What is this about switching to or from Apple's operating system?

I just read Laptop magazine's True Confessions of OS Switchers article. Now I am frightened.

First, even though I know kids use computers before they get out of diapers, surely there must be someone out there who is over thirty and has decided to switch operating systems.  I believe the youngest in this group was the Mac to Vista switcher.  He was nineteen, and here's his reason for switching.

With Macs the choices are pretty limited to what color my buttons glowed and where my dock was. If you enjoy using and customizing computers, stay away from Macs. They're a dead end.

Obviously I was wrong when I thought people might switch computers for a somewhat important reason.  Then again maybe the world has changed and what color your buttons are is more important than figuring out how get the crabs to return to the Chesapeake.

I was more impressed with the gray beards (from 20 to 23 years old) who switched to the Mac.

I hate having to buy/update additional security software and run daily spyware scans just so my system will boot in under five minutes. I made the switch and am bug-free to this day.

Having your system boot in under five minutes is a good thing. Not buying additional security software also makes sense.

Still the article doesn't tell me anything except that no one over 23 switches their computer operating system and wants to be featured in an article about it.

Of course not all of these folks make a commercial that Apple would be willing to use.  Here are the applications for one user.

My MacBook runs much smoother and has all of the features that I need like Photo Booth, iMovie, Comic Life, and GarageBand. The Mac is fun; it's more of a fun, entertaining "for play" computer instead of a "for work" computer.

In fact two of the three switching users mentioned Photo Booth.  I am not sure I have even launched Photo Booth on my MacBook.

So I guess this is the generation that will be taking over the world in few years.  I might lose some sleep but it is not going to be over the next generation and what motivates them.

If worrying about what color your buttons are on your computer will keep us from wrongfully invading other countries then I'm all for it.

Still I don't want too many folks coming over to the Mac or Linux. I am pretty sure that would lead to some kind of polarity shift in the world which might be dangerous.

The computing world actually works pretty well right now.  Those people, and they are most of the world, who are so afraid of switching to the Mac from Windows, give Bill's company plenty of customers.  Their desktops keep most of the business world humming.

The computer users, who want complete freedom to do whatever they want, run Linux and actually many of the servers that keep the world turning.  They stay happy and our servers keep on serving.

Those of us who just want to get our work done and enjoy computing a little while we are doing it run Macs.  What we do with our computers matters most to us.  The world won't collapse if our computers don't work.  We would actually be the ones left to run the world if all other computers died.

At least that is thought from here on the Southern Outer Banks of North Carolina on the eve of the Mullet Festival (nothing to do with your hair).

We expect some great seafood, a weekend of fantastic weather and hopefully fishing equally as good. Actually the weather is what I would call near perfect.

For entertainment I can suggest reading of my comparison of the real estate market to airplane seat pricing which is more important to me than the color of the buttons on my computers.

If that doesn't work, you can follow the suggestion that I gave to Blacksburg, VA and take a walk on the beach.

Still this operating system war has me wondering why my button color isn't important to me.  Maybe it is because I never have taken to widgets.

More likely it is because I like having the freedom and relative competence to use whatever computer I want. I actually kinda of enjoy being able to use three operating systems.  I can admit even OS X isn't right for everyone and not have a knee jerk.

That means operating systems aren't as important to me as being able to enjoy the beautiful scenery around me and to share it with others.

Comments

[Greg]

Heh.

I always though that there was not enough customization in the Windows world.

Of course I have been running Linux for going on a decade now. I use Macs for my productivity machines (and for my Wife's machines) - cause they just work. Right out of the box. No drivers, no futzing.

Textmate has made a Machead out of me though. I really prefer to program on my Mac now that I have seen the Textmate Way. Infact, I have spent some time trying to get Gnome's Gedit to behave like Textmate. I guess that's Textmate's highest praise.

[Mac vs PC]

On my site and forum I get lots of feedback from all ages and types of people who are thinking strongly about or are Switching to Mac, not just the under 20ers!

http://www.switchingtomac.com

[Wollie]

Good analysis. I briefly scanned the switch article you referred to and came away with impression that their reasons to switch were kinda trite. I stopped reading it.

Also, try to leave the politics out of your future articles. the "Heck, what can I say. My generation started out trying to save the world and then ended up trying to protect our country by blowing up another country because of made up evidence. We are mostly experts in our mind or by accident." is not only wrong but really doesn't have a place in your observations about macs.

Otherwise keep up the good work and I really enjoy reading your posts.

[Neil Anderson]

When I was 19 I thought building computers was cool too. Now I just want the thing to work. That's why I enjoy my 24-inch iMac. :)

[JonJ]

Hey, you should try Photo Booth. It's kind of fun. (I'm over 30, by the way -- a lot over).

[RobInNZ]

I had a good giggle when the 19yo reckoned he was a 'power user', because he customised the system to the way he wanted it to look and feel.

While there ARE valid reasons for customisation to speed work-flow, my general impression of this style of 'power user' is that they generally spend a lot of time fritzing around, to save a couple of minutes. And then go and do it all over again on each and every machine they work on.

Compare this to soneone who learns to operate a vanilla OS productively and efficently. Sure, some stuff they do will take a little longer, but its generally repeatable over the majority of the environment they work in.

Keep in mind that Im looking at this from an out-source solution provider point of view, not a single-user environment where the guy has all the time in the world to futz with his environment to the nth degree.

By the way, this is a from a 'grey-beard' of 35 who works in a primarily Windows world, and has been happily 100% Mac at home for the past 4 years.

[PGE]

Mac OS X is a great OS, but even a great os has it's flaws. I remember when I switched from Windows to Linux because of the possibility to customize the desktop even more than in Windows. Of course I switched because of other reasons too like security. I also work daily with the Linux platform (started about 10 years ago with RedHat Linux 5.2) and I am pleased to see that the Linux desktop is really great these days.

Why did I switch to a Mac then? Well mainly because of the media addons like Quicktime (and because I've always wanted a Mac too, but they we're too expensive back then). Another reason was that I can feel right at home when I start up the Terminal :)

I understand the first switcher which did a switch from Mac to Vista, desktop customization is important. If one feels that you cannot make your desktop your own, then I too would look elsewhere as I did back then when I switched from Windows to Linux. Some may think that I've taken a step back when I switched from Linux to OSX, but I don't think so. I use Gnome and I like the minimalistic approach to the desktop, and OSX gives me the same feeling.

[Tom]

Why the pain? Sure, there are some differences in the way the OS works. By really, it's the apps. Too much stuff that runs on Windows still does not run on OS X. And where there are the same apps they don't use the same commands, and often have subtle cross platform file compatability issues. This is incredibly important if you are producing, say, MS Office files, for a client and they expect them to look exactly like what you created.

Written by one who switched, and then 6 months later switched back.

Tom