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Update! The Night Owl’s Guaranteed Incorrect Macworld Predictions

January 7th, 2008

It’s a sure thing that lots of so-called tech reporters have been making the rounds predicting what Apple will unfurl at the Macworld Expo next week. While I’m sure some of those guesses are on the money, and I also suspect Apple spread some of those tales for maximum impact, others will be thoroughly off-base.

Now I have often told you long-suffering readers that I am not much at prognostications, nor am I qualified to do industry analysis in the fashion of my friend Ross Rubin of the NPD Group. But my opinions are as good as anyone else’s, otherwise, and so long as you understand I’m probably going to be downright wrong in everything I suggest, I’m going to take a stab at it.

Next week, you can have the pleasure of showing me up for the mistakes I’ve made, even though I’m admitting to them in advance, or you can simply include your own predictions in your comments to this article.

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The Mac Versus a PC: Has the Difference Vanished?

June 6th, 2006

In writing about the problems Microsoft is facing in finishing up Windows Vista, some of you have mistaken this for a Mac zealots versus PC zealots issue. But that’s not true. Vista’s troubled development process is well known, and when people recognized as Windows experts find serious issues with stability, performance and the user interface, it’s reasonable to predict that there’s trouble ahead.

But I want this commentary to focus on more than just operating systems. I’ll begin by taking you back to June of 2005, when Steve Jobs, in front of a huge WWDC keynote audience, said Apple was moving to Intel processors. This development had been widely anticipated in the mainstream press, so it didn’t come as much of a surprise. It was also true that Apple had been unable to deliver the promised 3GHz G5, or get ahold of a tamed version for a notebook. So it seemed, as far as I’m concerned, a natural consequence.

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Reality Check: A Look at Apple Reliability

February 25th, 2006

Fascinating how things change. Back in the 1980s, when Macs became dominant in the publishing industry because of the LaserWriter and PageMaker, you didn’t read about the goings on at Apple in the mainstream press every single day. It’s hard to realize that Apple had a double digit market share way back when, although the total PC universe was a lot smaller. At the time, however, I was too busy earning that paycheck to think much about the computer I used to for my work.

I felt lucky when I only had one or two system crashes a day, that a floppy disk didn’t become corrupted, and that an attempt to output a high resolution document didn’t fail. No, things did not always “just work,” but you put up with the anomalies and the annoyances and persevered. Yes, there was also an occasional computer virus or two. I learned the hard way to get proper protection from such things, and accepted that, too, as the cost of doing business.

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The Apple/Intel Report: The Pressure Mounts

December 17th, 2005

Over the past six months, most of my columns have focused on the well-known positive aspects of Apple’s impending switch to Intel processors. But, no, I’m not being a cheerleader; I just want to take as realistic an approach as possible and clear up the confusion and misguided speculation.

But there are land mines out there for Apple, and they are going to have to work real hard to avoid missteps. Unlike the Apple of even a few years ago, the tech world is watching carefully. Speculation on when the new products, which I’ve dubbed MacIntels, will arrive is no longer just the province of a handful of Mac rumor sites. The mainstream press has jumped in these murky waters with both feet. Industry analysts are predicting precisely what Apple is going to do next month, and expectations for the Macworld Expo San Francisco are higher than ever!

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