Paul Murphy writes for LinuxInsider, “What differentiates a Mac user from a PC user, assuming the usage decision is uncoerced by an employer? My wife, a reformed PC user (always the most merciless of evangelists), answered that question with a list straight from Jeff Foxworthy:
– You think virus protection is what you get a flu shot for.
– You actually make a conscious choice in selecting your Web browser and presentation software.
– You have suppressed a smile at the sound of another user rebooting their computer for the fifth time that day.
– You dress up in a black turtleneck and jeans to go out at Halloween.
– You’ve never sworn about a service pack.
– You have a Bush-Cheney sticker on your Volvo.
“OK, one of those is a ringer — but the question itself is interesting: what individual characteristics differentiate the two communities? Listen to the people who made the PC versus Macintosh decision for themselves and it’s pretty clear that the PC people get heavily vested in their knowledge of the machine and whatever Windows variant they have or aspire to, while the Mac people tend to assume the machine and talk about what they do with it,” Murphy writes. “That’s a very big difference, but what’s behind it?”
“One idea is that the Mac user’s focus on the applications is reasonable, and that the PC people whose focus is on the machine or the OS are really suffering Stockholm Syndrome — investing in the machine and emotionally bonding with the PC community rather than the professional one defined by the application as a survival strategy for the persona,” Murphy writes.
MacDailyNews Note: See SteveJack’s seminal article “Defending Windows over Mac a sign of mental illness” for more on how Windows users suffer from Stockholm Syndrome and the related Cognitive Dissonance.
Murphy continues, “Another idea comes from A. H. Maslow’s Theory of Human Motivation (Psychology Review, 1943). His idea was that people act to satisfy the highest unmet need in a hierarchy of needs with the basic physiological needs at the bottom and self-actualization at the top. Thus, his way of looking at the difference in behavior would be to say that the Mac user’s basic physiological needs have been met — after all they can assume that the thing works — and so their focus can move to meeting self-actualization and other higher level needs more closely tied to the person’s professional interests.”
Full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Mac OS X stays out of your way, unobtrusively allowing users to get work done, while Windows XP is constantly in your face demanding things, impeding productivity. Users who use both know this is so. Mac-only users surmise it. Windows-only users will scream bloody hell, but that doesn’t alter the truth. And Windows-to-Mac switchers will swear to this as fact in a court of law.
“- You have a Bush-Cheney sticker on your Volvo.”
Rediculous.
a) You have an Apple sticker.
b) You certainly don’t drive anything as ugly as a Volvo.
Then there’s those of us old-timers who have the “I’d rather be driving a Macintosh” bumper sticker…
(Reference: Back in 1984, Apple had a “test drive a Macintosh” promotion where you could ‘rent’ a Mac for a month to try it out.)
Well, as a staunch Republican, I guess I should stop using the Mac since I’m apparently not “open-minded.” I guess I’ll go buy my PC later today… Windows here I come.
What I’ve found is that the difference between Mac users and PC users is simple and straightforward:
Software versus hardware.
Fun example, from a PC using friend: Years ago, when CD-ROM drives were a new thing, my friend spent a weekend installing a CD-ROM drive into his PC. He had to figure out all the PC things that you had to do, install the drivers, etc. etc. He had a good time doing it and by Sunday night, he had a working CD-ROM drive in his PC. On Monday, he told me all about his adventure installing the CD-ROM drive.
This guy also had a Mac that he played around with (the company he worked for had both, so he had snagged a Mac from work) and he decided to see what installing a CD-ROM drive was like. So, next weekend, he took the Apple SCSI CD-ROM drive home, plugged it into the Mac, and it worked. So he threw in a bunch of CDs and played around. On Monday, he old me about some of the cool CDs he’d checked out over the weekend.
This was actually his epiphany, “Because the hardware is so easy, Mac users like cool software. PC users like cool hardware, even if they never get a chance to do anything with it.”
I remember a statistic someplace–I wish I could find it–that Mac users buy more software than PC users. There was another old, but similar, statistic from years ago that Mac users use more software than PC users.
But, generally speaking, Mac users don’t care as much about hardware. Mac users want to do cool things and that means software.
Muddy, while I’m sure your Camaro is “street legal”, I’m sure it isn’t environmentally ethical, given all the combustion compromises necessary to burn that much fossil fuel to generate that much horsepower. Wow, I’m soooooo impressed.
Ronnie when you fall; remember we all said, “have a nice trip.”
I would love to see a Gore Limbaugh joint commercial. Mac: the obvious choice for the right or left. In fact you could have a whole series of “oposites” who use macs.
“b) You certainly don’t drive anything as ugly as a Volvo.”
I’d take a Volvo S70 over any BMW and most Mercedes models. Then again, I run Mac OS X and Windows XP without any problems.
I use both Mac and Windows – I dont consider myself to be split between the two. I am the same user on both machines. This article, whislt amusing, is nonsense. In terms of Maslows Heirarchy of Needs, users of both platforms are already at the top of the pile. Is MacOSX better designed, more stable, more advanced and more enjoyable to use: Yes. Is there some psychological difference amongst PC and Mac users: No. If you want to get into the innards of a Mac there is a lot more to play with than a PC. I am really enjoying learning Unix on my PowerBook lately. Can Windows allow me to get my work done, without hassle: yes sir. If there is something that genuinely differentiates Mac from PC users I would suggest it is that Mac users constantly obses about how good their machines are, wheras PC users just get on with it (viruses permitting …), they are just computers for Christs sake. Get over it.
Make that the Volvo C70.
Dave Hunwick wrote:
“… I equate Mac users with liberals, open minded people thank you.”
What a closed-minded thing to say. Perhaps you’re confusing “open-minded” with “opinionated,” but closed-mindedness prevents you from see that opinionated people inhabit all areas of the political spectrum. As do Mac users.
I have an Apple sticker on my WRX…. it makes it go even faster.
“- You have a Bush-Cheney sticker on your Volvo.”
Geez, can’t you guys read – he said ONE of those was a RINGER.
“I’d take a Volvo S70 over any BMW and most Mercedes models. […] Make that the Volvo C70.”
Eh. It’s pretty boring/conventional.
I’ll admit, I prefer roadsters to four-seaters. The C70 looks pretty standard. I’ll admit, I like it better than any of the BMWs or Mercedes four-seaters. But it isn’t a “Wow! Gotta have it!” design. But the Mercedes SLK-350 looks really good–again, though, it’s sort of unfair comparison.
Freeman Thomas, the guy who designed the Audi TT and is currently at DaimlerChrysler, is the Jonathan Ives of the automobile industry.
The Consumer Report’s 2005 New Car Buying Guide states that most 2005 models of BMW, Mercedes, Volvo, and Volkswagen are reliability nightmares. The best rated luxury cars were Lexus and Acura. I guess we need to change our car analogy.
Oh, and muddy mudskipper, enjoy your crappy Chevy and your crappy Windows box. Hopefully your Camaro is as fast as you say so you can get the hell out of here quicker.
‘Bush-Cheney sticker on a Volvo’
What an idiot.
Everyone knows those stickers only stick to pick-up tailgates.
Dave Hunwick
I equate Mac users with liberals, open minded people thank you.
As a non-liberal, I hate to tell you that many other non-liberals consider “liberals” to be anything but open minded. I find many professed liberals or “progressives” or whatever you want to call them speak about “tolerance” in one breath and refer to their political opposition as “neo cons” “religeous biggots” “hicks” “rednecks” and “gun totin’ country music listening hillbillies.”
I honestly have not found liberals to be very open minded when talking to a non-liberal. Maybe you’ve had different experiences than me, who knows, but I know my experiences are not unique. Hollywood, which admittedly may not be a very good barometer of what general liberals act or think like, tends to be very rude and disrespectful towards conservatives, republicans, and people of faith.
I know many of the crude comments go both ways, but when I see the statements from mainstream liberal politicians, actors, and other public figures, I see a lot more disrespect from the left than the right. Maybe because I’m bias, but I don’t think so.
I will agree that Mac users are not all republicans or majority, nor do they all drive volvos. So I grant you that. But there are many conservatives and republicans who enjoy computers that work. I don’t think it’s a political thing either way.
Uncle Rat
Ronnie when you fall; remember we all said, “have a nice trip.”
What an assinine statement from an ass. Proves my point perfectly. Thanks.
Bennn
they are just computers for Christs sake. Get over it.
There will always be people that obsess over one thing or another, whether it be sports teams, cars, kitchen knives, clothes, shoes, purses, you name it. Since a lot of people spend a lot of their lives in front of their computers, why should those be any different?
Al
Everyone knows those stickers only stick to pick-up tailgates.
Thanks Al, another ignorant comment proving my point. Maybe I was more right than I realised. Are there any truly open-minded liberals out there?
C’mon let’s hear from some of them.
I love my Macs…and my Bush/Cheney sticker on my XTerra SUV. Macs aren’t the tool of the left…it just seems that way.
My pickup doesn’t have a tailgate or a Bush-Cheney sticker. It does have two Apple stickers. I view it as the best analogy (car-wise) to my Mac. I once saw someone putting 2×4’s into their BMW trunk…now THAT was funny! My truck works, and works well. Occasionally it will get a little beat up, but it keeps working well. I’ve hauled trailers, cement block, and yes, it’s even served as a hearse when grandparents passed away far from home, saving the family thousands. It takes everything I throw at it in stride. My Mac does the same thing. I was approached, half way through reading these comments, by my boss who wanted me to check out the Symantec window that popped up on his screen. Yep, he had had a virus. He wanted to know if I’d seen that message. Uh, no.
treadlightly
I was approached, half way through reading these comments, by my boss who wanted me to check out the Symantec window that popped up on his screen.
You’re lucky he didn’t ask you what the hell you were doing posting on this message board on company time. lol
twilightmoon
What I dislike more than anything is having people stick a label on me, thus relegating me to a pre-conceived category so that they can either dismiss me as one of the enemy or accept me into their tribe of group think. What self-respecting person would surrender his integrity and individuality and more importantly, the independence of his own mind, to identify with a particular group?
The fact is I am conservative about some things and liberal about others and I suspect that is true of most people.
P.S. How ironic: My password is “respect”.
Let’s see, I drive a Dodge Ram truck with an Apple sticker on the back window. Sorry though, I don’t have a Bush/Cheney sticker (although I did actually vote for Bush) or even a gun rack anywhere in my truck. So I guess I’m not your stereotypical Mac user, but the last time I checked, part of being a “free thinker” was not to fall for or believe all of the typical stereotypes. It’s really funny that those who proclaim to be so open minded are usually the ones who in reality are usually the least so.
There is no difference between Mac users and PC users.. basically as a result of their pleasant experience with Macs, Mac users are more optimistic and curious about technology, whereas PC users.. having already put the money down for the PC, must defend his/her decision, while inwardly frustrated and irritated, only comforted by the assumption that ,’If Macs had a better marketshare, they’d be hacked daily too…’
With no Mac users around to dispute their inner thoughts, they feel good about their buying decision..
And even if something goes wrong.. you can always turn on CNN to hear about the latest MS Windows patch.. you don’t need a 1-800 help line..
Of course.. that says nothing of the technological and superiority of the Mac which you simply cannot fathom if you’ve never used one..
It just makes sense that the rich guys would have the better product right..?
Right..??