%) 3. Firefox (27.70%) 4. Mozilla (4.92%) 5. IE (1.43%)
Notice that this may be biased towards Mac since the Fakepad.com blog is about iPads.
http://www.apple.com/opensource/
Darwin, Grand Central Dispatch are some other examples that I can think of.
They've since regained their senses, and now only choose open when it's the only way for them to compete effectively (for example, if they are facing off against a seemingly unbeatably strong foe, like Microsoft or Adobe, they will opt for openness because it tilts the playing field, but if they have a near-monopoly they will be the most tightly controlled vendor in the space...such as in smart phones).
Openness for Apple is not an end, it is a means to an end. Money and market strength are the goals, even if it is at the expense of consumers and developers.
In short, this article is from 2005, though I think many folks are still under the misapprehension that Apple products are "open", when they are actually often even worse than Microsoft products in terms of openness, which is pretty darned bad (though it's also a reflection of the fact that Microsoft has become more open in the intervening years due to market pressure and a few gadflies within Microsoft).
(relevant, since it's a current events article)
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/apple-mac-leopard-window...
(Article is a bit old; would love to see if with a 27" iMac. I doubt that you could get a PC equivalent for cheaper.)
Apple's not a software vendor. OS X is nice, yes, but it's a value-add to entice you to buy physical devices from them.