Honestly, this topic is NOT about Microsofty BashingŁ. Honestly.
Former Mac-user-and-writer-turned-Mac-nemesis John Dvorak says Mac OS X is better than Windows and the Microsoft empire is grumbling. How? Assaults by Google, Apple, LAMP.
Add the obvious internal problems getting a new, monolithic version of Windows out the door, and future paths have all the players heading to the same fork in the road.
How’s all this working? First, John says Mac OS X is better than Windows. See? Up there! Pigs are flying. Better yet, John says what some of us have pointed out for awhile; the assault on Redmond’s Microsoft Palace is multi-pronged.
I can put one on top of that: first time one sees horses puke
Someone else got one more?
But coming back to Dvorak’s column: Interesting read - thanks for the link!
I only do not fully understand his reverence for Google and why Google should be particularly qualified for creating a nice desktop OS. What is a desktop OS with a more “Googly interface”? A GUI based on an HTML Form with a text field, you press search, and get a flat list of links?
Perhaps it is just that I have been able to stay clear from Windows for quite some time now that I just cannot estimate correctly the benefaction the Google Desktop Search interface must present to Windows users.
I long time ago (84 computer years) I had a NeXT Cube. It was awesome. I had a suite of programs and was sailing through college doing reports and projects and producing output that left my profs salivating in disbelief. While I was doing all this on my NeXT, I was simultaneously in the computer science lab learning how to produce an ugly graph using a side-kick graph program linked with Lotus 1-2-3. Using DOS. Staring at black screens with backlit white text. Ugly text. We had projects that left me so frustrated and angry that I simply had to try and educate my prof. There was something better. But he hated Macs and didn’t even know what a NeXT was, so I made no progress.
But one day, my innovative optical drive gave up the ghost. Shortly after that, a lightning strike near the house sent a surge through my cube that would render it useless. NeXT sent a really smart person to try and fix it. But while he tried valiantly to fix the Cube (after all, my 1 NeXT was like 5% of the market for them…), it was hopeless. He hinted that they were going to port NeXTStep to PCs and maybe I should wait to upgrade. I remember muttering “I’d rather have a broken NeXT than a new IBM.”
Fast forward… When Apple purchased the superior NeXT OS, I knew it was only a matter of time before others realized how great computing could be. It was so far ahead of its time. In fact, there are features in that innovative OS that Apple was gun shy to adopt that are far superior to Tiger. Detatchable menus, for one (no menu bar across the top of the screen).
Who would have known back then that NeXT would soon appear on Apples. Or even more crazy, that it would ultimately end up on Macs built by Apple with Intel inside.
Dvorak is just now beginning to understand what us Mac users have understood for so long. There really is better way to compute.
I can put one on top of that: first time one sees horses puke
Someone else got one more?
But coming back to Dvorak’s column: Interesting read - thanks for the link!
I only do not fully understand his reverence for Google and why Google should be particularly qualified for creating a nice desktop OS. What is a desktop OS with a more “Googly interface”? A GUI based on an HTML Form with a text field, you press search, and get a flat list of links?
Perhaps it is just that I have been able to stay clear from Windows for quite some time now that I just cannot estimate correctly the benefaction the Google Desktop Search interface must present to Windows users.
Yeah, I haven’t figured out the Google connection yet. The only thing that makes sense is that Google gets lots of visitors, lots of advertising revenue, but how that ‘hurts’ Microsoft, I can’t figure. Yet.
MSN’s Search is anemic at best. Google is a verb. Microsoft is a noun which is always preceeded by an adjective, as in, “Fracking Microsoft.”
Still, Dvorak’s a good read, though a bit over the top. No doubt Microsoft is feeling the squeeze. I Apple’s Leopard is an advancement over Tiger, and Windows Vista turns out to be Windows XP SP 47, and Intel Macs can run Windows, too, then Gates will begin daily seizures.
Dvorak writes, “The new OS is getting zero buzz. Zero. There has been nothing like this since Windows Me.” Hey, I’m running WinMe! I’ve been trying to get rid of it since I got it. Didn’t know Google was getting into the OS game. Wonder if they’re getting in over their heads. I know the initial OS offering is bound to be buggy, but for me it sure seems worth a try. I particularly agree with Dvorak’s assessment of Jobs’ insistence that Mac OS will run ONLY on Macs. Why do that? Sell the OS separately from the hardware and worry about how the heck you’re going to keep inventory on shelves that keep selling out of Leopard.
Dvorak writes, “The new OS is getting zero buzz. Zero. There has been nothing like this since Windows Me.” Hey, I’m running WinMe! I’ve been trying to get rid of it since I got it. Didn’t know Google was getting into the OS game. Wonder if they’re getting in over their heads. I know the initial OS offering is bound to be buggy, but for me it sure seems worth a try. I particularly agree with Dvorak’s assessment of Jobs’ insistence that Mac OS will run ONLY on Macs. Why do that? Sell the OS separately from the hardware and worry about how the heck you’re going to keep inventory on shelves that keep selling out of Leopard.
Dvorak usually stretches the obvious to the limit and beyond. The obvious is Mac OS X getting all the buzz and Windows getting none. The obvious is LAMP getting into more shops and hurting MS in market share. The obvious is Microsoft’s failings here and there and beginning to creak a little at the joints.
The stretch beyond is Google. What does Google have to do with squat, other than the obvious; eating Microsoft Search for lunch.
A Google OS? I’ll bet Tera it never happens. If that happens, I’ll diet.
The stretch beyond is Google. What does Google have to do with squat, other than the obvious; eating Microsoft Search for lunch?
Isn’t MS Search an online-search latecomer? In the search game, Google is Microsoft.
Bambi Hambi - 26 July 2005 11:04 PM
A Google OS? I’ll bet Tera it never happens. If that happens, I’ll diet.
Don’t let your keyboard write checks that you can’t cash, Ms. Hambi. Or do you count a one-day fast sandwiched (hee-hee) between Big Macs (of course!) as being a (weight-loss-unnecessary) diet? I’m not counting out the OS possibility entirely. A Google-influenced version of Linux? Maybe. Unlikely, but just maybe. “Google is already part of the LAMP camp.” says Dvorak, meaning that they already have their mitts into Linux. Dvorak did preface his comment about Google Linux being “one odd possibility.” I think he’s admitting to a leap of imagination in that one, not stretching and calling it a forecast.
Dvorak is just now beginning to understand what us Mac users have understood for so long. There really is better way to compute.
We’re a brash lot, are we not?
Mostly correct, though.
Jeff Mincey - 26 July 2005 11:46 PM
Early in his career, long before even OS 9, Dvorak was a regular columnist for a Macintosh-only magazine. I think it was MacUser which was eventually acquired by Macworld.
That is correct. It was the US version of MacUser, which pretty much died when the Mac nearly died.
Jeff Mincey - 26 July 2005 11:46 PM
I think the guy writes only for effect, (as would a psychological adolescent). For years he bashed Microsoft and Windows and then shifted to another Ziff-Davis publication whereupon he began bashing Apple and the Mac. He wouldn’t know sincerity if it (expletive deleted by moderator).
That’s John. But he’s funny sometimes and has a quirky view of things. Whether that’s for effect or not is speculation. But it works. I read for the effects.
Jeff Mincey - 26 July 2005 11:46 PM
I don’t take him seriously one way or the other. I think he even makes Paul Thurrott look genuine and reasonable.
But only sometimes. Thurrott goes off on a limb sometimes that makes the tree look like it’s in Bizzarro World, or something. John is more entertaining because I think he’s trying to entertain. Thurrott comes off as serious.
People were surprised how quickly the Soviet Union fell apart. At the time, commentators were guessing this and that, crediting one, then another. Only sometime later did they come up with some story about why it happened. Those final pronouncements never made sense to me in light of what happened during the days it was occurring.
Microsoft is not the Soviet Union. (All right. I know some will make comparisons.) And, I doubt we will see it crumble almost overnight as the dominant monopoly that it has become. Further, in this case, we can point to numerous reasons for its fall from “glory.” Many will say they had seen it coming, even if it had only been wishful thinking.
I believe that what may finally be its downfall is the inexcusable delay in getting XP’s successor to market. They spend, what, 10 times as much on R&D as Apple? Whatever it is, this delay, the continued increasingly publicized problems with security and virii, and Apple’s on-going positive press is destroying it. Dvorak is not alone in making surprise moves to the Mac OS.
However, even if Microsoft had been quicker getting Vista out, I am not sure it would have been helped if the flaws in the current systems are not handled. I suspect, when the first releases of Vista hit the select few to get it (next month?), they will be giving us amazing reports. We will all be amazed because, after all this time, too many security holes will still be there, things will not work right, and there will little to excite us. The only ones to be excited will be current “Windows” (without the Vista) users who are excited about the “new” features introduced by Vista, features Mac users will recognize as already having been available to us since Panther…Jaguar, features those exclusive Windows users have never seen.
Will Apple end up replacing Microsoft as the dominant OS? I don’t know. But, clearly, Microsoft is heading for a more rapid fall than many people would have guessed even 24 months ago.
Yes, I know. What I refer to as Microsoft’s “fall” is not really a fall. It simply means that their OS market share will be substantially reduced from overwhelming to simply a majority, hopefully less. It means that instead of making billions and billions, it will be reduced to only making billions.
Still, the direction is clear. And, as soon as Apple buys Microsoft, ...
[So, then I was thinking, is a new email notification sent out every time one (“I”) edits a post? If so, people are in big trouble when I clean up a post multiple times! Let me hope not!]
[So, then I was thinking, is a new email notification sent out every time one (“I”) edits a post? If so, people are in big trouble when I clean up a post multiple times! Let me hope not!]
HG, I don’t think one goes out every time you make an edit; only a post. There are some additional settings in your Control Panel for email notifications.
What? You’d like an FAQ on the Forums? Well, nobody’s asked any questions yet. I’m still trying to figure it all out.
What? You’d like an FAQ on the Forums? Well, nobody’s asked any questions yet. I’m still trying to figure it all out.
FAQ’s? The problem is that we all ask questions, but they get answered (normally to our satisfaction)!
Then again, they may be questions, but are they frequent?
FAQ’s have answers that often do not provide the real answers we want! Except when they do.
Maybe you should start gathering the questions before you forget what they are! After all, you have all the time in the world, right!?
Never mind.
OK. This forum doesn’t have much in the way of instruction, but it also wasn’t difficult to figure out, either. Control panel. Post new topic. Post reply. Edit.
If you’ve been to one forum, you’ve been to them all. Except for icons. Or, as in here, lack of. Tara and Bambi’s new ‘minimalist’ look works OK for me, but then, I really like MacMinute, too.
Here’s a good question: If Microsoft’s R&D budget is 12 times what Apple’s is, why do they continuously crank out crap? Dvorak changes opinions like underware. I wouldn’t take anything he says with a grain of salt. I think Microsoft will always be a huge player, but in 10-15 years they will not enjoy the popularity they do now. Apple is evening the playing field bit by bit. When they start pumping out Intel based Macs, people will flock to Macs in droves (if Apple markets it properly).
If so, people are in big trouble when I clean up a post multiple times! Let me hope not!]
