This is why I don’t recommend Windows for people who don’t know what the hell they are doing. Have them stick with a Mac. And if they can’t afford that, have them stick with Ubuntu. Far safer and they don’t even have to remember to update their antivirus software every year. ;)
Ars Technica takes a peek at Windows 7 and what do they find? You guess it: more of the same. Rather than truly reinventing themselves and rebuilding Windows from the ground up, Microsoft just insists on beating the same ‘ole dead horse with candy colored plastic spoons. I mean, it’s just a mess. Every time I use Vista I’m constantly reminded of how much Windows is like an onion. Peel off a bunch of it’s layers and you’ll find some startling legacy cruft under the hood. I honestly doubt Windows 7 will be all that much different.
Great post on MacLife about one guy’s switch from Windows to Mac OS X. Sounds really familiar and practically mirrors my own experience in switching to Macs.
Ina Fried of CNET News did a recent interview with Brad Brooks, the corporate vice president for Windows Consumer Product Marketing at Microsoft, in which Brad explains that Mac buyers pay what he calls the ”Apple tax”. According to him, you pay more for a Mac in time and mone than you would a Windows-based PC. Is it me or does this sound a lot like what John McCain has been saying about Barack Obama. “Vote for ‘that one‘ and you’re sure to get higher taxes!”
The Choice Tax
There really is a tax around there for people that are evaluating their choices going into this holiday season and going forward. There’s a choice tax that we talked about, which is, hey, you want to buy a machine that’s other than black, white, or silver, and if you want to get it in multiple different configurations or price points, you’re going to be paying a tax if you go the Apple way.
I’ll admit it and say that Brad’s got a point…to an extent. There are choices when buying a Mac and each of them do allow for some limited configuration options. If you need a laptop then there are three different choices: MacBook, MacBook Pro, and MacBook Air. Need a desktop? You have three choices: Mac mini, iMac, and Mac Pro. Each of them are targeted towards different users with different needs. As far as design, yeah, you’re pretty much stuck with whatever Apple designs. But let’s face it, your typical Apple buyer isn’t concerned about what the computer looks like. Apple has already taken care of that by creating something that is simple and elegant. I rarely see anyone knock Apple for their designs. But for those who simply want something different then, yeah, they’ll have to look elsewhere. Apple is about providing a seamless experience; not about providing customers every option under the sun.
The Application Tax
There’s going to be an application tax, which is if you want choice around applications, or if you want the same type of application experience on your Mac versus Windows, you’re going to be purchasing a lot of software. And even at that you’re not going to get the same experience. You’re not going to get things like Microsoft Outlook, you’re not going to get the games that you’re used to playing.
Well, yes and no. Yes, you will likely have to purchase some software to replace versions that are comparable on the Mac. But it’s like that with any operating system. Hell, going from XP to Vista could require a customer to have to purchase software upgrades. What makes the Mac any different?
And, no, you’re not going to get Microsoft Outlook. But what you will get is a set of programs that come default on the operating system that will suffice for most users: Mail, iCal, and Address Book. For most people, these programs do enough to where Outlook isn’t really needed. Now, if you’re on an Exchange server then, yeah, you’re gonna need Office.
And games? Last I check virtually all of the most popular games are available on the Mac: Spore, World of Warcraft, Call of Duty, The Sims, and many, many more. Not every game is accounted for but, again, most people buying Macs aren’t really buying them to play games.
The Technology Tax
There’s a technology tax–Apple still doesn’t have HDMI, doesn’t have Blu-ray offerings, doesn’t have e-SATA external disk drives that work at twice the speed of FireWire. And so you’ve got all of these things that are truly taxes.
Apple generally doesn’t adopt a technology unless they are sure that it will be standardized. HDMI may be a current standard for televisions, but a standard for computers? Umm, not really. Most people don’t really need HDMI ports on their computers. Blu-ray adoption rates are pretty slow right now and it’s entirely unclear as to whether there’s a market there yet for Blu-ray drives on computers right now, thus the reason why Apple has decided not to adopt it just yet. The same applies for e-SATA. Why spend money providing the technology for something that isn’t a proven standard and/or there isn’t a good market for? Doesn’t make sense.
The Upgrade Tax
You’ve also got an upgrade tax. The only machine, as far as I know, within the Apple lineup that’s actually upgradeable is the Mac Pro, the $2,800 version, which is (more expensive than) just about any PC configuration that you get from any one of our manufacturers.
The average user has no need for the Mac Pro. The Mac Pro is professionals and/or enthusiasts who really need a high-end workstation computer for gaming, audio/video production, 3D animation, graphics, and other resource intensive tasks. Most people will end up spending about the same as they would for any other quality PC depending on their needs. Every Mac allows for memory upgrades and some even allow for hard drive upgrades and potentially processor upgrades. But, let’s face it, the average computer user doesn’t really upgrade their video card, processor, audio card, or any other components. Most use the computer as-is for the life of the computer. They might upgrade the memory once but that’s about it.
The Windows Tax
If people want a Windows experience, then start with a machine that was built for the Windows experience. There’s no question, if you look at it, and go to Apple’s Web site today, their No. 1 selling feature that they’re telling students as to why buy a Mac is because it does run Windows, and that you can get Office when you’re running it in Boot Camp or Parallels. But, then you’re just paying that tax again. You’re paying for an upgrade to Windows, you’re paying for the full version of Office, where you could get all of that at one price, at a price point that with a Blu-ray disk drive you can get with an $800 range from an HP or Sony.
I just went to the Apple site and clicked the Mac link at the top. Although it is mentioned in the Get a Mac FAQ page, I wouldn’t say that Apple is touting it as the main selling feature. Same applies to the Education page for students. Mac’s can run Windows; that’s just a fact. For some people, the only reason they don’t buy a Mac is because they need Windows to run one stinkin’ program. If they already have a Windows license then they don’t need to buy anything else. They can just buy a Mac and install Windows with BootCamp. So, yeah, it’s a selling point but not the only one. Besides that, why the hell would anyone go and buy a Mac, buy a copy of Windows, and buy Office 2007? Why not just buy the Mac and a copy of Office 2008?
The “What am I getting into” Tax
I think the question is, though, do customers really know what they’re getting into? I don’t personally believe that customers really know that a copy of Parallels is going to cost them $80, or that when they really look at what they’re going to have to pay in terms of another $200 for a (full boxed copy of Windows), that they’re going to pay for another $149 for MobileMe to put on there, Internet services, which they can basically get all the same functionality when they have Windows and Windows Live working together.
Yes, customers know exactly what they are getting into when they buy a Mac. In fact, I think Mac users are perhaps some of the most educated computer users out there. Most Mac users don’t really need Windows so the argument about what is needed to run Windows is moot. The ones that do need Windows are well aware of what is required.
As for MobileMe, most of the software that is needed already comes with a Mac. MobileMe allows you to sync your calendar, contacts, mail and more between your computer, the internet, and your iPhone. And it even works with Outlook. Can Windows Live do that? Can it sync with Windows Calendar and Address Book? How about syncing with Outlook? No? Then what’s the benefit of having Windows Live then?
The “False Security” Tax
That is a fallacy to think that Macs are somehow invulnerable, or impervious to virus, or phishing, or spyware. And we will tell you that based on our own data that you’re 60 percent less likely to get any type of virus…if you’re running Windows Vista versus Windows XP SP2. And also is that things like phishing scams are very real to the average consumer. And when you have Windows Vista running with IE7, we know that that capability together is blocking well over 11 million different phishing attacks a week. You’ve even got, No. 1, service providers like eBay out there on the Internet today that won’t even recommend you using the Safari browser because it is so compromised when it comes to phishing attacks. So there really is a security story here around Windows Vista running in connection with IE7 that really does create safety for our customers.
You’re right in that some Mac users have a false sense of security. But not all of them think that way. Any computer, regardless of the operating system, is vulnerable to viruses and such. But to say that somehow Windows Vista and Internet Explorer 7 are somehow more secure than OS X and Safari is a silly argument. Macs are more secure only in that it’s not as big of a target as Windows-based machines are. There just aren’t any real virus, phishing, and/or spyware threats out there for the Mac. Those that do get these threats usually get them because they did something stupid. Most Mac users are pretty well educated on what to do security wise so most threats aren’t much of a problem.
The “It’s really not about Apple” Tax
The question is, or the argument is, that understanding what the true value is of Windows and the choices that they make every day, really is not about Apple. It’s really about what is Windows, and understanding having customers understand the different things that Windows brings in terms of compatibility and choice to their everyday lives. And we have just not done an effective job of helping tell that story up until the last couple of months.
So the problem is that customers just aren’t as well educated about Windows as they should be? I take that as a back-handed compliment to Apple because, quite frankly, Apple has done a great job in educating their customers about their products. For the most part, Apple’s products speak for themselves as does OS X. So, honestly, as a business helping understand what the true value is of Windows has everything to do with Apple. Till you understand what makes OS X so great and the value it offers customers you’re never going to be able to truly relate to customers on what makes Windows so different.
Put it this way, I used Windows as my primary OS for the better part of ten years, starting with Windows 95 and used every OS that Microsoft has put out all the way up to Windows Vista. I have never been more confused and felt less educated that the time I spent with Vista. By comparison, the sheer experience of OS X was a breath of fresh air. Never once did I feel like I wasn’t able to do something, that Apple wasn’t able to educate me on what I needed to know about their OS.
The “You can’t do that on a Mac” Tax
But there’s also productivity value that you get on Windows Vista that you can’t get on a Mac. You can’t get Outlook, you can’t get Visio, you can’t get Project. And when you do get applications such as that, they’re usually stripped-down versions that don’t have nearly the amount of features, or the usability like the ribbon on Office. Those types of things just don’t come with a Mac. And that you don’t get the best in terms of hardware experiences, you don’t get high-definition playback on Blu-ray DVD on a Mac. You can’t do it, can’t get it, it’s just not there.
Virtually every application available for Windows has something comparable to it on the Mac. And, no, they aren’t stripped-down version, rather they are just more user-friendly and take a different approach to solving the same problem. Can’t use Outlook? Use Entourage instead (which comes with Office 2008). Visio? Use OmniGraffle. Project? Use OmniPlan or Merlin. Is every single feature accounted for? Not necessarily. But, then again, not every feature is needed. Features like the Office ribbon aren’t needed because OS X itself provides an API that allows for very robust user interfaces. These apps are still very, very powerful and do the job. The argument could be made that apps like these allow you to get your work done faster since they’re easier to use.
Seems that Brad’s argument always comes back to the same thing: Macs can’t play Blu-ray. Maybe not now, but someday they will. You mean to tell me that a good computer experience is predicated on the presence of Blu-ray playback? Who cares! So you can’t play Blu-ray movies. So what? Other than the average traveller who likes to play movies on his/her computer, who else really cares about Blu-ray? Again, adoption rates are slow as it is. Why waste money on an unknown market?
What’s interesting about this interview is that not once did Brad mention the word “design” as part of the description of Windows. The keywords I kept seeing were “features”, “choice”, and “experience” to describe what Windows is. The thing that folks like Brad Brooks, Steve Ballmer, and other at Microsoft simply don’t get is that design matters. It matters a lot. And it especially matters in the case of an OS. Design is more than just the sum of a product’s features. It’s not enough to simply have an array of choices if the majority of choices aren’t that good to begin with. And the user experience is entirely dependent on the design of your product. Good design is about communication, solving problems, and relaying the right information to the user. Without good design, all the features and choices in the world will only make your product come crashing down.
Is there an “Apple Tax”? No, there is not. People buy Macs because they want a good user experience. They want a product that is well designed, speaks to them, and does what it’s supposed to do. As an ex-Windows users, I believe that a “Microsoft Tax” exists a lot more than an “Apple Tax” does simply due to the lack of user experience and design that exists in Vista.
Just like John McCain, Microsoft just keeps on lashing out at Apple with no real argument other than “Apple sucks!” When will they ever learn that a better strategy would be to simply make a better product.
The more and more I look at the differences between Microsoft and Apple, the more I notice how much they mirror politics. I’ve written about this before (The Presidential Election: Mac vs Windows) and the idea that Microsoft is very much like the Republican party still holds water. Take the recent interview Steve Ballmer did for PC Magazine (Steve Ballmer: Microsoft’s ‘Head Coach’). My bullshit detector went off like a bandit and I just kept asking myself, “Am I reading a John McCain interview?” As Obama might say, Ballmer “just doesn’t get it”.
Ballmer was asked if he was concerned that Microsoft could lose some their Windows market share (currently at 90%). Even though PC Magazine already stated that Apple has an 8% market share, he answers with the following:
Today, Apple has much less share than that. They have about 3 percent of the market—a little less than 3 percent of the total market is Mac. We do our job right—not just Microsoft, we and our partners. I mean, because in some senses, the thing that really competes are Windows PCs against Macs. And Windows PCs come in various flavors and sizes and forms and shapes and price points. And some are good and some are less good. I mean, they’re all over the map. But part of the way we have competed successfully with Apple is not just on the quality of our software versus theirs, but the variety of experiences and choice that we and our partners, hardware vendors, device driver vendors, application vendors provide. And I still think choice—choice on price, choice on capability, choice on applications—I think choice is a big deal. And if we do it right, I continue to think we’ll do very, very well.
Umm…no Steve, Apple has more than just a 3% market share. Apple had a 3% market share two years ago. Where have you been? In fact, since the interview went to press, it has been reported that Apple’s market share will likely reach 10% by the end of the year.
As the Merovingian said in The Matrix, “Choice is an illusion created between those with power and those without”. Don’t get me wrong, choice is a good thing. However, when it comes to PCs, choice is an illusion because you’re still settling for the one thing that separates Microsoft from Apple: the OS! Microsoft isn’t doing it right with Vista. I’m not sure if Steve understands that yet or he’s just using the whole choice thing to bullshit us.
When asked to justify the $150 price tag for Microsoft Office, Steve had this to say:
In the U.S., without tax, that’s the price I’ll quote because in some countries, the retailers mark it up, in some cases there’s value-added tax, so I’ll just say—we have basically a $100 product. And most people will own that product before they would buy a new one for three years. If you tell me that for $33 a year I get a product that is more capable, that actually reads and writes documents that other people create, that is compatible with what I might use at work and, oh by the way, everybody’s got a set of features that they really do use extensively.
Problem is, Steve, Microsoft Office costs more than $150 if you’re not buying the Home & Student version. When you consider that the Standard version alone costs over $239, it’s more like $66 a year for most people. And you wonder why people don’t upgrade more often than three years? Make a better product and lower the price and more people will buy upgrades. It’s that simple, Steve. As it stands though, all you’re doing is gouging customers. Office documents are practically a standard and, as such, many people feel they have no choice but to buy Microsoft Office. So much for the argument of choice, huh!
When asked about how Microsoft relates to younger people, Steve mentioned this in his spiel:
I think the world of social networking is sort of barely scratched, and certainly if you look at it today and say what is—on a global basis—it’s ironic—but on a global basis, what is the most popular social networking offering? It’s actually MSN Messenger.
MSN Messenger is the corner stone of Microsoft’s social networking? Really? Really? What about Twitter? Facebook? So, IM and MSN Messenger are the lynchpin of social networking throughout the world? Wow, Steve, you’re REALLY out of touch.
Finally, the topic turns to the Apple’s “I’m a Mac” and Microsoft’s current “I’m a PC” commercials:
I think they need a little bit of correction, and you’ll see us be much more vigorous about stating the case for the PC. The truth of the matter is, this is ironic. The PC outsells the Mac 33 to 1—32 to 1. And despite the fact that we don’t sell PCs, we only sell Windows to people who make PCs. And the attack is actually on the PCs, interestingly enough. You’ll see us defend the PC. We’re going to talk about why—look, PCs are better than Macs. That is not something that can be debated. 32 out of every 33 times, somebody buys a PC instead of a Mac. I’m not saying that there are not some things that people like about Macs, apparently there are. But have you ever seen a cheap Mac? No.
Saying that PCs are better than Macs is debatable, Steve. If it weren’t then Microsoft wouldn’t feel the need to spend $300 million trying to convince people that the whole “I’m a PC” thing is just a stereotype. Seems pretty clear that you and Microsoft view Apple as a threat and with damn good reason: they’re making a better product and it’s selling! Regarding that cheap Mac, what about a Mac mini? Granted, there aren’t any cheap all-in-one Mac’s out there…but what if one came out that was priced around $800? Would you be worried then? Umm, yeah, you would.
You know, they like to act like Macs are lightweight, there are much lighter weight PC notebooks. Macs—do they have the best battery power? Of course they don’t have the best battery power. Macs tend to have nice screens, but can you get nicer screens for a PC? Of course. Do Macs work in business? No, they do not. Can you get Macs made in your own country? Because in some countries, there’s a lot of sort of, you know, what do you call them? Import duties? Taxes? You can’t get Macs made in those countries, they make them basically one place in the world, and therefore they get even more expensive.
Never ceases to amaze me the crap that Ballmer comes up with to try and make Macs look like a shabby deal. Apple doesn’t make that big deal about how lightweight their notebooks are. However, the Macbook Air is about as light as they come. And battery power? Nice screens? Come on. Have you even used a Mac notebook for longer than 10 minutes? And taxes? Come on. You can do better than that.
Macs don’t work in business? Tell that to an enterprise shop that switched to Macs! I run my business on a Mac every day. Just because Steve Ballmer says it doesn’t make it so. Saying Macs don’t work for business is a myth and complete bullshit.
You know, there are so many—you know, can you find Macs in—I’m very sensitive to exactly what mouse I have on my laptop. Can you find a range of choices? Of course you can’t find a range of choices. You know, anyway—can you find the applications you want on the Mac? Well, you don’t really get full Microsoft Office. Everything from Apple is available, there are still tons of business applications and there’s games—anytime somebody does client software—over time they’ll do a Mac client. Maybe nowadays people do the Mac clients mostly to save time, but that’s only on the high-volume applications. So 32 out of 33 times people chose PCs, there must be something better about the PC, and that’s a story that deserves to be told. I think it’s a story of choice.
So, you mean to tell me that the mouse that Steve Ballmer is using right now won’t work on a Mac? I’m willing to bet that that simply isn’t true. I bet the mouse he’s using will work just fine if he plugged it into a Mac.
And you don’t really get a full version of Office? If that’s the case, then who’s fault is that? Oh yeah! Right! It’s Microsoft’s cause they’re the ones that created it in the first place!
And there are quite a few choices of software for the Mac. Pick any problem and I’ll guarantee you there will be at least two or three solutions to pick from. Granted, not everything is mainstream, off-the-shelf software but it doesn’t have to be. The developers who write software for the Mac would rather save the customer money and sell them online rather than charging more for boxed copies.
And yeah, there’s certainly a lot more choices for Windows software but that also means there is a lot of crap software too. More choice does not automatically mean better quality. And just because more people choose to buy a PC doesn’t mean that PCs are somehow better. If that were true then more people would be buying BMW’s and Porsche’s and such. People who care about quality, ease of use, and design buy Macs. For may others who simply don’t care or are too scared to go out of their comfort zone, they buy PCs.
It gets worse when he starts talking about Vista:
…market research says people who own Vista like it. People who don’t own Vista don’t like it as much. It’s interesting, it’s not the people who own it who don’t like it. The survey results are quite clear on this. Vista owners are happy with Vista, people who haven’t owned Vista yet wonder about it because it did get some early press and there were issues that we’ve worked through on compatibility.
Guess what, Steve? I’m a Vista owner and I don’t like it. And I’m not talking about early use here when these so-called “compatibility issues” existed. I ended up deleting the image off my hard drive and likely won’t start using it again till I absolutely have to. Who are the people in this market research? Are they people like me? What kind of users are represented in this research? If it’s anything like the Mohave experiment then your research is flawed. Only two-thirds of all businesses use Vista and there are plenty of people who don’t like Vista even after using it for some time.
When people are new to a product, they generally tend to like the interface of their old product. So the third thing people say is, gosh, I was used to XP, it was familiar to me, I’m not familiar—I think the user interface with Vista is a clear improvement, but I’m sure the publication you write for—if you guys change the front page, people don’t like it at first, right? So it takes some getting used to. But as people own it and use it, they like it.
While that may be true most of the time, a lot of the changes made to Vista are so obtrusive and annoying that a lot of people aren’t “getting used to it”. People don’t want eye candy. They just want an operating system that is easy to use, easy to find things, and just works. While Vista is an improvement over XP in many areas it’s a failure in many others. Good product design is more than just eye candy. It’s about communication and solving people’s problems in an effective manner.
While Vista works for many people, others find it a hinderance compared to XP. I for one didn’t like the changes to the Control Panel. Compared to XP, it’s confusing and hard to find anything. I don’t like the organization and where Microsoft ultimately decided to put things. It’s a failure in usability because, even though I might get used to it, I still don’t like it and will still find it confusing now and then. And I’m a pretty smart guy. I can usually figure out things, others probably won’t. Other people might not be as observant as me. Your average computer illiterate Joe will likely have a hard time embracing and using the new control panel over the old one in XP. If I find it confusing you can be sure others who are less experienced than me will definitely find it to be confusing.
What I got out of this interview is that he probably hasn’t really sat down and used a Mac for any real length of time. If Ballmer and others at Microsoft were to force themselves to use a Mac for 3 months straight, they just might start to learn what it is that makes Macs such a good product compared to Windows-based PCs. Truth is that Apple is gaining ground because they are making a better product. Better design, better integration with the hardware, and a better overall user experience. If Microsoft could reinvent Windows to reflect a better user experience then they might just be able to turn themselves around. But until Ballmer and company starts using competitor products and starts understanding what makes them great then I don’t see that happening any time soon.
As evidenced in the current Presidential campaigns, leadership trickles down and effects everyone involved. It’s clear that Steve Ballmer doesn’t get it. He seems very out of touch with what’s going on with computer and the internet these days. Just like many Republicans, Ballmer and company tend to cover their ears and eyes and only hear and see what they want. One of these days maybe Ballmer will get it. Then again, maybe he won’t. And probably by that time, Apple will have gained a 20-30% share of the market.
Good luck, Ballmer! You’re gonna need it!
A while back, I talked a bit about Microsoft’s efforts to boost their image through a series of upcoming ads featuring Jerry Seinfeld. Well, they came…
And then they went. What happened? Well, if you’re a Seinfeld fan, the commercials are quite humorous here and there. Otherwise, it seems most people found them to be awkward and, quite frankly, they didn’t do a damn thing to boost Microsoft’s image.
So, where does Microsoft go from here with the rest of their $300 ad budget?
Now they’re aiming to redefine what “I’m a PC” really means with a new series of ads that attack Apple’s own ad campaign head-on:
And, here’s another version:
So, what’s the problem with this? Why will this campaign ultimately fail? As John Gruber of Daring Fireball pointed out, the characters in the Apple commercials are just computers personified. They don’t actually represent real computer users:
They’re not dressed as computers, they’re dressed as people. It’s postmodernism taken to a very silly and profoundly unserious commercial end.
Microsoft would have you believe that Apple is trying to put a stereotype on the average PC user. The reality is that Apple isn’t trying to stereotype the average PC user…just the average PC. And there in lies the problem with Microsoft’s campaign, that they still haven’t talked about the very thing that is causing all their problems to begin with: their product.
Seriously, do any of these commercials really make you feel that their products are any better? Do they? Do any of these ads make you feel like Windows is indeed better than the Mac OS? No? Why not? Because they don’t want to talk about Windows, that’s why. There’s nothing to talk about.
Just like the Seinfeld ads, there is absolutely no mention of Windows at all. Nothing. They don’t even talk about the very issue that is at the core of Microsoft’s problems, the fact that people are losing faith in Windows due to the abysmal reaction to Windows Vista. But rather than dealing with it, they’d much rather tell people that the problem isn’t with their product. No, the problem is you, the customer! It’s all in your head and it’s Apple’s fault because they put a stereotype in your mind!
Is it me or do you get a feeling like they’re just placating the viewer like a McCain/Palin ad? Strange how these things parallel. Wonder what a “Hello, I’m a Democrat.” “And I’m a Republican.” commercial would sound like? Hmm…
More “I’m a Mac” political parodies on YouTube! :)
When I heard that Microsoft has hired Jerry Seinfeld to do some Vista commercials, I didn’t quite know what to think. I mean, how exactly does Seinfeld relate to Microsoft’s core product? This is the guy who had a TV show about “nothing” with episodes talking about the “Soup Nazi”. Don’t get me wrong; I loved Seinfeld. [Don't get me started on talking about the dangers of chip double-dipping.] Granted, they may create some pretty funny commercials and it’ll all be in good fun. But does Microsoft really think they’ll be able to capture the same magic that is inherent in many of the “I’m a Mac” commercials?
Last month, Microsoft posted a website about a project called The “Mojave Experiment”, where they duped a bunch of people into thinking they were looking at a new version of Windows code named Mojave when they were really just looking at Vista all along. The problem with how they marketed The “Mojave Experiment” is that it’s just so blood subjective.
Some of the people who participated didn’t seem all that genuine, nor did they seem like the kind of candidates that most people would care about. Most of them just seemed…well…generic. I mean, which of them were business professionals, college students, power users, and/or information workers? When it comes to Windows users, those are the people you should be concerned about. Granted, your average home user is greatly important, but it’s the movers and shakers in the industry that you should be even more worried about because they’re the ones who recommend solutions to your average user. It just would have been nice to know who these people are and why a solution like Vista is so important to them.
Also, from the very beginning, you hear everyone talking about their initial perceptions of Vista, how they think it’s bad. So right from the get-go you’re hearing negative, negative, negative before you get to anything positive. That’s just bad editing and bad execution. It would have been much better to have heard some positives before talking about bad perceptions. People’s attention spans are small so you have to get to the point relatively quickly.
Another problem with this sort of campaign is that it’s a uphill battle. It’s like the Pepsi Challenge of Windows with Vista on one side and…uh…Vista on the other. Rather than focusing on how to make their own product better they’d rather spend their time and money on trying to get people think that Vista is better than what they think. The thing is though is that, although some of the issues surrounding Vista are just perceived issues, a lot of them aren’t and I think Microsoft knows it. Thus the reason for the Pepsi Challenge to begin with.
And with Seinfeld on board, Microsoft will spend an estimated $300 million dollars their ad campaign to reinvigorate the public perception of Windows Vista, $10 million of which will go to Seinfeld. As Ryan Tate of Gawker pointed out:
Yes, because if there’s one surefire way to convince everyone Vista is cool, cutting edge and not liable to get frazzled by life’s minor complications, it’s hiring a 1990s sitcom star and professional kvetcher! Who, um, very visibly owned a series of Macs on his show.
Yep, rather than spending the $300 million on developing a better product, Microsoft would rather spend it on having a comedian tell you absolutely nothing about a product that you already know enough about in the first place. Microsoft isn’t just battling perception issues with Vista, they’re also battling perception issues with themselves.
InfoWorld has some interesting statistics about how many businesses are using Vista now that Microsoft is no longer selling XP. According to their stats, Vista is dropped in favor of XP for 1 in 3 business PCs. What’s the reason? As John Gruber of Daring Fireball joked, “They just haven’t realized yet how awesome Vista really is.”
The real reason is a loophole in the Vista license that allows for downgrading to Windows XP. Granted, it still qualifies as a Vista license but at least users can downgrade if they wish.
The other reason is the hardware requirements needed to properly run Vista. Realistically, to run Vista right you really need about twice the RAM of what was acceptable with XP and a juicy processor to boot. Unless you’re running with a minimum of two gigs of RAM and at least a fairly current processor from the last few years or so, be prepared to watch Vista run like a dog. For businesses where performance is critical this simply isn’t acceptable.
Take the architectural industry for instance. There is a growing trend towards the use of BIM capable software like Revit and Bentley Architecture. These programs require a lot of juice to run due to large project files and on-the-fly 3D rendering. As such, available physical memory and processing is critical to ensure that these programs run smoothly. Any major hiccups and you run the risk of your workers sitting around twiddling their thumbs. Time is money so the more efficient they are able to work the better.
Current 32-bit operating systems can only handle a maximum of 4 gigs of RAM. Now, when you put that in perspective with the overhead taken up by an idle copy of Vista running compared to XP you can see the problem. My own personal copy of Vista takes up a little over 380 megs of physical memory, and that’s with it running nothing but antivirus software. What about Windows XP running the same antivirus software? A little over 190 megs. That may not seem like much but it is relative because a running program can take up not only the necessary memory needed to run itself but additional memory required by the operating system for additional resources and sub-system overhead (video, audio, etc.). As such, running something like Revit in Vista might be a completely different experience when running it in XP. The resources required in Vista could skyrocket due to the extra footprint of the video subsystems needed for 3D rendering alone.
So what’s the solution? For starters, a faster computer with more memory. Another step up would be 64-bit processing which would allow for up to 16 gigs of RAM and plenty of processing power. But this is an added expense, one that many companies aren’t willing to partake in just yet. It’s one thing if you’re an architectural firm and already have equated in the expense in your budget. But not every company is like this and thus the need to go to a 64-bit platform simply isn’t in the cards. So what do you do? You downgrade until such a time when it is in the cards.
For Microsoft, the reality of the situation just hasn’t quite hit them yet. If they had released a version of Windows that was more powerful than XP, more secure, but just as efficient things probably would have been different. More companies would have been more keen to upgrade. But as it stands, companies are taking the safer route and only upgrading on an as-needed basis. As such, it’s no surprise that only 2 out of 3 business PCs are running Vista.
Who knows. Maybe next year we’ll hear that 2 out of 5 business computers are running Leopard. ;)
As the Presidential election continues, I’ve been thinking a lot about the two candidates, Barack Obama and John McCain. I’ve thought about the philosophies and points of view that are so different between them. Being that I’ve been an IT professional for over six years and a web developer for almost as long, it’s only fitting that I draw a comparison with the current Presidential election to the two operating systems I’ve used intimately for the past ten years or so: Apple’s Mac OS and Microsoft’s Windows.
If you’ve never used a Mac then you might not have a clue what I’m talking about in this post. And when I say used I mean more than just a few hours. Anyone who has spent more than a month using a Mac will know exactly where I’m coming from and why I draw the kind of comparison I’m talking about to the current Presidential election. Comparing Windows users to Mac users is very much like comparing devoted Republicans to Democrats.
I recently read a three-part series of articles entitled From Win32 to Cocoa: a Windows user’s conversion to Mac OS X (part 1, part 2, part 3). This series of articles does a great job of reinforcing my views and illustrates my own experiences that made me switch from Windows to Mac.
I’ve used Windows since Windows 95 and was a staunch supporter of Microsoft, defending them even when criticism was at an all time high during the late 90’s and into the turn of the century. But after spending three years as an IT Supervisor for a small architectural firm, dealing with day to day issues with the administration of Microsoft software, and beta testing Microsoft’s latest OS, Windows Vista, my philosophy started to change.
The first change came when I got sick of dealing with Microsoft’s .NET platform for doing web development. I felt that there had to be something easier and just as powerful to use. So I ended up switching to the use of Apache web servers, PHP, MySQL, and Linux/Unix-based servers as my platforms of choice for web development.
The final change came when I went out and bought a Mac Mini out of frustration. The tools I was using for web development just weren’t working right on my Windows-based PC and I really wanted a change. I was already highly familiar with Linux and Unix-based operating systems so a Mac wasn’t that much of a jump for me. Once I got up and running I haven’t looked back ever since. I even formatted my old PC and turned it into a Linux server.
So how does this translate to the current election?
When I was beta testing Vista, it became clear to me that Microsoft was giving me more of the same. They were more or less trying to candy coat everything in a slick package and attempting to solve all of the users problems with band-aids. What they ended up with was a bloated mess of an operating system that required twice the horse power that Windows XP required. As such, anyone who wanted to use Windows Vista would have to buy all new hardware….including businesses, who are Microsoft’s biggest customers. What’s worse is that there are so many similarities to Mac OS X. They practically ripped off ideas from Apple. Yep, there’s lots of pork in Vista.
From a developers point of view, writing applications for Windows is a trying experience. I certainly remember my time trying to get a .NET web application working. I felt like I spent more time dicking around with the configuration than I did actually writing code. As Peter Bright points out:
Windows is dying, Windows applications suck, and Microsoft is too blinkered to fix any of it–that’s the argument. The truth is that Windows is hampered by 25-year old design decisions. These decisions mean that it’s clunky to use and absolutely horrible to write applications for. The applications that people do write are almost universally terrible. They’re ugly, they’re inconsistent, they’re disorganized; there’s no finesse, no care lavished on them. Microsoft–surely the company with the greatest interest in making Windows and Windows applications exude quality–is, in fact, one of the worst perpetrators.
Microsoft has always been a company that would have you believe that Windows and other products like Microsoft Office are the only solutions to consider for your business and personal life. They pretty much invented the use of FUD: Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt. Anytime a competitor has threatened their core business, they do what they can to either stomp it out or entice their users to keep using Windows with a little FUD (”Are you sure that’s wise?”).
The thing is that Microsoft doesn’t care about the conscientious developer or the home user. They only care about making their primary core customers happy: corporate enterprise customers. As such, Microsoft doesn’t really have to re-invent themselves if their corporate customers are happy. Corporate users are happy with “good enough”, which is exactly what Microsoft gives them.
Candy coating, band-aids, bloat, pork, inconsistent, disorganized, poorly managed, corporate loving, FUD, disillusioned user base, copycat design, more of the same, good enough. Gee…is this starting to sound like the Republican Presidential campaign?
Apple, on the other hand, is a company that is about forward, outside-of-the-box thinking. Their products speak for themselves. All you have to do is pick up an iPhone and realize just how much time and attention went into it. Apple is a company that attempts to solve problems by creating computers and gadgets that are well designed and highly usable. Much of their success has a lot to do with their leadership:
Apple is Apple. Apple, as a company, prides itself on being a leader, not a follower. As Steve Jobs famously quoted Wayne Gretzky, “I skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been”. So the charismatic (some might say dictatorial) Apple leadership wants the company to be seen as one that looks forward, not backward.
Apple practices good, solid user-centric design in every product they create. I’ve read many books about application and product design for my web development practices and Apple is always used as an example of good design. Good design is about communication. A well thought-out, well designed product communicates to you by showing you how it will solve your problem. In times like this, the product speaks for itself. What makes Apple’s products so good is that they accomplish something that many other companies fail to do: to make a product that is easy and fun to use and addresses the needs of what most people need.
Apple’s products are honest and direct. For Apple, less is more. You don’t need every bell and whistle. You don’t need a bunch of useless features that you’ll never use. So they get rid of the fluff and bloat and leave behind only what is necessary to get the job done. What you’re left with is a clean, usable product that is a joy to use.
Granted, Apple isn’t perfect. They do make mistakes and they are flawed in areas, and Steve Jobs would be the first to admit it. Most users don’t really know what they want till they see it so Apple tries to anticipate what users will want to use in the future by asking questions and creating new products based on new ideas and innovation. Many times they succeed, but sometimes they fail. But they learn from their failures and move on. Part of their failures includes listening to their users and asking them why a product wasn’t good. That’s just good management and good business.
Leadership, forward, outside-of-the-box thinking, communication, well managed, honest, direct, clean, usable, fallible, innovative. I don’t expect perfection but I don’t want something that’s just “good enough”. I just want it to work and work well and solve my problems. Apple give me that. I think Barack Obama will give me that as well.
Video: Multi-Touch in Windows 7
Recently, at the D6 Conference, Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer unveiled some of the new features that will be going into Windows 7. A brief demo of Windows 7 showed off some features that are obviously taken from Microsoft Surface. You remember Microsoft Surface, don’t you?
It obvious that Microsoft is clearly going after Apple. This demo is clearly Microsoft’s take on the Multi-touch interface that is evident in the iPhone. Granted, part of how this is implemented is quite new and fresh…but there’s still quite a bit that feels like a rip-off of the iPhone interface.
The problem here is that it’s unclear as to how useful a Multi-touch interface like this will be in a real-world scenario. Bells, whistles, and eye-candy are all fine and dandy…but how much of this will prove to be truly useful in allowing folks to do the things they want? If something like this can boost productivity and cut the time it takes to accomplish certain tasks then, great, Microsoft might have themselves a success. If not then it’s just another good idea that was poorly implemented, which is pretty much what I’ve come to expect from Microsoft.
When Steve Jobs unveiled the iPhone, he made it clear that Multi-touch was something new and exclaimed, “And, boy, have we patented it!”. What made the first iPhone demo so successful was that Jobs demonstrated how the touch interface was actually useful. In fact, Jobs was going out of his way to dissuade others into thinking they need a stylus for a touch interface saying, “We’re going to use the best pointing device in the world — our fingers.” He demonstrated an interface that was way ahead of the curve and proved that it was functional and useful in its implementation. All you have to do is pick up an iPhone and play with it and you’ll get a clear idea at just how good Multi-touch really works.
Obviously, Microsoft can’t use the same technology in Windows 7. Multi-touch is patented by Apple and it doesn’t look like Apple is too keen to license it out. Microsoft does need to be careful though. I’m not a lawyer and I don’t know how much of their interface Apple patented…but there sure does seem to be quite a bit in the Windows 7 demo that might cause alarms to go off with Apple’s legal department.
So how good is Microsoft’s touch interface? No one really knows. All we’ve seen is a flashy demo…nothing else. One thing is clear though: Until Microsoft can demonstrate real-world improvements with their touch-screen interface, much like Surface, it is still just a bogus concept. And given the Microsoft’s history with Vista, it looks like it will be a bogus concept.
Twitter: jeffwhitfield