Decisions, decisions... with limited airtime at our disposal, which ignorant and/or brain-damaged Apple-bashing article currently making the rounds should we decide to chomp on? Because, see, on the one hand there's PC Magazine crowing about that one recently discovered Mac OS X security flaw as if it somehow puts Panther on equally perilous footing with any of those Redmond-born "operating systems"; on the other hand, we've got BusinessWeek actually cheering those guys who defaced a slew of iPod posters with outright lies a few weeks back because an Apple tech gave them some lousy advice.

Oh, the heck with it-- we'll just mention both in as superficial a way as possible and skip the in-depth skewering for another time. Truth be told, that last Enderle rant took a lot out of us, and we still haven't fully recovered. We think we may have strained something.

So here goes. First up, BusinessWeek's Alex Salkever, who starts out slamming the quality of Apple's tech support and then goes so far as to openly condone vandalism: "I applaud the actions of the Neistat brothers, Casey and Van," who videotaped themselves spray-painting the phrase "IPOD'S UNREPLACEABLE BATTERY LASTS ONLY 18 MONTHS" on a gazillion iPod posters in Manhattan after Apple's support personnel allegedly told Casey that there was nothing he could do about his 'Pod's ever-dwindling one-hour battery capacity short of buying a whole new player. Not that Salkever doesn't have a point: if the support tech had actually made some useful suggestions-- such as pointing out that there are plenty of people like Yours Truly who have heavily-used iPods six months older than Casey's, which, following a guts-level update to the latest supported iPod firmware, still hold a good five or six hours of tune time on a charge-- maybe the Neistat brothers wouldn't have felt compelled to film themselves breaking the law.

But while we agree that Apple could have handled the situation better, for BusinessWeek to condone the defacement of property as "a lesson" is just wildly irresponsible. Heck, if the lawyers at Apple were feeling really twitchy, they could sue the Neistats' pants off for the cost of the ads that were trashed (we're guessing ad space in Manhattan ain't cheap), as well as projected lost iPod sales due to the lie they spread. (Talk about an open-and-shut case; the geniuses posted video evidence against themselves.) And yes, it is a lie; maybe Casey's iPod has a battery that crapped out completely after a year and a half, but guess what? We have two iPods that are coming up on their second birthdays and their batteries are just fine.

There's also the fact that Apple now offers a battery-replacement service, as well as AppleCare extended warranties for iPods; maybe those weren't options when the Neistats decided to make their little movie, but they are now. So are the brothers going to go back and videotape themselves fixing all the posters they ruined? Yeah, right. Maybe BusinessWeek should do it instead, lest someone out there decides to tape himself stenciling the phrase "BUSINESSWEEK APPLAUDS ILLEGAL BEHAVIOR LIKE THIS" on the cover of every issue of the magazine he can find.

Moving on... if you want a real head-scratcher of an experience, just try to follow Lance Ulanoff's logic as he asserts that, because of a DHCP security vulnerability made public a couple of weeks ago, "the truth is that the Mac OS is just as vulnerable as Microsoft Windows." Apparently one real vulnerability in a couple of years is just as bad as seven or eight "critical" flaws in a month. Apparently, too, a vulnerability that requires an attacker to have access to the local area network in order to do any damage is no worse than dozens of security holes that make it possible for viruses to propagate automatically via infected web servers or for attackers to gain total control of a system just by its owner opening an email message. And apparently a "flaw" (it's really an ease-of-use feature that goes slightly overboard in its default configuration) that gets "fixed" via unchecking one box in an existing system application is every teensy bit as heinous as the dozens of Windows and IE bugs that require users to download and install monthly patches to prevent armageddon. Who knew?

Since we're getting really tired, we'll just mention in passing Lance's repeated insistence that Mac OS X is just as vulnerable to attack as Windows, but nobody ever attacks Macs because there are too few for anyone for care. Perhaps one day someone will point out to Lance that there are plenty of technical reasons why Mac OS X probably is inherently more secure, such as the fact that it ships with most network services turned off by default and requires users to enter administrative passwords before altering crucial system configurations. Then again, by that time we expect that Lance will be wearing one of those darling white jackets with its sleeves fashionably sewn crosswise to its sides.

Lance ends his whirlwind tour through Demento-Logic thusly: "How cocky are you feeling now, Mac elite? Hmm. Suddenly it's gotten pretty quiet around here." Quiet? Well, Lance, that's because most people are reading your article syndicated over at ABC News ("Bad Eisner! No biscuit!"), and that version lacks any sort of method by which they might actually answer your intriguing question. Attention, Mac elite: you might be interested to know that Lance does have a publicly-posted email address in his PC Mag bio. And remember, if you're feeling compelled to tell him how cocky you may or may not still be feeling, well, he did ask...