Mac users hear a lot about Steve Jobs’ “reality distortion field”—the aura of his charisma and its sanguine effect on the Apple faithful. If Steven Levy’s recent Newsweek interview with Microsoft chairman Bill Gates is any example, Gates’ reality is pretty distorted too. But I’m not so sure it has as much to do with charisma as it does with self-delusion.


In excerpts of the interview published on the Newsweek Web site, Gates said that the newly released Vista’s selling point to the average consumer is features likes Sidebar and its ability to handle large amounts of photos, HD movies and DVD burning.


Sound familiar? Apple’s been doing digital photos, movies and DVD burning for years with its iLife software suite. As for Sidebar? That’s Vista’s way of running mini-applications called “gadgets.” But you probably know them as Dashboard and widgets—features of Mac OS X ever since Apple released Tiger.


Incredibly, Gates actually gets offended when Levy suggests that Microsoft ripped off some of Mac OS X in Vista’s features, look and feel:


“You can go through and look at who showed any of these things first, if you care about the facts. If you just want to say, ‘Steve Jobs invented the world, and then the rest of us came along,’ that’s fine.”

Then Gates goes on to suggest that Microsoft may have been too forthcoming early in Vista’s development, when it was still called Longhorn. He doesn’t say it directly, but Gates intimates that Microsoft showed off features that Apple ended up copying and shipping in its products before Microsoft could, because Microsoft spent so much time working out Vista’s security features.


That’s not just wrong, that’s astoundingly, jaw-droppingly wrong. Dashboard aside, the basic look and feel of Mac OS X—not to mention its core file structure—has been around since Windows XP was new, and Vista/Longhorn was not so much as even a glimmer in Bill Gates’ eye.


That’s not where Gates’ own version of the Reality Distortion Field ends, though. He also claims that “security guys break the Mac every single day. Every single day, they come out with a total exploit, your machine can be taken over totally.”


Now, Gates said this within the context of Vista’s improved security. And Vista is a marked improvement over Windows XP in a multitude of areas—security may very well be a major one.


But for Gates to suggest that “security guys break the Mac every single day” makes me wonder exactly where the hell Gates is getting his information, or at the very least, what he’s smoking.


Because about the most public display of Mac OS X-related bugs I’m familiar with is the recent “Month of Apple Bugs” project, which ended not so much with a bang but rather a whimper. The project’s organizers found one really good bug in there, which was fixed by Apple a few weeks later in a security update. Otherwise it was mainly just a mishmash of problems they discovered in third-party application software that runs on Mac OS X (not to mention Windows, in some cases).


And I’m completely unfamiliar with any “exploits,” as Gates put it, that would allow a malicious user to “take over totally” a Mac running Tiger.


So Bill Gates is, at best, grossly mistaken and really poorly informed about his major competition for the hearts and minds of consumers. And at worst, he’s well aware of just how mistaken his claims are and choosing to make them anyway. “Distorting reality” is one way to describe that; another would be “lying.”

Source

lol

...that' s gots to be some pretty potent ganja you' ve gots there, o' ll billy-boy... ...where can i score me some?...

Interesting but none of this matters to us when Macs are still useless for gaming. Microsoft will never lose their grip on PC gaming which is exactely why Apple computers will always remain a distant second (if that).

Why even bother upgrading your Mac when you can' t use it for anything intensive? So you can encode your movie 2 minutes faster? Fuck off. Mac fanboys are the worst out of all the fanboys. Not that I don' t appreciate the pressure on MS but don' t bullshit me with your 2000$ computer that can' t play games. Stupid assholes.

http://tv.truenuff.com/mac/gaming.php

Linux! ROTFLOL!!!

That seriously made my day!

Looks like Agent Ghost has Mac Envy. Personally I buy consoles to play games. I buy computers for non-gaming tasks, like video editing, sound mixing, DVD authoring, compressing, Photoshop stuff and the like. My computer is 4 years old I think, maybe more. And I don' t feel the need to upgrade it because it still kicks tons of ass compared to my much more recent Windows computer.

People buy PCs to play games yet complain about the PS3' s price? WTF?

People buy PCs to play games yet complain about the PS3' s price? WTF?

They complain because it looks like somebody dipped PS3' s textures in paint thinner.

I never said the PS3 was too expensive for me. I said it was too expensive for a console. If no one buys it they won' t make games for it, publishers would also be less willing to invest in higher budget titles as well. There' s a strong correlation with a marketshare of a console and how much value they have as a platform in terms of games. PC gets around this issue entirely, no one has doubts about the PC as a gaming platform, it' s already king. However each new console has to prove itself.

I don' t really care what the sticker price is as long as it supports the games I' m interested in, infact I plan on spending about a grand on my PC in a few months just for a videocard and a powersupply. It' s not about the money it' s about the value the purchase has. I' m not crazy enough to spend that much on a console as it' s a closed system with a limited marketshare as well as being limited with how many games will come out on it. I' m not the nostalgic type that can play old games that I' ve already beated, after i' ve beaten a game it' s pretty much dead to me. So consoles have a limited value in my books. PC on the other hand is by far my favorite gaming platform. Which by the way is going to kick some serious ass pretty soon with DX10 and new marketing initiatives.

The 360 and PS3 are mearly midrange gaming computers that plug into your TV and that use controllers. Years from now both those consoles will be yesterdays news and the games will no longer be impressive in their fixed resolution. They can offer gaming experiences that you can' t have on PC which is why I still buy consoles. Obviously it' s apples and oranges, but my point is PC is still the King regardless of the cost.

That being said I' m not trying to say that Macs don' t do anything better then PC, they just suck at the things that is supposed to make them so expensive. In terms of hardware, Mac users are always being fucked up the ass, a Mac with the same parts as a PC would cost twice as much, and they still can' t fucking play games! Mac users love to say " I don' t use my computer for games" , no shit you have a Mac! If I wasn' t a gamer then I might consider using an Apple os if I could use it on PC hardware but then if I wasn' t a gamer I wouldn' t need a 2000$ computer, I' d just buy a cheap 400$ computer and wouldn' t know the difference.


http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-6553260189868317794
You have to admit this is pretty funny.

Wait is that on a Mac site?

oh

Here is the CEO of Microsoft making a complete ass of himself!

What an idiot

I think he has put me off buying Vista now....

I guess this proves it, money cant buy dignity.

“You can go through and look at who showed any of these things first, if you care about the facts. If you just want to say, ‘Steve Jobs invented the world, and then the rest of us came along,’ that’s fine.”

Ha Ha Ha.
Funny
Yeah i feel the intensity.

That being said I' m not trying to say that Macs don' t do anything better then PC,

Agent Ghost i will disagree. Macs looks cooler.

Wake me up when it gets to the point where Macs can seriously rival PC' s. Until then i' ll be ignoring dumb comments made by industry figures and bearing in mind that Vista will outsell OS X by an incomprehensible amount.

Hmmm the old PC Vs Mac debate, always a good one to get a flame war started.

Agent Ghost i will disagree. Macs looks cooler.

read carefully