Wow. Somehow I've become the embodiment of every misconception people have about Mac users. Okay, fine.

"Yes, Jake. We already established the Apple model is to make you think you have the best. The airline passengers in first class are definitely more satisfied in surveys I would venture to bet."

What's your point, exactly? Have you ever flown first class? Are you arguing that first class *isn't* really a more satisfying flight experience--it's just that the airlines' model is to make their first-class passengers *think* the extra room and better food makes for a better flight? Besides, the surveys were taken by *PC World* of *PC World* readers.

I never told anyone here they should get a Mac. Certainly nobody who wants to build a machine to play Bioshock should buy a Mac. At the same time, to say that all Macs have going for them is simplicity and cool is just ignorant. Almost as ignorant as saying Macs still only have a one-button mouse: I've been using a two-button mouse with a scroll wheel for over a decade now. (I could use 5 buttons if I wanted to; I don't.) Even Apple makes a two-button mouse now, though I don't know anyone who likes it. I bought my two-button mouse at Office Max; I bought my Microsoft keyboard at CompUSA in the general keyboard department.

"That's what 'running software that's consistently reviewed as the best available' gets you in a market characterized more by dogma than technical knowledge."

Is this the same market that chose Windows because it's a better value? Or is this the dogma that leads the *PC* Magazine reviewer to say, "After three intense days with Apple's Mac OS X Leopard Version 10.5, I have three main things to say about it. First: despite minor problems, it's by far the best operating system ever written for the vast majority of consumers, with dozens of new features that have real practical value..."?

See, when I read these letters, I don't see Mac users trying to convince PC users to switch. I see PC users ridiculing Mac users for their choice of computers. Go, use your Ubuntu machine and be happy--I'm sure you have the machine you want. I have a lot of respect for people who build their own machines and put Linux on them. Just give us the same respect, that we have the machines we want and for equally valid reasons.

Even though his mind is clouded by the pretty lights on his "complimentary" Apple Cinema display, he was very clever in starting a skirmish in the never-ending Apple vs PC debate. Someone can correct me, but I don't recall any of his articles generating so many comments.

I just got a big reminder of why I don't like Apple anymore (used to). I went to their site to research the new iTouch, which actually looks pretty cool. There was video of course, but it quickly turned into an iTunes commercial with a long boring diatribe on exactly how to buy music. So I thought I would fast forward through that. I could not. No fast forward. I had to watch. Steve says! Okay, so I will just turn down the sound. No volume control either. Then it froze. Isn't that impossible or something? Oh sorry, must have been my PC.

That experience brought back all those wasted hours on my iBook, you know the one with the faulty logic boards... doing it "different", which in applespeak means one way, their way, with a one button mouse. Steve says.

This Apple Leopard is the ultimate mean machine. Microsoft must be totally LIVID!!

Gimme an Apple any day. I work better and faster.

As for cost -- hey, when you consider all the work, time and money involved in using extra programs to protect your privacy, your PC security, and your peace of mind, then Macs come out being the only logical and sane choice of operating systems -- hands down.

No, Microsoft's monopoly is in no danger whatsoever. To the extent an extremely large and confused organization has emotions at all, it should be embarrassment that they shipped Vista years late, features missing, and of dubious quality. But I don't think they feel that either. What they feel is secure that no one is threatening their monopoly for the desktop in any way.

The Mac has their market share, and don't seem poised to get much more. They're just not competitive (price means something in the real world). Linux fans thought they had a chance at unseating MSFT for the desktop, but that was a pipedream (it did succeed in pretty much destroying Sun for the back end, though). Dell sells Ubuntu-equipped machines directly, but that's more a sop to the Linux true believers than a credible market play.

MSFT are so secure in their monopoly that they can deliberately bloat up Vista so you need to buy a new machine in order to run it. They and computer manufacturers know that they have a real problem in that all the current PCs run just fine and everybody's happy with XP (finally). Who needs a new PC?

All this is just to show that the image of MSFT looking nervously over their shoulder at Macs poised to take over the world is truly Koolaid. Apple is just not a significant enough portion of the market to concern them. In fact, MSFT put money into Apple when it got dicey just to keep the Treasury Dept. at bay. The government likes to see competitors, and if you have to invent them or prop them up, so much the better.

My point, Jake, comes directly from the post you attacked titled "Apple encourages the smugness" by Thadeus Crumb. Granted, you were talking about his comment on Intel boards in Macs, but the rest of the article had more to do with selling a marketing ideal.

Here are some snippets so you know what I'm talking about:

"It works for them... To get people to pay exorbitant margins, you have to make them feel somewhat dirty and smelly if they don't...In the case of a first class section of the airplane, though, the guy who pays $300 extra for a glass of brandy and 4 extra inches of space for his butt is directly subsidizing my seat in coach. It's hard to see how Mac users giving Steve Jobs more money than his machines actually deserve benefits anyone other than Steve Jobs..."

So, what I'm saying, is that those people in first class will rate their experiences higher because they felt pampered, while my seat in coach wasn't designed to make me feel like in some elite club so I wouldn't rate it in the same way.

You were sold on a product that supposedly looks nice and behaves with some sort of advanced mind set and you're in some sort of coolness club because you bought a Mac, etc. So when you're asked how you feel about the Mac, do you think your human mind is going to do anything but confirm your purchase? It would be similar to cognitive dissonance, except for the fact that you probably do like your Mac. But, don't for a second think that you have not been influenced by an ad campaign specifically designed to make you feel like you are superior to us Neanderthal PC users.

Plus I hope we're not comparing any OS's to Vista, since it's simply unfair. Vista is the biggest piece of crap ever. At least so far.

And as far as my comment about the one-button mouse: do most Macs not come standard with a one button mouse? You could ask the same question about my PC, except PC "standards" are a lot looser. So, when I built my PC, I choose the exact mouse that would make me happiest, not the one that Jobs thinks I should use. Basically, every Window's machine I've touched in the past few years has had a wheel button mouse, and not one Mac I've ever seen. I guess your just a different kind of Mac user.

jason.