Life Is Rich

I’ve posted in the past my general dislike and paranoia of web-based applications and the access to our data that are therein provided to the corporate entities who own said apps. Generally, the perceivable danger to the less delusional than myself are corporate theft or misuse of data for marketing purposes. In my mind, the number of ways our personal data can be abused hasn’t even scratched the surface of the imagination. I won’t even mention the fact that I hate web applications which relinquish the user to the most horrid UI common denominator of that supported by a browser. I want my well integrated, highly functional, polished, and stylish thick-client application – but that’s a post for another day if I can help myself (actually, I’ve already spent too many days and posts on that already).

Google’s Reader, an RSS Feed aggregator, has been very popular, as have most of Google’s web applications – at least within the domain of web applications. Recent polls show that the uptake of web applications has been much lower than I think many anticipated. In a unique way, Google has exposed another facet of the danger of relegating control to data to an external company. When someone else manages your data or the way you access or use that data, that someone can change the rules on how that data is accessed or used.

In this case, Google has decided to unilaterally and without user opt-out ability to share information from these users use of Google Reader to other parties for which this information was not originally intended. Needless to say, outrage has ensued:

“I’ve been a Google booster for years, both in person and in my online columns. How can I trust you guys again? I shared confidential information with specific people, and now you tell me that *anyone in my contact list* can see what I’ve shared! This is an idea conceived by an idiot and approved by a fool. If I wanted to belong to a silly social networking outfit, I’d join MySpace.”

Honestly, I think Google was just trying to jump on the social Web 2.0 buzzword bandwagon and try to catch some of the MySpace / FaceBook love. No matter, the consequences are pretty severe and shaken the trust of its users, much like the privacy scandal which sullied Facebook’s image just a month or so ago.

WARNING: Philosophical diatribe ahead…

As I consider myself the antithesis of a luddite and a general lover of all things technology and gadgetry, it’s rare for me to feel so negative about an up-and-coming trend. Unfortunately, this trend to centralized applications and operating systems is not the natural progression of technological enlightenment. In actuality, this regression is little more than a return to the mainframe and terminal – although a somewhat prettier terminal.

Centralized systems are like communism, fascism and totalitarianism rolled into one – in the computer world that is – where the privileged few control everything. The PC was a revolution – a howitzer in the face of the autocratic glass encased IT handlers. It allowed the “common man” – or common office worker – to control his own technological destiny and innovate and build new methods of using said technology. Web applications are nothing more than the consumer-side implementation of the office mainframe environments of the 70′s and early 80′s. Web applications provide no intrinsic benefits to the consumer other than a standardized, dumbed-down interface and an easy (for IT personnel) method of application distribution. Doesn’t this sound familiar?

This is not to say that the “Internet” is bad. This is to say that our use of the Internet as an application platform via the Web is bad. I love the whole service-based trend of access to information via non-UI web services – but making a rather rudimentary mechanism for delivering a very thin multimedia experience as the platform for developing rich UI applications? Yuck!! It was O.K. when it was text and a few images and links to other pages of text and images. We’re past that now. We need the richness of modern application designs and UIs and platforms with the vast information provided by the Internet (through web services).

Unfortunately, as the old slightly modified cliché goes, “if your favorite tool is a hammer, all your problems will look like nails”. Right now, the favored tool of corporate America and many IT vendors is the web as seen through the browser. This will lead to my next rant about how the IBM’s of the world have brainwashed both the corporate world and the IT / development community into thinking the only way to build good apps is to use expensive tools, expensive application server software, expensive servers, and expensive contract services. I’ll save that for another day… But let’s just say, this is one of the reasons why I love becoming / being a Cocoa / Mac developer.

Over Thanksgiving while visiting the in-laws, my father-in-law and I were discussing his plans to upgrade to Apple’s latest version of their most excellent operating system, OS X. As a relatively recent convert to the land of Mac, he asked me very bluntly – “what’s to keep me from installing the OS X upgrade on multiple computers?” My answer, “Nothing”. The conversation then turned to the “Family Pack” version of the software, which allows for the installation of up to 5 computers in a household. He was a bit astonished that a company would provide a single user and family pack versions with no onerous regimen to verify installation like in the world of Windows. This is a common response to those who’ve lived in the world of an oppressive company that treats its customers more like criminals than consumers.

My father and my father-in-law both proceeded to buy Family Packs within weeks. Supposedly, 33% of Leopard sales are of the Family Pack variety. As Mike Schramm states on TUAW.com, the difference between Apple and Microsoft (in this case) is that Apple trusts their customers with trust, while Microsoft demands validation (the picture is funny too). In addition, Apple offers the customer a financially reasonable ($129 vs $199) alternative to “pirating”. Microsoft is more interested in pillaging its customer base with exorbitant prices and a half-dozen versions with varying features stripped out depending on whether you bought the basic, premium, or ultra-premium super-duper extended version.

Ever since I fell in love with the Mac with the introduction of OS X 10.1, I’ve felt that in many ways, Apple had my back. Sure, they are a company trying to please their stockholders and make lots of money, but they understood that the road to financial success was through a strong and loyal customer base – or at least, this has been my perception since joining the fold. This doesn’t mean that all their decisions have been customer friendly in the past, but it seemed to be the going concern in the last five or so years.

Apple has gotten in bed with some strange bedfellows as of late (content providers – record companies and TV / broadcast companies, phone companies). Many of these organizations have a nearly opposite relationship with their customer base. Many are more interested in suing their customers rather than creating a relationship based on synergistic goals of delivering customer needs and financial reward. I fully believe (and hope) that Apple felt that they had to work with these organizations to bring new technologies and innovations while intending to maintain the values which I have perceived. In some ways, this has seemed true – in others, not so much.

The “Family Pack” is a little piece of that customer focus. Leopard’s success is a shining example of the fiscal benefits of placing the consumer first.