Message to Apple - Let's Do This!!
I am thinking we need to start a petition. Maybe petition is a strong word,
but you get the idea. We need to get info posted on all of the rumor/apple
forums (spymac appleinsider, etc. etc. etc.) and get people to sign on to
the ideas being posted here. In one place - like a petition.
First, we need some consensus. The amazing thing is that I think everyone
here wants to see apple strong, wants to see them with good earnings
reports, etc., and would personally pay what they can afford to do it, if
apple would just respond and give the users what they are demanding.
I agree that apple is a business and needs, especially in these days, to
have a means of profit. However, I think we agree (most on this board) that
a few things were very bad moves:
1) charging for 10.2 at full cost to users of every vintage and at every
level.
to clarify: true, the ugrade should be good, and quite an improvement.
however, i agree with those that have said that they bought a new mac
recently expecting an upgrade path to the much-hyped jaguar. and they got
hosed. add another 129 to your already pricey machine. That stinks. Most
cases they at least grandfather an upgrade for 1-3 months prior to the
announcement of the upgrade. With all the hype at the wwdc etc, this was
out there well in advance and people should not be taken for a ride. If
apple wants loyal customers that will buy new machines, they can't screw
people that bought in advance of the final release because they thought they
would be treated fairly. They are going to either push people away
completely, or push them to wait until the day after announcements to buy.
Which, given the powermac specials going on now, is clearly not the goal.
2) There should be a .mac lite.
This should allow at least forwarding of the mac.com accounts. Possibly a
small fee even, and a small storage allotment, but there should be an option
that is free or nearly free. 100$ for bells and whistles and space most
people will not be using is crazy. Apple had a good thing going with
itools, people were sharing their movies, photos, etc. and now it is not for
consumers. it is for people that need 100mb of space to collaborate etc.
It was rude to those that had adopted the new address and tried to support
apple by using the address to advertise to everyone they emailed.
3) We need new powermacs.
I think at least we should be saying 1 and 2. This is the clan of mac
faithful, and I hear many naysayers out there, including myself, who's faith
has been shaken. I sympathize with those who recently 'switch'ed and think
that apple needs to hear the complaints. I support apple. And I am
willing to hang with them even if it means paying for an upgrade to software
that was not truly release-ready until (presumably) this version, though I
have already spent over $100 on the OS, when all it did was make my
machines obsolete (for what i do - and let's not debate this, but fcpro
drops frames on my powerbook when in X, and works fine in 9 - that is just
one example) - but they need to be kept in check. and right now, i think
we need to voice our opinions in unison. Let's get some consensus and
submit some type of petition to apple - i think it would be great to get
some of the 'switchers', especially those featured in the advertisements, to
show both our dedication to thinking different and our concern with a few of
these latest moves.
Thoughts? - let's not beat this to death. Let's do this. Let's get the mac
minority together and make this expo something constructive and something
other than one-sided.
Chris
