I’m an Apple fanboy.  Have been for years.  I proudly tote an iPhone 3G[s] around, purchased on the first day it was released, thus replacing the original iPhone, which was purchased the day it was released after sitting in the rain for hours.  I’ve slept on the streets of San Francisco to get a “lucky bag” for the flagship grand opening.  I’ve sat outside of stores waiting for the operating system releases.  I own three generations of laptops, numerous Airports in all shapes, sizes and functions. I will probably get a Mac cursor incorporated into a tattoo at some point.  I preach the gospel of Jobs to those teetering on the brink of pixel salvation.  My mac is an extension of my brain … or at least it was until Snow Leopard came along.

There are so many expletives that I would love to pepper through this post that even Tarantino would be appalled … however, I’ll refrain for the sake of keeping this blog kid friendly.  I will say that my blood is seething with a rage that I’ve only felt when VPN’ing into PCs, experiencing super lag while working, or having connections drop for no particular reason on a regular basis.  This is getting-flicked-in-the-ear and then thwacked-in-the-forehead pissoffery.

Shame on you Apple.  Shame on you for luring loyal fans who gleefully brand themselves with your tempting sexy products.  Shame on you for not testing your product on apps that are one generation back.  For example … say I want to fire up Photoshop CS3, or DreamWeaver, or even  Lightwave 8.5 … *BONK* you’re doing it wrong.  They either hobble along like James Caan after a lovely massage from Kathy Bates or they crash harder than idiots on YouTube.

For an OS release that was touted to be minor modifications and enhancements to make life easier, the $29 for a single copy or $49 for a family license sure sounded appealing.  However, given that now I’m going to have to drop $2k to get my apps up to a working level kind of defeats the purpose of UPgrading.  The least they could have done was put a little M$ decal on the box (or 10) saying “Caution: Snow Leopard doesn’t play nice with elder Leopards” … or “You buy it, you break it.”

I’m leery to throw down that 2k for the sake of a new dot release that will magically fix everything that has been borked, but at the same point, I’m now working with a system that doesn’t like my apps and a lot of promises to folks for production that can’t be met until I either throw down money or ride out the storm.

You had the world eating out of your hand Apple.  Your industrial design, your fanbase and your potential for greatness was limitless … given your recent string of boondoggles, I’m going to step down from my pulpit for a while and wait for you to get your act together before I laud your graces further.

I look forward to the day you can get your ish together and crank out a dot release that magically fixes everything that you decided to fubar, but for now I’ll go back to YouTube to watch those idiots and make myself feel a wee bit better.