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For six years, the Internet Nexus served as my technology blog, but I've since started blogging at the SuperSite Blog instead. If you're looking for the blog, please head there. --Paul

Wednesday, February 11, 2004

The iMac Needs to Lose Its Head

Business Week Online (not the print magazine): "When Steve Jobs introduced an iMac with a floating flat-panel display in January, 2002, the faithful roared. The press wrote about it incessantly. Time even gave Jobs a gushing cover story based on the iMac, hailing the elegant desktop PC as a 'sleek machine' that could be the future digital hub of the home ... Digital anchor is more like it. In the first fiscal quarter of 2004 ending December 27, 2003, iMac unit sales and revenue plummeted by 24% and 29%, respectively, compared to the same period last year. The iMac was the only Apple (AAPL ) product line to show shrinking revenues and unit sales over that interval. Indeed, the iMac has posted disappointing numbers for several quarters now, leading some to wonder whether the product that Time dubbed Apple's 'new core' has gone rotten. Alas, it has."

I've owned a 17-inch iMac for almost a year now, and I can make two observations about it based on near-daily use:

1. It's a beautiful (albeit underpowered) machine. People do comment on it. Even my wife noted that it was attractive the day after we got it, and she's almost a Luddite.

2. The easily-moved, easily-tilted screen is useless. Here's how screens work in the real world (head's up, Mr. Jobs): You position them once and then you forget about them. I haven't moved my PC screen once, and it's always perfectly positioned. Oh, but not with the iMac. With the iMac, you get to reposition it constantly, as every little errant hit or nudge on the screen, as you reach around it (often to find one of its inexplicably hidden ports or the power button) sends the screen reeling to the side.

People talk about the G4 Cube as a mistake of design over function, but I think the Cube was a better design than the sunflower-like iMac.

[ Posted at 2:47 PM | Permalink ]