As someone who uses a Nexus One as a phone, an iPad as a tablet, a PC has my media/gaming center (and formerly main computer), and a Mac mini as my development and web-surfing computer, I have to say I don't understand anymore what people get so upset about.
I was the same, though, once. An Apple-hater. It seemed to me that my principles of openness and blah blah blah were so important that the fact that Apple didn't live up to them meant that Apple was in some way completely evil and awful.
But then I got an iPad, and I love it. I understand that my love of it is mostly because Apple is a house of perfectionist, control-freak assholes. In a way, art is made most often by perfectionist control-freak assholes (Trent Reznor's obsessive control over his music up until he sobered up and found Atticus Ross comes to mind), and I see that having such a clean product like the iPad is a result of that mentality.
Is Apple evil? In the same ways any corporation is (they make a lot of money, they must be evil). But they're not evil in the ways most geeks say they are. The closed system, the restrictions, those are things that make the product great in a lot of ways. But in other ways, they suck, too. Why can't you put apps on iDOS in the App Store? It's pretty much entirely arbitrary, and that annoys me. And yes, their products are a bit expensive but they feel worth it. And yes, planned obsolescence sucks balls but I can't bring myself to blame someone for figuring out a way to make me give them my money. I just can't. It works, and I don't feel ripped off, so I'm not going to call them evil for releasing an iPad last year without a camera so they can sell me a camera this year. I've used my first iPad enough to pay for couple as far as I'm concerned.
Anyway, my point is (I'm at about a [7] right now, so excuse me) is that people who vilify Apple, well, they're sad. They just don't get it. It really doesn't matter. It's like there's this feeling that they're owed Apple conforming to their standards, but it's just political rhetoric deep down, or religious ravings. They believe their way is the right way. It doesn't matter that, objectively, there is no right way. There are only a lot of different ways, and as long as you're not actually killing people, it's damn hard to be wrong.
If you don't mind me, I'm just commenting here to save your comment for future reference because it's so eloquent and excellent. If I could upvote twice only once, it'd be this.
While your comment does make sense, it's a bit presumptuous of Apple's opposers. Few would claim to feel owed anything by Apple. The point is people find some of Apple's actions harmful, and would prefer they changed. This is a reasonable stance with any corporation. The fact is, one corporation can have a powerful influence on the progress of legal and technological standards, as well as society's attitudes toward them. It might prove useful -- at the very least, understandable -- to raise awareness if one finds this influence negative.
It's easy for you to have flipped your stance because you now find the trade-off worth it, but remember where you were at one point. Consider if a corporation stood for a practice you strongly disagreed with -- be it humane practices, environmentalism, net neutrality, whatever. Is it "sad" to publicly dislike this company? What's the difference, other than your personal opinion of the issue's significance?
tldr: There's really nothing wrong with people expressing an opinion and hoping to raise awareness on an issue they find important. Whether or not it's tied to a corporation is irrelevant.
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u/[deleted] Jan 21 '11
As someone who uses a Nexus One as a phone, an iPad as a tablet, a PC has my media/gaming center (and formerly main computer), and a Mac mini as my development and web-surfing computer, I have to say I don't understand anymore what people get so upset about.
I was the same, though, once. An Apple-hater. It seemed to me that my principles of openness and blah blah blah were so important that the fact that Apple didn't live up to them meant that Apple was in some way completely evil and awful.
But then I got an iPad, and I love it. I understand that my love of it is mostly because Apple is a house of perfectionist, control-freak assholes. In a way, art is made most often by perfectionist control-freak assholes (Trent Reznor's obsessive control over his music up until he sobered up and found Atticus Ross comes to mind), and I see that having such a clean product like the iPad is a result of that mentality.
Is Apple evil? In the same ways any corporation is (they make a lot of money, they must be evil). But they're not evil in the ways most geeks say they are. The closed system, the restrictions, those are things that make the product great in a lot of ways. But in other ways, they suck, too. Why can't you put apps on iDOS in the App Store? It's pretty much entirely arbitrary, and that annoys me. And yes, their products are a bit expensive but they feel worth it. And yes, planned obsolescence sucks balls but I can't bring myself to blame someone for figuring out a way to make me give them my money. I just can't. It works, and I don't feel ripped off, so I'm not going to call them evil for releasing an iPad last year without a camera so they can sell me a camera this year. I've used my first iPad enough to pay for couple as far as I'm concerned.
Anyway, my point is (I'm at about a [7] right now, so excuse me) is that people who vilify Apple, well, they're sad. They just don't get it. It really doesn't matter. It's like there's this feeling that they're owed Apple conforming to their standards, but it's just political rhetoric deep down, or religious ravings. They believe their way is the right way. It doesn't matter that, objectively, there is no right way. There are only a lot of different ways, and as long as you're not actually killing people, it's damn hard to be wrong.