Once upon a
time, there was an analyst named James Poyner who kept taking
swipes at Apple with nothing to back it up, and who kept doing
so from progressively smaller analyst firms. In other words,
he was an idiot who kept having to settler for lesser jobs, but
for whatever reason he was determined to take Apple down with
him. Maybe he thought that the resulting attention was propping
up his career. Or maybe he just couldn't help himself. But one
way or the other, the guy was a moron, and I didn't think I'd
ever see an analyst who could top him. Until today, that is.
Now I'm not
saying that Rob Enderle is necessarily literally smoking
crack. I'm just saying that after reading his recent
comments, drug
usage would seem
to be
the most likely conclusion. There's nothing wrong with criticizing
Apple if you've actually got something to complain about, but
Rob seems to have taken one too many trips in the wayback machine.
Like so many Apple bashers before him, he can't help but alternate
between making statements that are no longer true and statements
that never were true. Here are a few highlights, for those who
don't think they can stomach the whole debacle:
"Currently,
folks seem particularly upset that they are buying brand-new
machines and then still have to pay for an upgrade to the latest
version of the Apple operating system."
Well, this
one's easy to argue against: it's simply not true. All new Macs
come with Panther, and there's even an up-to-date program for
those
who
bought their
Mac after Panther was announced but before it came into existence.
"More and more
seem to realize that iTunes only works with the iPod, making
it likely they might have to, at some future point, repurchase
all of the music they have already purchased online through iTunes
should they ever want to use that music on something else."
Apparently
Rob has never heard of burning his music to CD, which of course
allows the user to re-rip the music into any format that he or
she wishes. For that matter, iTunes is one of a short list of
services that actually allows free and basically unlimited
CD burning. And why is it that he's criticizing Apple
for using a different file format than Napster, but not criticizing
Napster for using a different file format than Apple? Nothing
like a good old-fashioned double standard.
"The iPod is terrible as a PDA..."
That's because
it's not a PDA, it's a music player...
"You'll find more cool stuff in a Gateway store than in an Apple
store today."
By "cool stuff",
is Rob referring to the TV sets that Gateway now meekly sells,
or the "everything must go, we're closing our doors" signs that
can
be found in so many Gateway stores these days?
"the failed switcher campaign..."
Why am I not
surprised that this guy has no idea what the highly
successful Switcher campaign was all about?
"It's time...that
Jobs stopped sitting around milking his installed base and started
thinking outside the box."
Yeah, Rob,
that's it. If Apple would just start innovating for
once, they could catch up with industry trailblazers like Gateway
and original
idea factories like Dell. Maybe steal an idea or two from a true
innovator like Microsoft. I'd run down a list of Apple's list
of recent innovations and instances of thinking outside the box,
but the list would be far too long and everyone reading already
knows it by heart anyway.
It's been a
long time since I've read such a total piece of trash...and I
mean a long time. I would advocate that readers not even dignify
it by reading
it, but then again maybe it's good that Mac users be reminded
from time to time just how big of a wall of absolute falsehoods
Apple goes to bat against every day. Fear-spreading idiots
like Rob Enderle are, unfortunately, a big reason why there aren't
more Mac users -- don't forget that as you read his pile of rubbish.
It's why you shouldn't ever feel guilty for spreading the truth
about the Macintosh. Someone has to combat the Enderle's of the
world. Oh, and take a careful look at Rob's picture at the top
of the
article:
Is it me, or
is he falling over as that photo was being taken? See, I told you
he was on crack.
Do you think
that Rob Enderle really is smoking something? Are you his dealer?
Confess it on the billpalmer.net
discussion boards.
Oh, and you're invited to join the billpalmer.net online Mac
User Group by clicking here, although
I'll warn you that there's no crack allowed at meetings:
