[Salty]

Very stream of consciousness...

http://threeshadesofawesome.com/weblog/?p=573

Let me know your thoughts, if you care. Essentially in it the biggest point I make is that the biggest misstep Apple is currently making is that it's no longer making incredibly software for specific purposes that help people be creative. ALA the original iLife and iWork apps + the Pro level apps. Apple has seemingly lost interest in those markets despite the fact that they were really what helped prop up the Mac back in the dark days and get people to love the platform. And the fact is that you can increase R&D in those areas and not see direct financial gain while still cementing your platform as the one to beat.

[subego]

Hardware company, yo.

Apple used to make its own applications because no one else would.

[besson3c]

Originally Posted by Salty 

Very stream of consciousness...
http://threeshadesofawesome.com/weblog/?p=573
Let me know your thoughts, if you care. Essentially in it the biggest point I make is that the biggest misstep Apple is currently making is that it's no longer making incredibly software for specific purposes that help people be creative. ALA the original iLife and iWork apps + the Pro level apps. Apple has seemingly lost interest in those markets despite the fact that they were really what helped prop up the Mac back in the dark days and get people to love the platform. And the fact is that you can increase R&D in those areas and not see direct financial gain while still cementing your platform as the one to beat.

I don't get the whole "creative people need to use computers that have taste" concept. A computer is a tool to run software that does a job. If the software you are most productive in, know best, prefer, need, whatever is Windows based, using Windows is a no-brainer, and the hardware is irrelevant. If one needs to be "inspired" by hardware, maybe they should seek inspiration somewhere else? This seems silly to me.

Second, I don't get the arguments your colleague makes about "oh, it has a faster i7 processor", and I hear this sort of thing a lot (also with Android vs. iPhone). For starters, there is no popular/mainstream PC software that really drives the need for faster and faster CPUs anymore, this is pretty much irrelevant to most people (one reason why much more modestly powered mobile devices have proliferated), the last killer app was social networking which is platform/hardware agnostic. Very few people "need" the fastest PC money can buy unless they are avid gamers (where the Mac has never been a big player anyway), and many haven't caught on that as far as bang for their buck they'd probably be best off bragging about the fastest SSD which is probably far more impactful to overall performance than the difference between two models of i7.

Still, value is not derived from a hardware checklist, value is derived from software. What we feel about Windows is pretty much irrelevant, some people are going to be more productive on it because they are more used to it, so they should probably stick with it. All of the apps that most people will need are available on both platforms now, hardware is becoming increasingly irrelevant, so to me the vast majority of the tired Mac vs. PC arguments should be put out to pasture.

As far as Apple's pro app strategy, I'll leave that to people more knowledgable to discuss, I don't use any of them. I don't get the sense that this is terribly central to Apple's business right now.

[subego]

Creative types are the ones who care about specs.

There is no amount of CPU/GPU power which is too much for me. There are plenty of people (myself included) who are considering abandoning Apple for this very reason. They simply aren't competitive.

OTOH, creativity is about setting up as direct a drive as possible between your brain and your tool. All else being equal, the Mac usually does a better job of this because that's been its significant focus for its entire lifetime. Windows is intentionally designed to be as general as possible.

[subego]

All that said, these things have been around long enough it isn't about choice the way it used to be.

By the time someone has a choice (buying their own first computer), they've already had Mac or Windows forced on them for a decade. As you say, most will pick what they already know, it's just now that's a choice made by your parents and your school.

[Shaddim]

For desktop, that's why I went hackintosh. In that area of hardware, Apple's too far behind the curve.

[besson3c]

Originally Posted by Shaddim 

For desktop, that's why I went hackintosh. In that area of hardware, Apple's too far behind the curve.

What do you do with your computer anyway? I believe subego is into audio?

[subego]

I do more visual stuff. Most of it is resource intensive, but it's After Effects which has the limitless appetite. If it's not real time, then I'm not wasting what's being thrown at it. Right now, it's not even close.

Luckily, right now is more photography oriented, so I can deal with what I have. I'm only waiting for the hammer to drop though, and when it does, I'm going to need the best I can get my hands on at that moment. If it happened tomorrow, I'd have to jump ship.

[Shaddim]

Originally Posted by besson3c 

What do you do with your computer anyway? I believe subego is into audio?

Video production and games. Pew pew

[Sphincty]

Oh look it's another fat guy with over gelled hair, wire rimmed glasses, the ubiquitous t-shirt with some esoteric reference or meme and pre-pubescant scruff...seriously I can't tell you guys apart anymore...if I was going to commit a crime I would adopt the look...

[subego]

No one forced you to read it.

[ort888]

A post 6 years in the making.

[Salty]

Prepubescent? Dude I can grow that in like two days. And there's no gel in my hair in those photos. And the shirt is a band shirt I bought at a concert.

Also Besson even if you don't get it, clearly there's a reason most creative types use Macs.

[besson3c]

Originally Posted by Salty 

Prepubescent? Dude I can grow that in like two days. And there's no gel in my hair in those photos. And the shirt is a band shirt I bought at a concert.
Also Besson even if you don't get it, clearly there's a reason most creative types use Macs.

There is a reason, but it's not necessarily a good one.

[Salty]

Frankly I find Windows to be a rather oppressive work space. The task bar was really designed to only run a few applications at a time, and the notion that nearly ever app needs to take up the whole screen all the time is silly. I find OS X's layout though on paper more cluttered is often a better solution.

[Shaddim]

You don't have to run Windows apps full screen, you know. That's a habit of the user, not the OS.

[Phileas]

Originally Posted by besson3c 

There is a reason, but it's not necessarily a good one.

Oh dear.

[ShortcutToMoncton]

Originally Posted by Shaddim 

You don't have to run Windows apps full screen, you know. That's a habit of the user, not the OS.

Even better is hot keys to "pin" windows apps to one-half a screen. I've got Explorer pinned to the right side, and a Word doc to the left - it's far easier and more convenient to do that sort of window control on Windows than it is on my older version of Mac OS, anyway.

[Salty]

You don't have to but the OS is designed with that approach in mind.

[besson3c]

Originally Posted by Phileas 

Oh dear.

Seriously, this is a myth.

Good UX is good UX, good usability is good usability, good visual communication is good visual communication. You don't cater these things to the personalities of people, you cater them to the job at hand, and the skill level, knowledge, and familiarity of your users. If the users are creative minds that are used to computers, you can leverage that familiarity in certain instances (although even then the apps that they would be used to would probably be so divergent that there probably wouldn't be much to leverage that is unique to creative apps and not just apps in general), but the majority of the OS X UI is built around catering to users of all skill levels. Whether or not the user is creative and has zero skill, you basically design the UI no differently - there is no familiarity to leverage to make certain elements discoverable, so you just go for a more generic sense of clarity.

[subego]

How much would you rate the importance of visual appeal?

[besson3c]

Originally Posted by subego 

How much would you rate the importance of visual appeal?

Appeal? I think this is somewhat overrated. The appeal is great for productivity and enjoyment, not to mention marketing, but I don't think this appeal has a sustaining quality. If you live in a certain app, the lustre and sex-factor will eventually run its course, just like the genie dock effect probably has for a number of experienced users. Remember back in the day when Mac geeks would slow-mo that effect?

If you live in an app, the usability and learning curve sorts of concerns become overshadowed by sheer efficiency once repetitive tasks get committed to muscle memory too. Sometimes there are tradeoffs here - a number of users can be crazy efficient in the vi/vim or emacs text editor, but its learning curve is fairly high.

For people that don't live in an app, the visual appeal is a very important part of user experience, although that user experience can be trampled on if there are usability issues with the app too. Sometimes apps can convey the sense of having great usability by having great visual appeal, when really this is superficial.

[subego]

I don't necessarily disagree with you about the sustainability of visual appeal, however I don't think the converse is true.

Lack of visual appeal has sustainability.