Jonathan Blum, “tech guru” for Fortune Small Business, asks “Is it time to consider moving your small business to Macs?”
Blum writes, “First, you should know that I’m no Apple fanatic. I’ve used the gear steadily since the Reagan era; the early Apple II and the computer-as-Cuisinart lookalike that was the original Mac were both college tools of mine. But overall, I have found Apples, as lovely as they are for certain applications, just not worth the hassle for most small businesses.”
MacDailyNews Take: Typical ham-handed set-up that attempts to establish impartiality: I’m no Apple fanatic, but I’ve used their products for a long time, so, even though no iMac model ever made even remotely resembles a Cusinart, get ready to believe the mountain of bullshit I’m about to shovel.
Blum continues, “Still, even I have to admit that the latest Apple line of desktops and laptop computers is flashing some serious small-business form. Apple computers now run on the same basic electronics guts – Intel chips and the like – as any PC using the Microsoft operating systems. Peripheral support for Apple is strong: Every gadget vendor wants a piece of that sexy iPhone/iPod pie.”
MacDailyNews Take: Shouldn’t a real “tech guru” implicitly understand “Apple computers” are referred to as “Macs?” We ask, not only because Blum does it repeatedly and awkwardly throughout his piece, but also because the last “Apple computer” rolled off the assembly line in December 1992. Now, can someone please explain how a printer or scanner or whatever peripheral maker is getting “a piece of that sexy iPhone/iPod pie” by writing Mac drivers?
Blum continues, “Many smart shops I chat with are dumping their Windows machines for Macs. Take Jaffe Associates, a Washington, D.C., marketing and business-strategy consultancy. This 25-person firm recently unplugged its traditional Windows server architecture to install a similar system from none other than Apple. The company considered upgrading its aging Windows XP terminal server but endured Microsoft sticker shock when it calculated the cost of deploying collaborative software: Chief Operating Officer Shani Magosky got a quote for $100,000. Then she priced Apple technology for same functionality and found she could build a similar system for about half the price… To see if Steve Jobs’ brainchild really does have game for the average small business, I ordered up an iMac several months ago and installed it in my little digital world. “
MacDailyNews Take: So, instead of stopping with a nice example of how a smart person dumps Windows for Macs and saves a lot of money, Blum proceeds to conduct his own experiment to see just how much meaningless nonsense a cretin can generate for Fortune Small Business.
Blum continues, “My verdict? Though Apple computers can produce excellent results for small business, expect issues: Macs remain a niche product. No matter what you do with a Mac, you have to deal Apple’s peculiar vision of all things computerish. First off, the packaging is seriously overdone: ‘Designed by Apple in California’ is prominent on the box. Like I care.”
MacDailyNews Take: Well, there you have it. Because Macs come in award-winning packaging that prominently displays the words, “Designed by Apple in California,” small business should expect “issues.”
Blum continues, “Why should locating the ‘on’ switch be such struggle? Just stick the thing where I, and my employees, can find it: right up front.”
MacDailyNews Take: We hereby apologize; we had no idea Fortune Small Business was employing the mentally-challenged as a tech writer. Jonny is obviously “special.”
Jonny continues, “As promised, setup was a two-click, plug-and-play affair: Plunk the iMac on the desk, plug it in and turn it on. Setting up peripherals and Web access was also dead easy. But – as ever, with Apple boxes – there were not enough USB ports. A USB hard drive had to be dumped in favor of Ethernet enablement unit.”
MacDailyNews Take: “Ethernet enablement unit?” Jonny, all iMacs come with built-in 10/100/1000BASE-T Gigabit Ethernet via RJ-45 connectors. There’s no need for an “Ethernet enablement unit,” Mr. “Tech Guru.” Match the ends of the wires with the holes on the iMac, Jonny. Spend a bit more time with your Sesame Street shape cube before setting up your next computer, okay?
Jonny continues, “No question, running native 64-bit Apple code on the Mac is blazing… But again, there are issues: Offsetting all this speed are some curious features clearly not aimed at the average small business. The desktop is divided into quadrants that exist beyond the screen’s edge. Only with some complex keyboard commands can I slide from one to another. All the goofy Apple-centric commands leave users trained on PCs constantly fighting to parse out what the control, option and command keys do. And there is the very odd mouse. Apple devotees swear by the touch-sensitive shell of the ‘Mighty Mouse,’ but its top left- and right-click buttons still look an awful lot like just one.”
MacDailyNews Take: Jonny, the ability to conceptualize virtual screens and mouse buttons requires an IQ above 70.
Jonny continues, “The real eye-rolling winner is Time Machine, quite possibly the silliest operating system extension in history. Must I really sit through a full round of special effects – the desktop slides away to reveal some mysterious star in full supernova disappearing into infinity behind my various back ups – just to find a what I said to a client in a lost e-mail? Honestly.”
MacDailyNews Take: Yes, by all means, replace an intuitive visual representation with a typically opaque Microsoft dialog box festooned with badly-labeled tabs that offers only text descriptions and buttons. That’ll help you more quickly find your files. Most people would appreciate things being thought out to such a degree and made simpler (and – gasp! – more fun) for them. Not Jonny the “tech guru.”
Jonny continues, “On balance, is there money to be made with Apples? Depends… But other than raw speed, I had a very difficult time measuring any quantifiable improvement over the PC for average business chores – that kind that ultimately affect your bottom line.”
MacDailyNews Take: How quickly poor Jonny forgets his own perfectly measurable and quantifiable example of Jaffe Associates’ Chief Operating Officer Shani Magosky and how “she priced Apple technology for same functionality and found she could build a similar system for about half the price.”
Jonny continues, “Yes, Apples can be easier to use, but with some things, like as syncing your Apple to not-Apple portable devices such as BlackBerrys and smartphones, expect real trouble. I and my assistants had terrible problems getting all of our company programs to work properly.”
MacDailyNews Take: Color us wholly unsurprised that poor Jonny and his attendants had terrible problems syncing their ancient and outclassed mobile devices. Jonny seems to know that Macs can also slum it with Windows, so why doesn’t they just fire up that ancient and outclassed OS to sync their ancient and outclassed devices until they can afford iPhones?
Jonny continues, “Yes, more businesses can now go to Macs – I would say they now make sense for maybe 20 companies out of 100, up from just 5 a few years back. But for the rest of us – particularly those that need basic computing and basic features – Apple is still more expensive and simply not worth the integration headaches for the average small shop.”
Full article, Think Before You Click™, here.
MacDailyNews Take: How fitting that Jonny ends his FUDfest with a random concoction of nonsense numbers and then caps it off with an outright contradiction of the very real-world example he cites, Jaffe Associates, which shaved half of their costs by dumping Windows for Mac.
In all seriousness, the fear is palpable. Expect the volume and vehemence (along with the ridiculousness) of the FUD to increase as Apple Macintosh continues to take share from Windows PCs.
[Thanks to virtually every MacDailyNews Reader on the planet for the heads up.]
another letter to the editor,
An Apple fanboi is a person whose best efforts are futile compared to the idiocy of Microsoft apologists.
It never fails to humor me that the most ardent Apple fanbois seem convinced that the most pathetic PC protagonist is a better orator for Windows as an alternative Mac than the sum of their concerted efforts or wishes.
Or, maybe Apple fanbois are so insecure and weak that the mere mention of a favorable Windows piece makes them crap their skivvies and wilt into a quivering heap of fear and worry.
The only other guy smart enough to know the author was talking about an ethernet enabled drive. MDN dropped the ball on that one hands down. And there aren’t enough USB slots on a G5 Mac. No excuses. The ones on the keyboard are too slow and why is there two an inch and a half apart? What else besides a mouse that is low powered and 1.1 would I plug in? So i have a hub, but you think $2,000 could get a card in the back.
I know some fanboys will disagree but I’m just sayin’…
This is a true sign that Macs are making inroads into the business (small and large) market space.
Windows apologists seemed fine with Macs eating into the consumer market for the past 3 years, as it did not touch their IT departments (AKA Fiefdoms).
But now the iPhone along with large consumer and educational adoption of Macs is starting to bleed into the corporate world, and they don’t like it. Resistance will get louder in the Mainstream Windoze Media, but the more it does, the more it brings Macs into the conversation, and on real merit, which IT groups are often forced to work with due to their customer’s demands, Macs will only grow.
That guy has an SE….wow…that was a pretty sweet machine back in ummmm 1988 or so….20 years ago…I want one…nice piece of history.
I hope all the small businesses that my small business competes against read and believe Blum’s article. I want all my competitors to have Windows systems while my team uses Macs. Then, while my competitors are constantly restarting their machines and fighting viruses and struggling with poorly designed software, my company will be eating their lunch.
People like Blum are encouraging the villagers to come down to the beach and see the big wave coming–just before the tsunami called Apple washes them away.
Bottom Line: If Mac’s get a strong foothold into the business world… which it looks like is happing these days… then the IT guts are in real trouble! Why because it’s harder to justify one job if the platform your using isn’t failing all the time!
And MAC’s just don’t fail all that often… plus managing a Mac server is easy… even I can do it and I’m just a salesperson at heart!
And that’s not a good thing in the mind of a IT person!
Somebody should tell Blum to plug the mouse into the keyboard. I have no doubt that he, in a very Windows/PC-like manner, used two of the USB ports on the back of his iMac for the mouse and keyboard. Incidentally, I find it staggering how Apple’s lowly little iMac has grown into the ideal corporate desktop; it really is ideal.
I thought that Blum might be referring to a NAS when describing his “ethernet enabled drive”, but really, who with any tech credentials would refer to a NAS that way? And, who with a NAS would be running out of USB ports trying to add USB drives?
For 90+% of iMac customers at least one USB port goes unused throughout its lifespan. For everyone else there are USB hubs for less than $10. Especially in a business environment, most iMacs will be connected to the keyboard and the Ethernet port. That’s it. There is no reason in a real business for iMacs to have external drives. Any business that is a real business (not the pseudo tech writing business that Mr. Blum pretends he has) will have their Macs networked to a server.
It is painfully obvious that Mr. Blum is a hired gun. Nobody can be as publicly stupid as that and not get paid for it.
have a look or join the tech guru discussion here:
http://fsbfeatures.blogs.fsb.cnn.com/2008/05/30/why-macs-still-arent-right-for-most-businesses/
Jonny is obviously “special.”
Hahaha well played MDN.
Most people do not see the future of work place the Mac’s now give. iChat makes video conferencing easy, this will cut down on long email exchanges, and can save travel cost. It can also help your employes have more contact with each other . When MS Office combined several apps that were geared to specific jobs they made employes more productive and expanded the resources of the companies. You can now incorporate iLife into the business apps. This will change the game of business like Office and the internet did in the 90’s. Time Machine, Back to my Mac, and Boot Camp will make IT a lot easier. He even mentioned how easy it was to set up. Even Photo Booth could be useful tool.
Business people who have vision can see usefulness in what Mac’s have to offer now. Unfortunately most stick with what they know or follow the success of others.
…. johnny, we’re gonna need to go ahead and move you downstairs into storage B. We have some new people coming in, and we need all the space we can get. So if you could just go ahead and pack up your stuff and move it down there, that would be terrific, OK?
Wow. Just wow. I cringed while reading this awful article. This guy was has no idea what he’s talking about and has no basis for his arguments. He sets up arguments only to support them with irrelevant crap. The packaging of a Mac is overdone? How does that cause any problems? In fact, since the boxes are so nice, less of them are ending up in landfills. Ha!
@feral:
😀
lol!!
He said, “…running native 64-bit Apple code on the Mac is blazing…”
But what exactly is he talking about? The kernel isn’t 64-bit and no applications that ship with OS X are 64-bit.
These fluff pieces appear all the time. They’re designed to piss people off and inflate the hit counter. This article is so obviously mediocre that its intentions are transparent.
p.s. who came up with the label “fanboy” anyway? Just another need to slap labels on fellow humans we can’t “show up”, I guess. Lame.
To feral: I would go ahead and set off those bug bombs in the basement but whatever you do, don’t fsck with that guy’s most precious possession.
http://www.thinkgeek.com/homeoffice/supplies/61b7/
I used bad judgement and actually read the source article. Sorry. Then darn, I just had to write some comments at their website. And it is so embarrassing! They posted what I wrote. Hanging my head down low, I present here my comments on the article.
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—–
I have been running my business on Macs for seven years and started working on them professionally in 1991. With that experience behind me I have to ask:
Is the point of this article to perpetrate FUD? (Translation: Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt, an antiquated method of perpetrating propaganda). It’s nice to have Mr. Blum sort of suggest Macs, and certainly skepticism about any change frequently pays off in perspective. But this backhanded criticism of Macs in the article is just plain bizarro silly. I don’t think the article is helpful to anyone! It comes off as some weird piece of anti-Macintosh marketing ad purchased by Microsoft. It’s reminiscent of the bad old days when certain ‘technical journalists’ dared not criticize Microsoft without also taking a swipe at Apple seemingly so as not to lose Microsoft ad revenue at their magazine. In other words, what was the point of this article?
The worst bizarre statements are right up at the top under the headline:
“Apple is flashy…”
Subjective much? Apple is ‘flashy’ is a backhanded way to say they are vacuous. Flashy these days means Paris Hilton. And we know what she’s worth. A more insightful investigation about what an ‘Apple’ (actually called ‘Macintosh’, as written on its box) really is, beyond being visually pleasant, would be helpful and expected of any technical writer. So where is the depth of investigation?
“…but still more trouble than it’s worth for basic computing tasks.”
I have heard there are a few people that are so ingrained in the cranky lack of intuitiveness in Windows that they find the Mac interface ‘difficult.’ Well, some people actually like Paris Hilton. I work with both Windows and Mac OS X and I find exactly the opposite of this bizarro statement to be true. When I help my Windows clients with their OS problems I make an awful lot more money than when I work with my Mac clients. The reason is very simple. It is a big pain in the backside working in Windows. Basic computer tasks in Windows become a remarkable chore.
So please everyone! Use Windows and make me more money! But sadly I have a solid conscience that demands I be honest. You need to choose the computer that best performs the specific tasks you require. The choices in business are Macintosh or a Windows PC. What shall it be? Why not BOTH? Macs do both! So that makes the choice dead simple. And when you buy a computer it is essential that you consider ROI (return on investment) and TCO (total cost of ownership. I suggest you compare the Windows PC to a Mac running Mac OS X. A hint: You won’t find any studies in favor of the Windows PC. They don’t exist.
What I do when I personally need the occasional Windows-only application is I start up my virtualization program of choice, which is Parallels (but VMWare has its benefits as well), and run Windows XP. Works just fine, or as fine as Windows ever is.
Final point: People like to criticize Mac users for being ‘cultists’ who ‘flame anything bad said about the Mac’. Yeah, both platforms have plenty of raving loonies. But the fact is that the number of articles that slam the Mac out of ignorant hatred of anything not Windows is beyond comprehension. This is how it works: If you goad someone into becoming upset, typically it works and they respond in kind. So if Mac users slam this, IMHO, pointless article, why should anyone be surprised?
:-Derek Currie
Adrian sez:
‘He said, “…running native 64-bit Apple code on the Mac is blazing…”
‘But what exactly is he talking about? The kernel isn’t 64-bit and no applications that ship with OS X are 64-bit.’
Um, Adrian. I like to be kind to newbies. It’s OK to be incorrect while you learn about a computer. You look up the answer, you shrug your shoulders, oops you were incorrect, now you know better, then you move on to the next challenge.
But to show your ignorance in public is not a good idea. It’s embarrassing. Please restrain yourself. If you look up the answer to your question and verify that you have the correct information, and it contradicts what someone else has published on the web, by all means provide the correct information. But here you did the opposite. And someone might believe you! Then you’d be guilty of spreading misinformation. The result is the newbies like you who are too lazy to bother verifying their statements end up as confused and lost as you are.
I hope you see my point. We all have to grow and learn. Just don’t do it in public.
All of Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard is 64 bit. And what is kewl is that even though it is 64 bit, it still runs everything that is 32 bit, including drivers. You can’t do that in 64 bit versions of Windows.
I hope that helps you understand this issue.
;-D
@splat,
Darn right the SE is a fine machine–we bought ours in ’89, and it’s great…with its 2 MB of RAM and HUGE 40 MB HD.
Asmodeus,
People call ’em like they see ’em. Would you prefer another a hasher pejorative like “idiot”, “moron”, or “imbecile”? Jus’ askin’.
Oh.
My.
God.
“Ethernet enablement unit?” WTF?
If you Google the phrase (in quotes): “Ethernet enablement unit” you come up with 5 results, all related to this bozo’s article. He’s managed to create a truly unique 3-word combo. Amazing!
Bozo article, I name thee the “Ethernet enablement unit” rag!
I’m impressed that he got “native 64-bit Apple code” running on a 32-bit iMac.
I think I figured Blum out: he works in the back country of Missouri.
I sent him a personal email asking for verification. I’ll post his reply.
P.S. I might be incorrect about Missouri; it might be the Sahara.
What the hell is a “hasher pejorative”?
People call it as they see it huh? People like you that can’t think for yourselves and have to toss out lame ass labels at others like everyone else, you mean. Right?
Groupthink at its most rotten core. How typical and pathetic.