Joining the Fray

As someone who uses computers all the time - for both pleasure and my livelihood - it is a subject that I can't help but know a lot about. I keep my ear to the ground for big changes in the industry because they can affect me and because right now there is a whole lot going on.

I am a Mac person. Having admitted that, I feel that anybody who can at least turn on a computer has an opinion about Microsoft and maybe their competitors too. Most of the technology professionals I have met are polarized as either Mac or PC users (I'm not including Linux here). Between these two factions, there has been a marked increase of waving-of-flags, shaking-of-fists, gnashing-of-teeth and drawing-of-lines-in-the-sand. There has been a marked decrease in sitting-on-fences. Blogs devoted entirely to promoting either side of the upcoming OS war are popping up everywhere. Discussions with tech-savy friends seem inevitably to veer into what Apple is doing lately and how great/crappy they are. Apple, as far as I'm concerned, is out for revenge.

I've read some of the Windows Vista blogs pro and con. I agree with the cons that Vista has 'borrowed' heavily from OS X. Complaining will accomplish nothing, of course. But suffice it to say that Microsoft is doing the latter of the two things it does best: 'bully' and 'react'. Here's why:

Microsoft (MS): (Windows 95) "Yay, we suddenly rule the world"!
Apple (AP): (NeXT OS) "whoops"!

MS: (Windows 98) "Hey look, we did it again"!
AP: "somebody please help us".

MS: (Windows ME) "Looks like we can do no wro... Dear God! Put it out of it's misery"!
AP: "tee hee". [the outburst promptly causes Apple to pass out due to malnutrition]

MS: (Windows 2000) "Whew"!
AP: "Dangit"! [again passes out]

MS: (Windows XP) "OK. Here's hoping that... Yes! It's good. That aught to hold them for a while". [and they weren't kidding]
AP: (OS 9) "Why won't anybody buy our pretty computers"?

MS: (Windows XP) "Yep, sitting pretty here".
AP: (OS X) "It sure IS pretty". [referring to OS X]

MS: (Windows XP) "Can't talk. Killing the worm threat. Die worms! DIE"! [internet viruses or Worms Armageddon? The viruses are still around]
AP: (OS X Jaguar) "Hmm, I wonder if we can make it more than pretty? Hay, d'ya'll think we can sell us some of these here eyePawds"? [for some reason Apple are country bumpkins in this quip - I'm not sure why]

AP: (OS X Panther) "Now it IS more than just pretty. Golly, those iPods WERE a good idea! Now let's open an online music store".
Google: [flexing muscles threateningly] "Google and Apple friends".
MS: (still Windows XP) "Hey, wait a minute... Aren't WE supposed to do that"?

AP: (OS X Tiger) "Yay, we suddenly rule digital music! No, of course they won't mind paying for Tiger. We released Panther, like, 2 weeks ago".
MS: (still Windows XP) "Hey Yahoo, you still like us, right"?
Yahoo: "Bah! Fat chance. We would NEVER join forces with yo... [looks over at Google] ...I mean, we would never NOT join you".

AP: (pre-OS X Leopard) "After 'Leopard'? Um.. we were thinking ..Manx".
MS: (Beta of Windows Vista) "OK, Widge... uhh... Gadgets, CHECK! Transparencies, CHECK! Hi-Res Icons, CHECK! Faster you scum! [whips cracking] My Daschund can write better code than that"!
Linux: (Red Hat) [waiting in the wings, quietly sticks pins into Windows-shaped voodoo doll]

Now, I realize that Microsoft isn't going belly-up anytime soon. But they're the richest company in the world and are on 94% of computers out there. They should be taking us to new wonderful places with technology. But instead all they seem to do is react and bully.