Minimalism

As many of you know (and I use the word many lightly, as I do not know how many people will even read this) as of July 1^st it’ll be illegal to drive while talking on the cell phone that isn’t hands free in California. I’ve had a Bluetooth ear piece now for over a year, but I haven’t used it. It’s not because it isn’t yet the law, it’s because… well, it’s just too damn slick.

My Bluetooth piece looks like it belongs in a modern art museum. It glows a sexy shade of red and is so clean and sleek in design that it only has one button on it: + and – for volume. Every other command one may ask a Bluetooth earpiece to do is done though a cryptic series of Morse Code-esque tapping done to the main unit. Turning it on, off, syncing, unsyncing, hanging up and placing a call are all done through some unknown foreign language of pompous pushes. A few times the damn thing died on me because… yeah, it doesn’t tell you when the battery is low. At least, not in a way that is distinguishable to me yet. Perhaps it flashes twice to let you know it is dying. Like Columbus stumbing upon the Native Americans… I have yet to discipher this language. It may be telling me where the gold is, but I cannot understand.

Don’t get me wrong, the thing looks great. I do believe that if I have that attached to my head while I sit at Starbucks that I’m officially 10x more legit. But the thing is completely useless! What is the point of looking cool if you need to learn code in order to work something that is supposed to make life easier?

My Bluetooth unit isn’t the only thing that is so sleek that it has managed to make itself completely unusable. Actually, it’s a whole company that is so self absorbed in the glory that is itself and the sleekness of their products that you cannot tell where its head ends and its ass begins. Maybe you’ve guessed what I’m talking about. If you are sipping your green tea while you sit at your Ikea table rested carefully on top of your bamboo wood floor then look at the logo on your computer. Does it resemble a certain fruit you get at your Farmers Market? That’s right; I’m talking about Mac here. And I’ll be the first to admit, that stereotype is old, played out and wrong. After all, even people with carpet buy these things now.

I have to say, there are some aspects of Macs that I like a lot. The aftermarket product availability for their Ipod, for example, is top notch. I also think that their advertisement is some of the best out there right now next to MINI. And I will not deny that their products look amazing… but that is the problem. They have made their products so minimalistic and sleek that they have ceased to be functional.

I was on my friend’s Macbook while he was setting up his new Mac G5. I wanted to do a print screen of a photo. If I were on my PC I would hit control print screen and have the image copied. So simple! Now, try to do this on a Mac. Just like my Bluetooth it requires a cryptic series of key pushes in a certain order to command the computer to do what you want it to do. It is not as simply and dummy proof as control print screen, oh not at all, and it isn’t even universal for all Macs! Ironically, as I was struggling with this my friend was struggling at the same time with similar minimalistic problems with his new Mac G5. The computer was so damn minimal that it was hiding nearly a terabyte from space for him. After all, showing these hard drives would clutter the look of the my computer folder.

I look down at his Macbook’s super sleek floating keyboards and make a very shocking discovery… there is no print screen button. He didn’t know how to do it. Hmm, there must be a solution for this somewhere, so I went online. I type in “how to do print screen on mac” not only were the answers plentiful, they were scattered on lists called such things as “frequently asked questions”. If it is asked so much, why not just label a key print screen? Oh, that’s right… Mac. First place said control F3. That didn’t work. Then it was something like control F13, but the computer didn’t even have an F13, it stopped at F10 (read: minimalistic), then I think it was apple shift 3. So after a number of incomprehensible codes I got it to copy. Go Mac!

This doesn’t begin to scratch the surface of my frustration with this stupid operating system. Why do I need to hit control mouse in order to right click? Is splitting the mouse in two so aesthetically unpleasing that they couldn’t do this? Why the hell do the screens disappear up or down at the slightest whim? Why isn’t there a bar showing me where everything is. Why do I have to do a shortcut to see what I have open, a shortcut to open something new, a shortcut to change over to another program… where is the shortcut to see what all of the shortcuts are? But just as that chair would be less visually stimulating if you could actually sit on it, the Mac would be less visually stimulating if you could actually use it.

I’m sure I’m offending a lot (again, number is used lightly) people who swear by their Mac. But it doesn’t crash! I don’t have viruses! It’s the thinnest laptop on the market! Yes, but do to Mac’s communistic cost controls you paid more for it than any other comparable unit, and you just look like a smug asshole for using it. I bet you have one of those slick bluetooth ear pices on right now too.