Thanks to the latest round of GPS products, I think I finally understand why so many people have a fear of technology.
For years, I was always amazed when folks always mentioned how much they hate computers because they don’t understand how to use them. What’s so hard to understand? You power on, log on, mess around with some software, figure out how to manipulate all the variables offered, and ultimately work the system. Sure, there’s a range of veritable jargon to master, but it’s all shop speak that can easily be conquered with some familiarity.
Then I got a GPS system for my birthday. Here’s what happened. I opened up the box. I took the unit into my car. I plugged the unit into the car battery. I turned on the unit. Everything was up and running without flaw within 30 seconds. The only thing I had to do was plug in an address which the GPS unit (Garmin 360i) recognized before I even finished. There was a voice that spoke to me about directions. The whole thing “just worked”. It was perfect.
That’s when I realized how complicated most consumer electronics are for people. There are many people who don’t care and don’t want variables, tweaks, hacks, configurations, add-ons, plugins, upgrades, versions, betas, optimizations, and driver modifications. They want their microwaves, refrigerators and TV sets. I open the box, plug in, hit some buttons and my food is warm. For me the “it just works” mentality has always meant, “I don’t have to download several extra .dlls and reboot four times to get the thing to sync remotely with work.” For everyone else “it just works” means “the only effort I need to put in is driving to the store and buying it.”
I realize this isn’t anything new, but until you’ve witnessed the magic of a GPS solution working without flaw, you haven’t seen the world from the eyes of people who just want to buy goods and services and never want to understand or manipulate them. I got my laptop and have already put in over 12 hours of work loading in software, taking off the pre-load crap, rebooting, defragging, cleaning the registry, etc. And I’m still not done. This is why Apple products are so appealing to the hoi polloi — they just work and everything is contained without extra effort.
Apple today vs. Apple yesterday
OK, sorry to derail the thread, but I have to bust the myth about Apple and “it just works”. Yes, 10 years ago, Apple meant “it just works”. Today, they’ve gone to Intel processors (on Apple motherboards with Intel chipsets), and the former domination of Apple over the development process seems to be pretty much gone.
Yeah, it’s a slick operating system. The peripheral devices like iPods do tend to “just work” on both Windows and Apple. Nevertheless, I spent quite a few hours setting up my wife’s Macbook, tweaking a few settings, troubleshooting the wifi connection, installing virtualization software because she had an app that was Windows-only, yet required for school, etc.
The benefit to Apple from where I sit is how little time I need to fix things after I install them. My kids manage to break something regularly on their Windows box, while my wife’s Mac (after the initial setup) has required perhaps six hours of tech support from me over the past year.
My mother’s picking up a Macbook, too. It’s actually going to match my wife’s, because white was what was on sale from Apple at the time 🙂 My hope is that, after the initial full-day or so of configuration, hers will be as trouble-free as Christy’s.
The best-laid plans of mice and men…
—
Matthew P. Barnson
It will be interesting to
It will be interesting to see what happens in the new Apple Intel era.
And I agree that Apple’s just-workage ratio is down from where it was 10 years ago. But based at least on my own personal experience with both, Apple is still WAY ahead of the PC in terms of right-out-of-the-box satisfaction.
Especially when you factor that the average computer user doesn’t want to edit video, or handle network routing, or even play games. They want to work on their damn documents, look at their damn pictures, check their damn email, and surf the damn net. And that’s it. Apple makes the simple stuff a lot easier to get to and handle.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m a lifelong PC user and am still convinced that it’s more versatile than Macs… the modular hardware alone is a huge selling point, and it’s unquestionably the dominant force in computer gaming (and will likely remain so for decades to come), but when my Grandma Jane says she’s thinking of getting a computer, I point her towards an Apple solution.
Just you wait…
If you think a GPS is an “it just works” appliance, you obviously haven’t actually tried to use it!
What you have just done is equivalent to starting up a “virgin” PC. Oh that thrilling sound of the cooling fans whirring to life and the new monitor beginning to glow! Driving with it, on the other hand may be more like trying to configure that computer to dual-boot Windows 95 and Slackware Linux. Using floppies. Then putting it on an Appletalk network.
Don’t worry, it’s only that bad if you live around a lot of new (as in, built since the New Deal) roads or are in a remote (as measured from the headquarters of Navteq) part of the US.
Seriously, I love my GPS. She has a sexy Australian accent, apparently named Karen. She’s just kind of ignorant about my neighborhood.