I just had my first anniversary.

Last November, I switched from PC to Mac.

Violent MSFT dissent. XP no more. So long, spyware. Etcetera.

Best. Day. Ever.

Launch Day

After a few months of consistent and dedicated whinging, I’d managed to persuade my tech lead that I needed a MacBook Pro to edit video on (and you can see the eventual results). We had plans to make videos to help explain concepts that had thus far been explained by unfriendly, bank statement-esque tables. This is how it turned out:

Justgiving Fees – Explained in Video! from Justgiving on Vimeo.

A month previously we’d been at FOWA ’07, and I remember a different tech lead remarking at just how many Mac laptops were on such wanton display. I think his words were something along the lines of:

Why are there so many fucking macs in here? They’re shit!

Now at this point, it would be dishonest of me to not mention I really wished I had one. Kai and I were idly sipping (Adobe) beer and had a chat with a guy from the Czech Republic who was an agency CEO. I don’t recall the name of the company but he was suitably clad in black and denim. He was speedily tippy-tapping away on a pristine white MacBook. So we asked him why he had a Mac over a PC. He said:

Well. It just works, you know? I open it. It turns on. I can do my work. I send email. I know the battery won’t run out after thirty minutes. I know where everything is. It just feels right, man.

This was the discussion that tipped me over the edge. I had to procure one. It would be life-changing. My workflow would be transformed. I was a Pre-Hardware Fanboy.

So a few weeks later, freshly hungover on a crisp Friday morning, ignoring the behest of the current sysadmin (dude, if you get a Mac, I’m not letting you on the network) we bundled into a black cab and went to the Regent Street Apple Store. The house where dreams come true. The cathedral of chrome. The creative’s temple.

I scampered throughout the store like an over-caffeinated child in a Toys’R'Us. I chose my MBP, I rifled through the accessories, grabbed iWork AND MSOffice, bought a ridiculous bag to put it in, and had the whole lot walloped onto somebody else’s credit card. To those of you who have shared that experience, it’s a special one isn’t it?

We then quickly caught a cab back to base so I could start tinkering.

And this is how it is meant to be. The pure Apple retail experience. I know it sounds weird and simperingly geeky but I’ve since shared other people’s Mac-buying experience and it was perfect. The Apple dude was nice. The shop wasn’t too crazy. The smiles of the store rep, knowing they’ve got another convert.

Now at this juncture, it’s worth making a quick cultural point.

I work for an extremely Microsoft-biased organisation. MSFT is legend around here. We are Windows. I have colleagues who own Microsoft watches, and who think Vista is actually good, and that Windows Media Player is great and Sharepoint is usable and all kinds of other Redmond-related insanity.

Me, I’m an Xbox 360 fan and that’s about as far as it goes.

So the arrival of an Apple computer into such a hostile environment was marked by a combination of apathy, mild derision and claims that it would ‘never be able to get on the network’. Which it did. Really easily.

As I write this, my sysadmin and his line manager at work have both made a pilgrimage to the Apple Store.  So it’s been about three days, and I’m man enough to admit that I really, really want one of the new MacBook Pro’s.

Glossy screen or not.

My current machine is 11 months old now. It’s kind of upsetting just how much the basic spec has moved on in that time.

Why can’t I trade in my not-that-old-MBP for a new shiny one, and just pay a few hundred quid to deal with the depreciation and upgrade kerfuffle?

I can understand the economics behind Apple wanting everyone to just buy a new machine (at least once a year, looking at the release intervals), but it’s not a great end-user experience.

Of course I only whinge now because I know there’s more chance of me building my own laptop than convincing the aforementioned sysadmin to buy me a new shiny ’08 MBP.

Sigh.

The iPod Touch 1G was a shortlived little beast.

I’m sure many folks bought one, like I did, to tide over until the inevitable release of the iPhone 3G. I think we had a rocky nine months together. Residual value dropped pretty quickly. The cost-per-use ratio was not particularly great. The back scratched up quicker than anything, ever.

Since getting StormTrooperPhone (my white 3G), there’s been one small and unaddressed annoyance. And it’s the Video app.

On the Touch, Video is handled by it’s very own application. It’s great for finding all your content in one place.

The real-world use is something like:

• listen to an album for a bit
• start watching a podcast when you’re on the tube
• go back to the album you were listening to when you change stations
• start watching podcast again from where you left off
• rinse and repeat

Trouble is, the 3G has totally hampered this workflow. The video app is tucked away in the recesses of the whole iPod app. So you can’t pause music to watch video. This annoys me every day since the media integration of the two has gone backwards.

Now it works like this:

• create awesome playlist with Genius
• find a few minutes to watch Mahalo Daily
• watch it
• try to go back to playlist. It’s gone.
• weep

I just want my Video app back.