Rodney O. Lain - 1999.02.17
This article was originally published on The
iMac.com, a site which no longer exists. It is copyright 1999 by
RAC Enterprises, which also seems to no longer exist. It is thus
reprinted here without permission (which we would gladly obtain if
possible.) Links have been retained when possible, but many go to
the Internet Wayback
Machine.
I must admit, I love words. I'm not a wordsmith, but I play one
on the Internet.
As a wannabe wordsmith, I'm always reading and looking for the
perfect word to express what I am thinking or feeling. However,
while scanning this week's issue of Newsweek magazine (the February
15, 1999, issue), I immediately thought about a word that described
the way one particular Newsweek columnist was probably thinking and
feeling as he wrote about the Microsoft antitrust trial: the word
was "epiphany."
In layman's terms, an epiphany is the realization of something
that is obvious, but hasn't been recognized as obvious until some
enlightening event occurs that forces a person to see
that-which-wasn't-considered-obvious in a new light. For example,
let's say that, for years, you've always saw your father as a mean,
callous, old grouch, incapable of showing emotion. Then when
something earth shattering happens, like the Minnesota Vikings' not
going to the Super Bowl, he breaks down and cries openly. Loudly.
Continuously. Then you began to realize something that has been
evident all along to those with eyes to see: hey, Dad really is
sensitive.
That, my friends, is an epiphany.
Now what in the world does this have to do with things
Macintosh? Read on...
That Newsweek article that I'd mentioned at the beginning of
this column is titled "A Window on Their World: The real lesson of
Microsoft's videotape follies is that computers are still too hard
to use." The author is Steven Levy. You can read Levy's column
yourself by getting a copy of the magazine and turning to page
61.
In his column, Levy unknowingly gives a sideways advertisement
for the Macintosh. He recaps the oft-repeated details concerning
Microsoft's recent embarrassing submission of doctored videotaped
experiment in their antitrust trial, which was supposed to prove
their argument that disabling the Internet Explorer portion of
Windows 98 prevents all of Windows 98 from functioning as intended.
But what Levy's column dwells on is "the fascinating nature of that
second tape [that Microsoft attorneys produced], showed in court
uncut." That video footage, according to Levy, "provided a damning
snapshot of computer use, circa 1999. While the experiment itself
involved esoteric tasks, Jim Allchin had to do something every
computer user dreads: installing programs and running the Internet
on a new PC."
That is Levy's epiphany, folks. Someone his finally realized -
or has admitted publicly - that PeeCees are hard to use, after all
of these years Windows upgrades. And it took someone from Microsoft
to emphasize the point. You see, Allchin is a Vice President at
Microsoft - affectionately known as "The Windows guy." And he, of
all people, had major problems with installing and using the
operating system that's lauded for being "as good as a Mac." It
would be hilarious, if it wasn't for the sad fact that Windows runs
on 90 percent of the world's computer desktops. Read for yourself
the sad account:
"'I'm going to take my life into my hands,' [Allchin] announced
when the tape began, 'and connect on, hopefully, the Internet.'
"Then the connection kept dropping out. Then came a weird error
message he attributed to the IBM [ThinkPad he was using]. And then
there were things that were not errors, but simply the sorts of
annoying user-hostile phenomena that are all too familiar: endless
dialogue boxes, loud unwanted music, annoying rebooting, cluttered
menus, even tough-to-open shrink-wrapped software boxes. At one
point, Allchin wanted to install a Microsoft program that would not
work until he keyed in the 11-digit number on the license
agreement, written too small for him to see without his glasses
(his assistant read the numbers to him). Then the Windows Guy
didn't know what to do next. 'It didn't tell me to reboot,' he
mused. 'But I thought you were supposed to reboot...'"
Need I quote anymore?
Now I said that all of this was a sideways advertisement for the
Macintosh. It is. I've quoted from this article all weekend as I
worked the aisles of the Apple Store Within A Store at my local
CompUSA. I surprised my managers and my coworkers by spending the
whole weekend (8-hour shifts on both Saturday and Sunday) in the
SWIAS, without once having to talk about PeeCees. There were so
many people there - and, yes, they were buying iMacs and Blue G3s - that I didn't even take a
10-minute break Saturday nor Sunday. When I did a sales pitch to a
customer, I always reminded them of how complex the Wintel PC is,
by telling them that even Microsoft VP Jim "The Windows Guy"
Allchin can't work his PC. Then I segued (another favorite word of
mine) into an impressively quick-and-dirty demo of
plugging/unplugging USB peripherals, installing the software on the
iMac ("gotcha," I tell them - iMac's software is preinstalled at
the OEM), and getting onto the Internet.
Usually, they then timidly ask me how do I install software (I
didn't realize why they were so timid in asking that question until
reading about Allchin - another epiphany, perhaps?). I always tell
them
- pop in the CD-ROM
- double-click the descriptive icon that "magically" appears on
the desktop
- sit back and do what the instructions tell you.
"That's all?" they ask.
"That's all," I reply. And to rub it in, I remind them of Jim
Allchin's installation woes.
By the time I finish with them, they're already sold, and all I
need to do is ask them the Jobsian question: what's your favorite
color?
It's great to see when people reach enlightenment about the Mac,
and about Windows. It's even better to see that more of the media
and the public are seeing the light also. But why did it take so
doggone long, Steven Levy?
And why did it have to be poor Jim Allchin who suffered with
tackling Windows? He didn't deserve such frustration and
embarrassment.
The person doing that demonstration should have been Bill Gates
:-)
Editor's Note: the opinion piece quoted in this column is
© 1999 Newsweek, Inc.
- Rodney O. Lain
Rodney O. Lain, a former university English and
journalism instructor, works full-time as a software developer and
works part-time at a local CompUSA Apple Store Within A Store. A
card-carrying member of the local Macintosh User Group Mini'app'les, Rodney writes this
column exclusively for theimac.com. His greatest desire is to
become an African-American Guy Kawasaki. A self-professed
"workaholic writer," he waxes prolifically about race, religion,
and the "right OS" at
"Free Your Mind & Your Behind Will Follow", his unabashedly
pro-Mac website. When he's not cranking out his column, he collects
John Byrne comic books, jogs, and attempts to complete his first
novel. He lives in Eagan, Minnesota, a southern suburb of St.
Paul.
