Apple to the core

Here’s a little personal history. Me and Apple computers go way back. I bought my first Macintosh computer in 1991, and was amazed by its ease of use, its versatility as a word processor and power as a graphics device. Better yet, I never had to service the thing: the built-in monitor and hard-ware were durable and trouble-free, built to last. Eventually I upgraded to an iMac in ’99 (one of the first-generation, purple iMacs; I still pound away on it, it’s like a battleship, but it lacks the more recent advances in software).

Moreover, I would happily evangelize on the merits of the Macintosh to anyone who would listen. It was a tough sell, living in a society where mostly everybody I knew loaded up on cheap IBM knockoffs instead – then complained when the beasts inevitably died, or developed various "illnesses." Hey, I never had that problem with my Mac, I’d point out.

Sure, you might be saying, Apple’s prices are higher. But isn’t it worth it knowing you’ve bought something that will last (give or take a few hardware upgrades down the line)?

And yea, and lo, I was right behind Apple’s dedication to sleek design and its vision for future technology angles. I remember being bothered by the lack of a port for diskettes on the iMac. Of course, Steve Jobs and Apple were thinking way ahead again: soon, everyone was burning CDs, linked via the Internet, and diskettes were a thing of the past.

Then came the iPod. I was reluctant to jump on the digital music bandwagon at first. It took a long time to warm up to the idea of MP3s and endless streams of downloaded music. The iPod seemed, from a slow-learning-curve perspective, to be just another personal music player. But in time, I came to crave one.

This is partly due, I’m sure, to savvy marketing on Apple’s part. Apple has built its success on the philosophy of putting the cart before the horse: rather than guessing at what people want, they simply and continually shape and package our very desires – more music downloads, more portable music, now more portable photo files – even before we actually know what we want. But they can’t be faulted for succeeding in a free market.

If all this seems a bit autocratic to some, as though Apple were Big Brother, dictating our consumer impulses – well, let’s recall that Apple still only holds a puny six percent or so of the world’s computer market. (That’s nothing compared to Bill Gates’ share of the pie.) And recall that the company’s most famous ad campaign was based on a 1984 drone scenario – the drones, Apple was quick to point out, were PC users.

So now, with the uncanny prescience that Jobs’ team is known for, along comes iPod and its many offspring. Just last month, Jobs unveiled an Apple hard drive (sans monitor and keyboard) that sells for under $499. At the same time, he presented the iPod Shuffle, a smaller, much cheaper digital music player with about one-fourth the capacity of the iPod. Suddenly, Apple is even meeting consumer price-point demands!

Now, take a look around. In a society that couldn’t give a hoot about Apple five years ago, iPods are everywhere. It’s kind of galling to see so many of these little beauties falling into so many unlikely hands. I’ve seen plenty of people gifted with free iPods who could easily afford them, or had no clue what the thing was even for. Ironically, these are people with no prior experience with Apple products or technology more recent than the fax machine. Yet they get the free iPods. ("What is this? Some kind of Palm Pilot?" I heard one lucky but clueless recipient announce to a room full of twentysomethings. She might as well have admitted her age. )

Everyone’s got one. Cell phone companies are giving them away with their products. Even airlines throw in an iPod if you travel first-class. iPods are practically dropping out of the skies.

Yet so far, I haven’t been able to score one.

Here I’ve been a dedicated Apple man, saying good things about Apple and its products for a long, long time now. Even when Jobs was off running Pixar.

In fact, nothing would PLEASE me more, or GIVE ME greater pleasure, than to speak highly of the iPOD and other Apple products, NOW that everyone else has jumped on the bandwagon.

So what I’m proposing is this: If the folks at Apple, in their infinite generosity, should see fit to send me one of their delightful products for my own personal use – well, I wouldn’t say no. In fact, I will continue to say nice things about the company that has been a gleam in the eye of the computer industry for so long. And this I promise: it will remain "our little secret." I won’t gloat about it, nor will I tell everybody in town. I’m sure you don’t want everyone in Manila to know you’re giving away free iPods. But the smile on my face, I suspect, will give the whole thing away.