I also didn't use present tense. So I didn't say they'e selling shit on a cracker, I said they could have.

Geez, people read too much into that. I've never been up-down moderated so much for 1 phrase that was fairly accurate and a compliment to Apple's great marketing department. Goes to show how emotional people get about brands.

That statement said nothing about the quality of their products. Yes, marketing is only a factor, but the product is also only a factor. Without good marketing it's just a toy. With good marketing it becomes gold. If Apple didn't market their products they way they do now, I doubt it would have achieved the same cult status it has now, and it especially wouldn't be the same kind of social status symbol they somehow inserted into millions of peoples' brains.

Anything else people have inferred from my statement kind of proves my point.

See? I told you they had a great marketing department.

Not necessarily. The point of marketing is to make you want it. It doesn't have to be great, you just have to believe it's great.

I feel your entire post was only trying to say "People buy Apple because 'it just works!'(TM)".

So do everyone else's. It's why I purchase a lot of Asus. I have good experiences with their hardware and they make what I like. But as you pointed out, everyone has their own stuff that they actually care about. To some it's the raw power. To others it's the trackpad. Past experiences contribute as well. Raw power cannot be subjective. Software is (which can make the raw power seem different depending on the person). Even history with the company is subjective to each individual. Trackpads? It depends on the software sometimes, but sure, other times there are clear differences between IO peripherals. Am I going to give the whole thing a better rating for build quality because of a trackpad? Probably not.

Well said, sir/madam.

Yes, yes they do. You're just being ignorant.

Listen, you like what you like and we all have reasons for buying what we do. I'm not going to judge you if you buy it because you truly like it. That's fine. But justifying your purchase by asserting higher build quality is bunk. First, you personally do not have the resources to prove that. The people who do don't find any brand consistently higher than everyone else. That is fact. It's evident in regular tear downs and reviews. Need I remind you that much of the equipment is shared across brands? Grow up.

He didn't solve a dilemna. This argument is completely set up from the start. For one, Apple is one of the richest companies in the world. iTunes is a huge part of their success, but also their Apple branded products. Being as how insanely expensive the majority of it is by comparison, and how much of a choke-hold they had on profit margins whenever their products were sold, I'd say profits was a very large business goal and not just a "side effect". Not that that's bad or anything, it just makes Jobs out to be some kind of saint that was only in it for the inventions when he was actually just one helluva marketing guy. The innovator in Jobs was only a step to where Apple ended up.

Except that if anything, Apple is a marketing machine. They could have sold shit on a cracker.

Exactly. I can totally see how the huge changes it's made since 10 years ago can be confusing.

Then show me the donate button. Seriously, RAM is cheap. If you own a machine that only supports up to 8 however...

After whining about my workstation having only 3.1GB of recognizable memory and my desire to have at least 8, I had a co-worker ask me why I needed more than 2GB of RAM. I asked him if he was really a developer. Yes, he was serious. Yes, my jaw was on the floor.

Not to mention they make it easy to re-claim/export your data.

OK, trying to apply the "don't be evil" mantra to this situation is really reaching. The issue of blocking iframes is security-related, end of story. Second, if a website doesn't like people iframing their shit, they can block it too. It's only a double-standard if Google complains.