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Coolness!

whats the prize once the virus count hits 100 000... a mac mini?
like ostriches with their heads in the sand...

A quick trip to BoingBoing.net's publicly-available stats page for a real world example, backs the installed base figures up by revealing an interesting figure: 14.5 % of their visitors so far this month are using Macs.

Yeah, except if you're going to be touting numbers, how many of those computers are running OS X? Certainly not 100% or a number even close to that. And there are plenty of issues with pre-X Mac OSes

News from The Bangkok Post. What next MDN, Mac news from The Ethiopian Examiner?

Get your apple news round the world:
http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&ned=us&q=apple&btnG=Search+News

Clark-

Yeah! I agree. Only American's who know that they are better than everyone else should be able to write about Apple. Everyone else is just a waste of oxygen.

*satire*

Cpt. Obvious
Mar 12, 05 - 11:04 am
A quick trip to BoingBoing.net's publicly-available stats page for a real world example, backs the installed base figures up by revealing an interesting figure: 14.5 % of their visitors so far this month are using Macs.

Yeah, except if you're going to be touting numbers, how many of those computers are running OS X? Certainly not 100% or a number even close to that. And there are plenty of issues with pre-X Mac OS's

If you break out the stats by OS type MAC 14.5% of the total boingboing.net hits Mac OS X 13.1% and Mac OS 1.3% . So of all Mac hits 9.5% are not Mac OS X hits so 90.5% are OSX. Neat I say that the conversion to OSX is almost complete.
this is the link to the stats break out page
http://boingboing.net/stats/awstats.boingboing.net.osdetail.html

".........And there are plenty of issues with pre-X Mac OSes..."

Cpt. Obvious....

Yeah, but the issures arent viruses or malware...I read somewhere that there are something like 68 (or so) viruses for Classic Macs "in the wild".... and the last one hasn't been seen since 1995 (or thereabouts)

I happen to have a Mac running OS 9.x on my network (online)... and I dont worry about malware attacking it either....

This is a testament to how well the Mac OS is (now) as far as security goes.... and how well the Mac OS has been in the past...

Can the same thing be said about the WinDoze platform ??

uhhh... I think not..

my god someone's twigged on

Hmmm, 14.5% on Macs but only 8% on Safari. I wonder how many mac people have their browser "cloaked" to look like they are on a windows machine. I do that sometimes - mostly when a site tells me it won't work for the Macintosh. The thing is, a LOT of times it DOES work on my Mac - after I set the user agent to IE 6 on Windows.

MW - worked

This is misleading.
Technically, a trojan could gain access by prompting a user for an Admin password. Most people would just blindly give their password in order to get a certain piece of software to install...

How many people actually check the requestor information on the Admin password dialog? And even if they do, and the requestor is unfamiliar (which is often the case) aren't they inclined to give their password anyway, so that they can install their new fangled extension? (like a cool trackpad scrolling tool or some such)

This is really not an argument against trojans. Spyware, yes. Trojans no.

"Most people would just blindly give their password in order to get a certain piece of software to install..."

If someone opens the door for strangers, they deserve what happens. (FWIW, I don't see why anything besides a system update needs admin access in the first place).

Mac OS X is secure, but it isn't stupid-proof. There should be a book "Mac OS X Security for Dummies". Better yet, Apple should bundle a manual or PDF covering basic security (if they don't already).

68,736…68.737…68,738…you get the idea. Counting Windows viruses is like watching the score on a pinball machine.

So HOW MUCH LONGER can the press keep harping on the miniscule 'marketshare' when CLEARLY the numbers need to be moved up?

Where exactly? I don't know, but it sure ain't 2%.

Apple or someone needs to do a serious study of 'marketshare' and 'installed base' or whatever it takes to get the computer buying public even MORE of a comfort factor in buying Apple. And as encouragement to developers to invest time in the Mac platform.

Everything has POINTED to a larger base of users, but no one wanted to connect the dots.

More people will buy Mac if they don't feel as if they are out in the wilderness.

dv

My anti-virus software for Winbloze is shaking in anger

... but I'm too stupid to know that something better exists, so I'll just live with it. Think of all the cool Wal-Mart crap I can buy if I save money by buying a Dell.

Note: This post is highly sarcastic.

your windows box sucks, arod is a windows user (i dont really know that)

All you viruses are belong to us!

Total market domination. We have the monopoly on viruses.

I'm not sure about all of the numbers that fly around, but I wrote a small piece of software to be used in a first year university class of about 1,000 biology students here in Australia. I wrote it on a Mac, of course, to work on the Safari and Firefox browsers. I did a quick survey in the first class to see how many students used either Firefox on a PC or Safari or Firefox on a Mac. Less than 1% of the students indicated that they use Macs and less than 2% indicated that they use Firefox. Firefox use among the students is now about 90%. The Mac numbers will be more difficult to influence.

These low numbers are probably biased by reluctance of students to raise their hands, but the numbers certainly did not look like 14%

68,000 viruses, eh?
So where´d they all go?
I never got any on my peecee?

Kind of like saying that in the history of mankind there have been 1 gazillion strains of flu...

snerkly,

You think you are having trouble catching one, try using a Mac. There isn't a single virus out in the wild for OS X.

I sit here with no firewall or anti virus software, using OS X, with a broadband connection, and I wait, and I wait, and I wait, and I wait.

My Mac has been on, 24/7, for about 6 months without a reboot and I wait, and I wait, and I wait, and I wait.

Try doing that with your peesee, you'll find most of those 68,000 viruses.

The U.S. has around 15,000 murders a year by people using guns, Germany about 20 (I don´t have the exact number - Japan, Britain about the same low number)....
are you all going to move to Germany for fear of being murdered by a gun in the U.S.????

I doubt it. Same thing with PC owners moving to a Mac because of a virus. (Own mac and peecees - viruses never effected us here - other than I had to purchase virus software for peecee.)

Wheezo sez:

"The U.S. has around 15,000 murders a year by people using guns, Germany about 20 (I don´t have the exact number - Japan, Britain about the same low number)....
are you all going to move to Germany for fear of being murdered by a gun in the U.S.????"

No, because you don't get just 'a little dead'. And death is final and unchangeable. No one really believes that they will be a victim of gunshot death, but once it happens it can't be rectified. Unlike viruses which happen over a period of time, and can nudge you into taking different steps. Like buying a Macintosh.

DV

"68,736 Microsoft Windows viruses vs. zero for Apple Mac's OS X"


2 Billion PC's without security through obscurity VS. 25 Million Macs with security through obscurity. Do the math.

And dont give me the "apple's security through obscurity is a myth" BS either. Apple has had MORE Security issues this year than MS has.

And, As it says on all apple security updates:
"For the protection of our customers, Apple does not disclose, discuss or confirm security issues until a full investigation has occurred and any necessary patches or releases are available."

http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=61798

Oh yeah, And unless your just a complete moron, and you dont "read before you click" then you deserve a virus.

MW "Anti" as in Anti-Virus isn't needed unless your a complete dumbass.

Oh and AL, comon with the no reboot in six months..thats BS..My Brand New G5 was up for about 3 weeks before I had to reboot it..Dont you do updates too?(they require a reboot)

Either
a) you dont really *use* your mac but just surf and check email.
b) you really do wait and wait and wait 5 months before you use it..

Are you a fisherman?

Hey Wheezo!

If you lived in a neighbourhood with a high murder rate and you could afford to get out you sure as hell would.

You can afford to switch to a Mac. Their TCO over the life of the machine plus the cost of the productivity software needed is lower than just the TCO of a PC of equivalent power and usefulness.

KernelPanic, I think it's Medication Time.

Our Xserve in work has an uptime of 7 months, 22 days.
Not everyone updates software. Our Xserve works perfectly, so why update it?

I remember saying that a long time ago when we used solaris. Keep that mentality dude.

"If it aint broke don't fix it" can be a double edged sword. And besides, thats an xServe. The OS's are pretty different.

"Don't Panic" KernelPanic, just look for a towel!

It surely sounds like you are clutching for straws ...

Of course there is some security to be had through obscurity, it is not
what you can rely on. Apple is being sensible about not disclosing security concerns until it has been fully investigated; of course there are pros and cons to this too.

Of more import, is the fact that Mac OS X is fundamentally more well structured as an OS to support decent levels of security. Not foolproof but not the basket case Windows is. If only Windows NT had inherited the levels of security that VMS had, then you might have something to talk about. The underpinnings of Mac OS X, are publicly available as Darwin. So any weaknesses should be easier to discover (and fix) since the Mac OS X is so well structured and documented.

In any case, the real "story" (my MW) is that, in the real world, it is inherently safer to do computing on a Mac (or a VMS system or Unix ... in that rough order) than to play virus roulette with a Windows virus-honeypot! I haven't had an active computer virus since 1980 ... well I guess that means never!

Windows users say they have more software, well it seems that they have more
viruses as well. Maybe I/we should be jelous that they have so much.

But then again maybe not.

As a Windows XP user who is sick and tired of viruses, spyware, and adware, let me assure you MacAddicts of something:

We don't know that Macs don't have viruses.

No really, we don't.

Until last month, I thought Macs had the same problems with viruses as I did.

Until last month, I thought Macs had anti-virus programs (you mean there isn't a single one? Woah).

For me, the Number One Reason to use Mac instead of Windows would be the virus issue, and Apple should get to work advertising that fact.

http://www.symantecstore.com/dr/sat3/ec_MAIN.Entry10?V1=533864&PN=1&SP=10023&xid=27685&CID=0&DSP;=&CUR=826&PGRP=0&CACHE_ID=163912 <- Should Norton stop selling this then?