Oliver,
I wholeheartedly agree with the sentiments in Scott's article and frankly, am pretty surprised that this was the best Apple could come up with to unveil the latest version of their post-production software, which we all believed held so much promise for us as media professionals. The whole thing is just bizarre and reeks of an Apple "marketing" decision gone very awry.
FIrst let's address FCPUG. I've known Michael since the 2-pop days and he has always been a stand up guy. We also know that over the years Apple has gradually backed away from working with user groups like his, (I'm so old I remember when we called them SIG's!) and has become basically unapproachable for this type of support. So for all practical purposes, Michael and Daniel were probably put in somewhat of an untenable position. Let's face it, It would have been the noble thing to do, but it would have also taken extremely big balls for those guys to say no to Apple.
But Christ, all those other sponsors must be VERY pissed off…
OTOH…
I think we can all agree that throughout their history, Apple has been nearly as notorious as Microsoft in their disregard for the welfare of small developers and other companies (Avid in this instance) in their quest to build the "world's greatest" operating system. Like anyone trying to slay a Goliath, it all seemed cute and good when they were the droopy, crunchy, bastard hippie children of the computer revolution, providing welcome contrast to the obnoxious propeller heads from Redmond. Apple's decades long fractional market share also helped rally their troops (us) to pledge allegiance to the computer "for the rest of us…" This, in spite of horror stories out of Cupertino regarding Steve Jobs rude, dictatorial and often humiliating management style.
But now the man who reinvented the Walkman for the digital age and put a phone into it is the 800TB gorilla. And although I agree it's maliciously thrown around way too often, the term "fanboy" is an apt description of a new generation of users seduced by both "cool" (if not always the best) products and the infamous Jobsian cult of personality with a disregard or lack of knowledge of it's "dark side". Apple's not only conquered the computing industry, but as of this moment, holds many of the keys to the future of media creation, distribution and consumption. They are the new gatekeeper. The pinnacle of corporate America. What IBM was (and what Apple loathed) in 1984. And frankly, as evidenced by a dunderheaded move like this, everyone should be starting to fear them more just a little.
Agreed, it won't get much play beyond our small community of digital media creators. But I think what many of us are sensing and reacting to is that same kind of feeling we got when we saw a big bully picking on others smaller and weaker in the schoolyard. Say what you want about Avid, but they play in an extremely small and specific corner of OUR schoolyard; editing and post production.
Best,
Larry
So I say have a little class Apple. Where's the Vision? Values? Ethics? Anything beyond just the bottom line…
--- In Avid-L2@yahoogroups.com, "oliverpetersvidy" <oliverpeters@...> wrote:
>
> And more press:
>
> http://www.studiodaily.com/blog/?p=6064
>
> - Oliver
>
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