For those Boston Globe readers thinking about switching to Macintosh from Windows in order to free themselves from viruses and worms, Hiawatha Bray offers the following:
“In the past two weeks, an unholy trinity of ‘malware’ — techspeak for malicious computer programs — ran riot on public and private data networks. Two of the three, Blaster and Welchia, took advantage of a known security flaw in Microsoft Corp.’s Windows operating systems, used by more than 90 percent of desktop computers worldwide. The third, SoBig.F, used the notoriously unsecured Internet e-mail system to relay billions of falsely addressed messages bearing copies of itself. But like Blaster and Welchia, SoBig only infects Windows computers. Some experts draw a simple lesson from these events: If you want secure computing, board up your Windows,” writes Bray.
“‘The first and most effective measure you can take to secure your computers is to immediately remove all your Microsoft products and never install them again,'” said Eric Raymond, author of ‘The Art of Unix Programming,'” Bray reports.
Bray continues, “Jeff Jones, senior director of trustworthy computing security at Microsoft Corp., senior director of trustworthy computing security at Microsoft Corp. dismissed claims that rival software is more secure. ‘I think they have as much or more vulnerabilities in the code as any other software,’ Jones said.”
“Besides, switching to other operating systems isn’t easy. Linux will run on the same hardware as Windows, but many users still find it difficult to use. They’d need weeks of training and stacks of manuals to study. The Apple Mac OS only runs on Apple hardware. Users would have to buy entirely new equipment. And despite the Mac’s reputation for ease of use, the transition would still involve a lot of work. Cem Kaner, an attorney and professor of software engineering at Florida Institute of Technology, just made the transition and hated every minute of it. ‘The hassle associated with transferring 6 gigs of e-mail from Windows to the Mac was enormous,’ Kaner said,” Bray writes.
Full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Transferring 6 gigs of email from a Windows machine to a Mac in not an enormous task. Kaner could’ve saved much “hassle” simply by visiting the local Apple Retail Store or checking this simple webpage. And to quote the “senior director of trustworthy computing security at Microsoft Corp.” (a misnomer if ever there was one) dismissing claims that rival software is more secure, without any proof or research, is simply ridiculous. This article does a disservice to its many Windows-using readers who might have had a chance at a better way of computing before they read this piece of tripe. Nobody in their right mind would want to “buy entirely new equipment” in order to go through an “enormous hassle,” now would they? Anyone thinking of switching to a Mac who reads this Bray piece will instantly be safely back in the center of the Windows Reservation. Mission accomplished, Hiawatha. Another fine example of the decline of U.S. “journalism” and why Apple has such trouble increasing market share.
Bray’s email address is: bray@globe.com
The Boston Globe Ombudsman is Christine Chinlund: ombud@globe.com
Letters to the Editor: letter@globe.com (Letters should include the name, address, and daytime telephone number of the writer)
Pissed about Macworld not wanting to come to your second-rate town, Bray? Or are your pockets being lined by Microsoft? I smell fear in this article. Fear that people are waking up.
If only people took as seriously the purchase of the computer as, say, the purchase of their TV or other home entertainment system. Then I’m sure there’d be far more Mac OS users (X or otherwise).
I think that longstanding Apple owners are just better informed people, who, in general, spend more time choosing their computer equipment (and most likely many other purchases).
Then we would likely not have these problems in the first place (at least not the scales recently reported).
As for switching… I would argue that upgrading from an earlier OS like Windows 3.11 to Windows XP would be just as painful as switching from one platform to another. Yes, I’ve done just that…many moons ago.
People are afraid to “make a $1000-$2000 mistake” by switching to Mac They also cannot understand the concept of “sidegrading” their software (pay upgrade price to change platform from Windows to Mac) – they think they have to buy all new Mac versions for full price. Almost all people who buy computers are not experts. They don’t know what to buy. But, they definitely know not to buy a Mac now, thanks to that article from the putrid Globe.
Mr. Bray is actually one of the best technology writers found in newspapers today. If you’ve had a chance to read his stuff for the past 4 years as I have, you will know that he touts and rips apart both M$ and Apple quite equally. You’re viewing the ease of switching from a perspective being a more advanced user, hence making the move wouldn’t be as difficult. Having helped various family members over the last two weeks with these worms and setting other things up, I can attest that a simple thing of moving emails from one computer to another might take a little more patience than most people have.
natis, a total moron could switch from PC to Mac with total ease by using Move2Mac:
http://www.apple.com/switch/howto/move2mac/
Furthermore, natis, Bray KNOWS about Move2Mac, having reviewed it in the past, but somehow fails to mention it in this article where it would have MADE PERFECT SENSE to do so. Why? Why? Why?
Because Bray, for some reason, doesn’t want it known, even though he knows it is NOT HARD to switch. Follow the money.
If the guy was using Outlook on the PC, it is very difficult to transfer 6 GB of mail to the Mac. According the the webpage given that tells you how to do it using a .Mac account, he would have had to go through 1228+ steps (5 MB at a time). Not really easy. Once you are in the MS World they make it very challenging to leave no matter how hard they try to drive their customers away.
I always thought that the best cure for the MS monopoly would be for them to have to open up their file formats. Any changes to those formats would require 6 months notice prior to MS being able to use them in their products. Seems logical. MS could not argue this since they know they make nothing but great products that people love. Competitors would be fine because they could easily read and write those formats, and know the truth about MS products.
he said..
“The Apple Mac OS only runs on Apple hardware. Users would have to buy entirely new equipment.”
and just think… they could use this new hardware for the next 4… 5 years… more than likely they were going to be upgrading their crap windoze machine anyway.
,,,,”And despite the Mac’s reputation for ease of use, the transition would still involve a lot of work. Cem Kaner, an attorney and professor of software engineering at Florida Institute of Technology, just made the transition and hated every minute of it. ‘The hassle associated with transferring 6 gigs of e-mail from Windows to the Mac was enormous,’ Kaner said,” Bray writes….”
who in their right mind would have 6GB of mail to move it they did switch?
Switching is very hard for most people. Most people have no idea of how to use their computers and rely on a local expert (one of their kids, a neighbor, co-worker, etc) for support. The relative rareness of Macs combined with widespread misunderstandings (many of the people I know think “you can’t get the Internet on a Mac”) make it difficult for Apple.
The AppleStore concept was probably designed to counter this … an attractive non-confrontational place where people know they can get knowledgeable support. Last week I ran into a couple who were looking at Macs because their daughter is off to college next month and they don’t have anyone to support their PC (which they are giving to her).
It is very difficult for Apple to offer enough to overcome the mindset – “but there is no one who can help me” (false as the image may be)
Everyone, and I do mean everyone — not just Mac users, needs to write to Mr. Bray and the other addresses written above and complain in specific detail about this piece. Mr. Bray for many, many years has been a blatant pro Windows fanatic all the while claiming the is a neutral observer and reporter on the computer industry. This type of shady journalism should enrage every reader not just Mac users.
The only way to get him to quite this kind of crap down is to inudate not only him but also his editor and others above him in the system. This was done in the late 90s by the Mac users and he tempered his misleading articles for a few years. I believe he has forgotten that lesson. He needs another dose.
C’mon guys. You’re being typical Apple heads in wanting this article *about viruses* to focus on methods for switching to the Mac. That is not the point of his article! Mr. Bray is an excellent tech writer and has been a stong tell-it-like-it-is voice on both sides of Mac v. PC. He initailly slammed the iMac in 1998 and a couple years later wrote a mea culpa.
At least he is talking to people who say “ditch MS altogether” which is pretty rare in most tech articles.
Stop wanting a Switch piece when that isn’t the author’s point.
For most people, the hardest part of switching is understanding that it is not hard to switch. Bray is way off base.
And if you have 6GB of mail to move, then you have bigger problems – like stacks of thousands of old magazines throughout your house. Good grief. Ever heard of archiving?
6 GB of mail? 6 GB of mail?? 6 GB of mail???
Does he still have the first email message ever sent to him??? Why keep that much mail in the first place? Oh, well, the PC mind never ceases to amaze me. Surely he should remember “Move2Mac” software
<<If the guy was using Outlook on the PC, it is very difficult to transfer 6 GB of mail to the Mac.>>
Umm, no it’s not. Outlook2Mac is a $10 piece of shareware that did the trick for me when I switched a few months back. It was extremely painless, fast and easy to move everything into Entourage (and it works with Apple Mail too). Granted, I only had about 200MB of mail and not 6GB to transfer over, but the concept remains the same.
It was certainly NOT a major struggle for me to switch myself and it really makes me wonder why all of this FUD about it remains out there. For those who need some hand holding, David Pogue has a great book out there called “Switching to the Mac” and it pretty much spells out everything. Trust me, as a recent “switcher” myself, it really, really isn’t that hard. I put it off for many months because I believed the myths that it would be so painful and difficult. It certainly isn’t nearly as bad as most people, including the author of this newspaper article, make it seem…
http://www.littlemachines.com/index.html
http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/switchmacmm/
It’s hard to move that much data cos’ it’s Windows. When I want to move gigs of information, I simply grab a firewire cable and hook up my two macs. Try doing that with Windows. that’s the one thing that I never understood about Microcrap Winblows, there never is an easy way to transfer large amounts of files. And don’t even try mentioning ethernet cable or ethernet itself. WAY too slow.
Moving your email and other data from Windows to Mac is much easier and takes much less time than trying to troubleshoot and fix your computer from the lastest attack of virii.
Personally, $1000 for all new equipment (a Mac), is a VERY small price to pay for the 5+ years of peace-of-mind and no virii crashing.
Bray’s advice would be like advising someone not to undergo cancer surgery because the pain of surgery for 1 day is worse than the pain of the cancer. “Keep the cancer. Everybody has it, and many live long happy lives. If you have surgery, you’ll have pain for an entire day after the surgery, and afterwards you may have no pain but you’ll have a hard time finding other non-cancer people. I heard that many non-cancer people can’t do everything they use to do. You should learn to live with the cancer, like the rest of us, and tolerate its lifelong dull ache.”
Wintel Sufferers are masochists. Let then suffer for they enjoy it. Mac users are too busy to bother – they’re working with their computers, not “working on” them.
I just tried to send an e-mail to the author of this fud-infected article, and it came back undelivered. All of the other e-mails I have sent out this morning went out just fine. I wonder if this is a dodge by the Globe.
Why is this written this way? In order to stop people from considering moving from Windows to another platform, ie. Mac or Linux. Why does Bray lie in order to keep people using Windows? Why?
Adam Smith,
Probably Bray the Wintel dolt’s email box is stuffed full of Sobig.F crap and his quota has been exceeded. Bray should get another job. He really sucks at his current one.
Bray is a fine tech journalist! This is a good piece! Yes he probably should have mentioned something about 6GB being unusual and maybe given an example of someone who made the switch easier but honestly, stop jumping all over him for not talking about Macs for 10 paragraphs.
This is an article about the massive amount of worms and how MS is partly to blame. Take it for what it is. Whatever, this is the worst mac-troll board I’ve seen. Back to the relative sanity of SpyMac etc.
Orion,
Please use your head.
Bray knows about Move2Mac, having reviewed it in the past, but somehow fails to mention it in this article where it would have made perfect sense to do so. Why? Because Bray, for some reason, doesn’t want it known, even though he knows it is not hard to switch. Follow the money. Bray is not a journalist as evidenced by this article.
I seem to remember Microsoft paying columnists to write pro-Microsoft columns a few years back when all the monopoly trouble started. It sounds like they’re at it again. They get a couple weeks of bad PR from the security holes in their OS, so they start making calls to all of their bought-and-paid-for columnists to start churning out columns on how it’s really not any greener on the other side.
Why switch. Use both
After reading many of the comments to this article, I thought I would pass along my experience. I use a PC and I have not had one problem with viruses or worms. It is a Sony laptop with XP home. I surf the internet daily, send and receive emails daily. My children use the computer to do the same as well. I have never patched or updated my laptop. It has been running perfectly. How do I do all this. Well, I came to the conclusion that this virus mess was never going to be straightened out and I am too busy to mess with all the patching. So my strategy was simple. I have a Mac with OS X which is my digital hub and network connection. Runs beautifully and reliably. With it I surf the web, email and connect all my digital devices. Is’nt this all that most of us want to do anyway? My Sony laptop? I use it to run any of the windows only stuff. IT IS NEVER CONNECTED TO A NETWORK. (btw – many of you complain about the cost of Mac ownership and yet you own several PC’s. For $799 you can get a Mac that is 4 times more “powerful” than what I use. I am a fairly sophistcated user and my little aging iMac is still serving me extremely well. Incidently, the $799 price includes all the necessary software)
It is really just a matter of common sense. If I had to become an auto mechanic in order to drive my car, well, I would say I’d have to switch to some other mode of transportation.
With Mac OS X I am using a sophisticated UNIX system. How much do I know about UNIX? I can spell it. How many problems have I had? Zilch! How many pleasures? Untold. It gets me there and back in style and never ceases to amaze me. I am happy.
Windows should be required to carry a warning. WARNING: CONNECTING THIS PC TO A NETWORK MAY BE HAZARDOUS TO YOUR HEALTH.
rrl:
That’s a new angle. Use Macs as a firewall for PC’s! Apple could use this as a Trojan horse to get Macs into corporate IT departments.