The Wrath of the Apple Tribe 870
Narrative Fallacy writes "If you've ever written about Apple products with even a hint of negativity, you'll appreciate Salon's excerpt from Farhad Manjoo's True Enough, about why the Apple tribe is so rabid. 'There are many tribes in the tech world: TiVo lovers, Blackberry addicts, Palm Treo fanatics, and people who exhibit unhealthy affection for their Roomba robotic vacuum cleaners,' writes Manjoo. 'But there is no bigger tribe, and none more zealous, than fans of Apple, who are infamous for their sensitivity to slams, real or imagined, against the beloved company.' Wall Street Journal columnist Walt Mossberg has even coined a name for the phenomenon — the 'Doctrine of Insufficient Adulation.' 'If I see the world as all black and you see the world as all white and some person comes along and says it's partially black and partially white, we both are going to be unhappy,' says psychologist Lee Ross at Stanford University. 'You think there are more facts and better facts on your side than on the other side. The very act of giving them equal weight seems like bias. Like inappropriate evenhandedness.'"
Experience it first hand (Score:2, Insightful)
ratio (Score:2, Insightful)
I blame it on Apple... (Score:5, Insightful)
Seriously, market a product as "stylish", "hip" and "different", and you'll raise a troupe of people to whom presenting themselves as different is pretty much their only end. I personally find it one of the most disgusting facets of consumerist capitalism.
How to pretend to be a tech journalist (Score:5, Insightful)
Step 2: Write an article about all the hate mail you get
Step 3: Ad revenue
Goto Step 1
Dvorak has done this so many times he should be selling his technique on an infomercial at this point.
inappropriate even handedness (Score:4, Insightful)
Can we mod this story... (Score:5, Insightful)
I must not be a fan then (Score:5, Insightful)
But I will point out the negatives in their products where I see them. There is no point in pretending that they don't exist as all that does is give them time to fester. I am a realist. I'll also point out issues with the company when they deserve it. Yeah, praise is better but only if they are going to work for it.
I am more judgmental because I've been in the IT field for years and have used, and I mean really used, many different OSes out there. I also wouldn't have considered calling myself a Mac user before OS X. Sorry fans, but OS 9 was pretty terrible.
I suppose Apple needs the rabid fanbase as they are advertisers that pay the company for the privilege. Maybe Apple should even thank them every now and then for keeping the company afloat for so many years. They also need the realists that speak their mind and truthfully say what is good, what is bad, and what is downright idiotic. Yes, this means that these groups will clash but it is needed.
How else are they going to move forward?
Re:inappropriate even handedness (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Experience it first hand (Score:5, Insightful)
I've heard of some crazy stretches for comparison, but come on, a journalist actually comparing a group of people that have an affinity for a company's products to a deeply-complicated bloody 60+ year old conflict? Talk about going off the deep end.
Re:I remember the days before the Internet (Score:4, Insightful)
While the employees and shareholders of Apple have every right to boast of its success, I fail to see why fanboys can make any kind of claims as a result. "Hah, I'm superior to you because these people that I am unaffiliated with are better than some other people!" isn't a sane position.
Re:inappropriate even handedness (Score:3, Insightful)
By the anti-evolution lobby making such a big deal about evolution and the need to include alternate theories, they've somehow made themselves a presence that otherwise would never have existed in the educational system. Everybody around the country now knows of the concept of Intelligent Design, but 10 years ago, nobody really thought about it at all.
They've made such a big deal out of it, including high-profile activism, that some people feel compelled to at least acknowledge them when referring to evolution. An acknowledgement that wouldn't have been there 10 years ago.
And this is the perfectly valid reason why some situations are ridiculous for providing an even-handedness where it is not justified. In this case, it's exactly due to your assertion that there is no science behind it.
Re:Experience it first hand (Score:5, Insightful)
Been there, done that. Points drops almost as fast as when you suggest Linux may not represent perfection.
Mac Pride (Score:4, Insightful)
The real reason Mac fans tend to be overly defensive is that they've felt marginalized by software and hardware vendors for years due to Microsoft's dominance in the desktop computing arena. I'm not blaming the vendors, sometimes fiscal reality precludes making a version of their product for a relatively small market, but it can be frustrating to Mac users who are convinced that their platform is superior to what Microsoft has to offer but still have to wait months or years, if ever, to get their hands on a desirable product.
It's not unlike other minorities--African-Americans, gays etc., (not that Mac marginalization has anywhere near the same significance as the often violent discrimination that gays and blacks have experienced in their lifetimes)--who react to discrimination by the majority by developing a sense community "pride."
Granted, though, many of Apple's fans go way overboard in it's defense. This, BTW, is from a long-time Mac user and recovering "rabid" fanboy who converted from Microsoft way back in DOS days who now uses OS X, Kubuntu and Windows XP interchangeably as necessary.
The article in short (Score:5, Insightful)
That's basically all the article says. And we knew that, of course. But why are Apple fans so extremely sensitive to criticism? I've said many 'bad' things about Apple on this forum, and it inevitably got me modded down. Apple zealots are even worse than the Linux zealots of ten years back.
Re:Experience it first hand (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:I blame it on Apple... (Score:3, Insightful)
Donating your time, or the $300 bucks you were about to spend on your next ultra-meaningful tattoo to a local charity would be pretty different. Stopping to pick up litter on the street is pretty different, and so on.
Re:I must not be a fan then (Score:5, Insightful)
Even though I'm not a big fan of Apple, I will admit they have some advantages here and there.
You and Farhad need to stop pimping each other (Score:5, Insightful)
BTW Farhad is the biggest Apple Fanboy in the world. Before this week 80% of his columns were about iPhones, iPods, Macs and Apple.
Re:The most rabid group..... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:I blame it on Apple... (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't know many people who just wear whatever the fuck they want. It's sad.
from reasonable commentary to moral relativism... (Score:3, Insightful)
Some Apple fans do really annoy. E.g., the tendency for claiming that Mac invented everything. They accused Lian-Li of copying the G5's holed case-design; yet, servers used ventilation holes for a long time, and my year-2000 Gateway had them on the front. They also acted like the wire-less hard-drive replacement on the new G5's is some new invention of Apple's: it's juts hot-swap, which has been around forever (and Apple's implementation isn't that great, as you have to open the case to do it).
In any event, those kinds of comments are perfectly fine. They're regarding largely matters of personal opinion. And the issue isn't so much that Apple fans disagree, but the way it's done; provide evidence, don't accuse writers of "ball-licking".
But then the article digresses into the pits of moral relativism with talk about the Israel-Palistine conflict, or the abortion issue. These are issues of right and wrong. There isn't a real middle ground. Either something is right, or it isn't. There is no "plusses and minuses". How about we talk about the pro's and cons of rape, too?
Re:I dunno.. (Score:2, Insightful)
IMO, the Linux zealots are less scary.
I'll agree with you on that
Linux is about freedom and choice.
So it seems, as long as the choice is *NOT* Microsoft.
Take the guy who did Linux boot benchmarking -- it quickly resulted in optimizations of the process.
Unless we're discussing the scheduler!!
Now try to do the same with Apple. Apple is about the "experience".
Unfortunately the experience involves giving up even more freedom than a GPL license or MS involves!
I've never seen a fan reply to the complaint of the iPod's lack of ability to play Ogg Vorbis as "You know, they should really include that".
The should include it but won't & for good reason, the Vorbis codec is rapidly becoming dated and was almost all hype. Whatever happened to bitrate peeling anyway? I love FLAC
If it was a Linux device somebody would have added that within a month of the iPod's release.
You can run Linux & Vorbis under iPodLinux.
But seriously... I prefer the Zune interface & if they ever get around to ramping up the capacity & vastly improving their playlists to equal or better than the iPod then I'lljump ship in a heartbeat. Of course I sure do miss the ability to record with my Nomad Jukebox3! That was the bomb diggity...
Re:Experience it first hand (Score:4, Insightful)
By my highly unscientific and unsubstantiated count, the number of highly vocal (postal?) pro-apple and anti-apple slashdotters are about equal.
If I have ato make a choice I'd rather read someone unreasonably gush about something they love rather than someone vent spleen and name call. That is the important divide, not which computer or OS you like.
Luckily there are still a few people posting thoughtful arguments and comments. Those are a pleasure to read. Please save your mod points for them.
Re:I blame it on Apple... (Score:5, Insightful)
The people I know who fit that rabid fanboy stereotype are the ones for whom Mac ownership is the hippest thing about them, dorks who think their choice of tech moves them one step closer to the cool-kids table.
Re:I blame it on Apple... (Score:2, Insightful)
I didn't become a Mac fan until around 2005 or so when my fiancee got a Mac Mini, and it's the same with most of my friends who also became Mac fans.
I don't know why the Mac hating crowd needs to resort to 6+ year old marketing slogans, if there's really that many valid reasons to flame us Mac fans
Re:I blame it on Apple... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Many Apple users are unable to see real problem (Score:4, Insightful)
Obviously the platform you were used to was more stable.
The whole dig at the single mouse button is so 1980's, since all serious Mac users have been using three button (or more) mice for decades.
Re:Experience it first hand (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Experience it first hand (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:It's a religion (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Experience it first hand (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:It's a religion (Score:3, Insightful)
She *did* install iTunes on the PC, and it still wouldn't let her copy or play her music. She couldn't "use them in any way she pleased." It was all locked down, nothing made sense to her, she was pissed off, and spent the next hour on the phone all pissed off and trying to get me to help figure out why it wouldn't just work. I really didn't enjoy that phone call.
If you want to talk to her while she's pissed off and trying to make a piece of hardware that's supposed to "just work" work, be my guest. Post your phone number and I'll have her give you a call. But as far as my experience with it went, it doesn't "just work" -- it locked her out.
I even asked my Apple buddy if he could help me, and he said (and I quote) "Think about it from Apple's perspective selling this to the music companies. They don't want you to be able to copy your music to another computer." So I thought about it. Fuck that, and fuck Apple.
Re:Experience it first hand (Score:1, Insightful)
when do you think XP was released? 1992? (Score:4, Insightful)
Windows didn't have an ounces worth of usability and security until Windows 2k was released in February of 2000. When was Mac OS 10.0 released? September of 2000.
Same thing with the switch to Intel. They kept saying how superior their Power PC chip was, then with the switch to Intel they're saying its now working so much better. WTF?
Because the G4's and G5's were superior chips to the Pentium's, especially the P4. The problem is that IBM is a shitty fabber. They weren't able to deliver on what they promised (3 ghz G5's within a year of the release of the first Mac G5) much less continue PowerPC development. If IBM had kept up development and you could get a 3ghz dual core G6 in a laptop Apple never would have switched to Intel.
Re:Mac Pride (Score:4, Insightful)
Compare that to Microsoft who goes out of their way (even today) to entice developers, and has a massive 3rd party sales channel (oem's) - the likes of which Apple doesn't even attempt to compete with.
The only other group I could compare them to is the Commodore Amiga fans - of which I was one. We felt marginalized, but it was probably for lack of a clone market and Commodore's lack of marketing and management skill. They actually had a rather good developer support program - even in the early days of the product.
Mind you Apple is doing great things in some areas to improve things - for instance they have a much better developer support program. You still can't install Apple software on 3rd party products - which is where Microsoft is making a killing - and I think frankly Apple is losing out on.
Re:Experience it first hand (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:inappropriate even handedness (Score:2, Insightful)
That is an unjust and inaccurate statement.
You can't say ID is wrong just because of your bias - when it is clearly "not even wrong [sciam.com]" - it's very wrongness impossible to prove or falsify.
To say it is completely wrong demeans everyone else who is honestly and properly wrong...
Or for that matter, those who hold non falsifiable assumptions as matters of faith and philosophy, without misrepresenting them as science (which in the end includes pretty much everyone).
Hey! Rounded corners are nice. :p (Score:3, Insightful)
Well, square corners slightly bothered me for all of the two minutes it took to find Displaperture.app [manytricks.com], which restores the roundness and lets you set how much roundness you want. :D
But, yeah, I do find some amusement with the ultra-super fanbois who simply lack the ability to get over it or find another solution instead of bitching and moaning.
How does one troll in a product review exactly? (Score:2, Insightful)
I don't see cries of sacrilege when I post a gripe that SoundBlaster hasn't made suitable Linux drivers for my X-Fi card, or that I give a thumbs down to Belkin keyboards. The very concept that stating likes / dislikes of Apple products should be conceived as trolling rather proves the point that this stuff is taken way too seriously.
Media bias 'n' stuff (Score:4, Insightful)
I can't speak for other Mac users but my experience has been such as to induce a certain vehemence in supporting the platform. I have used Macs, PCs and many other micro-computers since they each became available. Despite its shortcomings it was clear that Apple had had a fundamentally good idea from the moment the Lisa and Mac appeared. CP/M and DOS immediately seemed dated. If you were a Mac user though, the DOS crowd spent years telling you it was a worthless idea... right up until Windows appeared. Overnight the story changed to; it's no big deal, Windows is just the same as a Mac now. But it was not just the same. In fact most of the people saying this had only a very superficial knowledge of the differences. "They both have windows..."
These days I have (almost) given up discussing the matter. Life is too short. It is the nature of people that they do not like to think that they have made an incorrect or ill-judged decision. They will "invest" their own sense of worth in the decisions they have made. It is human nature but it is not science. As it has been most tellingly put: It is difficult to reason people out of something they were not reasoned into. Most PC users today were taught on PCs at school. They use them at work. They never even got to make that "decision" to use a PC. They know many of the idiosyncrasies of the machine. They are comfortable. They do not wish to hear that they have wasted serious quantities of time doing things that could have been avoided had they used a different system. Better to let them discover it in their own time... possibly by watching over your shoulder. Then their disappointment at realizing they have wasted much time may be mitigated by their pleasure at realizing that they have improved their position by their own efforts. In a cynical age, enthusiasm disturbs people. They are suspicious of it. To display it can have quite the opposite effect to that intended.
Enough. More than enough.
I've criticized Linux and lived to tell the tale. (Score:1, Insightful)
Sorry, but I'm calling BS on this one.
Here is a site partially created to praise the glory that is(n't) Linux, and I have written strongly against it on these very pages. I have been modded down accordingly. I have gone months without seeing a mod point.
But I have never been banned. Never even close.
You pay the price for going against the herd, to be sure, but ultimately, the fact that, despite feeling the need to kind of throw a bucket of cold reality on the Linux orgy (oh, let's be honest here--this is Slashdot--the Linux circle-jerk), I'm at least trying to do it fairly and even-handedly.
I'm sorry, but if you were really as vilified as you say, then you were either being a jerk or there was a glitch or something.
And I'm writing this from a Mac (which I switched to very recently, largely because VMware Fusion is so damned good that I can run Windows and Linux software I like on top of OSX with very very little trouble).
Re:I blame it on Apple... (Score:3, Insightful)
It is insane to judge entire nations by few morons that belongs to it. Same thing with your poor "experience" that makes me laugh.
JFYI: We are running a bank that machines are only macs. And at least our 6K internal users has totally opposite behavior as your customers.
These days OSX is a Unix. Just that plain Unix that is registered at Open Group consortium (well, Linux since not Unix, hence is not there). Lots of my friends that are Ph.D. actually, moved from Linux to OSX just to make stuff really done. We all use Linux and we love it in its niche. However, our time is expensive, thus waste our time to configure it *properly* -- too costly for us. Among with that, Microsoft Windows even not considered to look at because we already has been there and know where it sucks and where it really wins.
Summarize, Macs are not problem-free or bug-free. In some cases OSX Server is like Microsoft product or sometimes worse. All software sucks, no matter what you use. But despite of this, Macs still does *much* more efficient at the end of overall run: they are cheaper, stable and better integrated. Personally I watch how Linux evolutes and how OSX does. And currently I can say: "Bravo, Steve!" for how clever Apple combine proprietary and open source together. Yes, I would love it more open source than it is. But I see evolution and see how Apple moves to the right direction.
What this sort of articles wants to say me? Use Windows? -- no, thanks. Use Linux/BSD? -- I do for years, I know them all. Apple is very serious about software. And probably this is the answer why [stuffthathappens.com].
Re:Experience it first hand (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:I have similar experiences to the grandparent (Score:3, Insightful)
If the situation is as bad as you describe, you should indeed be annoyed by the departement unwillingness to train one of you on Macintoshes. It would look like to be the most rational way to resolve those issues.
MacOS, Linux, Windows... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:inappropriate even handedness (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Experience it first hand (Score:5, Insightful)
I've heard of some crazy stretches for comparison, but come on, a journalist actually comparing a group of people that have an affinity for a company's products to a deeply-complicated bloody 60+ year old conflict? Talk about going off the deep end.
Not really - he referred to an academic study on perceived media bias to illustrate his argument; that study happened to use the P - I conflict as its basis. He was interested in the conclusions and how they relate to readers reactions to stories; which is different than the comparison you purport him to make.
Re:Experience it first hand (Score:3, Insightful)
I've heard of some crazy stretches for comparison, but come on, a journalist actually comparing a group of people that have an affinity for a company's products to a deeply-complicated bloody 60+ year old conflict? Talk about going off the deep end.
From the article....
To understand the phenomenon, consider a study (PDF) that Robert Vallone, Lee Ross and Mark Lepper, psychologists at Stanford University, conducted in the aftermath of another issue that provokes many accusations of press bias, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
The author then goes on to briefly summarize the findings of the study, which was the reaction of three distinct groups of people to a carefully selected sample of news stories on a specific incident in the conflict, not the conflict it's self. And explains the reason for referring to the findings of the study.
At no point did he compare the Apple/PC conflict with the Israel/Palestine conflict. That would be preposterous. The findings of the study don't have to apply to just one particular subject, but are indicative of a more general psychological state.
Just to satisfy my curiosity.. what is your position in the Apple versus the rest of the universe debate?
Re:I dunno.. (Score:5, Insightful)
What I'm saying is that the fanboys' perception is that whatever is current is the absolute perfection. Take OS 9 for instance, where you had to set manually the amount of memory an application could use. If you brought up that setting memory is an oddly unfriendly characteristic for an OS that aims to be user friendly, you'd get a reply [google.com] along the lines of "Lets see, I select the app, "get info"-->Memory and then set the amount. What's hard about that?"
Of course now that OS X is here, it's OS X what became the definition of perfection. I get the impression that many people refuse to acknowledge the existence of any faults until they're fixed, then the subject is quietly forgotten. For instance:
Everybody swore that a mouse with more than one button isn't needed, until Apple suddenly released a computer with one.
The memory limit was an "advantage", because Windows would die a swap death, and "Whgat New user is going to jump in and go manilulate large excel files?", anyway?
etc.
This attitude turns many people off, because: It creates a feeling that there's some sort of apple collective that many people aren't interested to join, because for them computers are a tool and not an object of religious worship. It creates the feeling of that it's hard to get a honest opinion about anything because many people are dedicated to sweeping faults under the rug. And it creates an impression of inflexibility: Either you accept the package in full, or you'd better not get it at all, because there's nothing in the middle.
Re:Experience it first hand (Score:5, Insightful)
And looking at that profile page, he's certainly been modded into submission -- ten posts in a row of the last 24 modded down as trolls, when they were in fact nothing of the sort. I'd say he's got a fair point that the
Re:Puh-lease. Apple zealots are tame.. (Score:3, Insightful)
I am, of course, referring to Team OS/2.
Re:Experience it first hand (Score:4, Insightful)
However, I posted on one of them, and that was the end of my excellent karma. Since then, I stopped posting on Slashdot for a while, and decided that I can only read some "funny" comments and that's it.
The "mod" points are falling into wrong hands at some points, and some people only reads comments feeling they are offensive. (It appears that I'm sarcastic, and that makes things worse).
I can't agree with you more, and now that I have mod points, I try to use them wisely (Always trying to put funny ones). Good luck with your karma, cause it took too much to me to be an excellent, and took only 1 second for a person to take it down.
Re:I blame it on Apple... (Score:3, Insightful)
Your average home or business user of a Mac, otoh, is likely to have made the choice for reasons of style. Sure, they like that it might crash less than their old Dell, but they don't need a machine to run data-processing libraries. They need a machine with a white case which looks cool. That kind of judgment is more likely to create fanboy-ism, because they feel the need to come up with better reasons than "it looks cool!" and they have trouble doing so.
Re:Many Apple users are unable to see real problem (Score:3, Insightful)
A shame that people keep saying that, since it is wrong [macosxhints.com].
The Mac has a window manager too, just not an X11 window manager. And as with any UNIX system you can disable processes you do not want or need.
If you leave the GUI up, but no-one is using it - what exactly is it then going to do to cause a crash? If it's not in use it's not really "running", or at any rate not changing state.
Re:Experience it first hand (Score:2, Insightful)
Exactly. I never even consider any apple products because of this, (laptop, PC or even an MP3 player), because the reviews cannot be trusted. On any PC product (sound card, video products, games,
Speaking to an Apple fan is the worst. When I recommend a product I always mention a situation where the product might not be good. With The Apple crown any product is the best thing available for anyone "Just strap on and you will reach the moon".
Best example of this is the MP3 players. Apple's player is way over-priced and offers way more than needs 80% of the population's needs. My MP3 player must have FM-radio, SD card support and AAA batteries. No need for a hard disk, because I keep my music on of the same cards for the past 4 years (one card per music style). USB batteries recharge? So I must bring my laptop on these 2 weeks camping far away vacations to recharge my iPod? But most of all I can get the MP3 player for my needs for half to a quarter of the price of the closest Apple product. Yet everyone I know that owns an iPod (and derivatives) makes little smiles or derogatory comments on my player because their iPod is so much better. Yet I often get called by poeple trying to transfer iPod-iStore music between medias.
Anyway, sorry but no Apple product for me, not enough critics and no product is THAT good, the Apple crowd are worst than car salesman or stock market pushers.
Re:ratio (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't want to inject too much seriousness, but... It's amazing how the little things can bother people. Perhaps we're all spoiled or just have no control over the big things, so the little things seem important.
Though I'd like to think I was/am not this bad, I learned a lesson two years ago when my wife died of a brain tumor. Twenty years together ended in just seven weeks (diagnosis to death). We did almost everything together over the years and I spent almost every moment with her over her final weeks both in the hospital and at home. I took care of her and gave her the meds 4 and 6 times a day (even the IV meds). I was there 24/7 the last week when she was in a coma, even sleeping next to her in the 8 inches between her and the railing.
Even now, I remember everything.
The little things don't bother me anymore.
[Remember Sue...]
Re:Experience it first hand (Score:5, Insightful)
Secondly, I guess you haven't been paying attention, but comparably spec'd Macs are generally +/- $100 of the competition. Just because Mercedez-Benz doesn't make a $12,000 economy car doesn't mean their cars are expensive. All the entry-level luxury sedan cars cost roughly the same and the same goes for Apple's products compared to the competition.
The last thing I'd like to point out is I find it interesting how PC users constantly talk about the need for Mac users to justify their expensive purchases, when most Mac users don't really put cost at the top of things to consider when buying a machine. Apple doesn't really pander to cheap people because that market is already flooded.
Re:Many Apple users are unable to see real problem (Score:3, Insightful)
Ofcourse it's possible.
Either you can disable the gui entirely, booting straight into text-mode console:
http://www.oreilly.com/pub/h/348 [oreilly.com]
Or you can boot to a console + gui mode, where it doesn't load the full gui, but you can still launch individual gui apps:
http://forums.macosxhints.com/showthread.php?t=24259 [macosxhints.com]
The architecture of OS X is not that different from other unices, except that instead of running X for the graphics, it runs Aqua, and instead of using init and a collection of shell scripts, it uses launchd and a collection of xml files.
Re:Experience it first hand (Score:3, Insightful)
So you got banned for close-mindedly bashing Apple, and the people that called you out are the zealots?
Yes, how dare you not like apple. Did you read what you wrote? Calling apple out on their lock-in is automatically closeminded (it's not a monopoly when we do it) and bashing.
In other words, the Anti-Apple-anti-lock-in crowd are the zealous ones here
They're not the ones camping a slashdot account for months to enforce a groupthink.
Re:Experience it first hand (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:I must not be a fan then (Score:3, Insightful)
You are correct, sir. They had prototypes of Intel boxes since the early days of OS X and did parallel development. It was a long planned strategy.
Why did Jobs deny it? Think back to the Osborne. It was announced they had a better and faster machine coming out in a few months. Bye bye Osborne as buyers held on to their cash.
qz
Re:Experience it first hand (Score:1, Insightful)