“Want to know what might be the best reason to put a spiffy new Apple Mac in your small business office? It’s not the hip ads or the easy-on-the-hand keyboard that comes with the iMac, or the ridiculous debate about whether Apples or PCs running the Microsoft Windows operating system are faster or easier to use,” Jonathan Blum writes for TheStreet.com.
MacDailyNews Take: Yes, it is ridiculous that some people are still debating whether Macs or Windows PCs are “faster” or “easier to use.” Apple Macs have been proven study after study after study after study to boost productivity, decrease support costs, offer lower total cost of ownership (TCO) and retain their value far longer than Windows PCs. In hundreds of independent reviews, Apple’s Mac OS X is the clear winner over Microsoft’s Windows (VIsta or the ancient XP).
Blum continues, “Rather, for my small business money, the single most exciting productivity tool probably lies hidden deep inside some Macs: Automator. This piece of code, which Apple describes as a ‘personal automation assistant,’ is part of the new Microsoft Office 2008 for Mac (starting at $400) suite of office software. Yes, you have to buy the whole Office software package to get Automator.”
MacDailyNews Take: Wha? Do some research. Please. For once. Automator is part of Mac OS X. It has shipped on every Mac since the release of Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger on April 29, 2005. Microsoft’s bloated Office is definitely NOT required. Hey, it’s TheStreet.com, what do you expect? Automator is an application developed by Apple for Mac OS X that implements point-and-click (or drag-and-drop) creation of workflows for automating repetitive tasks. Automator enables the repetition of tasks across a wide variety of programs, including the Finder, the Safari web browser, iCal, Address Book and more. It can also work with third-party applications such as Microsoft Office or Adobe Photoshop. More about Apple’s Automator here. Apple’s Automator Actions website is here. None of this is surprising because, as we saw less than a month ago (‘Tech guru’ spreads the FUD about Macs in business – May 30, 2008), Jonathan Blum knows pretty much nothing about Macs.
With that major correction out of the way, Blum loves his Automator, even if he has no idea what it is, who makes it, or how it got on his Mac. Blum writes, “For the right operation, the gains possible with Automator are enormous. And it is this simple: Think of how slick it would be to get the boring, repetitive stuff that bogs you down all day out of the way. And my read here is firm: Somebody, somewhere is going to make a lot of money with Automator. That person might as well be you.”
Full article here.
MacDailyNews Note: Contact: Jonathan Blum
@ChrisW357
Read my previous comment
@ ../.
Ah! Gotcha… thanks. I skimmed the comments a bit too quickly. I’ll be firing away in a bit.
MS mu$t be handing out incentive$ to anyone if they can $omehow connect Office, or any other MS product to Apples rising star.
He is not so dumb, he wrote an article and needed to get some eyeballs, so he acts dumb so that the whole Mac community jumps on it and boom, instant readers.
harpo64, ../., and ChrisW357,
MDN’s “Contact: Jonathan Blum” link was too complicated for you?
You guys are making Blum look smart.
Forget Blum, what’s his boss’ email???
Nevermind, he’s indy… *grumble*
@ Tired Of Retards,
You could give us a small break. Normally I don’t miss something like that. I’m also used to sites being a little more “up front” when it comes to contacting them.
Just having an off day. I’m not doing research on an article, though.
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Idiot!
Why would he say that “Apple describes [Automator] as a ‘personal automation assistant,’ ” and then claim that it’s from Microsloth?
What a maroon!
@Jeff
Exactly.
Isn’t this the same guy that thought that flash ram and Flash were the same thing?
@Tired of Retards
What’s the point in emailing Blum directly? It’s like pouring water in the desert. The purpose of his articles can be summed like MDN said:
None of this is surprising because, as we saw less than a month ago (‘Tech guru’ spreads the FUD about Macs in business – May 30, 2008), Jonathan Blum knows pretty much nothing about Macs.
He is not interested in writing the truth. He writes for hits and his articles are flamebaits. Commenting on the story on a story page works as a refutation to benefit other readers, not the writer. Lacking that feature, complaining to the editors is the next best thing.
If you can’t argue properly without using words like retards, please don’t post at all. We don’t like trollish behaviors.
Well, that does it. This guy has given me the final push! I’m gonna start writing for “Brain Surgery Monthly”. I don’t know a thing about brain surgery, but I bet I can write at the same inteligient level as this guy !
UFB
oh this is all just a waste of my time and its not even a good waste…i think im over the web. i might even quit reading the news…
Jonathan Blum is a moron.
Eric Willard is a moron.
Billy Gates is a moron.
Stevie Ballmer is a moron.
And the list keeps growing… LOL
Its really all related to the brain washing that 90% of the population has suffered from for the past 10 years or so. I had some friends that were so brain washed that using their iMac was difficult because they kept trying to make things harder for themselves. Like uncompressing zipped files. And when I led them to the FREE Stuffit Expander, they continued to get defensive.
This retraining and liberation might take YEARS folks… patience is a virtue!
…who the hell let him out of storage unit B? he prolly doesnt get a paycheck either…just free staples…uuumm yeeeah about that…
Hey, it’s hard to google things sometimes. I mean, he might have misspelled automator.
Wikipedia.org – “Automator is an application developed by Apple for Mac OS X…”
Quit stroking thestreet.com and their stupid stories…..all they want to do is hurt AAPL stock. IGNORE THEM!!!
Automator is good for viewing porn.
He’s an MS shill, along with TheStreet.com (if it isn’t owned by MS, outright), plain and simple.
Eschew TheStreet for evermore and especially clicks to his crock.
@It’s About Time,
The lack of “standard” splash screens for Apple apps is one of the many reasons I’m a proud “Mac person”!!
Aside from pure laziness and ignorance, or hit bait there’s no reason people like Blum can’t click the mouse a time or two to access the About menu on Automator or any other app. If this no-nothing Blum keeps getting a paycheck for such idiocy, next he’ll be saying that he doesn’t know who makes OS X or how it got on his Mac, but Somebody, somewhere is going to make a lot of money with it!
@Steve516,
Why make things harder than they have to be? Mac OS X can uncompress ZIP files with a quick double-click all by itself. Stuffit Expander is necessary only for .SIT or .SITX files.
@Reality Check
If you can’t beat ’em, join ’em, eh, Reality Check?
@John Gee,
There’s another great asset built into OS X and it’s called “Help”. If you go to the Finder’s Help menu, open it, and type “Automator” into the search filed you’ll instantly get several step-by-step examples of what Automator can do, and how to use it.
Ahhhhhh……how low can “professional” journalism go? We’ll see……