More of my sites

WinInfo Daily News
SuperSite for Windows
Windows IT Pro Magazine
Connected Home
Thurrott Dot Com
Windows Weekly at TWIT

About this site

For six years, the Internet Nexus served as my technology blog, but I've since started blogging at the SuperSite Blog instead. If you're looking for the blog, please head there. --Paul

Sunday, April 10, 2005

A curious NYT article reminds me of OS X Tiger

As I do every Sunday morning, I separated out the parts of the New York Times and the Boston Sunday Globe, and then sat down with the subset of the papers I intended to read. In the business section of the Times was a weird little article, about Longhorn of all things, called Will the Next Version of Windows Be Worth the Wait? It contains, among other things, the following text:

What was remarkable about the Windows 95 introduction was the acquiescence of customers, who participated so willingly in the spectacle. Microsoft arranged for retail outlets to open at midnight on the day the system would first be available, a stunt that proved as irresistible as klieg lights at a Hollywood premiere. One chain counted some 50,000 people lined up at its stores across the country.

These people were chasing an operating system, of all things - plumbing that serves a necessary function, to be sure, but of no more intrinsic interest than the pipes that snake below the floorboards of a house. In 1995, however, Microsoft managed to make the mundane appear life-changing. The Seattle Times quoted one happy midnight customer, standing with his wife, who predicted that "this is going to enhance our marriage."

Today, of course, Microsoft doesn't need such an introduction. Its Windows operating system comes with virtually every single PC sold, guaranteeing that each version will sell hundreds of millions of copies during its lifetime. Microsoft could opt to not market Longhorn at all, and it will still be a tremendous success (which makes the point of this particular article moot, from what I can see).

Anyway, Tiger. As I mentioned previously, this article made me think of Apple's upcoming Mac OS X update, and how the fanatical elements of the Mac community are convinced that Tiger will change everything (in the same way that they thought Jaguar would change everything two years ago). It made me scan back over that Times article, replacing "Microsoft" with "Apple." Now it reads like the following:

These people [are] chasing an operating system, of all things - plumbing that serves a necessary function, to be sure, but of no more intrinsic interest than the pipes that snake below the floorboards of a house ... Apple [manages] to make the mundane appear life-changing.

The difference between Tiger and Windows 95, or Longhorn, of course, is size: Though Apple will get lots of press for the release--it always does--Tiger isn't going to change the face of computing in any way. According to people I know who have been using pre-release versions, it's a minor upgrade for end users (though a decent update for developers). But it's also for the Mac, and that fact alone limits its impact dramatically. It just isn't going to be a big deal to the wider world. I mean, 180 million consumers have successfully installed the latest Windows XP service pack. 180 million.

Before you prep your email client for a venomous but misguided rebuttal, save yourself some time. I'm looking forward to Tiger, as you are. But I'm a geek, and I'm into testing the latest and greatest software as soon as possible. You and I, however, don't represent a very large crowd however. So don't take this as a dig. I'm just being honest about it. Tiger will likely be a decent OS X upgrade. It will eventually be a solid release too, after the first two or three patches are released in rapid succession. But it's not going to set the world on fire. It's not a Windows 95, XP or a Longhorn. And it's certainly not an iPod. And that's just the way it is.

[ Posted at 6:22 PM | Permalink ]