Friday, January 07, 2005
Headless iMac rumor is just as phony as it ever was
Well, let's see now, Apple has filed a lawsuit against the rumor site that broke the "news" about the impending release of the fabled headless iMac, so that definitely means that the product is for real, doesn't it? Apple wouldn't go to such great lengths to protect its secrets if they weren't even real, would it? I mean, you don't sue a site that published rumors that didn't even come from inside Apple, so the rumors have to be true...right?
Yeah, right.
But allow me to back up for a moment here and look at how we've gotten where we are, because it's been a rather astounding journey. After years of the tiny irrelevant "geek caucus" wasting keystroke after keystoke trying to convince Apple to remove the monitor from the iMac, such futility finally gave way to flat-out lies on the part of the frustrated. If you can't convince Apple make the product, then why not just make up fake rumors about its impending release in an attempt to build support for the product and force Apple into building it? And as a result, such nonsensical rumors have been floating around for so long that the mythical product has even taken on multiple pet names during different phases of the fake rumor-mongering: headless iMac, headless eMac, iMac mini, take your pick. After all, any time a bad idea has finally been fully exposed for being a bad idea, the best way to start with a clean slate is to reintroduce the bad idea under a new name.
But for reasons that range from the added attention on Apple due to the iPod hype, to the old "repeat something enough times and it becomes true" philosophy, to perhaps pure random chance, this year's round of phony headless iMac rumors got taken seriously for once. And not just by Mac enthusiast sites whose deep geek underpinnings prevented them from understanding that outside of the Geek Caucus, no one in the real world gives a damn about having their monitor separate from their CPU. No, this story got picked up by everyone from the major newspapers to Wall Street analysts. And worse, it more or less got reported as fact by the mainstream outlets, perhaps finally fully exposing just how little of a clue the mainstream news entities have about the Macintosh user base. Because not only were the major news outlets willing to accept the notion that any widely-circulated rumor about future Apple products must be true, they went further and assumed that any rumored Apple product that rings popular among the Mac Web must also be just as popular among the other ninety-nine percent of Mac users.
If there's one thing we're sure of here, it's that there's more than enough embarrassment to go around.
But a few days ago, things took a turn for the utterly weird when Apple filed a lawsuit against the Mac rumor site that had first posted the supposed specs of the latest incarnation of the headless iMac. You see, Apple has been attempting to keep leaked product announcements from being published on such sites for years. But Apple always managed to accomplish this simply by filing a cease and desist order against the site, demanding that the confidential material be removed. And in the past, this has been a fairly good sign that the offending rumor was, in fact, true. After all, you don't sue someone for posting confidential trade secrets when what was really published was something that the someone simply sketched out on the back of a napkin and had no relation to any actual impending product.
So when Apple filed its suit against the rumor site that posted the headless iMac rumor, virtually every member of the Geek Caucus took that to mean that Yes Virginia, there is a headless iMac. And since (despite not setting out to do so) I ended up being just about the commentator to have stood up and said that the whole thing was a bunch of crap, it was now time for the Geek Caucus to flood my inbox with material of the "we're right, you're wrong, when are you going to admit you were wrong and apologize?" variety.
If nothing else, some of it made for some, well, fun reading. What I found particularly bizarre is that some folks actually seem to think that I suddenly concocted my stance against the headless iMac simply to provide hype for this. But those of you who have been reading this site for awhile will recall that I've railed against this idiotic rumor every single time it has surfaced. Heck, I was shooting down this nonsense back in 1998, when the original iMac had just been introduced and the Geek Cauvus was already rebelling against the future by begging for a headless iMac all the way back then. You think I've been over the top in smashing this nonsense this year? Nah, in comparison to previous go-arounds, my smackdown on the headless iMac rumors this year has been pretty darned tame. I even originally thought I was going to get to sit it out this year, until it became disturbingly clear that the nonsense had grown legs this time around. You want to see over the top about this nonsense? Check the archives. You'll think I've had a lobotomy since then and now. And as far as my other interests, if we do things right over there, then this will take care of itself.
But the bottom line is that every last one of those individuals failed to pick up on one ever-so-minor detail: Apple didn't file a cease and desist order, as it has done in the past to get confidential information removed. No, Apple sued the rumor site.
And that's a whole different ballgame, kids.
Think about it: of all the rumors that have ever circulated over the years, and of all the times that the rumor turned out to be true, and of all the times that the rumor came about because of a leak from within the company, never once has Apple ever sued a website simply for posting it. Clearly there's something more going on here. Something else altogether. This isn't about the headless iMac rumor, or the iWork rumor, or any other particular piece of information that the site posted. No, this one particular rumor site has gone and done something that put it in a class all unto its own. Something utterly bizarre, such as maybe the guy who publishes the site is an Apple employee, or maybe the site has been buying information from employees, or something else like that, on a soap opera level, because otherwise you just don't waste your time suing a rumor site. I mean, to do that you've got to be pissed.
I don't believe for one second that Apple's lawsuit against the website that posted the headless iMac rumor means anything as far as the rumor being true. For all we know, Apple decided to intentionally spread a false rumor to certain employees, just to see where that misinformation ended up surfacing, so they could figure out just who it was that leaked it. And if you're Apple and you're going to throw something fake out there, then why not use the most laughably false rumor in Apple history? Especially when you know that the Geek Caucus who publish these sites will eat it up like candy.
Now I'd be more than a little disappointed if it turns out that Apple leaked the phony headless iMac rumor just to snuff out a rogue employee. If that's the case, then I can't imagine that Apple was expecting it to gain this kind of traction, because we really do have a mess now. Maybe Apple figured that the headless iMac would get laughed off by everyone outside the Geek Caucus this time, just like it has every other time in the past. Or maybe Apple leaked it because they don't hold the same opinion I do when it comes to the downside of all this fake headless iMac talk. Or maybe Apple didn't leak this at all. I don't really know, and I don't know if we'll ever know what it was that caused the most absurd rumor in Apple history to suddenly find legs this year when it had always petered out in the past.
But I do know one thing: I don't see Apple's lawsuit as having told us anything about the headless iMac one way or the other. So instead I'm just going to stick to the facts of the matter, which are that it's a pointless product with no target market whose only purpose would be to confuse potential buyers about the merits of Apple's other Macintosh products and thus make them less likely to buy a Macintosh at all. Steve Jobs is neither an idiot nor hopelessly out of touch. I gave the headless iMac rumor a zero percent chance of being true prior to the lawsuit, and I give a zero percent chance of being true now.
Well, let's see now, Apple has filed a lawsuit against the rumor site that broke the "news" about the impending release of the fabled headless iMac, so that definitely means that the product is for real, doesn't it? Apple wouldn't go to such great lengths to protect its secrets if they weren't even real, would it? I mean, you don't sue a site that published rumors that didn't even come from inside Apple, so the rumors have to be true...right?
Yeah, right.
But allow me to back up for a moment here and look at how we've gotten where we are, because it's been a rather astounding journey. After years of the tiny irrelevant "geek caucus" wasting keystroke after keystoke trying to convince Apple to remove the monitor from the iMac, such futility finally gave way to flat-out lies on the part of the frustrated. If you can't convince Apple make the product, then why not just make up fake rumors about its impending release in an attempt to build support for the product and force Apple into building it? And as a result, such nonsensical rumors have been floating around for so long that the mythical product has even taken on multiple pet names during different phases of the fake rumor-mongering: headless iMac, headless eMac, iMac mini, take your pick. After all, any time a bad idea has finally been fully exposed for being a bad idea, the best way to start with a clean slate is to reintroduce the bad idea under a new name.
But for reasons that range from the added attention on Apple due to the iPod hype, to the old "repeat something enough times and it becomes true" philosophy, to perhaps pure random chance, this year's round of phony headless iMac rumors got taken seriously for once. And not just by Mac enthusiast sites whose deep geek underpinnings prevented them from understanding that outside of the Geek Caucus, no one in the real world gives a damn about having their monitor separate from their CPU. No, this story got picked up by everyone from the major newspapers to Wall Street analysts. And worse, it more or less got reported as fact by the mainstream outlets, perhaps finally fully exposing just how little of a clue the mainstream news entities have about the Macintosh user base. Because not only were the major news outlets willing to accept the notion that any widely-circulated rumor about future Apple products must be true, they went further and assumed that any rumored Apple product that rings popular among the Mac Web must also be just as popular among the other ninety-nine percent of Mac users.
If there's one thing we're sure of here, it's that there's more than enough embarrassment to go around.
But a few days ago, things took a turn for the utterly weird when Apple filed a lawsuit against the Mac rumor site that had first posted the supposed specs of the latest incarnation of the headless iMac. You see, Apple has been attempting to keep leaked product announcements from being published on such sites for years. But Apple always managed to accomplish this simply by filing a cease and desist order against the site, demanding that the confidential material be removed. And in the past, this has been a fairly good sign that the offending rumor was, in fact, true. After all, you don't sue someone for posting confidential trade secrets when what was really published was something that the someone simply sketched out on the back of a napkin and had no relation to any actual impending product.
So when Apple filed its suit against the rumor site that posted the headless iMac rumor, virtually every member of the Geek Caucus took that to mean that Yes Virginia, there is a headless iMac. And since (despite not setting out to do so) I ended up being just about the commentator to have stood up and said that the whole thing was a bunch of crap, it was now time for the Geek Caucus to flood my inbox with material of the "we're right, you're wrong, when are you going to admit you were wrong and apologize?" variety.
If nothing else, some of it made for some, well, fun reading. What I found particularly bizarre is that some folks actually seem to think that I suddenly concocted my stance against the headless iMac simply to provide hype for this. But those of you who have been reading this site for awhile will recall that I've railed against this idiotic rumor every single time it has surfaced. Heck, I was shooting down this nonsense back in 1998, when the original iMac had just been introduced and the Geek Cauvus was already rebelling against the future by begging for a headless iMac all the way back then. You think I've been over the top in smashing this nonsense this year? Nah, in comparison to previous go-arounds, my smackdown on the headless iMac rumors this year has been pretty darned tame. I even originally thought I was going to get to sit it out this year, until it became disturbingly clear that the nonsense had grown legs this time around. You want to see over the top about this nonsense? Check the archives. You'll think I've had a lobotomy since then and now. And as far as my other interests, if we do things right over there, then this will take care of itself.
But the bottom line is that every last one of those individuals failed to pick up on one ever-so-minor detail: Apple didn't file a cease and desist order, as it has done in the past to get confidential information removed. No, Apple sued the rumor site.
And that's a whole different ballgame, kids.
Think about it: of all the rumors that have ever circulated over the years, and of all the times that the rumor turned out to be true, and of all the times that the rumor came about because of a leak from within the company, never once has Apple ever sued a website simply for posting it. Clearly there's something more going on here. Something else altogether. This isn't about the headless iMac rumor, or the iWork rumor, or any other particular piece of information that the site posted. No, this one particular rumor site has gone and done something that put it in a class all unto its own. Something utterly bizarre, such as maybe the guy who publishes the site is an Apple employee, or maybe the site has been buying information from employees, or something else like that, on a soap opera level, because otherwise you just don't waste your time suing a rumor site. I mean, to do that you've got to be pissed.
I don't believe for one second that Apple's lawsuit against the website that posted the headless iMac rumor means anything as far as the rumor being true. For all we know, Apple decided to intentionally spread a false rumor to certain employees, just to see where that misinformation ended up surfacing, so they could figure out just who it was that leaked it. And if you're Apple and you're going to throw something fake out there, then why not use the most laughably false rumor in Apple history? Especially when you know that the Geek Caucus who publish these sites will eat it up like candy.
Now I'd be more than a little disappointed if it turns out that Apple leaked the phony headless iMac rumor just to snuff out a rogue employee. If that's the case, then I can't imagine that Apple was expecting it to gain this kind of traction, because we really do have a mess now. Maybe Apple figured that the headless iMac would get laughed off by everyone outside the Geek Caucus this time, just like it has every other time in the past. Or maybe Apple leaked it because they don't hold the same opinion I do when it comes to the downside of all this fake headless iMac talk. Or maybe Apple didn't leak this at all. I don't really know, and I don't know if we'll ever know what it was that caused the most absurd rumor in Apple history to suddenly find legs this year when it had always petered out in the past.
But I do know one thing: I don't see Apple's lawsuit as having told us anything about the headless iMac one way or the other. So instead I'm just going to stick to the facts of the matter, which are that it's a pointless product with no target market whose only purpose would be to confuse potential buyers about the merits of Apple's other Macintosh products and thus make them less likely to buy a Macintosh at all. Steve Jobs is neither an idiot nor hopelessly out of touch. I gave the headless iMac rumor a zero percent chance of being true prior to the lawsuit, and I give a zero percent chance of being true now.
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