Comments on: Four things I didn’t know about Apple

By: Hawk Wings » Blog Archive » Apple Mail Team engineer who blogs!

Hawk Wings » Blog Archive » Apple Mail Team engineer who blogs! — Tue, 31 Oct 2006 12:44:21 +0000

[...] Given the much-hyped culture of secrecy at Cupertino and much-hyped stories of Steve Job’s view about communication with the outside world, anyone who sticks their head above the parapet (NDA or not) is admirable. [...]

By: portal-008 - Technology - Apple » Four things you didn’t know about Apple

Thu, 10 Aug 2006 21:52:59 +0000

[...] Here,,,,s a list of four things you may or may not know about Apple.Here,,,,s a list of four things you may or may not know about Apple. [...]

By: Tony Meyer

Tony Meyer — Thu, 10 Aug 2006 06:45:02 +0000

I think that Time Machine will make drastically increase those numbers. For a start, I expect that almost all of those 22% that backup non-automatically will switch to Time Machine. These people, for whatever reason (inability, laziness, etc) aren’t installing software to do it for them, but if it’s right there, why would they not? (Well, if a second HDD is a requirement, then that’s one reason, but perhaps a partition will do, or maybe future Macs will come with a “Time Machine Drive”).

Increasing the 26% is harder, but if Apple makes this more on than off by default (either literally on by default, or popping up a “I see there’s a secondary storage device here – would you like to turn the Time Machine on?”) then surely that will make for a significant increase.

My concern with Time Machine isn’t that people won’t use it – I’m sure they will – it’s how easy it will be to take files completely ‘out of time’ (backup space isn’t unlimited), or to exclude files.

By: Tim Johnson

Tim Johnson — Wed, 09 Aug 2006 22:04:59 +0000

The iTunes print feature is truly useful – I’ve been using it for a long time now. It’s also good to print the covers to PDF so you can mail them to friends who can then print them at work on nice colour laser printers (and where iTunes can’t be installed).
[Just had to get the Mail hook in there...]

By: Andre

Andre — Wed, 09 Aug 2006 22:01:50 +0000

Don’t forget that Apple had a serious credibility problem back in 1997. The way to fix that is to say very little until the product is almost ready to ship or is shipping, which is what Jobs is doing.

Also, if you run a small company that wants more attention than its market share would normally warrant, wouldn’t secrecy and surprise be the most effective way of getting that attention? Startups do this all the time; Jobs manages to do it with a multi-billion $ company. Pretty impressive, actually.

By: Tim

Tim — Wed, 09 Aug 2006 21:26:00 +0000

@Dan – hehehehe! Fair point :) I have to install the Vista beta on my PC box today for a freelancing assignment. I’m not looking forward to it. Still, the idea of dialogue and feedback is a good one, even if in this particular example, it is poorly implemented.

@Uno – No need to apologise. There is no strong on topic enforcement on Hawk Wings. I’m an academic, so rambling is my natural mode :)

Sure, Jobs’ command of the media and the message is incredible. But it is in no sense a dialogue, and that attitude (it seems) comes to infect the whole company.

I never knew about those CD covers. Neat, eh?

By: Uno

Uno — Wed, 09 Aug 2006 18:38:33 +0000

@Tim: I partly agree, but you have to commend the way Steve Jobs creates media publicity and public interest without saying anything.

Personally I don’t care all that much as long as I get good products, be it software or hardware. I’m an IT admin in a larger Windows environment (I have been a silly Windows user long before I did the eye opening switch thing), and I get daily reminders on how inferior the Windows server and client solutions are. Not to mention the difference when it comes to third party software developers. This is where the Mac community really excels in my opinion (yeah, pun).

And as far as rumours go, well — I won’t use it until I’ve tried it anyway, so as long as it’s not out there it’s really all the same to me. :-)

Oh, on topic: great tip regarding the CD covers! And sorry for the rambling in here. I have an off track mind.

By: Dan

Dan — Wed, 09 Aug 2006 16:49:55 +0000

Have you *seen* any of these Microsoft blogs? I went digging around them once before, and was absolutely not impressed. For one, I would guess less than 10% of the blogs have a readership that goes outside MS. All of the blogs also are very general, since they can’t discuss secret MS details just like every other company.

It’s a nice idea, getting user feedback via blogs, but in MS’s case, isn’t working too well. I mean, look at Vista…

By: Neema Agha

Neema Agha — Wed, 09 Aug 2006 16:28:09 +0000

I don’t see why it’s important for a company to have lots of blogs. MS has lots of blogs but that’s just another form of PR to cover for the Vista disaster. Products and action speak much more than words. Apple stands behind their products and that’s fine by me so long as they continue to crank out innovative products.

By: Jesse David Hollington

Jesse David Hollington — Wed, 09 Aug 2006 16:28:05 +0000

I think there definitely does need to be a middle ground between those extremes, but I do lean toward Apple’s approach, since Microsoft frequently spends *so* much time touting new features that they tend to lose sight of what is important.

Also, it does benefit Apple since the actual release of a product creates more impact and therefore generates more sales. By the time Vista gets here I think most folks are going to consider it kind of passe since it’s been hyped so much.

(Not to mention the obvious fact that rumour and speculation creates *more* publicity for Apple).

Further, I respect the fact that Apple generally sticks pretty close to their release dates. Let’s not forget that Windows 95 was supposed to be Windows 93, and that trend has continued ever since….