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New Apple Column on Ars Technica
Steve Cowan writes "A new Apple column by Eric Bangeman, called Mac.Ars, debuted at Ars Technica. The first edition is an insightful, unbiased take on the current state of Apple and its offerings. The author discusses Panther, the G5, consumer hardware offerings, Premiere, Microsoft Office, the 'Switch' campaign, the effects of Apple's relatively recent purchases of products like Logic and Shake, Apple's position in the server market, and lots more." What's the fun of being a Mac pundit unless you are biased?
Ars also launched an Linux.Ars column shortly after Mac.Ars -- not too shabby either.
> What's the fun of being a Mac pundit unless you are biased?
:)
What, you mean like Slashdot's bias for anything Linux or Open Source?
I dont' understand the reason for writing that article - it was a big introduction with no keynote speaker.
I got from that article that the writer:
- Intends to create a column for in depth technical review where other rumor sites fall short.
- Feels the Switch campaign didn't work out for Apple because the consumer line can't be customized
- Feels Apple's software development strategy yeilds great results but might present a probelm if Apple is the only one developing for the market
- Feels there is no market for the Xserve but there is a market for Panther Server (...though there is no market for server grade hardware?)
SO WHERE IS THE IN DEPTH TECHNICAL REVIEW? The author basically did a feature review. There was nothing new - a few opinions about consumer's desire to have faster graphics card - but no in depth anything.
I sure am glad I have apple.slashdot.org and macrumors.com to read because Ars' Apple column won't be on my list again.
I only came here to do two things; kick some ass, and drink some beer...looks like we're almost out of beer.
However they will be shortly. Until I can run to the local (dallas, tx) Apple store and pick up a G5 running Panther, it is a future offering.
Just come out with the new powerbooks already. I'm probably just going to buy a notebook from PowerNotebooks instead since I've already got a 900MHz iBook and a G4 Tower. I was looking forward to a new powerbook. Oh well...
Ignoring the heavy anti-MS bias here on Slashdot, why the fuck was Daring Fireball mentioned? Looks like a cheap and perhaps biased shot to me.
i ng .htmll _script _for_bbedit_redux.html/ 2003/01/safari.html0 3/05/interface_detail s_itunes_vs_safari.htmlt /2003/01/scripting_safari _urls.html
http://daringfireball.net/2003/03/antiantialias
http://daringfireball.net/2003/07/grab_htm
http://daringfireball.net
http://daringfireball.net/20
http://daringfireball.ne
If those article gives you an idea of what you'll find there sometimes, you'll see that the stuff DF.net posts isn't just rabid OMG APPLE RULZ!!!1 kind of stuff.
It's a Mac user talking about Macs and Mac stuff. That doesn't make it biased on that basis alone.
Can we start moderating comments in story summaries? Please?
Mikey-San
Karma: +Eleventy billion (mostly affected by watching Celebrity Jeopardy)
Daring Fireball offers well-written opinions about Apple-related topics. It would have been nice of pudge to provide a few links to supposedly biased pieces that Gruber has written, instead ignorantly pointing at the front page.
Of course, it can be difficult linking to things that don't exist...
So they follow it up with data from their server logs:And potentially, a huge chunk of that unknown value are Mac. They even state that themselves:So they begin doubting the poll results from their readers, so they check their server logs. They're then shocked to find that there really is (potentially) over 30 percent of their readers using Macs.
They then pull out their server's browser logs, which show that Safari is the second most used browser by their readers (unsurprisingly trailing Internet Explorer).
It took all this trawling though their logs, and yet they still wouldn't admit that the poll's results could be somewhat accurate. Perhaps this new section is Ars actually admitting, in a very backwards way, that many of their reader do actually use Macs. Not they they want to admit it.
Say what you will about other sites, but claiming that ArsTechnica are unbiased is a joke.
Every article there on anything remotely Mac has been biased.... Ars Technica is more anti-Mac than Slashdot is.
The "We're not biased" attitude (And tone of voice) should not fool anyone... after all, how many people here think CNN and Fox news are totally objective? (They're both biased, just in different ways.)
Ars Technica excells at selling FUD wrapped around plausible sounding and "technical" analysis. Its one of those things that unless you are proficient in the technical area you won't recognize to be FUD.... which is why they are so successful with the slashdot crowd (which doesn't seem to be very engineering oriented.)
Course, as with most people their definition of "biased" is "anything I don't agree with" (and so this article will likely be moderated troll).... but the reality is there is an objective reality.
Its just that if you're not proficient in the reality of the situation, its difficult to detect bias.
And if you confuse an objective tone for authortiative knowledge, you're open to easy manipulation.
Yeah, and you guys panned the ipod too: http://apple.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=01/10/23
Go to macrumors.com and read "Any day now" for the 15" Powerbooks for 9 months. Have the cash in hand and just wait. I'd actually prefer a Ti one with one exception, chipping paint. Plus I just bought a 900MHz iBook for my wife (which she doesn't use at all so it's mine now!!!). I want 1 laptop that is high end and wide screen (this makes coding much easier as my long ass lines tend to fit better). I'd prefer a 15.2" from Apple but the 17" Sager one is nice too (plus I won't have to wait a year or longer for decent games to come out, should I decide to play instead of work).
So I am in the market for an Apple, but wait a few months is bullshit. Even if they announce them next week, they won't be in stores for 3 months.
Follow apple for a while before you make statements that are inaccurate about their releases. Not to mention they give no information in the way of a roadmap (with the exception of announcing a product then not delivering for 3-6 months).
What's the fun of being a Mac pundit unless you are biased?
Pudge, was that a shot, or just good-natured ribbing? Gruber writes the best-written (and yes, most opinionated) columns on Apple-related topics anywhere, on the web or in print. In other words, it's not just a diary with a few sentences about whatever came into his head on the way to work that day, nor is it hype-mongering drivel about Apple, but rather they are extremely well thought-out and tightly-written articles. Pudge, you're a smart guy (I've heard you speak and read your own blog/mail list posts), you don't need to be reminded that all news media contains bias. I'm glad that Gruber has the sack to acknowledge this, and write what he really thinks rather than tone down his writing to get syndicated on some mainstream Mac site.
I don't agree with everything Gruber says, but his feed is at the top of my NetNewswire client and I look forward to his content every week. I think a lot of people will take your comment out of context -- care to explain?
"First you gotta do the truffle shuffle."
True objectivity - like some think should be the norm - is in all practical sense non-existent. And every true attempt at it is boring - except for the holy wars that follow.
Facts, figures, comparisons, great stuff. But - in this context - meaningless without some extrapolation, guesswork and creative thinking...
I look for a bit of bias in everything I read and view, if only to check or offset against my own. It's fun. And the sites mentioned don't seem to claim to hold the holy grail of platform objectivity, so there you go.
It's surprising how many people value "objectivity" in what is supposed to be a bit of enlightning reading. What fun is left for the author if he's not allowed his own thoughts on the matter?
Btw thanks for pointing out Daring Fireball, don't know how I could have missed that one!
I think, therefore I am...I think.
It wasn't the submitter, it was pudge that added that comment. Note how it's not italics.
This site has a good reputation for good content and none of the biased crap that is found on other tech sites and *gulp* Slashdot, or Dvorak's arse talk.
And one thing I've always said: if it's not on Ars Technica, it's not worth reading.
AC comments get piped to
Let's start with the windowing environment, since that is the first thing users will notice. While both KDE and GNOME are mature, stable, and accepted as IEEE standards, Apple has elected to use neither. In fact, they don't even use X at all! Their display system is a proprietary, closed-source system called Quartz Extreme. In addition to the moral issues involved with closed software, this precludes the user from running X apps. There is an untested and alpha-quality X11 emulation layer available for download, but it is emulation, so programs will be slow. Does this sound like a standards-based system to you?
Looking under the hood, it gets worse. While all other *nixes use standard ELF binaries, Darwin (Apple's name for their proprietary "Unix" kernel) does not. It uses Mach-O, an unproven format that is proprietary to Apple. The moribund FreeBSD, off which OS X is based, uses ELF, so clearly Apple went to the extra effort of "switching" (heh) simply to break compatibility. With ELF, users would be able to run most of their Lunix apps; with Mach-O this is impossible. Additionally, Apple has moved most configuration info fromhuman readable text files into a proprietary database called "NetInfo", which is much like the Windows registry we all loathe. Why? These are only a few of the ways that Apple has deliberately broken compatibility with other systems, presumably in order to lock users in to expensive Mac hardware.
When we factor in the threat to users' civil liberties that is posed by the DRM included to support the iTunes Music Store (do you really think it will end there?) it is obvious that real *nix gurus should give OS X a wide berth. Caveat emptor.