“Have you heard? Microsoft has got a new operating system! It’s called Windows Vista! It even has a new slogan! ‘The Wow starts now!’ CNET.com has just reviewed it! Oh, wait. They describe it as ‘essentially warmed over Windows XP,’ and say there’s ‘no compelling reason to upgrade,'” Michael Parsons reports for The Times. “The good news? ‘It’s stable enough for every day use.’ And if that doesn’t make you go ‘Wow!’ I don’t know what will…”
Parsons reports, “When Microsoft takes five years to upgrade its most important product, the very linchpin of its global business, and tells us we’re going to go ‘Wow!’ when we see it, and then it entirely disappoints, there’s a case to answer. CNET.com says, ‘After more than five years of development, there’s a definite ‘Is that all?’ feeling about Windows Vista.’ C’maan, you expect me to leave that alone?”
Parsons writes, “The truth is for years now, and for many years to come, Bill Gates and his company have ensured that I spend hours of my life in front of computer software that is vulnerable to security attacks, patronising, awkward, and stuck in some tedious 1980s assumptions about who I am and how the world works that was abandoned by more innovative engineers decades ago. And it would be really, really nice if that experience got better.”
“Vista takes us back to the future. It’s 1985: Michael J. Fox is a time traveller in white sneakers, we’re listening to a soundtrack USA for Africa singing We Are the World, swigging a New Coke and wondering why it tastes so weird,” Parsons writes. “Good times, no doubt, but do we really want to relive them?”
“I know where I have to go if I want a real time machine. Apple has a long history of presenting its products as though they came from the future, and setting aside the actual merits of the products (as though Apple fanbois care about that), there’s no question that Steve can at least create the pleasant perfume of futurity,” Parsons writes.
MacDailyNews Take: Those who have never used a Mac cannot imagine what we Mac users already know and so they are reduced to fumbling about, blaming marketing, regurgitating myths and other nonsense. People who use both Macs and Windows overwhelmingly choose Macs. People who only use Windows overwhelmingly choose, er, Windows – while making all sorts of ignorant claims about Macs (read on).
Parsons continues, “I don’t know if you’re bored of the Apple/Microsoft thing. Lord knows I am, which is why it would have been so great if Vista had closed the gap between Apple’s boutique, expensive computers which often have trouble integrating into corporate environments, and PCs which are part of Microsoft’s enormous ecosystem of cheap and cheerless good-enough computers that for various historical reasons everyone has ended up having to use but no one particularly likes.”
MacDailyNews Take: Macs are actually less expensive than PCs of comparable specs. Just because Apple refuses to litter the market and handicap their customers with worthless, stripped-down, bottom-end $399 garbage PCs like Dell et al. does not make Macs “more expensive.” Apple Macs actually integrate quite well into corporate environments, but you have to actually have used a Mac to begin to know such a thing. Life’s too short to settle for what some deem to be “good enough” without ever actually trying the benchmark system to which they purport to be measuring “goodness” against. A tar paper shack in the desert seems “good enough” to someone who’s never been inside an actual house.
Parsons continues, “I use PCs running Microsoft software because I have to, in the same way I use the British transport system, with a heavy heart and a sense of foreboding. I’m beginning to wonder if this will ever change.”
Full article here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Gandalf” for the heads up.]
MacDailyNews Take: Mr. Parsons, you type opinions about things which you obviously know very little, if anything, mixed with statements that are unsupported by actual facts. You could use a Tandy TRS-80 or an IBM Selectric for that; you certainly don’t need Microsoft’s bloated junkware. It amazing what the average cretin thinks they need when it comes to personal computers, isn’t it? The real reason that Microsoft is “the very linchpin of its global business” is because of people like Parsons.
Only Apple Macintosh runs virtually all of the world’s software: Mac OS X, Windows, and Linux. Only Apple Macintosh. All other PC makers’ machines run a smaller library of software than Apple’s Macintosh as they cannot run Mac OS X or Apple’s best-in-class Mac-only applications.
Any consumer who buys a non-Apple personal computer is clearly making a purchasing mistake and needlessly limiting themselves. Why settle? Do you really think that little of yourself? Aren’t you worth more than “good enough” (that in reality isn’t even “good enough”)? If so, get a Mac.
SEE ALSO:Apple Macs can run more software than Windows PCs – October 30, 2006
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Analyst: Microsoft’s Windows Vista could be an opportunity for Apple – January 26, 2007
CNET Reviews Windows Vista: Is that all? Clunky and not very intuitive vs. Mac OS X; warmed-over XP – January 24, 2007
Security firm: 38-percent of malware already Windows Vista-compatible – January 22, 2007
Mossberg: Microsoft’s Windows Vista offers lesser imitations of Apple’s Mac OS X features – January 18, 2007
Windows Vista disappointment drives longtime ‘Microsoft apologist’ to Apple’s Mac OS X – January 17, 2007
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NY Times’ Pogue reviews Microsoft’s Windows Vista: ‘Looks, Locks, Lacks’ – December 14, 2006
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Windows chief Allchin 2004 email: I’d buy a Mac if I didn’t work for Microsoft – December 11, 2006
Unlike Microsoft’s Windows Vista, Apple’s Mac OS X Leopard will create no new jobs – December 12, 2006
15-year Windows vet tries Apple Mac: ‘My God! This is amazing!’ – December 04, 2006
Microsoft’s Windows Vista: obsolete on arrival? – December 04, 2006
InformationWeek: Now that Vista is the past, let’s look at the future: Apple’s Mac OS X Leopard – December 02, 2006
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Dave Winer: ‘Microsoft isn’t an innovator, and never was – they are always playing catch-up’ – December 01, 2006
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Microsoft’s Windows Vista vulnerable to malware from 2004 – November 30, 2006
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Microsoft’s Windows Vista is basically Microsoft’s version of Mac OS 9.3 – October 11, 2006
Embrace and Extinguish in action: TechIQ’s ‘The VAR Guy’ dumps Windows, switches to Mac OS X – September 25, 2006
Top Windows developer dumps Microsoft’s ‘pile of crap’ for Apple’s Mac OS X – September 12, 2006
$399 for Windows Vista Ultimate?! (Hint: Get a Mac) – August 29, 2006
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Microsoft Windows Vista: If you can’t innovate… try to impersonate Apple’s Mac OS X – August 10, 2006
Analyst: Apple’s new Mac OS X Leopard sets new bar, leaves Microsoft’s Vista in the dust – August 08, 2006
Microsoft botches another copy job: Windows Vista Flip3D vs. Apple Mac OS X Exposé – June 26, 2006
Sydney Morning Herald Tech columnist dumps Microsoft Windows, switches to Apple Mac – June 13, 2006
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Computerworld: Microsoft Windows Vista a distant second-best to Apple Mac OS X – June 02, 2006
Thurrott: Microsoft going to get eaten alive over Windows Vista’s resemblance to Apple’s Mac OS X – March 09, 2006
NY Times’ Pogue on Gates’ CES demo: Most of Vista features unadulterated ripoffs from Apple Mac OS X – January 05, 2006
Analyst: Windows Vista may still impress many consumers because they have not seen Apple’s Mac OS X – January 05, 2006
Apple’s talent and innovation vs. Microsoft’s hype – October 25, 2005
Microsoft’s Windows Vista strives to deliver what Apple’s Mac OS X already offers – October 10, 2005
Thurrott: many of Windows Vista’s upcoming features appeared first in Apple’s Mac OS X – September 26, 2005
Microsoft’s Ballmer: It’s true, some of Windows Vista’s features are ‘kissing cousins’ to Mac OS X – September 18, 2005
PC World: Microsoft innovation – an oxymoron – September 14, 2005
As usual, Apple leads, Microsoft tries to follow – June 02, 2005
Bye-Bye Bill: another columnist dumps Windows for Apple Macintosh – January 20, 2005
Orlando Sentinel writer dumps Windows for Mac and writes ‘God bless Apple’ – January 16, 2005
IBM Fellow dumps Microsoft Windows XP, switches to Apple’s Mac OS X – September 02, 2004
