Reactionary

Some people are saying it’s the end of the world. Next, Apple will license their OS to run on dull, beige boxes or even worse, they’ll abandon it altogether. It’s done. Over. They won. Let’s pull the plug and go live in Siberia in huts (if global warming keeps up, it’ll be like Florida soon).

Others say it’s not quite as bad, but it’s blasphemy to run the Evil Empire’s spawn on your beautiful Mac. Those who do it are cursed for life. How dare Apple Computer? How dare they? And then there are the worried this may kill software developers’ desire and need to continue developing for Mac and then where would we be?

Some have done it joyfully to at last use their Mac all the time… even for that one program they have to use for work and is PC-only.

I’m on the fence. I despise the idea of running anything touched by Gates et al on my Mac. I don’t need Windows and I don’t want it. But I can grant that if I were in that group who had to use some detested Windows-only program for work, it may be nice to just have my Mac do it all and not have to buy a cheap PC at all. I’m happy for those people who have seen it as a light so they can be all Mac all the time. I haven’t shunned them. I’m concerned about the developers making software issue. That’s a valid point. But I don’t believe the argument that Apple will license it’s stable, brilliant, watertight, gorgeous OS to cheap PC makers and even less that it will do away with it altogether and have Macs become expensive, beautiful Windows boxes like everyone else. Why? This is why: They care too much. Apple still loves its little computer that could and wouldn’t have spent so much time and energy developing a new OS just to can it and the company’s inherent sense of culture and style would recoil in disgust to ever bowing to the Evil Empire and throwing in the towel just when things have been going so well.

Apple’s always been different. They don’t play by the standard rules of business. They have always seemed to do what they want when they want, not because customers were clamoring for something. In 2001, were many people clamoring for an Apple-made MP3 player? Not I or anyone else I know. It came out of left field just as this week’s Boot Camp announcement. For those worried that Apple will finally let Redmond kick it aside when it’s been standing against it for so long, even in the worst of times when no one else would, the tauting language used when speaking of Windows on Boot Camp’s home page should be a sign there’s plenty of fight left.

And maybe this is what it’s all about, old injuries still hurting after all these years. Steve Jobs thinks he can win and he and Apple have taken a bold step towards bringing Goliath down. It may backfire as it has before and it may cost them everything they have, but I don’t think they arrived at this decision lightly. They must know the pros and cons and have taken another step, albeit a dangerous one, towards reprisal for that first betrayal years ago in the first of the OS Wars. They had their OS stolen (whether you believe that or not, Apple certainly does) and they want to win back what they lost. Jobs has taken it personally (he still talks about it; watch the Stanford University commencement speech) and he still thinks he can win. I’ll stay on deck even if this ship sinks.

Posted on April 6th, 2006 under General, Tech •  Print •  Email • RSS 2.0 feed • Both comments and pings are currently closed