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Comment Re:Do It, it worked in AZ (Score 1) 886

I'll ignore the first one as being ridiculous.

The second one, though, is an exception to the rule. "Clubs" can choose members based on pretty much any reason. There can be a club that is only for women, meaning you can't become a member. They are not claiming to serve everyone--only women.

This is somewhat different than a bakery that refuses to provide a service for certain people. Conversely, if they became a "Christian Bakery Club" and charged a membership fee which you had to pay in order to join the club, they would be within their rights to deny membership in the club to homosexuals, divorcees, muslims, jews, and any other people they deem as sinners. And they wouldn't have to make cakes for those people.

Comment Re:Sad to see the Republicans always... (Score 1) 85

Yeah it seems the only reason you'd want to go to the dealership would be to look at the car and maybe get a test drive.

Actually, as I understand it (and, no, I don't own a Tesla, but I keep checking their website in the desperate hope that there'll be a roadster there), they don't have "dealerships." Instead, they have "showrooms" where you can go look at the car and get a test drive. But, as I understand it, you can't go to one and drive away in a brand new Tesla.

Remember the old Gateway Stores? It's kind of like that.

Comment Re:A laptop with almost no ports?! (Score 1) 529

good = air
better = macbook
best = pro

But that's sort of my argument.

The MacBook is slower and requires extra money for port extenders than the high-end MacBook Air. You're not getting extra battery life. You're basically getting an $899 MacBook Air with a retina display. Now, again, I won't short change the retina display, but that's pretty much the only thing that is "better" about the MacBook. Everything else is either worse or equal.

Again, going back to the dark ol' days, you ran into the problem about the difference between a high-end Macintosh Performa and a low-end Power Macintosh. Really the only difference was that the Power Mac had a faster hard-drive (7200 RPM SCSI drives versus 5400 RPM ATA). Pretty much everything else was the same.

The MacBook is for those people who want an ultra-light portable with a retina display and care about nothing else. It feels a bit like the PowerMac Cube--you're trading in too much to get too little.

Comment Re:Enlighten me please (Score 1) 450

The theory is that by excluding the ports, the laptop can be made thinner and lighter. While "thinner" may be for the aesthete, "lighter" certainly has real world advantages.

Now, that said, I tend to agree that there is a happy medium between 1 port and 356 ports. In theory, Apple is supposed to be good at finding this happy medium.

Comment Re:A laptop with almost no ports?! (Score 1) 529

That you could try just buying what you what that does what you want and not bitch about the alternatives?

Because, little by little, Apple has stopped making machines that I want. And this truly sucks when I've spent the last 25 years of my life developing Macintosh software.

I'm typing this on a 17" MacBook Pro from 2010. It's not like I have a choice of buying another 17" laptop because Apple stopped making them. And having to set up a rube-goldberg arrangement of adapters to adapters (at ridiculous prices) is certainly not what I would call an elegant solution. And, yes, I'm a long-time Apple customer. My first "Mac" was a Macintosh.

As I said in a post above, I'm seeing the product line turning into a mess. Consider the new MacBook for a moment. It's thin, it's light, it's sexy. Okay, fine. Why isn't it a MacBook Air?

Contrast it with an $1149 MacBook Air. 8GB of RAM and a Dual Core i7. Same memory, same storage. Same battery life. Faster CPU. And a tenth of an inch thicker at the highest point and an extra 5 ounces. It also has 2 USB 3 ports and 2 Thunderbolt ports. And it's $50 cheaper.

What does the new MacBook give me? A tenth of an inch thinner at the highest point (it's actually thicker at the lowest point) and a larger (by 0.4 inch) Retina display. Of course, if you run the Retina display at retina quality, it's actually an 1152 x 720 display--smaller than the MacBook Air's 1366 x 768. The Retina display is gorgeous, I'll agree, but is it worth giving up CPU performance and connectivity? Why can't Apple give me a retina display on a MacBook Air? Why do I have to give up my Thunderbolt ports to get a retina display?

When Steve Jobs came to Apple, it's product line was a mess. I agree wholeheartedly. He cleaned it up into something that made sense. Consumer and Pro. Good, Better, and Best. Little by little, it's being turned back into a mess again. Why would I buy a MacBook over a MacBook Air or a MacBook Pro?

Comment Re:A laptop with almost no ports?! (Score 1) 529

A piece of paper is considerably thinner and lighter than a MacBook. But it doesn't do nearly as much. I'd be fine with a laptop that's an extra 4 ounces but has all of those things included rather than having to buy them separately and carry them around with the laptop, which negates any weight-loss that I got.

Apple is anorexic. They're more than willing to remove useful features in order to shave off millimeters and pounds. Then they stand up in front of the crowd and say, "Ooh! Look at me! I'm so pretty and thin!"

Comment Re:A laptop with almost no ports?! (Score 1) 529

Because it's starting to get confusing?

Way back when, you had the iBook and the PowerBook. You then went to the MacBook and the MacBook Pro. You now have the MacBook Air, MacBook, and MacBook Pro.

What's the difference? Weight? The MacBook is lighter than the MacBook Air. CPU? The MacBook Air's i7 is faster. Battery life is about the same. The MacBook has a retina display, which the MacBook Air doesn't have. The MacBook Air has a Thunderbolt port that the MacBook doesn't have.

Where's the rhyme and reason? Way back when, Apple had a line up that made sense. Pro and Consumer. Good, Better, and Best. Simple. Straightforward. Now? They're all over the place.

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