The War Rages On!
I actually say “the war rages on” with more then a touch of sarcasm in my voice. I am of course talking about the claimed Apple wireless exploit. The truth is, while I see it as a fairly interesting mystery; does the exploit exist or not, as I have mentioned in the past I find the real story lies within the reactions of many of the pro-Apple public. And while the reactions of such people hardly qualify as a war, one might think by the reactions of some that war had been declared against them.
I have recently began to consider, in a more detailed way, why is it that so many pro-Apple people have taken such exception to reported claims of such a vulnerability on their beloved computer hardware. Many people immediately point to Maynors statement in his explanation for choosing an Apple laptop for the public ‘third party’ wireless card demonstration. Maynor apparently said that the recent commercials depicting the ‘Apple Guy’ talking down to the ‘Windows Guy’ made him want to put a lit cigarette in either the ‘characters’ eye, or an Apple users eye in general, depending on which version of Maynors statement you believe. That statement, many of the pro-Apple people claim has driven them to be outraged and to go after Maynor and SecureWorks with a vengeance.
Now, I am quite prepared to agree that the SecureWorks side of this whole equation have certainly not produced anything near the kind of evidence I would need to see before I would say I believe that claims of a stock Apple notebook are valid. And that makes perfect sense to me, that anyone who cares about the issue for any reason would point out that Maynors reported claims have never been proven or established as valid in any public forum so they should not be relied on as accurate unless that changes. But, to say that this somehow translates into guaranteeing Maynor is a vicious liar who is simply out to besmirch Apples reputation in a vain attempt to aggrandize his own reputation does not logically follow from the facts or events.
Both Maynor and his sidekick Ellch use Apple computers and one would hardly expect, whatever words were literally used, that they had an interest in putting a lit cigarette into their own eye, so the implication of what Maynor actually meant should be clear. Maynor’s statement was not offered up as some kind of answer to a tough question where possible evasiveness or misleading intentions would come into play; it was just a simple off the cuff comment of the kind often given in casual conversation, not to be taken too literally, but to be taken with a grain of salt. Certainly sane people should never take that kind of comment as a good reason to vilify anyone and refuse to accept that lack of proof doesn’t translate into evidence of a lie. As such it doesn’t rationally explain what has made many pro-Apple users so angry to the suggestion that such an exploit might exist.
When one really dips into this peculiar kind of response from many of the pro-Apple crowd a definite and disturbing pattern emerges. I recently got into a bit of back and forth banter online at Zdnet with a few people responding to one of George Ou’s blogs where I had explained that I had become aware of reports of Apple viruses in the past, I even hunted down the sources of these reports and posted links, and they were quite reliable, being from major newspapers and IT security websites and such. But of course, those who are of that particular “pro-Apple” mindset that says Apple can do no wrong simply chose to refute the claim of an OSX virus deciding instead that a designation of trojan was much better. They then of course took me to task for relying on sources that didn’t agree with them. And I mean seriously chewed me out, really bad.
I finally decided to try something. Because the ‘Apple Heads’ in question were obviously so ready to take this OSX virus issue right to the mat, no holds barred kind of thing. I became very curious as to how long they would endure attacks directed back at them about this virus issue, that were just as ludicrous as their own attacks on me. Now of course, they do not take their attacks to be ludicrous at all, and of course they would take mine to be ludicrous, but I kind of had some learned friends collaborate with me on the composition of my posts to ensure I didn’t venture beyond the same kind of nonsense they were writing. So what ever they think, I am quite comfortable in the knowledge that they were every bit as ridiculous as I was in the exchange. And it appears that no matter how far I pushed it, even well beyond the point where a sane person would have just said “forget it, who cares” they just wouldn’t let it go. I got the felling I could have strung them along for weeks simply by spewing the same kind of contradictory nonsense at them that they were spewing at me. One of these bizarre individuals even said they had a PHD. Perhaps they do, but obviously no self esteem.
Even after I let the ‘cat out of the bag’ so to speak and finally brought the debacle to an end admitting I really didn’t care about the virus/Trojan question and it was all just a little experiment, they kept on going, trying to get that one last dig in. Why? Because someone pointed out that there were some reliable sources around the internet that say OSX has had at least one virus in the wild? Really? Does that make sense, that what we are supposed to believe is an otherwise rational person, with a PHD…is willing to go on endlessly to assert that Apple does not have viruses but does have trojans?? This truly is ridiculous. And tell me; this is so important you feel free to get foolish about it because……?
What is going on with some of these Apple users? I even gave them hints that going on and on about just made them look worse, and I even hinted they could shut me down by admitting that it was all a question of definition; but they wanted none of that, they wanted to be right. How is it that a computer has so captured the mind and soul of some people to the point where they are willing to make fools of themselves over the thing? Just one more question this whole controversy has spawned I guess.
I actually say “the war rages on” with more then a touch of sarcasm in my voice. I am of course talking about the claimed Apple wireless exploit. The truth is, while I see it as a fairly interesting mystery; does the exploit exist or not, as I have mentioned in the past I find the real story lies within the reactions of many of the pro-Apple public. And while the reactions of such people hardly qualify as a war, one might think by the reactions of some that war had been declared against them.
I have recently began to consider, in a more detailed way, why is it that so many pro-Apple people have taken such exception to reported claims of such a vulnerability on their beloved computer hardware. Many people immediately point to Maynors statement in his explanation for choosing an Apple laptop for the public ‘third party’ wireless card demonstration. Maynor apparently said that the recent commercials depicting the ‘Apple Guy’ talking down to the ‘Windows Guy’ made him want to put a lit cigarette in either the ‘characters’ eye, or an Apple users eye in general, depending on which version of Maynors statement you believe. That statement, many of the pro-Apple people claim has driven them to be outraged and to go after Maynor and SecureWorks with a vengeance.
Now, I am quite prepared to agree that the SecureWorks side of this whole equation have certainly not produced anything near the kind of evidence I would need to see before I would say I believe that claims of a stock Apple notebook are valid. And that makes perfect sense to me, that anyone who cares about the issue for any reason would point out that Maynors reported claims have never been proven or established as valid in any public forum so they should not be relied on as accurate unless that changes. But, to say that this somehow translates into guaranteeing Maynor is a vicious liar who is simply out to besmirch Apples reputation in a vain attempt to aggrandize his own reputation does not logically follow from the facts or events.
Both Maynor and his sidekick Ellch use Apple computers and one would hardly expect, whatever words were literally used, that they had an interest in putting a lit cigarette into their own eye, so the implication of what Maynor actually meant should be clear. Maynor’s statement was not offered up as some kind of answer to a tough question where possible evasiveness or misleading intentions would come into play; it was just a simple off the cuff comment of the kind often given in casual conversation, not to be taken too literally, but to be taken with a grain of salt. Certainly sane people should never take that kind of comment as a good reason to vilify anyone and refuse to accept that lack of proof doesn’t translate into evidence of a lie. As such it doesn’t rationally explain what has made many pro-Apple users so angry to the suggestion that such an exploit might exist.
When one really dips into this peculiar kind of response from many of the pro-Apple crowd a definite and disturbing pattern emerges. I recently got into a bit of back and forth banter online at Zdnet with a few people responding to one of George Ou’s blogs where I had explained that I had become aware of reports of Apple viruses in the past, I even hunted down the sources of these reports and posted links, and they were quite reliable, being from major newspapers and IT security websites and such. But of course, those who are of that particular “pro-Apple” mindset that says Apple can do no wrong simply chose to refute the claim of an OSX virus deciding instead that a designation of trojan was much better. They then of course took me to task for relying on sources that didn’t agree with them. And I mean seriously chewed me out, really bad.
I finally decided to try something. Because the ‘Apple Heads’ in question were obviously so ready to take this OSX virus issue right to the mat, no holds barred kind of thing. I became very curious as to how long they would endure attacks directed back at them about this virus issue, that were just as ludicrous as their own attacks on me. Now of course, they do not take their attacks to be ludicrous at all, and of course they would take mine to be ludicrous, but I kind of had some learned friends collaborate with me on the composition of my posts to ensure I didn’t venture beyond the same kind of nonsense they were writing. So what ever they think, I am quite comfortable in the knowledge that they were every bit as ridiculous as I was in the exchange. And it appears that no matter how far I pushed it, even well beyond the point where a sane person would have just said “forget it, who cares” they just wouldn’t let it go. I got the felling I could have strung them along for weeks simply by spewing the same kind of contradictory nonsense at them that they were spewing at me. One of these bizarre individuals even said they had a PHD. Perhaps they do, but obviously no self esteem.
Even after I let the ‘cat out of the bag’ so to speak and finally brought the debacle to an end admitting I really didn’t care about the virus/Trojan question and it was all just a little experiment, they kept on going, trying to get that one last dig in. Why? Because someone pointed out that there were some reliable sources around the internet that say OSX has had at least one virus in the wild? Really? Does that make sense, that what we are supposed to believe is an otherwise rational person, with a PHD…is willing to go on endlessly to assert that Apple does not have viruses but does have trojans?? This truly is ridiculous. And tell me; this is so important you feel free to get foolish about it because……?
What is going on with some of these Apple users? I even gave them hints that going on and on about just made them look worse, and I even hinted they could shut me down by admitting that it was all a question of definition; but they wanted none of that, they wanted to be right. How is it that a computer has so captured the mind and soul of some people to the point where they are willing to make fools of themselves over the thing? Just one more question this whole controversy has spawned I guess.
posted by David Burke | 12:21 AM
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