Apple

I want to be a force for good. Doesn't everyone?

Which is why I was delighted to be moved by the words of Microsoft's Bill Gates during a CNBC TV special in which he and Warren Buffett discussed the meaning of life. Or something similar.

Asked by an audience member what he thought of Steve Jobs and Apple, Gates began with an insouciant smile.

Then he tossed garlands of roses and pearls of praise at the Apple co-founder.

He said: "He's done a fantastic job."

Which was charming in itself. But he continued to describe how Jobs saved Apple: "He brought in a team, he brought in inspiration about great products and design that's made Apple back into being an incredible force in doing good things."

So, from now on, everyone who happens to be a fanperson of either brand should seek out one of his or her supposed mortal enemies, hold hands with them and see if, together, they cannot try to be a force for good things too.

Corporations can be heinous places. All day, people wander around, playing politics like so many Lindsay Lohans in "Mean Girls."

So today, one wonders just what machinations are being endured by Simon Aldous, the Microsoft Partner Group manager who was Wednesday quoted by PCR as suggesting that Windows 7 was rather inspired by the simplicity of the Mac OS. Indeed, Aldous declared that Microsoft's new operating system was designed to "create a Mac look."

In what appears to be a somewhat hurriedly written post on the Windows Team blog titled, "How we really designed the look and feel of Windows 7," Microsoft showed that perhaps some of its underwear is currently a little twisted.

The post read: "An inaccurate quote has been floating around the Internet today about the design origins of Windows 7 and whether its look and feel was 'borrowed' from Mac OS X."

This would suggest that Aldous was, in fact, misquoted.

However, the post, written by Brandon LeBlanc, continued, "Unfortunately, this came from a Microsoft employee who was not involved in any aspect of designing Windows 7. I hate to say this about one of our own, but his comments were inaccurate and uninformed."

"I'm Steve Jobs, and Windows 7 was my idea?"

(Credit: Stephen Shankland/CNET)

Some would therefore now conclude that he was quoted accurately, but he didn't quite get his facts right. This is entirely possible, though one might wonder why he would have made comments with a ring of such endearing honesty.

However, perhaps the most interesting aspect of this Windows Team post is a comment left by someone with the handle "i-dont-do-tat".

This commenter wrote: "I know Simon Aldous, having worked in the same U.K. subsidiary as him for a few years. He's a good guy who, for me, is telling it like it is. He's paying testament to the common view that a Mac is cool and a great template to copy."

As many in the world of business will tell you, copying happens all the time. The competition is scrutinized religiously, and the best articles of faith are taken and sometimes even improved. This happens in every product category.

The "i-dont-do-tat" poster concluded that perhaps honesty might not be such a bad thing: "Denying this to your customers just makes you look stupid because the very look and feel of Windows 7 is desperately trying to look like a Mac OS--just admit it."

Oh, of course one mightn't expect honesty in the mass-market arena. It is a very dangerous place in which to say anything at all. Equally, though, in a tech world interview, perhaps a little nod toward the opposition is not such a bad thing. It might even lull it into a little complacent smugness.

One can only hope that Simon Aldous had a good breakfast Thursday and that he hasn't endured any untoward communications. Unless it's a job offer from Apple, of course, which he should accept only if the company gives him a better deal and appears to come from nicer people.

That's how the corporate world works, you see. Like high school, it's all temporary, so you have to make the most of it while you can.

Sometimes you take a wrong turning in life and, Wednesday, a slight concussion led my eyes to fall upon the pages of PCR.

It is a little more intelligent than my normal reading matter, but I am very grateful for its interview with Simon Aldous, Microsoft's partner group manager.

He was quoted, for example, as saying: "One of the things that people say an awful lot about the Apple Mac is that the OS is fantastic, that it's very graphical and easy to use."

Perfect harmony?

(Credit: CC Esparta/Flickr)

You're waiting for the punchline, right? You know, the one about how he was kidding.

Wait away because he continued: "What we've tried to do with Windows 7--whether it's traditional format or in a touch format--is create a Mac look and feel in terms of graphics."

I know that such words might cause some entrenched foot soldiers in both of the fanchildren camps to hoot, hiss, sigh and reach for the nearest farming implement.

However, isn't it rather charming to hear someone admit that a competitor's product isn't overly expensive or overly pretentious, but that it has something about it that is good and that real people who buy real products actually appreciate?

Microsoft appears to be getting relatively strong early adoption of Windows 7 in the 10 days since its official launch.

According to Net Applications, more than 3 percent of PCs accessing the Web in the past two days have been doing so using the new operating system. Usage of the operating system has been growing strong in recent days, though Windows 7 already accounted for 2 percent of global Web traffic in the days ahead of its formal launch.

"The early adoption of Windows 7 looks very strong, and I don't believe Vista enjoyed the same early success," said Vince Vizzaccaro, an executive vice president at Net Applications. "Plus, we've seen surges the past two weekend days, and Windows has historically seen much higher usage market share on weekdays than on weekends."

However, weekends tend to see stronger usage by consumers. And consumers are more likely to move quickly to a new version of Windows than businesses, which tend to do extensive testing before adopting a new operating system.

The news is not all positive for Microsoft, though. As a whole, the Mac OS continues to gain on Windows. As of October, Windows had 92.5 percent of the worldwide operating system market, but Mac OS reached 5.27 percent, up from 5.12 percent in September. (Past numbers from Net Applications showed the Mac OS with significantly higher market share, though the market research firm says it has changed its methodology to better reflect the relative traffic of the countries from which it is getting data.)

Apple's recent anti-Windows 7 advertising has touted that if users are going to upgrade their Windows XP machines and have to transfer their data anyway, they might as well move to a Mac. Vizzaccaro said the early numbers suggest that the Mac might indeed be benefiting from such a trend but said it is too early to know for sure.

"We'll know much more in the months ahead," he said.

Have you ever been hurt by a lover who went back to her ex?

Have you ever experienced that constant troubling frisson, even when you were with them, that it was only a matter of time?

Well, might I offer you a little televisual solace? Jerry Seinfeld, he who walked a mile in Bill Gates' shoes with the man himself, has gone back to his first wife, the Mac.

It seems almost a movie from an alien world to remember Jerry and Bill buying shoes and moving in with a normal American family.

I know some found these ads bizarre. I found that a good thing. And a very good thing for Microsoft. These movies were a delight, a departure, a signal of something that was finally different, a signal that someone was, well, thinking different.

Yes, they didn't last. They were, perhaps too daring for their time and their brand. But they were more viral than the "I'm a PC" campaign.

So to now discover that Seinfeld has appeared on HBO's "Curb Your Enthusiasm" with a MacBook Pro craftily centered on his desk is to experience something akin to a kitchen knife being sharpened upon one's spine by a recently fired busboy.

You can see a still over at TUAW, because I am too disturbed to show it here.

Although I have embedded a little waffle from Seinfeld and his co-starring minions explaining their enthusiasm for "Curb"'s Larry David.

However, if it is, indeed, remotely true that Seinfeld was paid $10 million for his aborted Microsoft ads, one might have hoped that he would have wondered if it was quite right to be seen with a Mac again so quickly.

Unless, of course, Apple paid him $15 million. Which they wouldn't. The company would have been more ready for him to pay it. So, Jerry, love "Curb Your Enthusiasm". But did you really have to? Did you?

Art knows no boundaries. Neither does the level of emotion inspired by an assault on the culture of Apple.

Just last week, Verizon's Droid attempted to offer a hearty dose of spittle to the iPhone, so one upset Apple aficionado has decided that the Good Empire must strike back.

He has created a YouTube rebuttal that, he believes, offers some perspective.

He says: "iDon't need scare tactics." He says: "iDon't need to imitate." And he declares that the force is with him because "iDon't need a Droid...unless it's R2D2."

Sometimes it's hard to reach the decision that one doesn't need a product whose buttons one has never pushed.

However, one is touched that this person's heart is in an honest and sensitive place. Until, that is, one reads the line that says: "iDon't buy brands that bash other brands."

Perhaps my senses have left me for a well-deserved vacation on Pluto, but I seem to recall Apple rather merrily bashing Microsoft and, indeed, PCs in general, for quite some time now. The Cupertino company does it very well, often with an exalted level of wit.

Yes, as some readers have pointed out, he does offer an "iOops" as a signal to a certain irony.

But this movie still might leave viewers, rather like those who braved "Showgirls" and "Vanilla Sky," somewhat less than fulfilled.

Was Apple going to keep quiet about the launch of Microsoft's Windows 7?

Do raccoons know how to get at the leftover spaghetti in your garbage can?

So, indeed, here is an immediate retort starring Messrs. John Hodgman and Justin Long.

Apple's appeal is a very simple one. It is one that you have heard this before, often late at night, often inebriated, sometimes over the telephone.

Surely you remember the script: "Your lover let you down before? You went back to her. She was unfaithful again. And still you went back to her. Now she comes a-callin', telling you things will be different this time...and YOU'RE GOING TO BELIEVE HER? WHAT ARE YOU? NUTSOID?!!!"

However, this time, it doesn't stop there. Because Apple also specifically asks XP users whether it's terribly wise to go with Windows 7 when Mac is No. 1 for customer satisfaction. (The XP user, naturally, decides she doesn't need "pain and frustration.")

Apple has decided to create this little surge of communication, more examples of which you can watch here, designed to prick at your conscience while Microsoft tries to pick at your pocket.

Which suitor should you trust? The one who's supposedly let you down before or the cool, allegedly costly one?

In a tough economy, what may be most telling is how many people decide to bide their time and hide their money, until Windows 7 is deemed to be worthy of at least a steady relationship.

OS X 10.6 includes Boot Camp 3.0, a new collection of software drivers that make Windows run much better on Mac hardware.

(Credit: Screenshot by Dong Ngo/CNET)

Every time I see the "I'm a Mac/I'm a PC" ads on TV, I can't help but wonder, "Why not both?" And it has never been a better time for that.

Overall, personally, I found that while the new Mac OS doesn't warrant a "wow," it's still definitely worth the $29 upgrade price. Snow Leopard offers an even more streamlined Mac experience than Leopard and noticeably faster interface responsiveness. The application performance, however, is slightly slower than it is with Leopard, at least on the MacBook Pro we used as our test machine. As the OS is now a pure 64-bit operating system, expect the application performance to improve over Leopard as you add RAM or use it with a high-end desktop.

Mac users can read more about Snow Leopard in my colleague Jason Parker's full review. On the other hand, for Windows users, especially Windows 7, the release of Snow Leopard is straight-on great news.

Boot Camp 3.0 enables Windows to read files from OS X's partition.

(Credit: Screenshot by Dong Ngo/CNET)

I recently blogged about running Windows 7 on a 15-inch Unibody Macbook Pro, which required some tweaking with Boot Camp 2.1. Snow Leopard comes with Boot Camp 3.0, which makes installing and running Windows on a laptop a much more pleasant experience.

First of all, the new Boot Camp includes all the drivers necessary to run both the 32-bit and 64-bit versions of Windows 7 smoothly on the Mac hardware.

(Note that you only need to run the Boot Camp Assistant, BCA, if you want to dual-boot OS X and Windows on the same machine. The utility will then create a new partition for the installation of Windows. In this case, make sure you run the BCA first when the computer boots up to avoid file errors. If you want to run just Windows and skip OS X altogether, you can boot from the Windows 7 install DVD and start the installation the way you would install the OS on any PC from scratch.)

After the installation is done, Boot Camp 3.0 can be installed from the Snow Leopard DVD. Then, without further ado, you got yourself a great Windows computer.

An Apple manager has become a co-chairman of the group standardizing HTML, giving the company a higher-profile role in a crucial time for development of the language used to build Web pages.

The World Wide Web Consortium's HTML Working Group had been led by IBM's Sam Ruby and Microsoft's Chris Wilson. Wilson has stepped down and is being replaced by two others, Paul Cotton, who manages Microsoft's Web services standards team, and Maciej Stachowiak, who manages Apple's WebKit WebApps team, according to an e-mail announcement by W3C Director Tim Berners-Lee.

"Why three co-Chairs?" Berners-Lee asked in the note. "Clearly, there is a lot of work to do. Sam, Paul, and Maciej bring particular skills to the job (whether it is Maciej's experience with WebKit or Paul's with Working Group processes)."

Indeed, the two new co-chairs arrive during a crucial time. The W3C stopped developing HTML with version 4.01 in 1999, focusing instead on a very different standard called XHTML 2.0 that ultimately met its official demise in July. Browser makers, meanwhile, went their own way with a group called WHATWG, short for Web Hypertext Application Technology Working Group.

WHATWG's work ultimately grew into HTML 5 as the W3C embraced HyperText Markup Language once again. It's got a number of features to make the Web a better foundation not just for static Web pages but also for more interactive Web applications. For example, one Web storage lets Web-based applications store data on a computer, helping Web applications work even when a network connection isn't available.

The standardization process is complicated, though, with a complex back-and-forth between the standards group and browser makers trying new features on their own.

Meanwhile, Microsoft only began HTML 5 discussion in earnest earlier this month.

And Aaron Boodman, a programmer involved with Google's Chrome browser, suggested on the HTML 5 mailing list, "I would like to propose that we get rid of the concepts of 'versions' altogether from HTML. In reality, nobody supports all of HTML 5...Instead of insisting that a particular version of HTML is a monolithic unit that must be implemented in its entirety, we could have each feature (or logical group of features) spun off into its own small spec."