“Researchers have discovered that Apple’s new operating system, codenamed Leopard, will create 0 new jobs when it is launched early next year,” Tim Gaden writes for APC Magazine.
“This research (which was not commissioned by Apple) stands in sharp contrast to the findings of an industry report (commissioned by Microsoft) that Vista’s release will create 100,000 new jobs in tech support and help desk positions,” Gaden writes.
Gaden writes, “While Vista seems set to impact on the economy by creating more IT support jobs to fix the broken or frozen computers of other employees, research shows that Apple will take a different path.”
Gaden writes, “Apple is well known for its award-winning innovation. With Leopard’s release Apple will continue an innovative strategy of impacting on the economy by increasing individual productivity. It will let people get more of their own work done, faster and smarter, without the need for endless calls to tech support, compatibility hassles, driver problems or time wasted defending their PCs from viruses and trojans.”
Full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Ooh, scathing. We love it!
The desktop market has entered the dark ages, and it’s going to be in the dark ages for the next 10 years… Eventually, Microsoft will crumble because of complacency, and maybe some new things will grow… – Steve Jobs, February 1996
Mac OS X. Welcome to the renaissance.
Related articles:
Apple CEO Steve Jobs’ ultimate goal: ‘to take back the computer business from Microsoft’ – June 16, 2005
While there’s NO question OS X is, and will be continue to be, superior to any version of Doze for years, this article reads like a “put on” to me. It just seems very tongue in cheek.
Vista will be good for the economy because it will create new jobs.
Leopard will be good for the economy because it will increase productivity.
I’ll go with the latter.
Windows Vista will be great. I forsee less work for IT departments, as the new security features will elminate all the security problems I now face.
theloniousMac,
Your points are well made. I’ve been lucky enough to have worked in one company that was all Macs, but other than that, every company I’ve worked in so far, I’ve taken from 1 Mac (often my own) to dozens of Macs. I’ve been in the creatvie and operational ends of the broadcasting and film post production workforce for 2.5 decades.
Here’s what I’m getting to: One of the biggest problems I’ve had using Macs in the workplace has been that the IT people are incapabile and/or unwilling to provide ANY support for the Macintosh. This always leaves me having to provide desktop support (yes some is always required in the real world, even on Macs), and still keep up with the job I was actually hired to do. In a couple of situations, including my current employer, I’ve setup network services such as XSAN. For a non-IT person (heck even for a PRO IT person) this takes an incredible effort in research and then to implement and trouble shoot. This last setup went well, but the 70 and 80 hour weeks left me all but used up – I still had to stay caught up with my actual work. When a new person comes in, or a position is vacated and refilled there is an immediate need for desktop level support, and some network updating that takes place with each personal change.
Now for the otherside of the coin. Since all but one of the places I’ve worked has been Windows based, what I’ve noticed is that there are a lot of high school kids and college students in many many IT depts., even running IT departments. Having gotten to know many of these fellow employees what I’ve discovered is that the company saves bundles of money not hiring degreed pros. My belief is that this imaginary meccah of high pay for Windows IT pros only exists in the very largests corps., and even there IT salaries are low-balled by hiring underqualified personel for all but the most critical jobs.
Here’s another bit of perspective, and I know this is heresy, but I’m going to say it anyway, if 95% of the planet were on OS X there would be lots of IT positions available, and more or less, the same set of circumstances would exist in reverse. One reason it costs companies that use the Mac less is simply because they expect the users to support themselves. This creates a completely surreal perspective on what it really takes in dollars and cents to operate Macs. Let me quicly add that, I absolutely believe that it definitely costs less for a company to own and operate Macs, but until Macs become more prominent in the enterprise market place we won’t really know what it does cost to operate Macs, professionaly.
From where I sit, the enterprise workplace is already in dire need of professional Macintosh IT personel. Sadly, part of the cost for the priveledge of using something other than Windows in the workplace is that you support your own desktop, and often times the desktops of others if you happen to be the most knowledgeable person on staff for that other-than-Windows platform. This creates the false impression that Pro Mac IT people are not need – after 25 years in the work force I can tell you that I see this as patent misinformation.
The Mac needs to continue to be pushed into the enterprise market place so that the real need for real Mac IT Pros can be more clearly demonstrated.
Until the alleged deficiencies of VISTA are proven, a majority of you here should drink a tall glass of shut-the-hell-up.
Dream on Brad.
Here’s a clue. Microsoft said XP was going to be more secure in 2001. Today it needs a software firewall that still has open ports for Microsoft’s software validation.
If Microsoft says a product is more secure, they are lying.
Instead of attempting to maintain PCs, more IT guys should be learning to program cool software for MacOS X. Every Windows machine that’s waiting for an IT guy to get his hands on it is a waste of efficiency, money and productivity in American business.
If OSX is such a cheap alternative that supposedly requires little or no IT support, then why aren’t businesses embracing it wholeheartedly? It would seem like a no brainer, right?
Can’t believe no-one noticed the BSOD on the screen next to the Windows placard!
Hey KoolAid…
When will Vista be available to all? Just curious as to when I can quit drinking this glass of shut the hell up.
As for the article…delicious, tasty, very satisfying.
Re: ‘Don’t pass the koolaid’:
ICT is not going to make themselves irrelevant, they play the part of the advisor and the provider at the same time, this is fatal.
With their ‘skills’ they are protecting the status quo. They do not serve the interests of the company but themsleves, in many cases outsource companies.
For all your smart-ass, pithy, snarky remarks, none of you can answer the fundamental question: if OSX is so much superior than why isn’t it being adopted by businesses world-wide?
Hey Kool Aid….
My bet is you are a Windows IT guy…. and your company is potentially looking at macs…. or you are gloating about your job security when Vista finally arrives…. or your have your head in the sand and have not read one of the thoursands of pieces of info about the problems with Vista already….. any way you cut it… you don’t belong posting on this site….
I can think of at least one billion dollar global company that uses Macs in its business activities! Apple Computer.
punkinhead: one more who can’t answer the fundamental question. Go play with you ipod.
Kool-Aid,
Snarky, smirky, or whatever aside…I cannot answer your question, but I often ask myself the same.
Perhaps it’s just plain complacency. Who knows. All I can do is compare life with Mac to life with Wndows a few years back and weigh the experiences. Zero problems with my Macs…zip….nada. With Windows it was a disaster every week.
Good talk, Kool-Aid. Good talk.
We could also generate more trauma surgeons if the Air Force would drop a JDAM per night on some random American city. It would also create more jobs in the undertaker community.
Beats me why so many people believe in a god unable to present himself, unwilling to answer pleas, and willing to condemn people to eternal suffering. But they do anyway, in the same way many buy a lottery ticket, dazzled by the millions of prize money while blind to its actual value, probability-wise. As for Windows, when you have older windows pcs and IT staff, change is very difficult.
Heh, Heh – yeah, the BSOD is the first thing I noticed. Very apt in the context of the article.
Re: Vista security – no one can “declare” any software secure. Security is demonstrated over time by the number of “in the wild” exploits that effect the platform. Vulnerabilities are not exploits. Lab “proof of concept” exploits that require keyboard access to the machine are more indications of software flaws than structural problems with platform security. In this regard OS X (and for that matter, Linux)is clearly superior to WinXP. For Vista, the clock will really start ticking when it is generally available to the public at the end of January.
To KoolAid:
The answer is easy, inertia. In physics this is described by F=MA, force is proportional to the mass times the rate of change (of speed, in this case). For a given mass, the faster you need change, the more force required.
In IT, the mass is the user base and supporting infrastructure. The change is technological change (OS, applications, networking) and the force is the business requirement that needs the change to occur (competitiveness, security, growth, etc.). The mass produces the resistance to change because it represents hardware and knowledge, both of which must be either replaced or expanded.
That is the long explaination why enterprises established on the Windows platform are likely to remain that way for some time. It is certainly possilbe that they could migrate to another platform, but the change would require years unless some extreme force was applied that would require the change.
I was at a cocktail party once-IT guy gloating about Mac obscurity. I pointed out that a local university, when switching to Mac, trimmed IT staff from 12 to 2.
Shut him right up.
Macaday, you took the words out of my mouth.
I think that Jobs quote is the REAL story.
Koolaid,
The simple answer is that Microsoft Certified IT guys make most of the computer purchasing and deployment decisions.
They are not about to buy something that would require them to retrain themselves, their computer users and their IT staff and eventually reduce the size of their power base, their kingdom. They cannot erode their indispensability.
The best part of the referenced article is the accompanying photo of the Blue Screen of Death on a Vista demo computer.
“The simple answer is that Microsoft Certified IT guys make most of the computer purchasing and deployment decisions.”
Wow, I didn’t realize they wielded such power to the point of world domination.
“The desktop market has entered the dark ages, and it’s going to be in the dark ages for the next 10 years… Eventually, Microsoft will crumble because of complacency, and maybe some new things will grow… – Steve Jobs, February 1996”
“That’s one heck of a prescient quote from Steve Jobs.. It’s very hard to overestimate the guy.”
How? Microsoft still dominates, Apple has less market share than when he made that quote, Vista has already sold more copies than all Macs in existence.
When exactly is this Microsoft “Crumbling” going to happen? Next week? The week after?