When The Apple Grows, So Do The Worms
I have always been a big follower of not only Apple products and services but more of as a company itself. Apple’s ability to give it’s users what they want, how they want it, and deliver its service and support better and more productively than any other company in its niche has ever possibly been able to do.
As the company grows, its strives to keep out the worms.
Apple has always had fun, exciting, and most of all: innovative products. Back in the day you could always tell a mac from any other computer on the market. Whether it was the desktop that reminded you of the PiXAR lamp or the trippy color clamshell notebooks, Apple has always been defferent. Plus, they always “Just worked.” Although I never owned a mac myself but I had the pleasure of using them often.
Even with their branch off to the music industry with their iPod, Apple showed that they still had it going. A revolutionary way of playing music plus a kick ass advertising campaign that allowed for its entrance into today’s widespread pop culture. Using what Apple already had they integrated an easy to use music store combined with Apples gift of writing amazing code to assist their products well. Apple has always been a good company for one reason and one reason only (aside of innovative and creative ideas). Now this reason, to some, is the same for its downfall, but I’ll get to that in a second. Apples main thing it has going for its is its choice and ability to be 100% proprietary. Apple always had the ability to control their market because their systems only worked with their software and their software only worked with their systems.
This idea was great from a support and development standpoint, because Apple could develop their products exactly how they wanted and support them as easily as they made them.
Think of it this way, your brother, who is a PC user, is having a problem with his computer. He calls Microsoft in the middle of India to get WinXP support, not only can he not tell what the operator is telling him, the operator really doesn’t know much. They don’t know what kind of computer he is using, the system specs, what accessories and expansions he has installed, not to mention the plethora of installed demos and spyware installed by the vendor of the machine. And on top of that, chances our your brother doesn’t know much about his computer either. Now, on the other side, your sister, and avid Mac user, calls Apple and instantly the operator knows that because she is running her system (with probably only 1 or 2 areas of customization possible that only affects the speed of the machine) with version whatever of MacOS and is running this machine. Because they have manufactured their own parts and written their own software, they are easier informed and equipped to support it.
The problem comes in when Apple looses it’s ability to have this proprietary control over its market. This doesn’t come by fault of Apple directly due to any mess up of their own surprisingly, their expansion and growth. With Apples recent dive into the music industry and even more recently into the mobile communications industry, Apple has been itself in a position where forming cooperate partnerships and and relying on companies like AT&T and Intel to be just as strong as they are to provide their users with the same quality support has they had when they were mostly proprietary. Without this ability, Apple feel as if Apple will loose its edge in its ability to be as creative and as innovative as they have in the past.
We all love comics right?
Is Apple going anywhere anytime soon? Yeah, right! Apple will be able to keep us entertained for quite some time so there’s no reason for concern just yet. I’m pretty sure the public will stay excited with Apple’s ability to release glass trackpads and color changing iPods for just a little while longer. 
~Cory
Are URL’s Really Becoming Extinct?
I was reading an article earlier this morning on one of my favorite blogs, Wisdump, about how “normal people” don’t tend to use URLs as much as they used too, blaming search engines like Google for the extinction of said technologies. Sure, built-in technologies such as search bars from Google or separate toolbar for your favorite website make things easier and faster, but they don’t always provide the most practical solution. Me? I think URLs aren’t going anywhere, and I’ll tell you why.
Security
The article dips very lightly into the idea that by eliminating the use of the URL as we know it now, web security and the potential for “normal” computer users to be maliciously attacked drop. Yea, if we were still in 1995. Today when you think of people web surfing, you think of what? People going from web page the web page looking at information, hence the name “surfing” right? Who actually does that? People that use the internet are continually being sucked into just a few handfuls of site and services they use.
Think social networking. Users go to websites like Facebook and MySpace, but instead of surfing on to other websites around the net, they stay on that site. It offers more than just text to read and videos to watch, its a network of people to communicate with (social networking). Now I know by now you all are thinking “Cory, why are you explaining how social networking sites work? Its not rocket science!” I’ll tell you why: How many URL’s do you use to go to Facebook or MySpace? One.
Most of the URL spoofing attacks come from internal actions taken by parties during the attack. Think a message directing you to a wrong link or a those tricky seductive images (those get me all the time). So actually, if you were to get rid of URLs, how would you know your still on the same website? Seems like URLs are the only secure thing out there these days. Hmmm….
Attack of the Invading Google
In the article, the other shows a screen shot of your standard Firefox install plus adding the Google toolbar, stressing the idea that every computer user (a)Still has the default firefox/google search page (b)Has their search box set to use Google and (c)Actually installs and uses the Google toolbar. Either these “normal people” have a Google fetish or like searching right?
But Wait…
By “normal people” I mean those who are mere computer users, not literates nor enthusiasts nor experts.
So normal people, who are not computer literate, know to install Firefox because its a better browser and because its safer and easier to use, but can’t figure out how you have to put WWW before and .COM after your URLs.
Conclusion
Don’t get me wrong, I love Wisdump, always have, they have interesting articles on things that interest me plus they allow my brain to wonder, leaving you with blog posts to read. I’m not trying to blow them out of the water and call them out. The article still proves a good point that its easier to tell your friend to search for ________ on YouTube than to be able to remember the completely randomly generated ID.
~Cory
