Rob Connolly's Blog

Why This Apple Fanboyism Really Hacks Me Off!

2010.04.06

Firstly, I apologise if this article isn’t particularly well thought out or well worded. I just wanted to get this out there. Secondly, in the interests of keeping my blog clean, I’ve slightly censored some of the language I would have used. I’m sure you can use your imagination to fill in the blanks!

Is it just me or has there been an increasing amount of Apple fanboyism around recently? This is really beginning to annoy me. Principally, because I just don’t care. Apple are completely irredeemable in my eyes, they are worse than Microsoft, but no-one seems to see this, whatever they do!

This is really hacking me off in the Open Source media, particularly on podcasts (I’m looking at you Shot of Jaq!). Frankly, I don’t give a <censored> what Apple are doing, or what they might do in the future. I don’t listen to Open Source podcasts for this.

Then there’s Ubuntu, which seems to be moving closer and closer to the Mac in terms of looks (this isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but why can’t we be more inventive?). The Ubuntu community seems to be going
this way too. In a recent episode of the Ubuntu UK Podcast the words ‘the Mac just works’ were uttered. Hello! So does Ubuntu! (of course I can only speak from my experience, but I rarely if ever have problems).

As a solution to this growing epidemic, I propose a simple test which you should use if you are tempted to praise Apple in public, particularly in the Open Source media.

Simply answer the following five questions:

1. Name five pieces of Open Source software that Apple have contributed to the community.

2. Would you buy an iPhone over a Nexus One? Seriously?

3. Is the iPad even an original idea? (clue: No.)

4. If the Mac is so great, why is it so damned hard to use? Why can’t it be configured to work they way I want?

5. Do you like DRM? Apparently, neither does Steve. Slightly hypocritical, don’t you think?

If you can’t answer these simple questions in Apple’s favour, KEEP STUM!

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10 responses to “Why This Apple Fanboyism Really Hacks Me Off!”

Michael “Devil’s advocate” Howell

2010.04.06

I’m personally not a big Mac fan, but be very careful to ensure your arguments are valid.
1. WebKit, wpa_supplicant, Metakit, Apache, and CUPS. http://www.apple.com/opensource/. Though I can’t imagine them never patching them, Apple still probably gets far more from these projects than it gives.
2. No, if for no other reason that I don’t want to try to switch myself, as well as my friends and relatives, off Verizon.
3. No, though it’s probably the first implementation that wasn’t basically a keyboardless laptop, Windows and all. The CrunchPad would’ve won if the guys making it hadn’t been ripped off. Guess who probably orchestrated it’s demise. Hint: they had the moneys.
4. Difficulty to use is subjective. I’m in a graphic design class, and I’m the only person who finds writing HTML code easier than messing with InDesign. It’s not just familiarity (I’ve used both enough to understand them).
5. Do you expect that Canonical likes using MP3 in it’s music store? Do you think the Mint guys like shipping proprietary stuff with their system? Apple loves defending it’s own IP, but defending other people’s only helps them indirectly by getting them to put stuff on iTMS.
crapple

2010.04.06

a big +1 on that. This fanboyism really pisses me off. And it is not just in the opensource world, every seems to crazy about Apple stuff. Just look at any Foss-conference. Sometimes 50% Macs.
And no, it doesnt make it better to jailbreak it/put Linux on it.
TioDuke

2010.04.07

You forgot:

– If they like Apple (the closest company of them all), why do they bother with open source, anyways?
Jo Shields

2010.04.07

Zeroconf… Webkit… CUPS… okay, I’m out.
Rob Connolly

2010.04.07

I’m glad this post has generated some discussion, my point was really that I don’t want to hear about Apple through Open Source media channels.

@Michael “Devil’s advocate” Howell – Thanks for your comments:

1. Fair enough, though if they don’t help maintain them and just ‘threw them over the wall’ that’s just as bad.

2. LOL, that’s as good a reason as any. Locking down to one network is part of the problem.

3. All I wanted was a keyboardless netbook though! Not some crazy lovechild of a kindle and an iPhone!

4. I was talking specifically about how it can’t really be adapted to work the way you do. There’s (mostly) only one way to do anything. I had trouble renaming files because there is no entry for it in the right click menu!

5. Probably not, but that’s a slightly different situation. Apple have the clout to say ‘No, we’re not doing it.’ I’d like to see the MPAA’s reaction to that.

Again thanks for all your comments.
Mattj

2010.04.07

So you don’t want Apple discussed through Open source media channels. Isn’t that treating them like the elephant in the room? They are after all, however much you may personally dislike them, a major player in the technology world and not discussing a major competitor seems a bit childish and silly.

FWIW, Shot of Jaq isn’t specifically an Open Source podcast, but a varied mix of subjects.

Although you are 180 degrees opposed from the ‘Mac Fanboy’ stereotype, the extremism in the way that you express those views is actually fairly similar.
Michael “notriddle”

2010.04.07

@crapple: “And it is not just in the opensource world, every seems to crazy about Apple stuff. Just look at any Foss-conference. Sometimes 50% Macs.”
I’ve never been to any OSS conferences, but that sounds disturbing. I have seen it outside conferences, though, particularly with the “are you running a PC or a Mac” boxed-in thinking. I’ll give credit that Macs are consistently built well, but did you expect your $500 Gateway to be better than a $1000 Mac, or that a $1000 Toshiba is going to be worse than a $1000 Mac?

@TioDuke: “If they like Apple (the closest company of them all), why do they bother with open source, anyways?”
I’m not sure Apple is the closest company in the world (I expect they’re quite far away from OSS ;)).

@Rob Connolly: “2.” I have other reasons, including not wanting to get on an upgrade treadmill in order to STAY jailbroken.
“3.” Do you also want a small notebook, instead of a netbook? Personally, I agree with Apple that etablets have unique usecases, and should be adapted to them.
“5.” Maybe they do now, but I’m sure they didn’t when they started, and they don’t want to lose it now.

And I thought about the iPhone, but decided that it doesn’t contain any Digital Rights Management, There are no rights being managed, either of Apple or of the user.
Rob Connolly

2010.04.07

@Mattj I agree that not discussing the competition would be a little silly. However, I think the real elephant in the room is the praising and blatant copying of Apple, when we know what an awful company they actually are. In short I’d settle for a little more balance.

BTW I know that Shot of Jaq is not specifically an Open Source show, but it does have a heavy OS bent and I’d expect a little more discussion of this topic.

Also, the ‘extremism’ in my views was done a) because I was annoyed and b) to generate a reaction (it worked!)

@notriddle “2” Yeah fair enough, seems like a lot of work to be able to use YOUR phone the way YOU want to!

“3” Currently I’m happy with my netbook. I’d like to know the use cases you speak of because I don’t really see them at the moment.

“5” I personally don’t think they would lose it. They have the clout to really stand up to the rightsholders if they wanted to.

WRT Macs being well built: 2/3 of the people I know with a (new) Macbook pro (NZ$2500) have had hardware issues in the last 4 months. Compare that to my NZ$750 EEEPC which has been running flawlessly for two years.
istoff

2010.04.27

To add to the debate.

1. Name five pieces of Open Source software that Apple have contributed to the community.

http://www.apple.com/opensource/

Doesn’t fully answer your question, I know. This page could also be construed as explaining how apple benefits from OSS without explaining what is given back.

2. Would you buy an iPhone over a Nexus One? Seriously?
3GS over Nexus One? Definately. That’s because N1 currently has hardware issues that should be fixed in a newer handset version. I have a HTC Hero now and would probably stick to a Sense UI HTC Android phone over a generic Android phone. My wife has a 3g iphone. It works phenomenally well for her.

3. Is the iPad even an original idea? (clue: No.)
Who cares? If they market it to the point that its the number one developer supported tablet machine and it works for its target market, why should we care?

4. If the Mac is so great, why is it so damned hard to use? Why canâ€™t it be configured to work they way I want?
Wooo. Very subjective issue. I personally use apps like Firefox, Krusader, Songbird, JDownloader, OpenOffice and bash, etc as my primary interaction with it and in this way it feels like just another unix desktop to me. The fact that it works seamlessly with some weird hardware that I have which Linux doesn’t fully support means I’ll hang onto it a bit longer. Note, I have 2 OSX machines, 2 fedora and 2 ununtu 10.04 machines means I still prefer linux.

5. Do you like DRM? Apparently, neither does Steve. Slightly hypocritical, donâ€™t you think?
No, but I don’t buy online music through iTunes. Its a moot point as I live in South Africa and we don’t have online music except for Windows Media, which of course, is useless to me.

Last comment. I am relatively new OSX user, but have used Linux primarily since 2005. My osx desktop has been by far the most stable machine of the lot.

My Canon printer, scanner, logitech keyboard, hauppage usb stick and other bits and bobs work much better on OSX compared to the linuxes I’ve tried. I typically rotate between kubuntu, fedora and opensuse so I don’t believe its a single distro issue.

I deliberately made this posting more pro-apple than I normally would also in the interests of debate. I’m fully aware of the reasons to not use / dislike Apple, but I wanted to present a point of view of somebody with a different opinion.

Finally, if I was to stop using Apple products based on their business model, monopolitic attitudes, use of drm etc, I would on principle have to stop buying Sony, Samsung, Disney Products and a ton more that escape me at this moment. Anybody who advocates singling out Apple or Microsoft in isolation is misguided in my opinion.

For the record, I don’t use MS products, because they’re crap for the most part. Except for my Gears of War/ Forza 3 addiction, for which Microsoft has a lovely solution.

Sorry for the long post. Feel free to flame 😉
On Language/Platform Restrictions… – Blogging to Nowhere

2010.12.09

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