Dear 
Readers,
I've gotten all sorts of interesting mail regarding the revised "75
Advantages" series I've been working on, but by far the most
interesting letter I got was this one from Dan Edelen, the original
author of the 75 Advantages booklet. With his permission, I am
reprinting his letter here for you read about how the 75 Advantages
came about.
I'm hoping he will find the documentation he describes at the end of
the letter and send it to me.
A scan of the cover is included to prove that the document actually
made it into print.
Enjoy--
Jeff Adkins
Dan Edelen writes:
Jeff,
After seeing a note on MacInTouch that Low End Mac was taking a stab at revising "75
Macintosh Advantages," I thought you would like to know more about its
history. My knowledge of this comes from that fact that I was the
primary author of that document.
I came on board Apple's Mac Platform Marketing (with a title of
"Product Analyst") in November of 1996. Our group consisted of five
guys whose primary purpose was to produce pro-Mac, anti-Wintel
material. We provided dozens of promo and informational pieces (sent
out daily in thousands of units) to our sales staff, user groups,
evangelists, and retailers. My first day at work I was tasked with
revising the older "50 Mac Advantages."
The project took four months, although five weeks of that time were
consumed by Macworld prep. I was also responsible for designing an
interactive presentation of new technologies that included Open Doc,
Cyberdog, QuickTime VR, Project X (Hot Sauce), and the "new" Mac OS
7.6. Needless to say, trying to get anything Open Doc from any of the
third party manufacturers working on apps was a bear. In the end,
though, that Macworld was a big success for our group. (Although a
quick scan of those "revolutionary" new technologies reads like a
"what's what" of promising, but aborted, Apple innovations.)
During the four months, I reworked the fifty originals, updated the
info in them, checked to see if they were still valid, and came up with
an additional fifty-eight. The fifty-eight new advantages were easy to
generate - the real work was verification of claims and running things
past Legal. I was astounded how timid the company was in making claims
of performance and superiority. I lost count of how many times Legal
informed me that we could not make a particular claim even though we
had stringent independent or in-house testing that verified the claim.
Some of the additional fifty-eight were rendered ineffectual because of
legal issues.
Gil Amelio was extremely interested in our work and routinely used
my boss to preach the anti-Wintel gospel at higher level meetings in
the company. Gil supported us immensely and believed that our message
was what Apple really needed to shout from the rooftops (although that
later proved to not be helpful when March 1997 rolled around). Guy
Kawasaki's Evangelist group used us extensively. Jobs also came back on
board during the project. We felt even more empowered since we knew how
rabidly anti-Wintel he had been.
In the end, I sat down with my boss and distilled the fifty-eight
new advantages down to the best seventy-five. I had hoped for a
hundred, but Legal and the lack of completion of an independent study I
was hoping to use at the time brought the number of usable advantages
down to ninety-five - a bad number for obvious reasons. :)
Unfortunately for our group, the excrement hit the ventilating
device in March of 1997, and our entire group was disbanded, with most
of us being let go. I had literally handed in the completed "The 75
Macintosh Advantages Over PCs Running Windows" (the working title) only
two weeks before. At the point of my departure, the doc was going to
the printers. Unfortunately, the carnage from the layoffs of four
thousand plus employees brought the company to a standstill for a bit.
Still, even though Mac Platform Marketing no longer existed, that
document was deemed important enough to salvage. My knowledge of what
happened next is limited, but I was told later that a final print copy
would not be produced, only a PDF. The financial state of the company
was cited as the reasoning for the PDF-only format. [Note: I have a
copy of the "condensed version" that actually made it to print. JA]
Even though my stay at the company was short, I have always been
proud of "75 Mac Advantages." It hurt a bit to see it languish over the
years as the market changed, since I believe there is still a strong
message there. In recent years, I have felt that Apple made a grave
error in marketing by not going after the jugular of the Wintel
platform. Even when I was there, there was this pervasive idea that
there really wasn't any competition for the Mac. Our group had more PCs
than you could have probably found anywhere else in the company - we
knew someone besides us existed in the marketplace. We understood the
idea of knowing one's enemy. Shortsightedly, the Wintel platform didn't
seem to exist to many who worked at Apple. The mantra was always, "We
make the greatest computer out there, so why wouldn't people flock to
it?" That mentality still exists.
Somewhere buried on my hard drive I have the complete fifty-eight
additions. Maybe if I find the time, I can look back through all my
archives and send them to you. Anything to help the cause.
Take care and thanks for keeping the faith,
Dan Edelen
is a longtime Mac user. He was using digital sensors on Apple II computers in the 1980's and has networked computers in his classroom since before the internet existed. In 2006 he was selected at the California Computer Using Educator's teacher of the year. His students have used NASA space probes and regularly participate in piloting new materials for NASA. He is the author of two books and numerous articles and scientific papers. He currently teaches astronomy and physics in California, where he lives with his twin sons, Jony and Ben.< And there's still a Mac G3 in his classroom which finds occasional use.
