Espresso Tastes
By Mitch Berg
I have a Windows laptop, a LInux desktop, and – over the last year or so – a couple of Apple devices (one of the upsides of being a contractor and being able to deduct business expenses).
Macs are more expensive than they’re worth than Windows and Linux machines, and their users have developed – notwithstanding that I own some – a reputation as free-spending epicures.
And after working in electronic commerce at a few points in my career, I think I’m most surprised to find that every e-commerce website isn’t bumping up the “prestige” of Mac users’ search results – showing them the higher-priced books, downloads and hotel rooms higher up in their preferred search results.
Which is, by the way, what Orbitz is doing. Not jacking up the prices – as the local TV anchors were saying this morning – but showing them the more expensive results first.
Note to self; plan next vacation from my Linux box.
June 27th, 2012 at 1:18 pm
Mitch wrote:
“Macs are more expensive than they’re worth than Windows and Linux machines, and their users have developed – notwithstanding that I own some – a reputation as free-spending epicures.”
Could you quantify and qualify that observation?
For example, I know Macs are a big presence in schools; I wanted to know why.
Turns out it isn’t ONLY good marketing; there are some performance differences that would seem to apply to non-school users to smoe degree — and those differences don’t seem to support the profile of free spending epicures. Rather the opposite – it appears that Macs hold up better in school use compared to PCs, and are therefore replaced less often, for example. But the claim is also made that Mac using students are more creative and more productive than students who use PCs. And of course there is the claim that Macs are less susceptible to viruses etc. than PCs. But there were a lot of other reasons here too:
http://macvspc.info/pages/14.html
Then there was this interesting tidbit about 70% of college freshman using Macs
This is impressive: 70% of new college students are bringing Macs with them to school, according to a Global Equities Research analyst Trip Chowdhry. The figure comes in relation to his downgrading of Microsofts stock, which caused shares of the software giant to fall 2%. http://osxdaily.com/2010/08/05/70-of-college-freshman-use-macs/
Not really your free-spending-epicures here.
But the same osx site did a comparison of Mac users and PC users:
Profile of Mac vs PC Users that did show a taste difference, but it also showed things like this:
54% of PC people have completed a four year college degree or higher.
The same can be said of 67% of Mac users.
There are a lot of examples of tastes and preferences given, and some indications that Mac users tend to be more sophisticated, more urban, possibly more affluent, and distinctly more liberal — and younger — than PC users — and also more computer savvy.
But the one characteristic that interested me the most was that PC users were more likely to see two random people as different than as having things in common.
This post seems a classic ‘they aren’t like us’, we versus them observation again.
I’ll have to research the hypothesis that conservatives are more likely to see differences, and to identify themselves in us versus them terms, rather than seeing the common ground. You are ever inspiring for subject material, mon frere! Gotta go, mon frere – busy busy busy!
June 27th, 2012 at 1:47 pm
A developer was telling me how inexpensive and wonderful Apple laptops are today. With a floor of $1000, I suppose it’s easier to be wonderful, but that’s not cheap. He was from California, so maybe ‘inexpensive’ doesn’t have the same meaning there. 😉
June 27th, 2012 at 3:02 pm
Yes, but if they last eight years or longer, while you are replacing PCs…….maybe it represents a long term savings, even with the up front costs?
There are a lot of PCs in the $1k and up range as well.
Both coasts have a distinctly higher cost of living.
June 27th, 2012 at 3:41 pm
54% of PC people have completed a four year college degree or higher.
The same can be said of 67% of Mac users.
This works to defeat your thesis, Dog Gone.
People who have completed a four year college degree make more money than those who do not. Therefore, to advertisers, mac users make up an:
a) wealthier demographic
b) poorer demographic.
Looking at Mac v PC use in schools is silly as a metric of value provided to the end user because the end user of the product is not the purchaser.
June 27th, 2012 at 4:02 pm
If you use your Linux box to plan your vacation, you won’t be steered to more expensive accommodations, you will steered accommodations in Finland.
June 27th, 2012 at 4:57 pm
Yeah! Dog Gone and Rush Limbaugh now have something else in common – both are Apple Fanboys.
Orbitz must have found that Apple users are more likely to go for the higher priced travel options so they (operating on a percentage from the travel company) offer the more expensive options to the Apple users first. Sounds like excellent targeted marketing. Personally, I use Kayak for my travel arrangements and have not ever tested if I get different results when I search with my iphone or PC. Of course, most of the time I fly via Southwest which doesn’t allow bookings via travel consolidators.
June 27th, 2012 at 5:21 pm
The PC vs Mac dispute aside, most Apple products are considered to be akin to luxury items in society. Salesmen pick up on this when in person-think of a two guys walking onto a car dealership, one with an old flip phone and one with an Iphone-so why not make use of it when online?
June 27th, 2012 at 5:28 pm
Wasn’t there some homework our puppy-mill operator was supposed to produce? BTW DG when did you stop weaning your puppies at 4 weeks?
June 27th, 2012 at 5:50 pm
Booking through Linux will have you vacationing with a bunch of bald dudes with gray, frizzy beards to their chest and wearing suspenders.
June 27th, 2012 at 6:30 pm
Not people who use Ubuntu, Night Writer. They are more like the sheltered suburban teens joyriding through the wild part of town.
and then everything grows dark so they decide they need to open the hood and take a look at the xorg.conf man page
June 28th, 2012 at 11:38 am
Seeuentee said:
tl;dr
(isn’t there some ‘carpet’ to ‘attend’ to?)
…
In other news, the federal government is crafting legislatipn to force Americans to purchase at least one iPhone per household!!!!!
June 29th, 2012 at 12:46 pm
And notice how Seeuentee is appalled at Walker over changes to govmint wrker benefits but supports the dire work conditions for Apple.
Fact check that, biotch.