Posted on 11/05/2007 12:33:38 PM PST by Leroy S. Mort
Everything's fine over at Apple, with absolutely no one complaining about the company's decision to exclude new Mac purchasers from a low cost upgrade to Mac OSX Leopard. At least, that's the impression you'd get if you were to read about subject on the Apple Leopard pre-release discussion board, where buyer complaints about the upgrade policy were immediately deleted by Apple staff.
You may recall that customers who bought new Macs in August, when they were initially released, or just thereafter in September, were denied upgrade pricing, and had to pay full price for Leopard. However, customers that waited to buy their new Macs until October, at least 7 weeks after the new Macs were initially released, were rewarded by Apple with special $9.95 Leopard upgrade pricing.
When I questioned moderators as to why complaints about the upgrade pricing policy were being deleted, actually, let's use the correct term here, censored, I was told it was because the questions were not "support oriented". When I asked follow-up questions as to why posts praising Apple's upgrade policy, from customers that bought new Macs in October, were not also being deleted, as they also were not "support oriented", my own posts were censored.
The lone survivor of the many threads I saw is located here. Interestingly, in the last line of the thread, the original poster compares his situation, as an early purchaser of a new Mac, to that of early purchasers of iPhones.
This was my first visit to the official Apple support forums. I've always found the help I've needed elsewhere. One thing I found particularly disturbing while surfing through dozens of Apple discussion pages was the attitude of the most hardcore Apple and Steve Jobs supporters. This included outright lying when asked whether Apple uses a Microsoft like validation scheme to prevent installing a given copy of Leopard on more than one Mac. The question arose repeatedly in the context of whether it's really necessary to buy the $199 Leopard "Family Pack", versus the $129 "Single User" edition.
And in thread after thread, posters were repeatedly told by the Apple faithful that you can only install a given copy of Leopard on one Mac. A statement that simply is not true. I don't condone software piracy, that's an issue between you and your conscience (and Apple's legal staff, should you get caught). I also don't condone the wholesale spread of outright lies. Of course, when anyone set the record straight on this point, again, the threads were censored.
Censorship at Apple? In its infamous 1984 Super Bowl commercial, based on George Orwell's book "1984", Apple attacked the boring and gray IBM and its fledgling PC. For Apple 1984 was nothing at all like "1984". In that year, Apple changed the way we worked with computers. But, given 2007 Apple-style, perhaps the commercial was right, just 23 years too early and focused on the wrong company.
(Page 1 of that article is rather interesting, too.)
They KNOW they have you. You aren’t going to turn on them. You cannot go elsewhere............
And in thread after thread, posters were repeatedly told by the Apple faithful that you can only install a given copy of Leopard on one Mac.
So, who is it that's "outright lying" ???
Is it Apple personnel?
Or some schmoe on a discussion board?
I can tell you that there is no activation - just bought a Macbook, It didn't have 10.5 on it, but it has the DVD, and it can be installed on another machine. (The DVD I bought from Amazon hasn't got here yet).
How’s Vista doing?
iPing
Replace "can" with "may", and it's a true statement - maybe that's the confusion point.
It CAN be done, but it's against the license.
Do not question the Church and High Priest Jobs.
1984 and THX-1138 are good examples of this mentality.
Uhhh, people complaing about Apple and pricing seems to be a little daft in the head. What do you expect?
Only a sucker would buy anything affiliated with Apple. I thought when Apple was failing in the 90’s that MAYBE they’d change their ways and not try to rape customers for their proprietary software/hardware. Then when Steve Jobs came back I had a little hope he might make the Mac a more open source kind of machine similar to PC’s. I was wrong and I still hope they i-mplode.
saving
The author states it was his first trip to the apple support discussions. Perhaps he should have READ the EULA before he agreed to it - he may have learned a thing or two about what it’s for, and what’s acceptable or not.
It’s a technology support forum - user to user. Apple admins do exist, and they’re there to make sure the EULA is adhered to. Explicitly excluded are post...
“Discussions of Apple policies or procedures or speculation on Apple decisions.”
Deleting such posts has been standard practice - not some big conspiracy that started with Leopard.
Has Steve Jobs gone to jail for backdating his options yet? No? He must make political donations to Democrats.
Excellent here.
You know, I have no mercy for such people, as the policy was clearly laid out on the “apple store” website. This was the SPECIFIC REASON I held off buying a Mac until now.
I checked the site every day to see when, if ever, one could buy a Mac with little or no cost to upgrade to Leopard and when that was offered, I bought. It’s not rocket science people!
Tangent: I was a PC advocate and lover until the Mac afficionados on FR wore me down with their logic and insightfulness. I am now a convert to Macs, and I’m never looking back. Thanks to all Mac lovers, especially Swordmaker; combined with your posts, my personal experience with Macs at work has taught me there’s really no comparison.
You really DO, get what you pay for.
Thankfully, it took Vista to push me into the Mac world and I have never been happier. Now I only have to deal with MS at the office.
Leopard’s release date was always stated as end of October. I held out until I knew if there would be an upgrade program or not and what the cost would be.
It’s nuts to cry about this when you knew the potential cost going in.
Deleting such posts has been standard practice - not some big conspiracy that started with Leopard.
And yet posts favorable to their policy were allowed while those unfavorable were deleted. Is that in the EULA?
Is Algor still on the Apple board?
I guess I'm a sucker for a better product at a lower cost, then.
I thought when Apple was failing in the 90’s that MAYBE they’d change their ways and not try to rape customers for their proprietary software/hardware.
Rape ??? RAPE ???
Do you have any clue how stupid that sounds?
Did somebody pull out a knife or gun and force you to buy something?
Then when Steve Jobs came back I had a little hope he might make the Mac a more open source kind of machine similar to PC’s.
If you're talking Windows, then again you are mistaken calling it "open source".
If you're talking boxes, why should he compete with 800 other PC makers?
One of the reasons they were "failing" in the mid 90's is BECAUSE they tried the cloning business.
Apple distinguished themselves by making a better COMBINATION hardware & software. Why should they drop into the same market when they can create their own?
They seem to be doing rather well, even without your business.
According to Apple, yeah.
Not so. Originally it was slated for "Late Spring".
Then the iPhone was judged higher priority, and resources were diverted.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.