Nerds Love Persecution
There is (according to some) a minor trend in the works:
Now, I've gone through and read these guys' litany of complaints about Mac OSX...and really, they're grasping at straws. What's really happening is what I talked about in my Fifth Ave Apple Store post -- they no longer feel like a persecuted minority as a Mac user, so it's time to move onto Linux. It was like suddenly all the jocks and cheerleaders were playing D+D in the caferteria, so it's time to move back to the rear stacks of the library to start playing Magic.
"Hold on, G-ster!" you're probably saying. "That's a little unfair! These are people who care passionately about software issues and that whole dirty-hippy, open source mentality is more up their alley. They think all software should be free and easily examined and changed by anyone. Apple has lost it's way, while Linux is the true nerd's paradise -- what Apple used to be in the early 80's."
Except, of course, Linux has been around since the 90's. This seismic shift -- this need to escape from Apple -- didn't happen when Mac products really sucked in the 90's. Instead, it's happening now when the dam is about to break with people switching to Macs because the OS is incredible. If these folks really believed in the whole open source creedo, it would have happened a long time ago.
"Hold on, G-ster!" you're probably saying again. "Ubuntu is the first nice, human friendly version of Linux. All those other version in the 90's don't count. It's a totally different beast. It's the first Linux distro that you don't have to spend all day screwing and tinkering with just to be on the bleeding edge."
And to that, I say fine... but the whole conceit of the original quote is wrong then -- these switchers aren't "nerds" at all.
O'Reilly editor Brian Sawyer pointed to an interesting observation over at kottke.org: "If I were Apple, I'd be worried about this. Two lifelong Mac fans are switching away from Macs to PCs running Ubuntu Linux: first it was Mark Pilgrim and now Cory Doctorow. Nerds are a small demographic, but they can also be the canary in the coal mine with stuff like this." link
Now, I've gone through and read these guys' litany of complaints about Mac OSX...and really, they're grasping at straws. What's really happening is what I talked about in my Fifth Ave Apple Store post -- they no longer feel like a persecuted minority as a Mac user, so it's time to move onto Linux. It was like suddenly all the jocks and cheerleaders were playing D+D in the caferteria, so it's time to move back to the rear stacks of the library to start playing Magic.
"Hold on, G-ster!" you're probably saying. "That's a little unfair! These are people who care passionately about software issues and that whole dirty-hippy, open source mentality is more up their alley. They think all software should be free and easily examined and changed by anyone. Apple has lost it's way, while Linux is the true nerd's paradise -- what Apple used to be in the early 80's."
Except, of course, Linux has been around since the 90's. This seismic shift -- this need to escape from Apple -- didn't happen when Mac products really sucked in the 90's. Instead, it's happening now when the dam is about to break with people switching to Macs because the OS is incredible. If these folks really believed in the whole open source creedo, it would have happened a long time ago.
"Hold on, G-ster!" you're probably saying again. "Ubuntu is the first nice, human friendly version of Linux. All those other version in the 90's don't count. It's a totally different beast. It's the first Linux distro that you don't have to spend all day screwing and tinkering with just to be on the bleeding edge."
And to that, I say fine... but the whole conceit of the original quote is wrong then -- these switchers aren't "nerds" at all.
posted by Geoff G. @ 10:46 AM
4 Comments:
At 1:03 PM,
Anonymous said…
Since I absolutely love saying, "Hold on, G-ster" I couldn't be happier that you wrote this post.
Oh, I guess that's not true, I might have been happier if I got to say that AND the post was about food, shopping, or reality TV. Things the vapid, non-nerd, non-persucuted people like me like can appreciate.
But this was good too.
At 4:58 PM,
Matthew said…
I must say I do like VLC, which Dan told me about when I couldn't get Quicktime to play my Lost episodes. But I prefer Safari to Firefox.
At 8:10 AM,
Anonymous said…
I can't believe you're still a computer geek.
I can't believe I read these posts.
I can't believe I'm getting paid right now.
At 6:27 PM,
Anonymous said…
What a great site Car cover tires Bargain travel insurance in uk Tea tree acne scrubs Spyder rainier jacket size 14 Accessories totes individually designed accessories blackcatoriginals.com Securities fraud nanette goldberg audi s4 v6 biturbo preggo teens paxil prevent weight gain Group dental insurance florida Hello kitty and contact lens case
Post a Comment
<< Home