Forbidden Fruit

Last week, Nancy and I took some furniture to my stepson. On the way home, we stopped at The Mall at Millenia for dinner. I had a Giro. I like Giros (or, would it be Giri?). After that, we walked around so I could do my usually grumbling at all the over-consumers, so I could justifiy my lack of income. Anytime we go to the Millenia Mall, we stop by the Apple store.

(Image from Flickr - not me)

This is about how crowded the Apple store at the mall usually is. I've been to the mall a few times, and many of the other store may have few, if any, customers, Apple is always crowded. I'm willing to be they have people waiting at opening, and must do 'last call' a few times before closing at night.


It easy to see why Apple has such a cult status. Even I get drawn in to the beautiful machines. Deux ex machina. The sleek, smooth curves, wonderful lines....SEE! There it goes. The reality distortion field is real. I'm willing to be its alien technology.

Apple does make good equipment. Their OSX operating system isn't half bad either. Far better than Windows. They also have programs like Garage Band, iMovie, and other such iLife stuff that make content creation very easy. When it comes to content creation, OSX is way past the rest of the bunch. Even Microsoft programs seem to look and work better on OSX. Most people think they need MS Office, but NeoOffice works just fine, and writes in .doc format. OpenOffice.org should soon have a native aqua version for OSX.

Content creation is where the future of the internet is moving. Content for entertainment, news, and especially education. The easier it is for anyone to make content, the easier it will be to become an 'internet star'. Apple is making the path to internet stardom almost thoughtless. While businesses are moving to collaborative environments -where the emphasis on good hardware is greatly reduced- content creators will still need good hardware. For business, a thin client will do, but to record, edit, and publish an audio or video lecture on Quantum physics, you'll need high quality equipment. Even business will need good content creators. Apple is in the lead on content creation.

It always takes me great strength to walk out of the Apple store. Being an Ubuntu fan boy, it's still difficult to leave. Even while walking away, I hear myself saying things like, "Well, it is based on FreeBSD", and "There's lots of Open Source software for OSX", and "I could really use it for (insert rationalization here)", and other such nonsense. In reality, without the distortion field, I covet those beautiful machines.