Hackintosh? Excuse Me?

I ran across this while reading my son’s blog and found it bordering on absurd. I have never owned any computer other than a Mac. While I understand that Windows machines are computers, I can’t fully understand why anyone would choose to own one, but that’s another post altogether.

Owning and using a Mac has been like a rite of passage in the Cork family. It’s the only computer our family has ever had in our home and all three of our kids have taken Macs away to college with them. It’s one of the ways we define normal around here. To throw a non-Mac box running Mac software into the marketplace might be attractive to a few, but real Mac users won’t bother. It’s like, what’s the point?

Using a Mac is not just about the software. I mean have you seen the keyboard on the latest iMac, or have you felt the smooth curvature of the new MacBook Air?  It’s not about price. Macintosh is an experience, not some sort of utilitarian device available to the lowest bidder.

Obviously the person who developed this “box” doesn’t understand Mac and the true Mac user. Otherwise they wouldn’t be wasting their time and money. While I understand them trying (Windows has always copied Mac) I don’t understand how they think money could be a deciding factor.

The Internet: Center of the Universe

Have you seen the monster.com commercial with the ginormous-legged man pedaling the gyroscope at the center of the earth? That’s one of the first things I thought of when I first heard someone say the internet is the center of the universe. Then in my mind I began seeing someone deep in the earth’s core making all of these connections — kind of antique switchboard style. Then as I allowed my mind to expand and catch up with reality I realized how undeniably true that statement is. 

How many things do you do in your daily life that have nothing to do with the internet?  For me that’s a short list. I practically live online and I’m not all that young anymore. My kids and the young kids I’m surrounded by at work live their lives more immersed in the digital world than I, which is a little hard to believe. And it just keeps expanding and people continue to dream up new ways of being connected. Just a few days ago I read a brief update in Fast Company that told how we’re not that far away from our appliances being connected to the digital space. Can you imagine having your refrigerator sending you a text message that your milk is going bad and you’d better pick up a fresh gallon?

This past weekend I decided to experiment with Twitter so I went online and created my account and began twitting (you can follow me here but it’s not that exciting). Very quickly I discovered my 21 year old son twitting with some of our creative staff at Premier Studios. So being a good dad I signed up to follow him (that could have been very handy when he was younger). I found out he was sitting in a Saturday class wishing he were sleeping instead. I immediately jumped on iChat and before the program could fully open a window opened with the words, “sup Dad,” and Ryan and I began a chat while he was in class in Idaho and I was sitting in a hotel room more than 1500 miles away.

 

And yes, I told him to get offline and pay attention to the lecture — I may be connected but I’m still a dad.