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Rather significant mistake on Apple's site.

someguy

someguy

macrumors 68020
Original poster
Dec 4, 2005
2,351
21
Still here.
In Apple's "Get a Mac" campaign, there is a rather large mistake in Reason #4 that I think Apple should be aware of, but I wanted to run it by you guys first.

The error is found here.

Apple said:
To get a sense of just how big the virus problem is, search for “virus” at both Apple and Microsoft. Compare the number of results.
Click to expand...
The idea of this statement is to show that there is not much talk of viruses in Apple's world, whereas in the world of Microsoft, it is obnoxiously common. This point is very true, however the way Apple chose to display it to it's potential newcomers is flawed. If you click each of the links above, you'll see that the Apple search for the word "virus" yielded about 112 results (I say "about" because it keeps fluctuating between 107 and 112), whereas Microsoft's search yielded a mere 58 results.

Now, I am fully aware of the fact that anyone with enough sense to read the information beyond the resulted articles on both companies' sites, they would see that the difference in the nature of the articles clearly makes the Windows OS look bad in the way Apple had intended it to.

I am simply pointing out Apple's mistake in suggesting the reader "compare the number of results" at each site. I think it's somewhat vital to the success of the "Get a Mac" campaign that Apple does a better job of portraying the difference between the Mac and Windows worlds as far as security goes.

What do you guys think?


P.S. If anyone reports this to Apple before I do and receives any kind of gift reward in return, it's so mine and I will hunt you down. ;)





No, seriously. :mad:
 
I don't know. They still haven't fixed the typo I found on their Cinema Display page at the Apple store.

"...8 millions pixels..."
 
someguy said:
I don't know. They still haven't fixed the typo I found on their Cinema Display page at the Apple store.

"...8 millions pixels..."
Click to expand...

I didn't find that particular quote, but was it referencing two 30" screens? One 30" is just over 4 million, so two would make 8 million (duh).

I agree with the virus references though. It's misleading in a way. Hopefully people will research into a little bit.
 
adrianblaine said:
I didn't find that particular quote, but was it referencing two 30" screens? One 30" is just over 4 million, so two would make 8 million (duh).
Click to expand...
This mistake isn't very important, but the error is simply typographical. The word "millions" should not be plural. It simply doesn't make sense.

Anyways, does anyone know the best way to email Apple about this? I can't seem to find any email address to contact them.
 
I don't think that the number of results has anything to do with the severity of the virus. if 100 people talked about peanuts, and 1 person talked about the war - that doesn't mean that peanuts are more important or more dangerous.

although it might be a little misleading, i think it's within their rights to make such claims.
 
wimic said:
I don't think that the number of results has anything to do with the severity of the virus. if 100 people talked about peanuts, and 1 person talked about the war - that doesn't mean that peanuts are more important or more dangerous.
Click to expand...

But that's exactly what Apple is trying to do...they're claiming that the number of results is indicative of the problem.

And then it comes back and slaps them in the face when Apple's site has more references to "virus" than Microsoft's.

Really, really dumb on Apple's part...
 
wimic said:
I don't think that the number of results has anything to do with the severity of the virus. if 100 people talked about peanuts, and 1 person talked about the war - that doesn't mean that peanuts are more important or more dangerous.

although it might be a little misleading, i think it's within their rights to make such claims.
Click to expand...
Yeah but apple is implying that the less results that you would get from searching "virus' on each companies respective website would mean that viruses are not as big of a problem for the company that returns less results, so in this case they are incorrect.

EDIT: Bugga, i should really learn to type quicker:p
 
Look on google. Type in mac virus and it shows 62,000,000 results and microsoft virus shows 152,000,000.
 
®îçhå®? said:
Look on google. Type in mac virus and it shows 62,000,000 results and microsoft virus shows 152,000,000.
Click to expand...
Of course.

There are lots of things Apple could do to fix this error and prove what is obvious to us to those who aren't so enlightened. The basis for their claim is definitely valid, but they did a poor job of getting the point across, IMO. This is why I'm trying to point it out to them.
 
What the hell?

Check those links again, people. The number of results on MS's page has suddenly changed significantly, as noted in this email reply from Philip Schiller:

Philip Schiller via e-mail said:
Gary,

Thank you for the email.

Unfortunately, it seems that you have made an error of some kind.

When I followed the link you sent us in your email to microsoft.com, I see the results for a search on the term "virus" and the count is 63,917 (picture below). When I perform a search on microsoft.com myself, I get the same 62,917 result. That is much more than 58!

Any idea where you went wrong?

Phil
Click to expand...


How could this have happened? I am not the only one who saw 58 yesterday, am I? I do see ~63,000 results today...
 
someguy said:
Check those links again, people. The number of results on MS's page has suddenly changed significantly, as noted in this email reply from Philip Schiller:

How could this have happened? I am not the only one who saw 58 yesterday, am I? I do see ~63,000 results today...
Click to expand...

No, you are right. I remember following that link yesterday and saw only 58.
 
someguy said:
How could this have happened? I am not the only one who saw 58 yesterday, am I? I do see ~63,000 results today...
Click to expand...

Microsoft's search sucks?

For example when the released WMP 11 Beta, I searched their site to find a link to download it, no sensible links inside the top 10 (even WMP 9 for Mac made it :rolleyes: .)
 
Um...wow. I definitely saw it when it was only 58 on the Microsoft site...several times.

Amazing.
 
someguy said:
Check those links again, people. The number of results on MS's page has suddenly changed significantly, as noted in this email reply from Philip Schiller:




How could this have happened? I am not the only one who saw 58 yesterday, am I? I do see ~63,000 results today...
Click to expand...

You know Phil's email? I know Steves, but 'he' doesnt reply-he gets little slave monkeys to do it for him (OK, Execs but they're the same thing :D)!
 
ChrisG said:
You know Phil's email? I know Steves, but 'he' doesnt reply-he gets little slave monkeys to do it for him (OK, Execs but they're the same thing :D)!
Click to expand...
Yeah, me and Phil are like this --> *crosses fingers to show closeness*.

Just kidding, I never emailed him, actually. I emailed Apple support and he happened to reply back to me...

...so, now I have his email address. *evil laugh*


;)
 
Not nearly as bad as.. APPLE claiming for the past 2 weeks that.... MBP 17 inch will ship in 7-10 days.. That's just a plain ***** lie.. especially since I ordered ONE.... and on my invoice it clearly states that it won't ship for 10-18 days.... LIEs!!!!!!!!!!!!!

iloveyou
 
Strange, when I searched virus on Microsoft I got 67,913 results :confused:

That's more like it ;)
 
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