I just finished writing a letter. I have copied it and posted it here for you guys to check out as well.
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Re: Apple needs more of the old Magic
Undoubtedly, you have received a flood of email. Both reactionary and angry letters from Mac Users as well as more well thought out ones. It tends to happen when the media jumps all over Apple (whether justified or not).
But your latest article I feel, misses the point of many of the elements it brings to light. Commentary that not only can be misconstrued as reactionary itself, but to some as downright misinformed.
The article doesn't really start off very well. Rampant speculation that we as Mac Users expect Steve Jobs to bring about Star-Trekkian technology. Nor, I feel did you really understand exactly how exciting this year's MacWorld Expo in San Francisco turned out to be.
Apple has always focussed on innovation, even if it took a back seat to profits from time to time, but this year a small loss, certainly compared to other hardware and software giants, was nothing to become upset about. Sure, it's disheartening when your favourite company doesn't get to jot down numbers in black ink, but a slow economy certainly should be considered a factor here. Every other company involved in computer hardware and software sales appears to think so. I don't see why Apple should be excluded from that club merely because it doesn't follow the Microsoftian way.
Rumours are just that. Rumours. Sure, it's fun to guess, to stretch ones precognitive abilities, to see if your predictions of cool new announcements and upgrades is accurate. But to think the Mac Faithful shed tears of angst when something doesn't come about... well, it sounds like you were just trolling for a reaction.
Apple's announcements held quite a bit of weight this year. More than usual considering the somewhat downbeat nature of the previous Expo held in July last year. The laptop announcements hold quite a bit of potential. The first ever 17" screen full-featured laptop and probably the first full-featured 12" laptop (by full featured, it means it has everything you would need in a desktop as well as portability). and a remarkable price are nothing to dismiss out of hand. neither was the introduction of the Airport Extreme following the 802.11g standard or Bluetooth compatibility in every G4 machine.
The fact that you dismiss out of hand the iPod-ready jacket as
"Cool? Definitely. But when it comes to earth-moving products that might drive revenue or profit growth for Apple in the near to medium term, Macworld had very little to offer." seems to miss the point of the announcement. Apple is working with 3rd-party companies to develop products and ideas it integrate current technologies as well as future ones. The jacket may be a niche market, but what other ideas will spring forth in the next 11+ months?
The software announcements were also quite substantial. iTunes 3 (which has been out for months now) is being joined by a tightly integrated iPhoto 2, iMovie 3 and (the one you missed in your article) iDVD 3. All upgrades to popular and (except for iDVD 3) free for download as of their release date of January 25th. iDVD (which weighs in at about 2GB, due to the amount of extra stuff it comes with) will be available in the iLife package that same day. Significant? Perhaps not to the average PC User who doesn't know much beyond the name of the software, but to someone who has actually taken a look or even used these products, it will be a step further as these four iApps are tightly interconnected to provide ease of use even greater than their predecessors. And that doesn't even take into consideration the improvements a version number increase adds to these programs.
You dismiss KeyNote and Safari right away. A shame since you obviously don't understand their significance. KeyNote is a PowerPoint with actual power under the hood. It takes advantage of OS X's Quartz Rendering and provides complete compatibility with all the top PowerPoint-like file types. It has begun fulfilling on the promises that Microsoft's PowerPoint has always failed to do on the Mac.
Safari has been an unmitigated success within 24 hours. Already the most downloaded free application from Apple's site, it's poised to become the replacement to Microsoft's Internet Explorer for many Mac Users, considering Microsoft hasn't bothered more than a point-oh upgrade in their buggy, crash-prone browser in more than a year and a half. It also has been rated as faster, more streamlined, and more W3C compliant that Internet Explorer while still at it's beta stage. Up until now, Internet Explorer could sit on their share of the browser pie and claim to be the victor, since it's competition was either nowhere near as compliant (OmniWeb and iCab) or still in beta itself (Chimera and Mozilla). AOL Time Warner's Netscape isn't even a blip on the radar, so why you chose to include it in your article baffles me. They are not connected to the gecko-based Mac browsers that are impressing Mac Users around the globe.
"As for the software announcements, while Keynote and Safari are nice additions to the Mac world, even the most devoted fan would have a hard time believing Apple can actually compete with PowerPoint or Internet Explorer at this point. " Again you fail to see the obvious. These products already are showing promise to compete against Microsoft's Mac offerings. In reality, the majority of Mac Users are actively seeking an alternative to anything and everything Microsoft.
In one of his recent postings, journalist Andy Inhatko watched as dozens upon dozens of people grabbed up their free copies of KeyNote right after Steve Jobs left the stage and converted their own PowerPoint presentations to the new software on the spot. As well, Safari having already exceeded 500,000 downloads by the weekend seems to put credence in the idea that already 10% of the Mac OS X using population has jumped at the chance to use a non-Microsoft browser days after it was released and while it is still officially in beta.
"It's no surprise that the day before Steve Jobs's keynote speech, Merrill Lynch put out a "sell" recommendation on the stock, since..." No, it's not a surprise. However, connecting the two incidents seems rather amateurish. Do you really believe Merrill Lynch had based their decision on Steve Job's as yet unspoken Keynote speech? Number were involved in their consideration, not words.
This years MWSF Expo, unlike the financial report, was far from disappointing. And if this is how Steve Jobs starts off the year 2003, I suspect we'll be in for more exciting and interesting announcements throughout the year.
Hopefully you will be able to see that next time you write an Apple-themed article.
Robert Hammond
Adobe Support Technician and Mac Enthusiast
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Will it amount to anything? Not likely. But I feel a bit better now...
