Enough of the Nay-sayers: by George Edward Green III 11/10/97

Cloning is dead...deal! It seems like everyone is so depressed because Power Computing got at arrogant and Apple swallowed them whole. Steve Jobs is at Apple now, and whether you like it or not he’s the one determining their fate. Yes, Steve has a history of being a great big cry baby, who can piss off almost as many people as he draws in with his “reality distortion field”. Yes, Steve was essentially expelled from Apple because he was causing fights between divisions, ignoring authority, and sticking his nose in everyone else’s business. But that was years ago! Steve has had plenty of time to think what he would do with the company, and half the people I meet won’t even give him a chance.

The day Amelio was fired I called a friend and told him what happened. He asked me, “Is that good or bad?” I thought about it, and said I didn’t know. Here’s what I do know, Gil was charging Apple to fly him around in his personal jet. He was getting bonuses for profits that were nothing more that jumbling numbers on paper, and he was laying off the working class of Apple employees to feed his fat paycheck. Steve on the other hand has plenty of experience in the industry. He’s familiar with Apple, he only gets paid if the stock does well, and he’s not afraid to do stuff that might look bad now, but may help later.

Cloning wasn’t working. If it had been then all our friend would be using Macs made by Power Computing, not Wintel based crap. But instead those of us who have always used the Mac were buying cheap clones. That is not what Apple needed to survive, and obviously thus not what we wanted. Yes it looked great on our budgets but if Apple had died one year later, then it’d be a far different tune we’d be singing. Perhaps once Rhapsody is out and Apple is making at least comparable amounts of money of the OS, as the hardware then we might find Apple willing to try it’s hand at some more intelligent cloning. Right now though it’s just not an option. If you want a cheap clone then go buy yourself a PC. Either way stop whining to us real Mac users. We have no need for those of you who use a Mac but constantly complain about it.

I was emailed recently by the owner of a fairly popular Macintosh on-line ordering house. He insisted that Steve Jobs was Apple’s doom. He divined this from his bible, as written by one Jim Carlton. Jim Carlton is the same journalist who has been blackmailing MacOS Rumors. I haven’t read Mr. Carlton’s book but I doubt if he could predict the success and failure of companies so easily that he’d still be working at a newspaper, and not some huge successful psychic network! I’ve read plenty of books on Steve Jobs and I watch every piece of news that comes out on Apple. I sort through all the negative spins of journalist looking to be able to say they told us so if by some chance Apple dies, which it won’t.

Here’s what I see. Jobs has partnered with an industry leader at software creation. He’s lowered operating cost at Apple. He’s reduced the number of redundant positions, and placed some very talented people in important positions. Avie Tevanian, and Jon Ruperstein are good at what they do, and I expect some very impressive hardware and software to come out of Apple in the next 90 days. Steve has also began advertising the Mac in different ways. I suspect that between the new Think Different ads, and the upcoming product driven ads that Apple will sell a lot more machines this Christmas.

Another thing all these so-called Mac lovers, turned nay-sayers overlook is Apple’s stock. In the recent downward spin of the stock market what stock actually managed to climb, even if only a little bit? That’s right Apple. As soon as Apple starts to gain any kind of profit whatsoever that stock is going to climb like wildfire. There are a lot of people that believe Jobs is going to save the company, and are just waiting for the right signals that now is a good time to buy Apple stock.

Speaking of Apple stock, for all of you who constantly whine that Steve is leading Apple to hell, where’s your stock? If you care enough about Apple that you feel it’s your duty to point out to people that Steve is the Antichrist incarnate then you obviously have already amassed millions of stock right? If you don’t feel your investment in the Mac was worth buying stock then your opinion is obviously no more committed. As for me I intend to buy Apple stock as soon as my personal finances allow me to. I am certain that once Apple releases it’s hot new products, and awesome new OS that the stock is going to jump dramatically. Always being able to use a little extra cash I am looking to buy me a few shares. I believe that not only is Apple stock not a risk, I believe it’s money in hand.

To make a long story short I am sick to death of all this negative talk about Apple. Didn’t your mother’s ever tell you, “If you haven’t got anything good to say don’t open your mouth!”? The only thing holding Apple back now is negative public image and Steve Jobs isn’t the man creating that! It’ all of you who suddenly think you know it all about Apple. Those that Apple Recon, a popular on-line page about Apple, and Wall Street, call gurus dejour, are constantly hurling bad information, and misinformation about Apple into the masses. It helps no one when these people make these vast prophecies about the Mac dying, with little or no basis for their argument. At least someone has predicted Apple’s doom each week since 77, and they ain’t dead yet! So, shut your trap and sit back for the ride. Maybe if you don’t waste your time complaining you can watch what all the rest of us see happening. You can watch as the company we all love pulls itself out of the mess it’s in and returns as the leader we all know it should be, at the top of the industry. It’d be a darn shame to miss that show wouldn’t it.

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