Category: General

Ten years ago today Apple introduced the iMac (link to Apple’s website of that day courtesy of the Wayback Machine).

I was toiling away at Stream International on the Apple Customer Relations phone line when it was announced. I’d been at Stream for about 2 years, which made me practically an old-timer. Phone support is stressful, and Apple Customer Relations was considered to be the highest stress team; we were called (by the other teams and ourselves, with equal levels of pride and loathing) “The Scream Team”. When I’d started, I assumed it was the customers doing the screaming, but found that wasn’t always the case. Thankfully, most of the employee screaming was done after the phone call had ended.

Not always, but mostly.

At the time the iMac was introduced by Steve Jobs, several of my co-workers from Stream had made the move to Austin, TX, to actually work at Apple. They were doing much the same job but at a “Senior” level, though they were still contractors and not full-on, white-badged Apple employees. So I fired off an email or two to find out more, but there wasn’t much more to give. Internally, Apple was just as secretive as they were (and still largely are) with their customers. So we had to wait for the information to filter down to us. We at Stream, supporting Apple products, felt like we needed to know this information; after all, we were being asked by customers about it, customers that largely assumed we were still operating out of Steve Job’s garage. Why couldn’t we just go down the hall and knock on Steve’s door and get the straight poop, customers seemed to believe (but never actually said out loud, not that I can recall).

But me and my team existed on some twilight ground, not quite Apple, and yet seemingly given the full authority of “speaking for Apple”.

By the time the iMac was actually released to be sold, I myself had made the move to Austin. That’s a story for another time.

The gumdrop shape, the translucent blue plastic, the all-in-one-ness, the new-fangled USB interface… The iMac stood out, definitely. And there were always the reminders from our managers and the Apple liaisons, that Steve was banking the company on the success of the iMac.

Turns out to have been a good bet in hindsight. AAPL traded for $7.00 a share on 1 May 1998.

10 years later, it closed at $180.00 a share on 1 May 2008; there’s been two stock splits in those 10 years.

So much for Michael Dell’s (in)famous quote, when asked in 1997 what he’d do if he were running Apple: “What would I do… I’d shut it down and give the money back to the shareholders.“

I am human. I fuck up. Sometimes big, sometimes small. We all do, it’s part of life.

When I make mistakes, I have learned that the kind of people I want around me are people who can see the circumstances with compassion and humor. But I also don’t want them to let me off the hook; if I’m deep in denial, for example, I need friends who can correct my way, and for that they need to be able to tell me, in a way I understand and cannot deny, that I’m wrong. Not in anger or indignation, but with gentle but sharp humor.

And those kinds of people are rare.

When my own friends get into trouble, I hope to be that kind of friend.

All this work to advertise a paper-roll rack? Super genius.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k8TsOk-32Q8&hl=en]

Don’t miss the behind-the-scenes video, also.

On this, the National Day of Prayer, I give you stories. Like this one:

Even as her 11-year-old daughter lay dying on a mattress on the floor of the family dining room on Easter Sunday, Leilani Neumann never wavered in her belief in the power of prayer.

I was going to quote more of it, but the story makes me despair for the future of humanity. These parents, because of their religious beliefs, took no action whatsoever as their little girl died a slow, and by all accounts, painful death. A death that was entirely preventable.

And, no, prayer isn’t action, as P. Z. Myers points out (and from whom I got this story).

The Neumanns are going to be charged with second-degree reckless manslaughter, though I’m certain the courts will dance around the topic of the central role religion played in this senseless death.

I was going to go digging for more stories like this one but just this one has sapped my energy thinking of Leilani Neumann struggling to get up while her body shut down.

Enjoy your prayers today theists.

In conversation with Kevin tonight he mentioned my directness in stating the atheist worldview, and compared it to the forcefullness with which a devout Christian would speak.

We did not have time for a full debate – we were both just getting home and each had our own tasks to deal with – so I did not bring up my first thought. I’m going to make note of it here for future discussion.

Because the comment betrays a lack of understanding, I thing, and from anyone other than my good friend I would view the comparison as, well, insulting. I know Kevin means well, though, just as I know he would not be offended by my explaining why I see the motivation for a Christian or fellow theist’s beliefs as far from the foundations from which I speak as could be possible.

There’s so many ways in which they differ, but for the sake of a blog post I’ll stick with just a couple.

First, and most obviously, a devout Christian would not change their mind on their faith, no matter what evidence they were presented with. I, on the other hand, would have to change my stance on any verifiable topic if new, contrary evidence became available. That’s… that’s kinda the whole point.

I speak forcefully because the evidence is behind me. That is what my statements are founded upon. Direct observation by myself and others, repeated and repeatable experiments, theories that make predictions that can be tested… But tempered with the humility to be able to review and incorporate new discoveries or information.

Because Christians argue from a philosophical standpoint of faith and make claims of things that simply can not pass any kind of verification, they are then free to ignore any facts or actions that may erode their faith. There are no facts or observations that could not be rationalized around. In fact, in my life and readings any novel outcomes or details tend to reinforce the faith and mental states of the most devout.

Consider the prayers of someone hanging by a slender branch on a cliff. Dangling there above an abyss, the faithful will call out to their god for assistance. It’s a natural response in a dire situation.

If they then fall, and die, they don’t get a chance to consider that their prayer had zero effect. Any onlookers would rationalize it away as “God called him home”, probably pointing to the prayers of the victim as “evidence” of God’s involvement.

If the poor sap falls, and survives with injuries, they will obviously see that as a victory. “I could have died! And yet, I live. Not walking again is a small price to pay for getting out of that circumstance.”

If the person is rescued, that then also confirms the “power of prayer”. Obviously, God was listening.

See? Every possible outcome will serve to confirm the credulous’ beliefs. It’s like that for most of the devout. They believe for unfounded, illogical, irrational reasons, so there’s no foundation, no logic, and no rationality that could budge them from what they “feel” is true.

My statements may delight you, or they may anger you, but I will happily change my tune if you can demonstrate where I’m wrong. And that’s why my stance is as far from that of a religious persons’ as could be possible. And please don’t insult me by comparing me with those poor, misguided folk.

Did I mention that I keep thinking today is actual Friday? It’s my virtual Friday, because I’m taking tomorrow off from work.

I just got excited… then sad. Because Battlestar Galactica is not on tonight.

Then I got happy again, because The Office and “Lost” are, in fact, on.

I’m a mess.

While I work on collecting links celebrating today’s “National Day of Inaction Prayer”, enjoy a little (more) Bob Marley.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UyyAf45bCRE&hl=en]

Why am I still up?

Wanted to be more productive today. Did stuff, but not enough stuff.

Had lunch with my friends, though. That was good.

Goodnight, interwebz.

What? Rev. Jeremiah Wright has up and said some crazy talk? Oh, dear. Oh, dear, me. That’s horrible. Imagine, a religious leader saying something crazy.

That never happens.

Right, Pat Robertson?

“We have the ability to take him (Hugo Chavez, democratically-elected president of Venezuela) out, and I think the time has come that we exercise that ability.”

Oh, um, it seems Pat’s got something else on his plate.

But, surely, man of peace Pope Benedict XVI will denounce these abominous statements by Rev. Wright.

“Christ established here on earth only one church. The other communities cannot be called ‘churches’ in the proper sense.”

Hmmm… I guess that means “no comment”.

Well, how about some words of wisdom on this grave breach of religious etiquette from, oh, say, Pastor John Hagee?

“I believe that New Orleans had a level of sin that was offensive to God, and they are — were recipients of the judgment of God for that.”

…uh, OK, Pastor Hagee can’t come to the microphone right now. He’s, uh, busy.

Rev. Fred Phelps?

“God hates fags.“

That, too, looks like a “no comment”.

Frankly, I’m having a hard time finding non-outrageous, non-hateful speech by any religious leader. And I haven’t even gone searching outside of Christianity yet. I won’t defend Rev. Wright’s comments, but I do have to wonder; is the crime that he’s making them from the religious left rather than the right? Is that why he deserves so much air time and print space in the elite media? ‘Cause, I mean, seriously, people. They’re all crazy to me. This is about as shocking as the idea that teenagers are having sex.

Oh, sorry. I shouldn’t have sprung that on ya. Yeah. They are.

The problem with a question like “Is love real?” is that two of the three words in there are not well defined and vastly open to interpretation.