Apart from the shiny, they're good at building closed consumer markets which they can dominate ruthlessly, in the same way that Microsoft tries to build and dominate business markets.
is it so ruthless, when people are contributing apps from all over that work on apple's OS?
apple just makes IT easier for luddites and non-nerds to enjoy worry free computing, the whole 'think different' was good pr, but only could take on a rebel, 'creative' aspect because MS was ruthlessly locking people into bloatware that didn't work very reliably.
as apple got bigger, quality went down in some areas, but unless you're into linux, apple still represents a middle way, happy medium between gateswarez and the future, which undoubtedly will go to open source, peer to peer, drm free eventually. power to the people!
it's an interim thing...
(and yes the mac superiority complex is as ugly as any other!)
once you work with a mac, it's hard to go back, but one day i want to go beyond, to the starry firmament where the really free spirits live and code... ~"When an inner situation is not made conscious, it appears outside as fate." Karl Jung~
Just to contribute a bit more to the total OT-ness of this subthread:
Have you looked at Ubuntu? The Momcat has been trying off and on for years to kick the M$ habit. She has had a spin or two with several different Linux distributions, but even with live-in tech support (me) she never really got completely comfortable. Like a smoker breaking down, she would always eventually go back to the borg. About two years ago she tried Ubuntu and immediately fell in love. She shows every sign of being quite happy with it. She has gone through at least one complete upgrade with essentially no help from me. She still keeps an old W98 installation for the odd anime DVD that won't play nice, but she rarely uses it anymore. Now where are we going and what's with the handbasket?
