Josh McHugh

Upsetting the Applecrats

Ho-lee shee-it. Wrote a piece in Wired about how Apple rocks and how some distribution muscle from Sony could help them boost their market share, whether it be via a Sony investment/purchase or a deal like the Disney/Pixar arrangement. I had heard about what happens to one when one writes about Apple. But since the piece was pretty complimentary, it never occurred to me that I would get gooned. Wow. Scores of emails. The piece got picked up by a bunch of blogs, and the emails started pouring in. Here's one:
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From: Mark Dymowski
Date: Thu, 14 Aug 2003
Subject: Apple shouldn't be bought period
Josh,
Leave the Apple buyout thing alone. Steve Jobs IS Apple, and nobody else should control that. We don't WANT everyone using the Mac. It's special! It's unique! And to lose that niche would destroy the Mac. Don't destroy a good thing. This is our little secret place that nobody else knows about and once you ruin that, you'll ruin what the Mac is all about. Get it?
Mark Dymowski
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You can almost see this guy shaking a pitchfork.

Here's another:
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From: Ian Bruce
Date: Thu, 14 Aug 2003 10:33:49 -0700
To: Subject: Apple/Sony
Dear Josh, As we know, an acquisition of Apple by Sony is a pleasant little though[t] experiment and unlikely to ever occur. But, applying your logic to yourself, wouldn't it make sense approaching Rupert Murdock [sic] and NewsCorp to pitch the sale of Wired? Even though Wired clutches much less than a meager 3 percent of the Magazine market, I�m sure you can manage to sweeten the pot somehow. Sure, he's a rabid conservative scumbag, and is fundamentally opposed to virtually everything Wired is known and respected for, but hey, bidness is bidness.
Ian Bruce
Los Angeles
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What a blast. Apparently, not only is it verboten to say bad things about Apple, it is, with some people, verboten to write about Apple at all. Amazing. There have been a bunch of anti-Apple responses as well, and a few civil ones, though just a few. I must say that nothing I've written has caused such an immediate and vociferous reaction. I like it.

Blow-In This!

Blow-in cards. What a chafe. Magazine publishers should be fined for inducing readers to litter. How many times have I had to stoop and pick up a blow-in card that fell out of a magazine I was reading, then have to locate a trash receptacle to drop the offending item in, then bristle as another card fell out of the magazine a minute later? Many times.

I Googled the phrase "blow-in cards" and found a very informative entry regarding blow-ins on deadprogrammer's livejournal. Those sneaky printers use air jets and static electricity to stick the damn things in there.

I posted a response: I am plagued by blow-ins as well. I feel only slightly better now that I know their insertion process, mainly because the static charge thing is cool. I wonder how many times someone has picked one of those things up off the ground and actually used it to subscribe. not many, I'd guess. I'm trying to figure out some artsy thing to do with the scores of these things that fall at my feet every week, something on the order of the stuff people have come up with for the AOL CDs. Maybe just keep them and have an annual blow-in bonfire? Any ideas?