Yes there are a lot of trolls on this forum which is why I posted such a response.
In the end I think a lot of the heat of this long running debate is not as much technical as it is political and actually the social realities behind the technical and engineering decisions that lead to the reality of the systems we have today.
That is what the fight is about. it's about principles of engineering, design, aesthetics, and ethics.
On the one side, there is Microsoft. See Ballmer.
On the other side you have Steve.
Neither company is perfect, so this argument can go on forever until one takes it to the next level where the passion about this is really coming from. Either you think that Microsoft is the standard for aesthetics, design, or you think Apple is closer to the mark.
Then again you hit points of discrepancy, The argument is never solved. Some will always side on one side and some on the other.
What can't be argued (in my opinion) is that Apple is a) a superior company, providing superior products, not without it's faults but that is years ahead of Microsoft in almost every department. b) that Microsoft stole and leap frogged Apple in the technology department and peddled to the masses a VASTLY inferior rip off, locked them onto it's platform and then created partly on purpose, and partly as an accident of their original poor ethics in engineering and design - IT based reality we live in where we need teams to keep the system running. When you stand back and examine it, it is poor. Vista is more of the same, only on a newly more complex level.
OS X is designed to decent engineering standards and principles, therefore, those principled choices early on have translated to positive effects later. Microsoft is just trying to fill the holes with vista, you know you can build a water proof roof with straw, **** and silicone gel, but it's not a great design, even if it might be ok for a lot of people when you have to choose no roof or roof made of straw and ****.
Apple users who know the story of the companies reasonably well like Steve because he IS the proverbial pirate who could no matter how rich he is or how corporate his peers are, he still lets us know that he hates that ****, and doesn't give a damn about it except for making great stuff for us to enjoy. How much would it cost to build an iphone from scratch - hundreds of millions in R&D presuming you started with nothing. It's science fiction, i'ts fantasy. Left to Microsoft?? Forget it - Left to Nasa even! ?? forget it. Steve says, screw this, we can do it, we can make this thing, and everyone rallies behind him and in the end it's not him who's the champ, it's everyone at Apple AND Steve. Cool environment. He's a bit of a Gordon Ramsay - cool I like that, why would you let noodles and nerds dictate to you how to get things done say it like it is, you'll be dead one day and will you look back and say damn I was such a ***** or I made an iphone and look how much everyone enjoyed not using their crap old phones. I can tell you right now that Apple has made a REAL difference in my life through making everything so much easier to user. I used to suffer with windows for years until in 98 when I started using macs, and that was with the old OS, it was terrible but still better than windows, then came mac osx and I was like yeah this is what it's mean to be. It has just made everything so much better, and without windows pooping on my life every day, I'm a happy camper. Apple has done things wrong, I'm not a fanboy (really), but when I get upset I just remind myself of what it was like with MS..... and I realise as somebody funnily quoted here earlier, that I was complaining with a belly full of lobster while others had to eat slop.
Things like iphone, the mac, mac osx, make you think, yeah, you can acheive cool things in your life with the right amount of focus determination and energy, microsoft is just a depressing hunk of junk fat on the blood of the apple, but it's tummy is running dry and soon it will need to feed again or die. You can say I'm going to make something quality with my energy (aka steve at apple) or you can just succumb to desperation and fear and create windows and flog it to the masses like a **** burger with lettuce plus snail. Buy Buy Buy ....
Die Die Die you nasty beastly thing windows, die and die and transmute into fresh soil so that new life can come where your beastly form once occupied space and resources. ha ha ha
I wait the day when microsoft closes it's doors forever. you shall be the poop beneath my rose garden, and apple orchard.
