Computer for the Elite
Friday, June 16th 2006 | Ismael Ghalimi
Following recent discussions about high-profile users switching from Mac OS to Linux, Nicholas Carr posted a great article on the PC elite, presenting Linux as the preferred operating system for the techno-savvy elite today. Nicholas’ writing is superb — as usual — and I very much liked the sociological twist he gave to his story — my father was a sociologist. Nevertheless, I had to disagree with Nick on this one. The computer of the elite does not care about the operating system it’s running, for all it needs is a web browser.
As I indicated in my comment to Nick’s post, the elite will go beyond the OS and display its status not by showing a glowing Apple Computer logo or a cute Tux sticker, but by carrying a MacBook Pro laptop, running Linux on a desktop, and wearing a PocketPC-powered smartphone on the waist. It will demonstrate it’s sophistication by switching from one OS to another not every year or two, but every hour or two. Even better, it will go to meetings without any computer at all, asking visitors to lend one in order to get things done on the go.
The computer of the elite is the No-Computer. Or as the folks at Sun said two decades too early, the network is the computer — timing is everything, again and again. Now, can anyone please tell me why Nick’s article is accessible through this URL, but does not show on Rought Type’s homepage?
Entry filed under: Office 2.0
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Hi Ismael,
My initial response is a “yes but…”
Whilst I agree that for about 75-80% of users (and usage), a browser-based capability is fine, I do have some reservations that the message of Office 2.0 is becoming over-hyped and risks losing credibility as a result.
I agree that for the vast majority of people, the computer is just a vehicle for delivering “Office” facilities and surfing the Internet — for these the “No Computer” approach is fine.
But…
There is a lot of work done which is not “Office” based and in these cases, working via browsers (even with AJAX to reduce page loading) is not really feasible. For example I’d hate to try running Intalio|Designer via a browser. In these cases a locally-hosted solution is preferable.
Given the local hosting need, the choice of an OS and supporting software is relevant — although by using suitable development tools [e.g. Java, Perl, Ruby, Python, PHP…] and envronments [Mono, Rails…] the OS dependencies can be reduced.
So if local hosting is assumed, the question becomes one of choice. For the type of user who is into development and use of specialist tools, issues such as eye candy are less relevant than the stability of the OS and its openness (how easy is it to create software to run on it, are the storage standards open, defined and published under a non restrictive licence).
For stability a system based on a Unix-like architecture is recommended — this favours Mac and Linux over Windows — the arguments supporting this statement are found in numerous places on the web.
For openness, it is hard to beat Linux.
One final point — there’s a lot of FUD about Linux training costs, being hard to use, and lack of support. My personal experience is completely the opposite. What I do caution against is over enthusiastic hype and over selling, as this can damage uptake.
Andy — Home PC 100% Linux since 1999
Andrew,
I agree with you and call it Office 2.0 — not Computer 2.0 — for good reasons.
Computer 2.0 is further away, but will come eventually.
I have Fedora, Mac OS X and Windows XP running on three different boxes.
All of them 4lb notebooks, all running Firefox.
But I can easily kill my productivity for the day by switching from one to the other. The screen resolution, keyboard layout, settings are all different, just enough that it takes time to adjust. Of course I can always choose to be slow, use the mouse and pause before every click.
If I’m at a meeting and I have to choose between 4lb of weight and a USB key drive, I’d choose the one that lets me focus on the people in the meeting, and forget I’m even using a computer.
Does being incredibly more productive on a machine revoke my elite status?
Assaf,
Good points. But don’t worry, your elite status is warranted by the simple fact that you’re part of this very selective group of people who would — and could — implement their own operating system just for the fun of it.
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