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And, Sadly, They Die Mac, Too (4/4/01)
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Drat this darn economy! First we had to endure the loss of all those lovable dotcoms, which were clearly the Pet Rock-style novelty of the late '90s (instead of blowing a buck on a rock with two eyes glued on, you could sink your life savings into a fly-by-night company whose business plan was "secure venture capital, spend like mad, and pray it doesn't run out before the IPO happens." Fun for the whole family!). Now we have to watch Mac-specific retail chains bite the dust. Will the dot-carnage never end?
While we've never even seen a ComputerWare store, let alone set foot inside one or bought anything there, we're still mourning the chain's passing, as reported by MacCentral. If you call the stores, you'll be greeted by a pre-recorded message which states that "regrettably, after seventeen years in the business, we are unable to continue. We thank you for your patronage over that time." The ComputerWare web site still makes it look like the company is open for business, but we don't recommend you place any web orders there.
Why are we particularly mourning the loss of ComputerWare? For one thing, according to a CNET article, the company's motto was "We live Mac. We eat Mac. We sleep Mac. We dream Mac. All we do is Mac." The AtAT staff can relate. Plus, when a Mac-only reseller goes belly-up after seventeen years in the business (a portion of which was spent as "one of the largest Apple dealers in the nation"), that can't bode well for the Apple ecosphere at large. We sense a future fraught with peril.
It's a shame that ComputerWare couldn't hold on for another year or so. We're still confident that once Apple smooths out some of Mac OS X's rougher edges, ships it pre-loaded on every Mac, and announces that Mac OS X-native applications are plentiful, the platform will see a resurgence of interest-- but that glorious day is still a relatively distant dream. In the meantime, Apple will survive, dipping into its deep pockets if it has to, but ComputerWare might not be the last Mac reseller without four billion in cash on hand to call it quits. If that happens, we can only hope that Apple's plans to open its own retail stores is a lot wider in scope than we originally thought...
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SceneLink (2969)
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And Now For A Word From Our Sponsors |
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 | | The above scene was taken from the 4/4/01 episode: April 4, 2001: Another illicit Mac OS X 10.0.1 update hits the 'net; we imagine Steve's in leak-plugging mode right now. Meanwhile, at least one analyst still thinks that Apple will release a PDA one of these days, and the Mac-only chain ComputerWare bites the dust after seventeen years of serving California's Mac freaks...
Other scenes from that episode: 2967: OS X Update II: Son Of 10.0.1 (4/4/01) And the illegal updates just keep on coming! Sure, the first leaked Mac OS X 10.0.1 updater has been available for quite a while, but according to the faithful viewer dynamic duo of Oren Krinsky and the M@d H@tter, now there's a new and improved leaked 10.0.1 updater that's allegedly even better-- though the file posted at MacUpdate has apparently been removed at Apple's request... 2968: MacPDA: The Dream Lives On (4/4/01) Still waiting for a new Apple handheld computer to replace the long-dead Newton? Well, believe it or not, you're not the only one. As faithful viewer Eric Wright reports, there's a nifty CNBC article about how Apple's stock remains a stellar buy right now, due to the company's massive piles of cash and the possibility of Great Things™ in the future, driven in part by the recent release of Mac OS X...
Or view the entire episode as originally broadcast... | |  |
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