Filed under: Humor, OS, Odds and ends
Microsoft: We're not "cool enough" for Mac OS X
"Unfortunately, we're not cool enough to run on your OS yet. We really wish we had a version of Photosynth that worked cross platform, but for now it only runs on Windows. Trust us, as soon as we have a Mac version ready, it will be up and available on our site," reads the website.
Photosynth is a technology Microsoft has designed to create 3-D "worlds" with your photos. This technology is definitely cool, and we actually would like to see it come to the Mac, but the way they worded the install page just makes us laugh. Meanwhile, VMware Fusion's Pete Kazanjy told us that the warning about Photosynth not working in a virtual machine isn't quite right; he got it running just fine in Fusion 2 Beta 2, and has the video to prove it.
Thanks for the tip, Nate!
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 3)
Kizorblade said 12:30PM on 8-23-2008
Owned.
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Isaac said 12:27PM on 8-23-2008
Uh, I am running on OSX and the site is fully up and running.
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Isaac said 12:28PM on 8-23-2008
Never mind. I fail.
Graham Stevens said 1:06PM on 8-23-2008
What is the point of that comment? It will pretty much only be seen by Mac users!
The tone and inference will just piss them off and further reinforce the Microsoft's poor image amongst Mac users.
Very poor idea from Microsoft, not funny, not clever and definitely not cool!
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Simon said 3:33PM on 8-23-2008
As opposed to the get a Mac ads?
Seanross said 4:57PM on 8-23-2008
Pffft, it was hilarious
Nathanael Lawrence said 7:05AM on 9-16-2008
I'm amazed that you take this as some sort of snide sarcastic comment.
Live Labs (the team that made Photosynth) is small. There were only 15 regular contributers. Of them, the most famous face is Blaise Aguera y Arcas, whose SeaDragon loading technology is a major part of Photosynth. You can watch his presentation at TED 2006 and hear for yourself that he's not the typical Microsoft company guy. In fact before Microsoft bought SeaDragon, Blaise had taken it to Steve Jobs and got turned away.
Live Labs knows that Mac users are where the photographers are at and definitely wants to get Photosynth working for you ASAP.
The current release is about as early as it gets. They just got the synther to the point that it can calculate a synth in a sane amount of time (mere hours or less as opposed to the days that it used to take when they started the project). That being the case, they took pity on all of us who have been going crazy waiting for the last two years waiting and let us play with it.
The website is very bare bones at the moment and not even half of the features that Live Labs plans to implement in Photosynth are present yet. Right now Windows users are hard at work beta testing and bug reporting so that when Photosynth comes to the Mac it will be up to par.
I'd read the message completely straightforwardly. Okay, maybe with a bit of wink wink, nudge nudge, but I have to think that the team members that actually write the code are very eager to get it up and running on OSX. Don't think that Ballmer or the rest of the Microsoft empire has anything to do with it.
Cheers, brothers.
Sheppard said 1:10PM on 8-23-2008
God mac fanboys are so obnoxious, makes it sad when one is in a position of power on a relatively well known blog.
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Don said 1:16PM on 8-23-2008
Couldn't agree more Graham, that really irked me when I saw it a couple of days ago.
I twittered that I didn't like their tone!
I'm sure that wasn't the vibe they wanted to give out but it's just so damn irritating :-(
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CaptSaltyJack said 1:23PM on 8-23-2008
Silverlight is crap. Even at work, on my XP machine, I ignore sites that require it. Don't pay any attention to these proprietary, closed-source, web-based technologies, and maybe they'll go away. Hopefully.
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iansltx said 12:05AM on 8-24-2008
Like, say, Flash for example? What about QuickTime? Pages' and Keynote's obnoxious, proprietary file formats? Silverlight works great on my Mac...and I'm right with M$ on the whole "too cool for you" thing. Here's your smugness back atcha, Mac fanboiz!
Urkel said 1:24PM on 8-23-2008
MS really can't say anything that Mac users won't be jerks about. If they take a serious approach, Apple fans tell them to lighten up. If they joke then Apple fans act as if they won some fictitious war.
It's really obnoxious that the absolute worst thing about being a fan of Macs are the Mac fans.
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Graham Stevens said 1:32PM on 8-23-2008
I don't think this is true. Sure you will always get some fanboy responses on blogs like these but the same is true of die-hard MS fans (read engadget lately?).
The point here is that the comment on the website is very poorly conceived and will bring out all the negative comments. Why would they do this?
They could say something like...
Unfortunately, we're not ready to run on your OS yet. We really wish we had a version of Photosynth that worked cross platform, but for now it only runs on Windows. Trust us, as soon as we have a Mac version ready, it will be up and available on our site."
Job done... nothing 'funny' nor will it offend the average mac user. I am sure you will still get the fanboy comments but anyone with half a brain will see through these comments...
Jash Sayani said 1:24PM on 8-23-2008
Nothing new. Its a known fact.
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bengl3rt said 1:35PM on 8-23-2008
Just doing their part, as usual, to drive a wedge between folks and engender mutual dislike. If they can frame Mac users as a bunch of elitists and make Windows seem like the OS for the "common man", that's a marketing win for them.
The OS wars are over. Use what makes sense to you and what helps you get stuff done. It's a computer, not a religion.
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TD said 1:50PM on 8-23-2008
I wish sometimes you guys would give MS a break. I don't understand why it would annoy Mac users to be honest. It is not like MS has to release all their software cross-platform, and heck this is still in their Labs section!
Also, MS Labs have started to come out with some cool stuff.
@CaptSaltyJack
Ahh but those proprietary OSs and devices rock!
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Carroll Wills said 1:56PM on 8-23-2008
Well of course it's patronizing. That's the only tone of voice Microsoft has for anything that it didn't steal or invent (listen to the dismissiveness with which Ballmer speaks of Google, RIM as well as Apple).
IMHO, the really instructive sentence is the last one, which acknowledges the need for a Mac version. In the past, the tone of such a message would have been simple -- Windows only, TS to everyone else.
I'm going to be a "glass half full" guy today and see this as a step forward.
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Jon T said 6:57AM on 8-24-2008
Funny! I made the exact same screen grab - too funny!
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Petrus said 2:13PM on 8-23-2008
...
I hope you guys are smart enough to realize that it was sarcastic.
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Level 5 said 2:16PM on 8-23-2008
Exactly. MS is in a transitional period. Vista is not doing as they hoped, Zunes are not selling as they hoped, and the Wii just passed the 360 in sales. They have to do something! And of course, no one's perfect, they're bound to take a stumble here and there.
Lighten up, guys.