Posted on 10/26/2014 3:20:18 PM PDT by ImJustAnotherOkie
Similarly, one of the reasons Steve Jobs had Apple opened their own stores was the deliberate down selling of Macs in general computer stores such as Comp USA and Circuit City. Often the Macs would be deliberately unplugged or sabotaged so as to not work by Windows bigots. Many times the keyboards would not be connected, mouses missing, and the displays never dusted to make them look shabby. They were often shoved to the back of the store by Windows centric managers. Anti-Mac customers played their part too, sabotaging the operating systems on the computers.
One of the ways the Windows Bigots DID sabotage the Macs in a network was to make sure the fonts did not match. I REALLY suspect that was the case in your workplace because it is such a egregiously wrong example when I KNOW it simply does not happen as you describe. It sounds like enemy action to me.
Other examples are Windows bigots deliberately designing websites to exclude non-Windows computers from even connecting. I found that the case is some very prominent companies, including, in the past, Wells Fargo Bank, Chevron Credit Card, and Blue Shield of California . . . and I went straight to the top, the CEO to make them change. The CEOs were, to a man, unaware their IT departments were excluding a large percentage of their CUSTOMERS.
Several years ago, when I called the IT department at a large health insurance carrier for one of my employees, after she told me she could not register from her Mac, and then I failed and was shunted to a screen that said "You must be using a Windows Computer using Internet Explorer to access this Website." She had to log on to select a doctor on our company's new health care plan. I called the website help line and after going through several know-nothing help desks, I was connected to their head of their IT department said it was MY fault for "buying a TOY computer," and he had no plans for making their website available for "TOYS" and "if you want to get anything done on the Internet, you need to buy a REAL computer!"
This was when OS X Macs had just gone over 25% of consumer computers in California!
I then went on line and found the executive offices of the company in San Francisco and called and spoke to the CEO of the Insurance Company. He was shocked that consumers could not log onto his company's website. He transferred me to the VP of Customer Relations, a nice woman named Samantha (Can't recall her last name). . . she too was AGHAST that their customers could not even log onto their website from a Mac!
It turned out that the company had Macs in their Executive Suite. . . and VP Samantha kept me on the line while she attempted to register on their consumer website and got the same window I got saying "You must be using a Windows Computer with Internet Explorer" to use this website. She was audibly upset. She said to me, "Why have I not received any complaints on my desk about this. I review every complaint that comes through? The IT department has to pass on complaints for review." I said, "Obviously they aren't. Mac users are not ones to not complain when they can't use something like a website. I had trouble finding out how to get to your corporate offices. The only numbers on your website connect are filtered through the same IT people. You ask to get connected further, you get disconnected. I won't give up."
She then called the IT help desk with the same "know-nothings" and then, pretending to be a consumer trying to connect with a Mac, got connected to the same IT director I had been finally connected with and was also insulted about buying a toy computer and informed that HER company had no plans to ever support the Apple platform. She then asked to be connected to someone who could address that policy and he hung up on her! Guess who was minus HIS JOB that day????
With both Chevron and Wells Fargo, i had been using their websites with no problem. Then they hired new IT department managers who redesigned their websites using Microosoft products and suddenly they would not work with Macs. Calling tech support got similar answers to those given by the tech support at the Insurance Company. . . and that they would not support a "non-mainstream computer." At least they were not insulting about it, but they did suggest buying another computer to use their sites. Again, I went directly to the top, one with emails and one on the phone.
My standard questions for the CEOs I contacted in the past is "Are you in the business of selling 'X' or in promoting Microsoft products?"
With both, within two weeks, Macs were working fine again. . . and there were new names on their organizational charts for IT. I am sick and tired of the MSCE pukes who only know Microsoft products and think they have to use only their products and prevent others from using anything else.
Oh, one site I have not been able to make any headway on is the State of California's State Disbursement Unit. It is the organization that collects garnisheed wages from employers for child support. One of our employees has to pay part of his wages in a garnishee. The website claims it will work with a OS X Mac and Safari, but it will not. For the last three years, since they rewrote their previous amateurishly designed "Ransom note page," trying to log on with a simple name and password to pay the garnishee on line ALWAYS returns to the same page. However, it WILL work with Mac FireFox.
The State of California's webmaster refuses to take complaints about the website, instead telling a complainers to contact their County Child Welfare Offices about any complaints. . . who tell you they have NOTHING to do with the website and refer you to the Website phone number that refers you to the counties. Circle jerk. I have complained every three months to Governor Moonbeam Brown to do something about this. . . citing the now 30% of California consumers who may need to use this website and have yet to receive a response. It is the ONLY California website that will not work with Macs.
That is true. However, fraud losses run in the single-digit basis point range.
The card companies actually have rules against doing that. And for good reason: using plastic is supposed to be more convenient, not less convenient. It's all about the bottom line, and fraud losses with the current, imperfect system run in the single-digit basis point range.
If you are confirming non modern macs were exactly as i have described, i will agree they have solved those problems and are now only overpriced.
I think we have run the conversation on this one. I promise never to quip my dislike for apple mac on this forum again.
That was an interesting story, Sword...thanks!
How cool that the CEO changed their policy, good for you for pursuing it!
See ya’,
Ed
Ed, it never was policy. It was the unilateral decision of the MSCEs in their IT departments who made the decision. . . it never was the policy of the company. Usually it was the head of IT. . . who'd lose his job. where it worked before with Macs, and suddenly didn't, the IT director was a new hire who was changing things to "his" way. . . And he lost his new job too.
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