Why Not Apple

Ever since I made the momentous decision to purge products from Apple, Inc. from my life, I've been asked the simple question, "why"?

The answer is equally simple. David Pogue.

Now I realize that for the uninitiated, that may not make much sense. But let me connect the dots for you.

As you all know, I am the only objective technology writer on the planet. The only one that even comes close to me is Rob Enderle from "The Enderle Group" (where by "group" I mean, "Rob and his wife"). I have spent my life immersed in technology, from the very first gaming system ever invented to the awesome DELL (the finest computer builder in the known universe) that sits on my desk today. I am an expert without peer. Literally. Obviously.

And yet, while I toil away daily shilling for writing about Microsoft and all the amazing, tear-inducing products that come from The Software Giant™, I get no respect from the mainstream press. They routinely ignore me, or worse, vilify me as nothing more than a glorified cheerleader for Microsoft. Believe me, I am anything but a cheerleader for Microsoft. I once criticized them back in 1996 in an article I wrote, saying, "Microsoft may have stumbled here, but they're sure to come roaring back as they always do, vanquishing their opponents and regaining their rightful place on the top of the tech world heap." That's some pretty biting criticism right there. I don't know how anyone can call me a shill.

As The World's Only Objective Technology Writer, my obvious place is in writing for the top newspapers and magazines out there. To showcase my work, I created PAUL THURROTT'S SUPERSITE! FOR! WINDOWS! which demonstrates—daily—my propensity for verbal diarrhea and superlatives directed towards Microsoft and their partners. This stunning work has, unfortunately, gone largely unnoticed by the so-called mainstream press.  Bloggers ignore or deride me. My television appearances are limited to one-minute fluff pieces on the local 6:00 news. Legions of drooling Microsofties criticize me for owning Apple products. And that fucking David Pogue is writing for the New York Times.

For those of you who don't know who David Pogue is, here's a quick bio from his Wikipedia page:

David Welch Pogue (born March 9, 1963) is an American technology writer and TV science host. He is a personal technology columnist for the New York Times, an Emmy-winning tech correspondent for CBS News Sunday Morning, and a columnist for Scientific American. He is also the host of NOVA ScienceNow on PBS and was the host of the NOVA specials Making Stuff in 2011^[1] and Hunting the Elements in 2012.^[2] Pogue has written or co-written seven books in the For Dummies series (including Macintosh computers, magic, opera, and classical music). In 1999, he launched his own series of computer how-to books called the Missing Manual series, which now includes over 100 titles covering a variety of Macintosh and Windowsoperating systems and applications. Among the dozens of books Pogue has authored is The World According to Twitter (2009), written in collaboration with around 500,000 of his Twitter followers.

What this article doesn't mention is that David Pogue is an Apple lackey, pure and simple. He made a name for himself by writing "For Dummies" books about Apple, penning Apple columns, writing other Apple books, speaking at Apple conferences...you get the idea. The guy had his nose so far up Steve Jobs' ass, he couldn't see daylight. It wasn't until he wrote a couple cheesy Microsoft books that he was able to claim he was an "objective journalist" and got the NY Times gig. Now this singing, dancing, magician—basically a one-man walking minstrel show—gets all the attention while I write for "Connected Home" magazine.

My gorilla-sized hands are shaking in anger just thinking about it.

I hate this little sleazeball so much that I've decided to double-down on Microsoft. Yes, this means I give up a lot of ease-of-use and that I'll be even more out of touch than ever with the tech mainstream, but I can't stand to use the same products that this obsequious twit sings about (yes, sings about!) on his web page. The thought of touching a product that David Pogue wrote about makes me want to vomit all over my beautiful Microsoft Natural Ergonomic Keyboard 4000*.

So thus begins the purge (see what I did there? Nice literary transition, right? You don't get that with Pogue) of Apple from my life. No more AppleTV. No more iPad, iMac, iPod, or anything else beginning with "i". In fact, I don't even allow my wife to buy apples when she's shopping for fruit. I'm serious here, folks. Not even applesauce.

One day I will be noticed for my brilliance. And when I am, I promise you I will not sing. I will not perform magic tricks. I will not conduct the Boston Philharmonic. I will simply do what I do best: lie about write about Microsoft and how its magical tear-inducing products are changing our world for the better. It's what I do best.

It may make me less "interesting" in the eyes of the tech press, but everyone's got a schtick. This is mine. I am Paul Thurrott, Microsoft lackey. Obviously.


* See, that's something else Microsoft does right. They really know how to name a product!

Cleanup on Aisle Five

Does anyone have a towel? I need one, obviously, after my latest column. In it, I used up all my adjectives to describe the orgasm-inducing thrill I feel running up and down my leg every time someone mentions Microsoft. If anyone doubts my status as chief cheerleader for The Software Giant™, please put those fears aside and check out the list of superlatives I laid on Mr. Ballmer's company:

"a revolution" .. “most exciting company in tech, hands down.” ... "amazing" ... “Microsoft is suddenly riding a wave of excitement and enthusiasm."..."It’s breathtaking" ..."incredible" ... "delivering a solid vision" ... "amazing" (again)" ... "decidedly positive" ... "this is huge year for Microsoft" ... "not evolutionarily but ... fairly dramatic" ... "The most exciting company in tech, hands down? I think the case can be made, yes."

Now if you'll excuse me, I have to find my pom-pons. Obviously.

Not A Tech Enthusiast

I have repeatedly told you people that Paul Thurrott is not a Microsoft shill. Or a Microsoft Zealot. Or a Microsoft lackey. I am a Tech Enthusiast.

BWAHAHAHAHA. Good one, right?

I'm such a Tech Enthiusiast, in fact, that I have purged products from Apple Inc. from my life. Yeah, there's no sense in burdening myself with the most popular and well-designed products on the market. They're just not EXCITING! ENOUGH! FOR! PAUL! THURROTT!

God, I can't wait for Surface to surface. In the meantime, I'll be enjoying my Yugo Kindle Fire instead of that pesky iPad, and anything with the name "Windows" or "XBox" for virtually everything else. I just can't be bothered with quality any more. I'm "all in" on second-rate technology. My readers expect nothing less.

Obviously.

Broken Watch

Every now and again, I get a column exactly right.

This is one of those times.

Even a broken watch is right once a day.

This Doesn't Apply To Me Either

Because, you know, I have huge gorilla-like hands. And we all know what that translates to. Here's the skinny (That's a diet joke. Get it?) from some rag named "Geek Wire".

"A techno-dance routine that preceded Microsoft’s Windows Azure presentation at the Norwegian Developers Conference this week featured a group of women jumping around on stage to a song that included several drug references and this line: “The words MICRO and SOFT don’t apply to my penis.” 

In a strange effort to be inclusive, a monitor displaying the lyrics added, “or vagina.”

It's good to see Microsoft's partners being so inclusive, isn't it?

Just in case you were wondering...

...this, boys and girls, is what real analysis looks like. You won't hear this from me (obviously, because I have a vested interest in Windows 8 succeeding), but if you want truth, here are a few nuggets you won't read over on Paul Thurrott's SUPERSITE FOR WINDOWS by Paul Thurrott, courtesy of some hack named "Michael Mace" (who obviously doesn't write for the prestigious "Connected Home" magazine, so therefore he's irrelevant):

Windows 8 in its current form is very different; attractive in some ways, and disturbing in others.  It combines an interesting new interface with baffling changes to Windows compatibility, and amateur mistakes in customer messaging.  Add up all the changes, and I am very worried that Microsoft may be about to shoot itself in the foot spectacularly.  Even the plain colorful graphics in Windows 8 that looked so cool when I first saw them are starting to look ominous to me, like the hotel decor in "The Shining".

...shutdown requires five actions: a hover, a sweep, and three clicks.  Plus the command is hidden in a very non-intuitive place.  People used to joke that only Microsoft could think it was intuitive to have the Shut Down command hidden under the Start button.  I think it's sooooo much more intuitive to have it hidden under Settings 

If you're not a Windows user, it is hard to describe how disorienting this is.  It's roughly equivalent to giving someone a car in which the steering wheel has been replaced by a joystick.  Not only do you need to learn how to steer with a joystick, but all of the controls formerly attached to the steering column are now scattered in various spots on the dashboard.  The wiper control is a lever above the radio, the high beam lights are a switch on the rearview mirror, the turn signal is a set of buttons under the speedometer, and the cruise control is a dial hidden inside the ashtray.  Oh, and you honk the horn by bouncing up and down in your seat. 

Unfortunately, although Windows 8 may have a light hardware footprint, it has compatibility problems with some existing hardware, including some Windows 7 computers.  Computers designed for Vista can have much more serious problems.  This became very clear to me when I installed Windows 8 on my Vista-based mini tablet PC.  Windows 8 is not compatible with the wireless network chips in my tablet PC, so it can no longer connect to the Internet.  

If you're a productivity worker, Windows 8 does very little for you, and in fact probably makes your life harder.   

It goes on, and on, and on (this guy has diarrhea of the keyboard worse than even me), but you get the idea. We're looking at a forthcoming disaster folks, and no amount of cheerleading on my part is going to make it better. But I'm doing my damndest despite that. Obviously.

The Difference Between an Expert and a Hack

Experts write books.

Hacks sell T-shirts.

Any questions?

I Am A Silly Little Twat

...but it doesn't matter, because I'm also the Master of Spin™, and we're not talking about those ridiculous exercise classes.

Over on The SUPERSITE FOR WINDOWS, I've put my unique perspective on the failing Microsoft Windows Phone For Windows by spewing out market share numbers thusly:

"Windows Phone now controls between 3 and 4 percent of the market in the United States, Great Britain, France, and Italy, and over 6 percent of the market in Germany. As recently as the first quarter of 2012, worldwide market share for Windows Phone was just about 2 percent, so these are meaningful improvements."

Doesn't that just warm the cockles of your heart? It might mean something if it were true, but as usual I'm just cherry-picking the data I need to prove my own built-in biases and preconceived notions. Anyone with half a brain could peruse the data themselves and discover the truth. But we all know my readers won't do that, obviously, because they're Limbaugh-like mind-numbed robots.

It's good to be me. Obviously.

See?

I told you so.

I'm the only reviewer that calls this thing "responsive". I'll leave you to decide if that makes me a shill, or whether I'm the Rush Limbaugh of the tech world—always right, despite the overwhelming evidence to the contrary. One or the other. Obviously.

"Enjoy Your Yugo"

I will be reviewing the fantastic iPad-killing Amazon Kindle Fire (the greatest thing to come out of the tablet universe since Microsoft unleashed the format a decade ago), but needless to say, you know I'm going to say it's awesome, perfect, and will obviously be the final nail in the coffin of Apple.

Even though it's not true.

Look, I'm one of those people that can't admit when I'm wrong. The Fire is a freaking joke, obviously, and everyone that reviews it says so. But not me. You don't come to me for truth, you come to me for anti-Apple rants and shilling for products I like or have some financial attachment to.

Now go buy the damn Fire, and make sure you do it through a link I will helpfully provide that gives me a financial kickback. I have kids to feed.

Obviously.

Thank God That's Over

A lot of you have probably been waiting for me to give you my thoughts in this space on the death of Steve Jobs.

Obviously, Steve Jobs was a creative genius that changed the face of the computer industry forever. Every modern piece of technology you touch has his influence in it, and he will be remembered through the ages.

He was also a selfish spoiled brat that was universally despised as a human being, despite what you may have read in places like this, here, here, here, here, and here.

I never met Steve Jobs, but I hated him anyway. I have no idea how much money he gave to charity*, but I derided him for it anyway. I have used products from his company for years, but I hate them and only write about them because I have to in order to tell you how superior everything that comes from Microsoft is to the crap from Cupertino.

I take no pleasure in his death, but it will certainly make it easier to be critical of Apple without the cult of personality surrounding its former charismatic leader. Maybe if he had bowed to my superior brilliance just once, I wouldn't have such a hard place in my soul for him, but aside from one shining moment when Apple put a quote from me on their website, the company and the man basically ignored me. So screw 'em.

And let's get on to recognizing some true genius, shall we?

How to REALLY Fix Microsoft

If you're a regular reader of THE SUPERSITE! FOR WINDOWS! then you'll already have read the multi-page tome "How Microsoft can fix Microsoft." Here are a few ideas that weren't in the article. Microsoft, are you listening?

• Rename Microsoft. Henceforth you shall be called, "The Software Giant," a term I coined in reference to The Software Giant long ago. This not only reflects the nature of the company, but is in homage to me, which is just obvious.
  
  
• Dump the Microsoft Windows Phone 7 Phone. Seriously. You jumped the shark on that thing when you hard-coded facebook into it. Can you imagine walking around with a device that featured MySpace AND YOU COULDN'T GET RID OF IT? Seriously, Software Giant, WTF were you thinking?
  
  
• All Software Giant Press Releases should be written by Tech Genius and Weight Loss Expert Paul Thurrott. Obviously.
  
  
• Give Steve Ballmer a new title. The original article said to fire him, but in retrospect, that's a bad idea. I've thought long and hard about this, and I now realize that every successful company has its court jester. Ballmer can be to The Software Giant what Steve Wozniak is to Apple...a formerly great employee who pops up now and again to make an amusing comment about the company or the competition, gets some press, and then goes back quietly to his office to play with whatever gadget he bought that week. Ballmer would be perfect for this effort.
  
  
• Buy DELL and sell it for parts. Just because. Those bastard are weighing you down by slapping the Software Giant logo on cheap commodity garbage. You need to put an end to it now.
  
  
• Hire Michael Dell to replace Steve Ballmer. I know this seems to fly in the face of all logic based on my previous recommendation, but hey, I'm a professional critic. I don't get paid to make this work.
  
  
• Develop for Apple products so you can make the best damn software in the world again. Microsoft Word? Originally written for the Mac. Excel? Ditto. PowerPoint? Originally a Mac-only program before y'all bought it and slapped it together with Office. My point here is that all the really good Microsoft stuff was originally coded for Apple (with the exception of Windows, which was a lame attempt to rip off Apple until you came close with XP). Start writing for iOS and MacOS, and see what happens.

So that's it. If you follow my stellar recommendations, The Software Giant can once again regain its crown and be the amazing company it once was. Or you can ignore me and be the Rob Enderle of the tech world...a loser clown that gets it right once every 10 years or so. Your choice.

Success

Despite what you might read elsewhere, Apple's retail stores have been an unqualified success, and were (quite literally) from day one.

I just can't admit that anywhere else. Obviously.

After all, I have a reputation* to uphold.



*As a jackass, obviously.

Support Your Local Pundit

You can have it in any color you like, as long as it's a shade of black.

(No, I haven't gone soft, but Gruber said something nice about me a while back, so I'm helping him out. Don't get used to it, because he's still a jackass.)

Holy F***ing S***

"So there you have it: I just recommended iPad. Watch out for the flying pigs."

I'm So F*&%ing Clever

Remember, kiddies: When you're writing a review of an Apple product, it's important to hit all the right notes if you want to be taken seriously as The Most Important Windows Tech Analyst In The Free Word™:

Ailing Apple CEO Steve Jobs, who is currently on a mysterious medical leave of absence, returned temporarily to kick off the evolutionary product.

...Jobs said, opening the iPad announcement event, after receiving a standing ovation from the Apple-centric press in attendance.

Jobs and his Apple cohorts then went on to step through the expected product news: a thinner, slightly lighter new iPad that Apple claims offers better CPU performance and "nine times" the graphics performance of its predecessor.

Battery life is identical to that of its predecessor, as is pricing, which again ranges from $500 to a whopping $829. There are an incredible 18 different models of iPad 2, which comes in 16GB, 32GB, and 64GB variants, as before, and in models that work with Wi-Fi only, AT&T 3G wireless networks, and Verizon Wireless 3G. Good luck figuring out which one you want.

Basically, what we have here is a decidedly evolutionary update that simply maintains the status quo, technically and from a pricing perspective.

Problematically, the Android competition is just as expensive as the iPad lineup, so Apple obviously feels free to continue gouging consumers <----Note: I know this makes no sense whatsoever, but what the hell. It was fun to write. Never mind that if competitor pricing is at par or higher, Apple can't be "gouging". It sure sounds good. on iPad pricing. Those consumers show no sign of resisting this gouging, either: Apple is forecasted <----Note: not a real word to sell roughly 35 million iPads this year alone.

...if you do want to purchase a tablet device—virtually no one needs such a thing, remember—

Apple says the iPad 2 will begin shipping March 11 in the United States, but customers aren't able to preorder the device: Instead, you'll need to line up like a lemming at an Apple Store that day if you want one immediately. International sales start March 25.

I'll say it again. I am So. F&%#ing. Brilliant.

That Fracking Weasel

God, I hate David Pogue.

My obsession with him is almost as bad as my Steve Jobs obsession. What is it about Apple that draws such obnoxious, obsequious little twerps into its orbit? Seriously, I've spilled more ink over Pogue than any other columnist, and it infuriates me that he not only has his own column, but his own TV show, regularly appears on CNBC, has authored a series of books for both the Mac and Windows platforms that probably far outsell my own superior efforts, a blog, and God knows what else.

And he doesn't know a damn thing about tech. I'm the only one that does. Well, me and Rob Enderle. And sometimes Mary Jo Foley (who still rebuffs my drunken advances). I've been screaming this from the rooftops for years, and no one will listen. It sickens me. My overly-large gorilla hands are shaking as I write this, that's how angry I am.

It's a messed up world. Maybe once I lose all the weight I'm going to lose this year on my new diet that consists of fatty foods and not exercising, I'll be able to compete with this jerk.

Oh, and John Gruber doesn't know a damn thing, either, especially when it comes to the iPhone. Obviously.

I Am A Diet Expert

Trust me:

"If eating less made you lose weight, we wouldn't be fat."

"Fitness is good but it will not help you lose weight."

That's how you do it. Eat more bacon. You can trust me on this just like you can trust me on everything else I've ever said, particularly when I predicted the demise of iTunes, the iPhone, and the iPad. Obviously. No one could say it better: "You're welcome to your beliefs, but you're wrong."

Thus Spake The God Of All Tech

One year ago:

"Apple ... has unveiled its iPad, an iPod touch like tablet computer that, so far at least, doesn't seem impressive at all."

"It's actually ... can I say this about an Apple product? ... ugly."

"OK, this has to be a joke. He can't really be this excited about this device."

"This stuff is just boring. If Apple wanted this to be a game machine, they should have built hardware controls into that huge bezel."

"I can almost hear Apple's stock price dropping every second this demo goes on."



"Overall, this is a letdown. I'd be surprised to see anyone try to claim otherwise."

You know, for the life of me I can't figure out why anyone would call Paul Thurrott a partisan hack. It's clear that I was 100% right about this silly product. Obviously.

Gruber Gets One Right. Almost.

So even the overrated t-shirt salesmen got it half-right. When it comes to the operation of the company, Steve Jobs doesn't matter to Apple. But Apple is nothing without Steve Jobs. Trust me, they'll have to prop him up in a lobby display like Jeremy Bentham in order for the place to survive without him.