Kirk Hiner's

"When thinking differently just isn't different enough."

Mac OS Ga Ga

By Kirk Hiner

Growing up, throughout junior high, high school, college, and even my early years in the work force trying to wake up from the American dream, friends and relatives would comment upon my dating life with something like, "You'll never get married because you'll never find a woman who shares your interests."

I realize this was intended as an insult and not as a comment on my ability (or inability) to attract members of the fairer sex, but the point these people were missing was that I didn't want a girlfriend who shared my interests. She'd be some kind of freak! I didn't want a girlfriend who's happy staying up all Friday night watching Godzilla movie marathons. I didn't want a fiancee who heatedly defends Sam Jones' portrayal of Flash Gordon. I certainly don't want a wife who collects Turkish key chains. No, all I ever wanted of my significant others was that they be able to read Hamlet and make their own bed. Some could, some couldn't, and some had puffy eyelids. As the theme song once said, "It takes different strokes to move the world."

Which brings me to the point of this month's column; strokes. No, wait. Not strokes. Differences. Yeah, that's more relevant. Differences. See, we're Macintosh users. We're all about thinking differently. Much moreso than those people driving Dodge vans. We're the vanguard. We're on the cutting edge. We're so different that we confuse ourselves in the mirror, right?

Nope. Not lately. If there's one thing I've learned from the OS X Public Beta, it's that we all love to think differently only if we don't have to think differently to do so.

First and foremost, I love OS X. I've been using it for nearly two months now, and I never want to go back. Sure, people complain that the interface is too colorful and bubbly, but this is Apple we're talking about. What's the point of having a tangerine iBook or an Indigo iMac if the OS is a drab, plain gray; to borrow a phrase from William Gibson, "the color of television, tuned to a dead channel." And what's all this ruckus about throbbing buttons? People have actually been complaining that these buttons are distracting. Distracting? They're buttons, people! How long do you normally go before clicking "OK" or "Save" or "Dance" or whatever the screen wants you to do? How can you be distracted from something that's supposed to have your full attention anyway? It's like getting upset with those annoying flashing red lights near the railroad tracks.

People also complain that the Finder isn't as elegant as it was in what is now called the "classic OS." If by "elegant" they mean "random," then I agree. The best thing about the classic Mac OS is that it allows users to make their way through it however they please. Customize at will, it'll figure you out. OS X, on the other hand, is much more rigid. At least for now, you use it the way Apple wants you to, but this still suits me just fine. After using it a few times and making a few Apple accepted adjustments, I found myself flowing through it like a sax player laying down a solo on a nice groove. That's was OS X has, it has music; harmony. Its pieces flow together like a symphony orchestra. Going back to OS 9 after using it is like heading directly from the New York Philharmonic to Club 42 for yet another evening of Foghat covers from local bar band Street Foxx.

But I'm not here to talk about OS X, I'm here to talk about the people that hate it so. More precisely, I've come to ask them a favor. Boys and girls, fellow Mac users and friends, would you all just kindly shut up?

Okay, I'm not saying you shouldn't report on OS X, and heaven knows I'm not about to ask anyone to quit expressing his opinion. But here's something to consider when you next sit down to mourn the loss of the Apple Menu.

You're wrong.

I hate to be the one to say it, but it's true. You're wrong. That's not to say I'm right. Heavens no! I'm not about to claim superiority over anyone else publishing articles on the internet or in magazines. After all, I'm just a guy who knows a few rules about punctuation and who spends far too much time in front of a computer. In my book, that makes me eligible to write a few articles to put online to see what people think. In the mind of other Mac journalists, however, that gives them the right to run Apple Computer.

Expressing an opinion is one thing. Believing that opinion to be law is another. Far too often, opinions are prefaced with the phrase, "Apple needs to..." Well, here's my opinion; you need to grow up. What if they don't do what you demand? Are you going to take your ball and go home? Just because the company is heading in a direction that may not seem popular at the moment, that doesn't make them wrong. And yes, that includes directions that aren't popular with Mac fans. Apple has always bucked the industry, and now they're bucking some of us. We have a right to be worried, sure, but here's a news flash...

Apple Computer does not want to go out of business. Hard to believe, I know, but it's true. Why would they create an operating system that no one would want to use? They've released ridiculously goofy products before, sure, but the MacOS is Apple's bread and butter. They're not about to risk an overhaul unless they were sure it would pay off. Call me naive, call me blind, but I trust them there.

And hey, it's just a beta, and Apple has set up forums for people to criticize, compliment and suggest ideas for OS X. But this apparently isn't good enough for some journalists and users. They seem bitter that Steve Jobs didn't call them personally to find out what color the Close Window button should be. Such people obviously have never dealt with clients on design issues. I work for an internet design company that has over one hundred active clients. Many of our site are new, some are redesigns of sites originally completed by other companies. When a company hires us, we don't say, "Okay, before we get started, why don't you round up every single employee, maybe get some friends and relatives too, and have all of them make suggestions. We'll then take every single one of those suggestions and incorporate them all into the redesign.

Nope, it doesn't work that way. What we do is redesign the site and propose it to the client. We then get feedback, and we make alterations. A few steps later, and we're finished. The client is happy, and we get paid.

I know that's not a perfect analogy, but as my friend John once explained to me, all analogies are inherently flawed (save for the one where I compared conversing with a former roommate to climbing to the top of the Statue of Liberty, but I won't get into that right now). Along those lines, MacOS X will not be the perfect operating system. It won't be the classic Mac OS, it won't be Unix, it won't be NeXT, and it certainly won't be Windows. What it will be is a wild ride full of detours, potholes and the occasional traffic accident. But I can see where it's taking us, and I can hardly wait to get there.

So Apple, take the wheel. I'll be back here inviting people along, occasionally suggesting a direction or two, and no doubt picking up many Turkish made key chains along the way.

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