Hypereality

True, I was there.  I was astonished as each phase of outrageous Microsoft behaviour proceeded.  I wasn't a Mac user at the time, they seemed only used by artists home users at that point. 

I was working at one of the big workstation vendors in 1984. At one point I had a Xerox 1108 on my desk that I think was specced around $100k.  The Mac was very impressive but underpowered compared to our Unix workstations running X windows, but we were impressed that Apple could produce something that seemed to share the DNA of the Xerox machines for such a low price and in such a desirable designed package. 

I remember the first time I saw Windows 1.0, it seemed a bit of a  joke, one of the other guys had the job of investigating it and building the first apps for it.  He had a merry time, he showed me six or seven pages of C code he'd written that opened a window!  At the time I was writing fully windowing X-windows code with all the bells and whistles, and opening a window took only about 10 lines of C :-)    It turned out not to be a joke by the time Windows 3.1 shipped in I think 1991,  that was the important one. With 3.1 it was a usable OS on PC hardware. I can't remember what was specifically lacking in 3.0, but suffice to say, it wasn't super usable. It was with 3.1 that our office PC's switched over from  DOS to Windows. 

As the years went by there were several more egregious examples, the way Microsoft essentially ripped off Java from Sun when creating C#, I couldn't believe how all the support API's were almost identical given just a bit of respellings,  and then there was the whole Android rip off.  

Anyhow, Gates is a very smart guy but read Gladwells "Outliers" and Cringely's "Accidental Empires" and you'll see he had a very privileged leg up, and then started a career of sharp elbowed deal making.  Realistically Microsoft did create the industry as we see it today, and its nice to see what Apple became despite Microsoft, Google and how they benefitted from their sharp practices.  One of the most important developments of my career was the absorption of Nextstep and Unix into the Mac platform, I have a lot to thank Jobs and Ive for. 

I use tags a great deal and find the Yep Mac app invaluable. That permits far better ways of finding and managing tags such as adding sets of tags to multiple files in one go.

It’s frustrating that tags are missing from Notes, another place I’d like to see them is integrated with bookmarks for web. So lots more to do there in future revisions of Mac OS

Ah, socialism raising it's head in the US now.  Remember that although its never worked, the reason is that everyone else "just didn't do it right yet".

My favourite quote about socialism came from Margaret Thatcher. 

"The trouble with Socialism is that eventually you run out of other people's money."

@melgross Thanks got the info. I was thinking of getting one of these, now I’ll probably get the black for my watch 3 and the stainless when I get a watch 4

I'd buy a mini for someone as a gift on release, its just the right size for some ladies handbags. 

I don't see the need for a pro-spec or a pencil on the mini, just the latest bits and an update screen. All good.