You said — I don’t see him as bashing Macs per se, but rather the MacMania that some of their users have.
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Well, I think what you’re seeing, when referring to what was seen in those Apple stores, and people “drinking the KookAid” there — was not what he *or* you were thinking it was. You were thinking it was related to some kind of great devotion and “religious experience” of some kind..., and so, being “out of place” in the business world of hard knocks...
BUT, what was *really* going on was something that the business world of “hard knocks” should pay very close attention to. They were doing business better than any other retailer around, and thus “totally amazing” the customers in the process. Customers didn’t know that such a thing existed.
For one example, when the iPhone came out, I remember everyone being able to come in to the Apple store and get their “hands on” an iPhone and play with it, do all sorts of things with it, actually make calls to anyone in the U.S., anywhere, talk to them, have them call you back so you could see how it works, you could make conference calls and so on...
Now, I also went into an AT&T store at the time. There’s no way you could get your hands on any such thing, much less play around with it or make calls to see how it sounded or anything like that. Perhaps you might get a salesman to let you hold one for a minute but then he would be looking very intently at you, and rapping his fingers on the table, while you were doing it.
Apple lets you do that to all their machines there. You can do just about anything to them that you want. You can bring your kids there and let them play with the machines that they have set out for the kids to fiddle around with.
You go into other retailers and their machines are in *woeful condition* — sometimes barely working, shut down, a key might be missing, good luck if *anything* is working on those machines at all. I haven’t seen *any retailer* anywhere — do like Apple does in their stores. Nowhere...
And..., they don’t pressure you. They’re not going “hover” over you either. If you indicate, even just very minimally, that you don’t want any help at the moment, they’ll back off and just leave you alone. And..., the *very second* you want help — they’re right there on the spot, helping you. And then they’ll back off again, once you don’t want anything again.
Again, I haven’t seen that in *any* retailer, anywhere...
On top of that, if you’ve got any kind of problem with your Mac computer, whether it’s how to do a simple procedure, or you think you *might* have a hardware problem, but it could be a software problem — well, you just go to the “genius bar” and they’ll help you figure it out — no cost. If you don’t want to go into the store and find that you’re waiting in a “line” for five other people ahead of you, also wanting to talk to someone, all you do is before you go — you get on the Internet, you tell them when you’re going to be there and they’ll be *ready for you* exactly at the time you put in their “system” for having the “genius” help you.
Once again — I’ve *never* seen any retailer do that, so smoothly, so seamlessly and so expertly as Apple does it in their retail stores. Heck, you can bring that baby in every single day and talk to a “genius” there at Apple, if you want to.
SO..., when you say you see people “drinking the KoolAid” — I think *you* and other *retailers* have *absolutely no clue* as how to “retail” to customers.... LOL...
But, the customers *know* a good retailer when they see one. So, it’s not “religion” — it’s simply *better business* than anyone else has ever been able to do in the past.
For that, they’ve got a lot of people in the stores...
Regarding "Drinking the Koolaid".....I know very few PC users who have a love affair with their computers. Conversely, I've not met a hardcore Mac user yet who didn't get incredibly defensive (just read this thread) when their overall orthodoxy was questioned.
Fools, all. A Computer is a tool....no more, no less. If it performs the functions you desire...Great! If you're willing to pay a premium for those functions, more power to you. If you're not, don't. But anyone who looks at a company who has slick-ly marketed, mass-produced electronics as a "lifestyle to emulate" or a "religion to follow" is a tragically unfulfilled person.
While it's true that Apple has been very successful marketing to these true believers - and been moderately successful marketing to everyone else - the fact of the matter is that 90% of the population uses their home computers for one or two tasks (think internet and email). They want simplicity and reliability, at a good cost. Businesses (by far the biggest users of PCs, and where the *real* money is) want the same things, along with easy interoperability and low maintenance overhead. Until Apple figures out a way to break into the Intel/Microsoft "low-cost, high-reliability" paradigm, they'll be relegated to niche business uses, and personal toys.