The cult of Apple

Having visited the Apple Store in Manhattan (which is very much like the one on Michigan Avenue in Chicago, which I've also visited), I can sort of understand this assertion that we Mac fanatics can sometimes be a bit cult-like. Indeed, when someone switches from Windows to the Macintosh, as one of the faculty at work did several months ago after a particulary bad outbreak of spyware and viruses on his Windows box, it does almost seem religious. Before, he used to mock my love of the Mac, and we would joust in a friendly way over which OS was superior. Now, he's even more enthusiastic about the Mac than I am. (Ah, the fervor of the newly converted!) In any case, for those of us who wouldn't dream of ever using Windows except under duress (for example, I have a cheap Windows box in my lab only because my real-time PCR machine won't run without it), these massive temples to the Macintosh do produce a sense of belonging that we Mac users seldom find in the "real" world. However, I like to think of our devotion as a force for good in the computing world. Can you imagine how crappy Microsoft Windows would be if it didn't have even the single-digit market share competition of Apple to tweak it, if it were an utter and complete monopoly?

I'm particularly intrigued by Umberto Eco's statement in the article that the Macintosh is Catholic, while Microsoft Windows is Protestant.

I bet we could argue about that one for days...