Apple Everywhere

I first got into Macs, and subsequently computers, when I was leaving undergrad and moving on to work on my Masters degree. I needed a good laptop for writing, and I was torn between going with an IBM ThinkPad and an Apple Powerbook 5300cs. I remember I debated long and hard about my decision. I even went to a local Apple authorized reseller and spoke at length with a guy about why he thought Macs were better. It was a small store in Jackson, Mississippi, nondescript place with off-white walls and cubicles, looking more like an actuary office than any sort of retail store. The man who I talked to was very personable, but he looked like a typical office worker. Short-sleeve (it was summer) button down shirt with a tie, a pair of khakis, and some penny-loafers. However, when he showed me a color computer screen with a little rainbow-striped Apple logo in the upper right corner of the screen.  I was hooked.

Apple had just announced their most powerful Powerbooks yet, and I got my first Mac: the Powerbook 5300cs, a graduation gift from my parents.  About a month after I got it, Wired’s cover had an Apple wrapped in barbed wire, and my father was shaking his head saying I should have gone with the IBM.

Fast forward to 2005: IBM ThinkPad? Do they still make those? I seem to remember them being discontinued and then resurrected….or maybe not.

What about Apple? Apple is everywhere now. Everyone has an iPod, wants one, or pretends to hate them because they don’t have one. Everyone is familiar with those flashy silhouetted commercials on T.V. People know that the iTunes Music Store is the most successful online music store. People even know that Apple computers don’t have all the virus / spyware problems that Windows does.

Apple is known for stylish nice machines, and they even have a corresponding line of retail stores. There are no cubicles. No slightly yellowed off-white walls. No salesman in shirt, tie, khakis, and penny loafers.

Now it’s slick black on white store with light coming from every corner. Everything clean stylish lines. Cool machines sitting around, plugged into high end HD DV camcorders, or digital cameras, or cool USB MIDI keyboards. People flowing in like moths to a flame.

Monday after work, I went by the Apple Store in The Westchester Mall in White Plains. The two stores that used to be the right of the Apple Store were gone, covered by a large black facade featuring a large Apple logo.  Expansion.  The new cool slick looking retail Apple Store is expanding. Not only is Apple everywhere, but they are growing.

What’s missing? That guy in the button up shirt with tie may have been “square,” as they say, but he was personable.  When I walked into the Apple Store the other day no one said hi. They all cooly ignored I existed.  One worker was discussing firing guns with his friend.  One actually looked at me to see if I needed help and giving that partial twitch of a smile that says, “Well, let me know if you need anything.” I looked around at all the blue and grey and white Apples around the store, the black and white everything, and that slick, stylish aluminum. And, for a moment, I missed that rainbow Apple and the guy in the tie.