I no longer recommend Apple under any circumstances
|
| Author | Content |
|---|---|
| Ridcully Mar 10, 2010 2:34 AM EDT |
At one point, I used to routinely recommend Apple to those computer users who were fed up with Windows, but could not quite face Linux. I no longer do so under any circumstances. Steadily over the past 5 years, Apple's activities and strictures have convinced me that Apple is now the Microsoft of the Unix world. It is deploying the same business plan as Microsoft and employing vendor lock-in to a pitch of perfection that must be the envy of Redmond. Apple's prison cells may be pretty and the taps may be gold plated, but they still remain prison cells. Anyone using Apple's products is forced to comply with Apple's strictures and the general aim of Apple is always to collect the maximum of money for any product. I find their attitude to customers and users repugnant. Linux is no longer the "difficult to learn" system and the day of the Linux desktop is here, right now. My extremely positive experiences this year in changing "welded-on Windows users" over to Linux systems, especially Ubuntu, has convinced me that Linux is just as easy to use as Windows, but that freedom in computing is more important than anything Apple could ever offer. Apple is in fact, an analogy of the apple in Snow White: looks great, but in my opinion it brings the poisons of high cost and loss of all freedom. No thankyou. |
| Scott_Ruecker Mar 10, 2010 1:02 PM EDT |
I agree with you on Apple and Linux no longer being difficult to learn Ridicully. I will give them props for their hardware though, I would like to get a 'PC' laptop that worked as long and without error as theirs does. |
| TxtEdMacs Mar 10, 2010 1:36 PM EDT |
[serious] Scott, I hate to disabuse you of your illusions, however, paying twice the price is not a guarantee of higher quality hardware. Initially I was quite impressed with my daughters Mac Pro laptop, especially when I took it into the Apple Store* to evaluate the cause of the DVD R/W disc failing to write to high quality brand discs. We were advised to use the cheapest possible discs and the problem would disappear. It did for a while until the writer failed completely along with the battery [just a bit beyond the warranty]. The price of replacement was ridiculously high. My son ordered an Apple battery over eBay** and I bought a portable USB LiteON DVD writer as the better buy***. Thus, even overpaying does not assure you of a high value machine. If you have the cash, buy a higher end Windows machine and strip out the OS and install your choice of Linux [or one of the BSDs] and you are just as likely to have a long lived laptop. Or buy a high end unit used, which is what I have done. * Did not take out membership, where I suspect better treatment is bestowed. ** From an independent source. It arrived with better specs than Apple assures and so far has been much more reliable than the original. *** Obviously much, much cheaper and has been used successfully on multiple machines, which were running differing OSs. [/serious] YBT |
| Steven_Rosenber Mar 11, 2010 1:48 AM EDT |
Time needed to change hard drive in Apple iBook G4: 3 hours Time needed to change hard drive in Gateway Solo 1450: 3 minutes |
| Scott_Ruecker Mar 11, 2010 3:44 AM EDT |
I cannot refute any of what you all have said but my Sister, and now my Brother-in-law have had the same 17in Macbook Pro for almost five years now with not a single hardware issue. Its seen two users and their two daughters and is all but as good as the day it was bought. She bought a 15in a year after that is her personal laptop and it is in great shape as well. I have met many people at trade shows and travelling using Macs that were years old and fully functional. I am basing my opinion on only my experiences. |
| Alcibiades Mar 11, 2010 4:17 AM EDT |
"Apple is now the Microsoft of the Unix world" No, this is putting it far too mildly. Apple is much, much worse than MS. Apple wants to sell you a machine. Then it wants to forbid you to buy software from anyplace else. It wants to stop you from using anything but iTunes to do the buying. It wants to control the developers who develop that software in activities which are irrelevant to that development or that software. It wants to censor what content you can access. MS never did any of those things. We have always been able to buy computers from anyplace we liked, and put Windows on them. We have always been able to install whatever software we liked. We have always been able to buy through the mail, over the net, using credit cards, Web browsers, letters, cash, whatever. MS has never had or claimed the ability to reach out over the network and delete an application from our computers just because they were running Windows. All this has been accompanied by myths and lies. For example, the crazed idea that in some way OSX is optimized to the restricted range of hardware it runs on. The idea that OSX is more secure than alternatives. The idea that OSX is easier to use or more stable. The idea that the plain commodity hardware on which this stuff runs is in some way better because it has an Apple brand on it. Apple is a very bad company indeed. A world in which the Apple model was the standard one would be one in which large corporations and public bodies controlled what citizens can do and know. Anyone with any commitment to liberal democratic values should resist Apple, make the case for always picking more open alternatives, which include Windows. Do their best to ensure than schools and bodies on which they have influence do not purchase Apple products. It is analogous to the struggle against Apartheid. What is needed is a boycott and resistance. It does not matter what you think of the hardware and software. The company and its policies are incompatible with Western liberal values, and it must be stopped. |
| jdixon Mar 11, 2010 8:00 AM EDT |
> MS has never had or claimed the ability to reach out over the network and delete an application from our computers just because they were running Windows. True. They've merely settled for breaking the application so it no longer works. > The idea that OSX is more secure than alternatives. For most people, the alternatives are exactly one: Windows. In that case, it is. > The idea that OSX is easier to use or more stable. Again, it's far more stable than Windows. Ease of use is in the eye of the beholder. That said, I largely agree with your post. |
| dinotrac Mar 11, 2010 9:11 AM EDT |
Alcibiades -- Wow! I sure hope those are all pre-coffee posts. Sorry, but OSX is easier to use than Windows or Linux, especially for multimedia and graphics stuff. And OSX IS very stable. It builds on the work done at NeXT with NeXTStep, mating the underlying goodness with the Mac interface. They really are nice systems -- with system being defined as the combination of hardware and software. Hate Apple all you want. Hate the closed nature of what they do, but take off the tin-foil and let a little real-world oxygen percolate through those angry brain cells. |
| jacog Mar 11, 2010 9:57 AM EDT |
Quoting:.... especially for multimedia and graphics stuff. How do you define these things? To a user "graphics stuff" might just mean "running Photoshop", in which case it's no different than doing the same thing in Windows. Flash, same thing. You are describing running applications, and Windows users tend to not be bereft of the same applications that Apple users have. |
| gus3 Mar 11, 2010 10:00 AM EDT |
Microsoft did try to grab that power, through the Application Service Provider Industry Consortium, in 2000. IBM and AT&T were there, too. By getting the United Nations involved, they tried to take it on a global scale. |
| dinotrac Mar 11, 2010 10:46 AM EDT |
jacog -- Hmmm. You could be right, but how well does Final Cut Pro work on Windows? |
| jacog Mar 11, 2010 12:56 PM EDT |
Prolly not as well as Vegas Pro, dino. *insert eyeroll* How the heck does naming one productivity package make a successful argument towards the fact that you just generalised "multimedia and graphics" as being easier on one platform? |
| Alcibiades Mar 11, 2010 2:49 PM EDT |
So I am reading today in the Guardian that Apple has banned an app from the trashy tabloid Bild (German) because it shows nipples. Or rather, it permits the user to shake the phone until the ladies are naked at which point, to the astonishment of Cupertino basement dwellers, it turns out that these ladies have them. And to look at them on your iPhone is, well, verboten. Never mind that we all, male and female, grew up sucking on nipples, these infernal idiots think there is something about breasts that we should not look at them. Never mind that all over Europe in summer the beauty of the female form divine is on show on every beach. No, some troglodyte in Cupertino wants to tell us what we may and may not look at. But Bild had the last word on the subject. Today, said their spokesperson, it is nipples. Tomorrow it will be politics. Yes, it will. |
| Sander_Marechal Mar 11, 2010 3:32 PM EDT |
@Alcibiades: You know what's even weirder, there's an iPhone app called "shaker" Or "wobble" or something. Basically you pick an image and mark one or more areas. When you shake your phone, those areas will wobble. Guess what loads of people are using that for: making bouncing boobies of course! |
| gus3 Mar 11, 2010 3:32 PM EDT |
Quoting:Never mind that we all, male and female, grew up sucking on nipplesSome never stopped sucking. They now work in the government, Cupertino, or Redmond. |
| gus3 Mar 11, 2010 3:34 PM EDT |
Quoting:Guess what loads of people are using that for: making bouncing boobies of course!For the cash they shelled out for the iLoveSteveJobsPhone, they could have... Oh, never mind. |
| dinotrac Mar 11, 2010 3:58 PM EDT |
Jacog - You accuse me of something I didn't do! I conceded that you may be right, then asked a simple question. So you'll know, final cut pro is not a "productivity package". It's a very smooth and powerful video editing package, though they may have thrown a few extras into the mix. FWIW, if you are that enamored of Windows, more power to you. Tomayto tomahto and all that, but... Everything just seems to work more smoothly on a Mac. There's a reason so many artists and musicians choose to work with Mac, and it ain't the price./ |
| hkwint Mar 11, 2010 9:45 PM EDT |
Quoting:They now work in the government Wow, sounds like a nice country to live, where the people in the government actually work! |
| dinotrac Mar 11, 2010 10:28 PM EDT |
Hans - Don't know about the Netherlands, but here in the US of A, "work in the government" is a colloquialism for "Yahoo, baby!! Our ship's come in! We never have to work again!" |
| gus3 Mar 11, 2010 10:34 PM EDT |
Hence teh suck. |
| Steven_Rosenber Mar 12, 2010 12:03 AM EDT |
I like Apple's OS X software much more than Apple's Macintosh hardware. I did have a hard drive fail on my 2003-era iBook G4, I'm not happy about Apple abandoning PowerPC, it's a pain not to have a VGA port built in, not having a right-click button on the trackpad is annoying, having only one SODIMM slot is annoying, the way the wireless module installs is a design nightmare right up there with the impossible-to-replace hard drive ... But I do like the way it suspend/resumes (I credit tight integration between OS X and the hardware), and aside from the design flaws, I have been happy with the hardware. Not counting the trouble I've had with iPhoto, I enjoy the relative stability of OS X. It runs as well or better today as it did six years ago. |
| dinotrac Mar 12, 2010 5:27 AM EDT |
Steve -- I too, wonder about the current hardware. I've worked with (not had the opportunity to own) a few G4/G5 Mac servers and desktops, and -- sweet. The Mac OS really is all that. Nice solid Unix. Smooth, simple (once you get the hang of it -- hair-pulling until then) and consistent UI. If people want to hate Apple, that is their prerogative. I've certainly had choice words over iPods (my entire family loves them -- but me) and iTunes and DRM, but...Mac/OSX is a sweet system. |
| hkwint Mar 12, 2010 2:47 PM EDT |
Quoting:here in the US of A, "work in the government" is a colloquialism for ... ...We never have to work again!" That's why I thought gus3 made a mistake, probably he made a joke. Like "people working in Redmond?" Mwah-hah-hah-hah |
| Steven_Rosenber Mar 12, 2010 11:58 PM EDT |
Aside from however much freedom-hating is involved, a great way to go with Apple hardware is to run OS X and then use the Fink Project to bring in whatever desktop environments and Unix/Linux applications you wish. That way you get the sweet suspend/resume of OS X along with GNOME, KDE or whatever you want to use. I've only used Fink in a limited way until now, but I'm considering a box using this setup. |
| Alcibiades Mar 13, 2010 3:17 PM EDT |
The Fink project is actually very reprehensible. What all right minded people should be doing is, boycotting Apple and all its works and its products and seeking to diminish their utility to the maximum possible. Fink is making it possible to run Open Source applications on OSX. What we want is for there to be fewer, if possible no, open source applications on OSX. We should not want Fink to exist. In fact, as long as Apple continues on its present reprehensible course, we should want a clause in the GPL to say that this software may be installed on any computers except those branded Apple, and we should then enforce this rigorously by suing the hell out of Fink, Apple, and and anyone else who comes close to breaching this clause. The boot would be a bit on the other foot then. You want to limit your software to one particular hardware platform, fine. We want to restrict it away from that particular hardware platform. See how you like them apples. |
| jdixon Mar 13, 2010 3:37 PM EDT |
> What all right minded people should be doing is, boycotting Apple and all its works and its products and seeking to diminish their utility to the maximum possible. Sigh. Freedom is wonderful as long as everyone agrees with us, huh? > We should not want Fink to exist ... we should want a clause in the GPL to say that this software may be installed on any computers except those branded Apple, Who is this "we" of which you speak. I don't care one way or another whether Fink exists. As for the GPL, you should take that up with RMS. I'm sure he'll give it all the attention it deserves. |
| gus3 Mar 13, 2010 4:06 PM EDT |
Quoting:Sigh. Freedom is wonderful as long as everyone agrees with us, huh?When, in the name of "freedom," one aligns oneself with those who would take that selfsame freedom from others, one is merely demonstrating his freedom to choose his own shackles. It's like the "tolerance" conundrum. There is no requirement to be tolerant of intolerance. |
| dinotrac Mar 13, 2010 4:43 PM EDT |
gus3 - When, in the name of freedom, you seek to spread that freedom to others, you are furthering the cause of freedom. When, in the name of "freedom", you get all pissy because others are taking advantage of that freedom to spread it around, you become a living oxymoron. |
| Sander_Marechal Mar 13, 2010 5:09 PM EDT |
Quoting:In fact, as long as Apple continues on its present reprehensible course, we should want a clause in the GPL to say that this software may be installed on any computers except those branded Apple That would make it non-free software. As (mis)attributed to Voltaire: Quoting:I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it. |
| gus3 Mar 13, 2010 8:00 PM EDT |
Quoting:When, in the name of "freedom", you get all pissy because others are taking advantage of that freedom to spread it around, you become a living oxymoron.Ah yes, that "freedom to innovate" that Redmond whines about, but never really uses. Quoting:I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.Of course. I could tell everyone what a jerk you are, but it's easier to let you show them on your own. |
| Sander_Marechal Mar 13, 2010 8:08 PM EDT |
Quoting:Ah yes, that "freedom to innovate" that Redmond whines about, but never really uses. I don't care one bit what Redmond does or doesn't do. When Microsoft came out with it's own set of "open source" licenses, we all cried foul because one of the licenses restricted the software to only run on Windows. But now you defend to restrict free software from running on Apple hardware? Quoting:Freedom 0: The freedom to run the program, for any purpose That includes running it on Apple hardware if you wish so. |
| gus3 Mar 13, 2010 8:37 PM EDT |
Quoting:But now you defend to restrict free software from running on Apple hardware?Alcibiades is doing that, yes. I'm merely pointing out the contradiction--hypocrisy, even--of Free Software users and defenders buying anything from Apple. Such action is funding a company bent on shackling people to itself. |
| jdixon Mar 13, 2010 9:54 PM EDT |
> ...one is merely demonstrating his freedom to choose his own shackles. True. But life is all about choosing which shackles you're willing to wear and which ones you're not. From friends to country to family to religion, we're all bound by shackles of our own choosing. The fact that others might choose shackles different from our own doesn't lessen their right to choose. > I'm merely pointing out the contradiction--hypocrisy, even--of Free Software users and defenders buying anything from Apple. I'm not buying anything from Apple. However, others are free to do so, and even to run free software on it. It's not my choice to make; it's theirs. Their money, their choose of what hardware to buy, whether I agree or not. Their hardware, their choice of what software to run, whether I agree or not. It a huge step from saying people shouldn't buy Apple products to saying free software should not be allowed to run on those products. Free software is, after all, first and foremost about freedom. |
| gus3 Mar 13, 2010 10:28 PM EDT |
Quoting:From friends to country to family to religion, we're all bound by shackles of our own choosing.Wow, I get to choose my parents? *g* The others would shackle me, only so long as I allow it. I am free to change my alliances: my country, if another will have me; my friends and religion, from whom I can sever ties on my own terms. I have never impinged on the freedoms for others, so I myself retain the same. But I'm not allowed to buy a piece of equipment and study how it works? Nobody would have any objection if I blew it up with C-4, or melted it with thermite. After all, I own it, right? But let me try to take it apart and figure it out, maybe make it work different, and all hell breaks loose. *cough*iPhone*cough* |
| jdixon Mar 13, 2010 10:43 PM EDT |
> Wow, I get to choose my parents? You can choose not to acknowledge them. However, the most significant family member is usually chosen. > ...and religion, from whom I can sever ties on my own terms. Not a Muslim, I see. But yes, you can largely change these as you wish. That's why they're the shackles you choose. > But I'm not allowed to buy a piece of equipment and study how it works? I'm not the ones stopping you gus3. :) I'm not advocating choosing Apple products. I'm merely saying that other people are free to choose that if they wish, and that's not a freedom I would want to take away from them. Thinking we know better than others and should therefore be allowed to choose for them is very seductive. It's also almost invariably wrong. We can never know another persons situation as well as they know it themselves, and we can therefore almost never make better choices then they would. |
| hkwint Mar 14, 2010 1:04 AM EDT |
I don't see the problem, People paying about twice the cost price of hardware to receive the software as well are probably not going to add free software to their system. I mean, how many people buy a Mac and then install Free Software on it? Sure, half of the free software / open source developers I came across at FOSDEM two years ago. Probably because the Macbook (whatever version, I don't know) just had the best hardware and looks. Nowadays, it's different, I'm pretty sure since the wave of 'netbooks' only one in five FOSS-developers use a Macbook. So apart from the theoretical debat, I think this is a non-issue. That's what sets it apart from the anti-patent-covenant / anti-tivoization clauses in GPLv3, those were _real_ issues happening and preventing GPL software from being 'free'. But GPL software ending up on closed platforms (MacOSX isn't the only one!) doesn't cause the software to be 'closed', like TiVo did, and it doesn't divide the user base in two camps - like the Microsoft / Novell deal did. |
| Alcibiades Mar 14, 2010 3:49 AM EDT |
I accept that you cannot have genuinely free software, and also restrict where people may run it. But you have to put it in those terms to make the point. Make no mistake about it, wherever the Apple model predominates, all the freedoms of free software will vanish instantly. You will develop by being a licensed developer, you will sell by being granted permission to have your app included in the app store, and your app will be able to access only content which is not on the Cupertino Index. And you will run it only on systems which conform in all respects to the Cupertino criteria. It may be hardware brand today. Tomorrow it will be what other software or content is installed on your devices. Now you may, as an advocate of freedom and the Western liberal tradition, feel that it is OK for sects which limit their members freedom to be legal. You may even feel that the state should allow sect members to opt out of, for example, the state schooling system, and apply their funding to sect-run schools, regardless of what values these schools seek to inculcate. That is a legitimate, arguable, if wrong headed, point of view, with a long provenance going back to Voltaire and Mill. What you cannot in good conscience do is work to broaden the appeal of such sects. You cannot work to broaden the appeal and acceptance of groups whose main aim is to abolish the freedoms which you claim to be supporting. You have to oppose them. Apple, its ethos, its conduct, its approach to computing in the widest sense, place it in the camp of the enemies of personal freedom. It must be resisted. No-one with any commitment to OSS should have anything to do with it, still less with Fink. |
| Teron Mar 14, 2010 4:49 AM EDT |
And, up until recently, Apple hasn't been as bad as that. Also, Macs are (as of now) still outside of the draconian control Apple enforces on their more portable devices. I can honestly call OS X a good OS. The ones on iPhones and the iPad? Nope. Won't, and never will advocate those to anyone, precisely because of the draconian bullshit that comes with them. My disinterest in buying a new Mac has largely stemmed from Apple's new hardware design - I know I am about as comfortable on Linux as on OS X, and that I don't like Apple's new hardware, so no new Mac laptops for me. The day OS X develops control systems like the ones on iPhone is the day I stop calling the OS good. (Part of the reason OS X is good, by the way, are things like Firefox, Adium, Songbird, MPlayer OS X Extended, openssh, OpenOffice, and so on. About 90% of what I use on OS X is FOSS.) |
| TxtEdMacs Mar 14, 2010 9:06 AM EDT |
Quoting: [...] Make no mistake about it, wherever the Apple model predominates, all the freedoms of free software will vanish instantly.Think mathematics, i.e. a necessary [perhaps*], but NOT sufficient condition. Yes, if it happened Apple's predilection for absolute control might lead in such a direction. However, Apple has another bent** that effectively precludes it's domination of the market. For example, premium pricing [not matter if the underlying hardware justifies the cost objectively], aversion to marketing directly to the [so called] Enterprise market. Moreover, potential competitors can always effectively compete upon price advantage alone. Furthermore, those smart enough could employ a Free OS along with more features and more resistance to breakage. Do I need to say [serious]? YBT * Perhaps, because Apple is not the only avenue towards restriction of individual freedom. ** Sometimes they perversely breakup worse suppressors of freedom, just because they can. |
| dinotrac Mar 14, 2010 9:16 AM EDT |
Hans -- Lots of people add free software to their Apple systems, especially in business. You might be amazed. That said, I don't know how much they add. One reason for buying an Apple is the consistent GUI and the apps that run under it, and those apps tend to be things like Photoshop, Final Cut, etc. |
| jdixon Mar 14, 2010 10:34 AM EDT |
> That is a legitimate, arguable, if wrong headed, point of view, with a long provenance going back to Voltaire and Mill. Well, at least you recognize the point. Software freedom is only one aspect of freedom, and far from the most important one. |
| dinotrac Mar 14, 2010 11:56 AM EDT |
jdixon - I'm not sure that he does. What seems likely is that he's read, but failed to grasp what freedom is. Note the immediate resort to name-calling (sect) to set up an us-them dichotomy. Since those "sect" sorts aren't us, they are some kind of foreign horror that shouldn't be allowed to indoctrinate their own children -- and can we really consider the children to be theirs? After all, children are innocents. Perhaps we shouldn't subject the poor dears to "them" ? |
| jdixon Mar 14, 2010 12:12 PM EDT |
> I'm not sure that he does ... It's possible, Dino, but I'll give him the benefit of a doubt for now. |
| Alcibiades Mar 14, 2010 3:14 PM EDT |
I believe that Le Pen in France and the BNP in the UK, and the comparable parties in Europe, must be permitted the same freedom of expression that we all enjoy. I do not believe that we should patronize their enterprises, if they have them, donate to them, promote them. They are fundamentally opposed to freedom. It is one thing to protect the freedom of opponents of freedom. It is quite another thing to promote them. We need to do two things: one, recognize them for what they are. Two, avoid doing anything that may support them. The issue of sects and schoolings is just an example, but its a more complex one than you might think, and one the UK social services are confronted with daily. What do you do about religious schools in which beatings are common? What do you do about curriculums which promote the oppression of women. Who are, after all, British citizens too. |
| Alcibiades Mar 14, 2010 3:19 PM EDT |
I believe that Le Pen in France and the BNP in the UK, and the comparable parties in Europe, must be permitted the same freedom of expression that we all enjoy. I do not believe that we should patronize their enterprises, if they have them, donate to them, promote them. They are fundamentally opposed to freedom. It is one thing to protect the freedom of opponents of freedom. It is quite another thing to promote them. We need to do two things: one, recognize them for what they are. Two, avoid doing anything that may support them. The issue of sects and schoolings is just an example, but its a more complex one than you might think, and one the UK social services are confronted with daily. What do you do about religious schools in which beatings are common? What do you do about curriculums which promote the oppression of women. Who are, after all, British citizens too. There is an argument to say that the proponents of free software should be in favor of Apple's right to conduct its business how it likes. There is no argument for their helping it to conduct its business in ways that are opposed to the basic values of the free software movement. Similarly, whatever your arguments in favor of permitting sectarian schools, even ones which do not adhere to our standards of child protection and gender equality, there is no valid argument that a liberal society should finance such schools, when they inculcate standards and values incompatible with our own. |
| dinotrac Mar 14, 2010 4:20 PM EDT |
Alcibiades - Already on a wrong foot with "our own". Haven'y you heard? Common standards are out of favor these days. All cultures are equal, diversity rules, etc. However, more seriously and directly in point: Helping people put free software on an Apple may help Apple in some trickle-down manner, but it primarily promotes freedom for those people. It is little different from the provisions of the GPL that prevent distributing binary code without making the source code available. One accepts restricted freedom in the name of promoting freedom. As to sectarian schools, I don't know how they do things in the EU and the UK, but religious freedom in the US can be limited by certain kinds of laws, laws preventing abuse of children among them. Zealously so, sometimes. In 2008 more than 400 children were forcibly removed from their parents in a raid on a Mormon fundamentalist compound based on allegations that underaged girls were forced to marry the group's men. The taking of the children turned out to have been completely improper, and overblown response to shady allegations against one man, but... hey, it supports the point. Absent illegal actions, however, I'm all for being allowed to raise your kids as you wish. |
Posting in this forum is limited to members of the group: [ForumMods, SITEADMINS, MEMBERS.]
Becoming a member of LXer is easy and free. Join Us!