New Get a Mac ad: Security
I am not one of those Mac people who immediately hates anything from Microsoft, in fact I actually think Vista is a pretty good OS (I've been using it for awhile now on my MacBook Pro). That being said, the latest Get A Mac ad from Apple is right on the money. It is called 'Security' and it features the familiar PC and Mac, but this time the PC has a security guard. The security guard gives the PC a chance to 'cancel or allow' pretty much everything, much like Vista's User Account Control which can be pretty darned annoying.It is nice to see Apple aggressively taking on Vista, but I would still rather see these commercials highlight features of OS X rather than simply mock Vista (though that has its charms as well).
Thanks to everyone who sent this in.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
Richard H. said 9:25AM on 2-06-2007
I remember how annoying it was when I first started using OS X and was constantly pestered for the admin password to do this or that. I don't find Vista UAC any more annoying than OS X's. Plus, this is new for Windows. I'm sure they will tweak it as time goes by.
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Elliott Pogue said 9:46AM on 2-06-2007
The Vista UAC bothers you for oh-so-much-more. Plus, if you're a priveleged user, it doesn't even stop you from going on by asking for a password. You just zoom right along by clicking "Allow."
It's not a very great improvement from a security standpoint, because the default setup for Vista is still going to do basically what XP would always do. The only difference is one dialog box (that doesn't even pop up to the foreground all the time; I've had so many times where I've wondered what's been going on before I see that flashing task in my taskbar).
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warrenpeace? said 9:53AM on 2-06-2007
LOL. I actually liked Vista too. I installed it on the gorgeous 20" iMac I use at work. Then, after four hours use, it started this awful loop of boot, blue-screen, reboot, blue-screen, reboot. Now it's completely unusable. Good thing it's on it's own partition.
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cdavenport4 said 10:22AM on 2-06-2007
This is so true! {Allow}
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Edward C said 10:26AM on 2-06-2007
@ 1, Sorry to ask. but have you actually used Vista yet?
Vista UAC is A LOT worst then OSX. OSX ask for admin password where it make sense ( to me at least ) and Vista was like asking password for just about everything i was trying to do.
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Paul D. said 10:29AM on 2-06-2007
The OS X security prompt appears *very* rarely in normal Mac use, and it's always for things that alter important user or system settings — which is why the OS asks for your password. Only the proper user should be able to do those things. This is how a well-designed system should be.
But Vista, from what I hear, gives users "security" prompts for fairly normal tasks like installing programs. What's more, the UAC doesn't usually ask for your password, so what's the point? If it's not dangerous enough to require a password, why hassle the user? The fact that the system requires security prompts of any kind so often points to poor design.
Also, the Vista UAC is apparently modal, which means you can't do *anything else* until you've answered the prompt. How annoying! And just like the Mac commercial shows it to be.
PS This comment form is broken. I always have to leave the password box empty and wait for the email, because submitting messages with my password doesn't work.
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David said 10:32AM on 2-06-2007
Wow...VERY funny. I'm not one to get into the whole bashing one or another argument, but on a production basis, they did a very good job with this commercial. PC's secret service guy is awesome and perfectly cast.
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Henry said 10:45AM on 2-06-2007
"I would still rather see these commercials highlight features of OS X rather than simply mock Vista (though that has its charms as well)."
This blog seems to do this pretty steadily
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SubGenius said 10:49AM on 2-06-2007
Excellent commercial!
This should have been on during the super bowl.
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Richard H. said 11:14AM on 2-06-2007
Edward C,
Yes, I've installed it several times on various machines and I use it on a daily basis on my primary machine. There's definitely room for UAC improvement, but I'm serious when I say that my OS X experience has paved the way for my easy acceptance of UAC on Windows.
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sam said 11:15AM on 2-06-2007
hah that shizzle is hilarious. although i do think apple should stop before they cross the line and some feelings get hurt. (oops too late?)
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artifex said 11:22AM on 2-06-2007
you are coming to a sad realization; cancel or allow?
:)
Thing is, if you don't know your password in OSX, you can't continue. And at the least, for those who do, it makes you think longer. With a cancel/allow, that's a button press, and then oops!
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Wheels said 11:41AM on 2-06-2007
Why can't we bash Vista? It's a competitor to OSX (yes, Microsoft is Apple's competitor, not its friend), and it a poorly implemented operating system with security features that are akin to putting new icing on a stale cake. Gates and Ballmer don't mind lying to put OSX a bad light. Why should we mind Apple poking fun at truisms about Vista to put it in a bad light?
My father is a computer neophyte, and in the three years of his using OSX, he has never been asked for a password - trust me, I'd hear about it. I can just hear him now if he were on Vista and he was being prompted every step of the way. There'd be no peace in the house.
And for Paul D.: If you copy and paste your password into the form, it'll leave your comment straight away. This for also won't work for me unless I do that.
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henrrrik said 12:04PM on 2-06-2007
I haven't used Vista enough to comment on the intrusiveness of UAC, but any operating system I use had better prompt me for my password before allowing anything to tinker with my system files.
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swissfondue said 12:06PM on 2-06-2007
Hilarious!!!!
Cancel or allow? I say allow!
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bryan Webster said 12:12PM on 2-06-2007
Reminds me when I was on Microsoft Campus for a demonstration on the latest version of IIS
They basically stated that IIS on Windows Server 2003 was "secure by default"
This basically meant that by default IIS was not installed, as soon as you installed it Microsoft could not guarentee the security anymore!
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Donut said 12:45PM on 2-06-2007
The new Japanese commercials are a hoot as well. Didn't see one for Vista, but the Spyware protection one was pretty good. http://www.apple.com/jp/getamac/
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olivernward said 1:06PM on 2-06-2007
with my experience of using Vista, the whole "security" pop-ups were a joke, they never even asked for a password. how secure is it when all a non-authorised user has to do is hit enter? ....... not freakin' very. vista is about as secure as a wet tea bag.
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wako said 1:07PM on 2-06-2007
FIRST mac commercial I actually agree on.
The damn security thing annoys the hell out of me! If I werent so lazy I would uninstall Vista right now and go back to XP...
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Nick said 1:43PM on 2-06-2007
The complaints people have are:
1. that its not always clear what the prompts are for;
2. that there seem to be rather a lot;
3. that (on an admin account, which is what most Windows users use) you don't authenticate; you merely approve;
4. that you also get locked out till you click.
Number (3) is a good one. Imagine, for example, if someone steps out the room withouit logging out and his kid clicks "yes".
Number (4) doesn't happen on OS X: you can be doing more than one task at once and, after you trigger the authentication dialog, you can do something else and then come back to it. Not on Windows.
(Similar lock-outs happen, and have always happened, with Windows in other situations - sometimes one wonders if it really can be said to allow people to multi-task in any very real sense.)
All in all, Vista UAC, is quite an inconvenience but doesn't offer the protection it should. It's just bad design. And as PC observes right at the end of the sketch, you could switch it off but that's a really bad idea.
IOW, you're "damned if you do and damned if you don't".
A very pointed and very funny sketch.
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