Then Fall Caesar July 10, 1997 I can feel it all slipping away. Huge chunks of my rationality are just breaking off and falling into the void. I think mainly it's just because I'm worn down. I feel beaten by the industry where I make my living.Gil Amelio resigned as CEO of Apple yesterday. No big deal really, and certainly no surprise. Where will they go from here? Dave Winer wrote a depressing piece yesterday called The Sure Road to Bankruptcy, which basically detailed the mistakes he thought Apple has made, and the problems that Apple has. No problem, Apple is my favorite dog to kick too. The conclusion basically states that he's choosing to move Frontier to Windows rather than Rhapsody. Hard words to hear. But not even that was what really got me down. Later in the day, he got an email from some guy at Microsoft stating:
Brave email Dave. Welcome to a new home. We love you here, and wish you many happy memories. It made me sick. Literally, it made my stomach churn and I felt like throwing up. Why? Mainly because the email is so sickeningly sweet and touchy feely that it would be nauseating no matter who it came from or who it was sent to. The wording is just vile, but that's not the point. The point is that I hate Microsoft, and I hate their products. It's hard to describe why I hate Microsoft's products so badly, but I do. It's because of the intangibles, I believe. I can't point to Windows 95 and say, I hate the ugly grey buttons, or the style of the scroll bars, or the Start menu. To me, the gestalt is that it just doesn't act like it should. It just has no elegance, style, or panache. Same with the rest of their stuff. People use Microsoft products to get their work done, but Microsoft products aren't the tools that they love. I want to use tools that I love. I want to get my work done using a tool that I enjoy using, that makes me feel good about working with it. I feel good about getting work done using a Mac, it's the best tool on my bench. Unix is a great tool, too. So is Frontier, which is why it hurts that Dave has chosen Windows as the platform for its future. I think this obsession with tools has something to do with hackers, and the mindset of the hacker. Microsoft is the embodiment of the anti-hacker, the "suit" mentality. A hacker is passionate about tools, about work, about purpose. Microsoft has a passion for one thing, consumption. There may be hackers at Microsoft, in fact I'm certain that there are, but the end result of their efforts is diametrically opposed to that which the hacker values. I wish I could elaborate and give specific examples of what I mean, but it's hard for me to do so, because it basically boils down to thousands of little things. Rarely will you find truly demanding computer users who use Windows because it's their favorite. They use it because they've bought into the mindset that says you have to buy Microsoft because they're the biggest game in town. They may love Macs, or love Unix, or love OS/2, but they sit down in front of a Wintel machine every day and plug away because some clueless bastard in the IS department knows "nobody ever gets fired for buying Microsoft." Most of the time these same IS guys are wage slaves who don't really give a damn about much more than moving up the corporate ladder and covering their ass. In the meantime, Macintosh developers are departing the platform in droves. Adobe is distancing itself from Apple, other companies are abandoning the platform altogether. Most Mac developers are porting their stuff to Wintel. They see the market share numbers for Windows and head for greener pastures. What they don't realize is that Microsoft wants their business. Microsoft's goal is to write all the software running on all the computers in the world. In the meantime, they'd like to take over the mass media if they can as well. If you enter a market segment that looks interesting to Microsoft (nobody enters market segments where Microsoft is already entrenched any more), they are going to buy you out or crush you. Sounds pleasant, doesn't it. People are making plans for the days when Apple isn't here to kick around any more. Porting to Wintel. Learning a new platform. Moving on. The Unix guys are out learning NT. My call is to stand up for what you love. I know that 9 out of 10 people say "What's the big deal, computers are just tools", but if you're one of those people then you probably quit reading long before you got to this point. Sometimes I think of what it will be like if the day comes where I really don't have a choice but to use Windows NT, or whatever Microsoft has got us using in the next few years. I feel like the Brits, Indians and the other expats in Hong Kong must have felt like over the past few years. You see, most of the people in Hong Kong are ethnic Chinese, so when the colony was turned over to China, they became citizens, as though they'd lived in China their whole life. It probably sucks for them now, because being a part of China isn't nearly as cool as being on your own as Hong Kong, but they'll live with it and move on. On the other hand, the Brits, Indians, and other non-Chinese in Hong Kong have to live there as foreigners now, even if they were born there. They lost their homeland. When I look at Apple going down the tubes, and Sun and other companies see their market share in workstations eroding, I feel like someone who's about to lose their homeland. I can never be a citizen of the Microsoft empire. So here's hoping that Apple gets a great new CEO, turns it around, and carves out a permanent niche in the computer industry, no matter how small it is. And here's hoping that Linux and FreeBSD have a great and glorious future. We hackers need a home, same as anyone. |
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