The secret of Apple's design success: the humane interface
A key to Apple’s success is the company’s insistence on reducing options in the name of reducing complexity. Those who decry Apple customers as fanboys attack us and the company alike, saying that because Apple chooses to focus on simplicity, we and it must also be simple. That’s the wrong interpretation of the facts. Instead, Apple’s focus on simplicity isn’t about reducing choices to make computing idiot-proof; it’s about focusing on the important bits instead.
In the 1990s, Macs were for old people and hipsters (back when “hipster” wasn’t a catch-all term for anyone under thirty). They were fine if you were the artsy type, or if you couldn’t use a real computer, but for folks who needed to get real work done, Windows was the only real solution.
Unless, of course, you wanted to control your computer instead of letting it control you. In that case, you wanted Linux and its infinite configurability. What started as a server operating system became a staple of the hacker elite, many of whom saw fit to clone the functionality of their favorite Windows programs and give away the source code. And let me tell you, 1998 is so going to be the year of Linux on the desktop.
Meanwhile, the Mac had its own devoted following, but most outside of it refused to take Apple seriously.
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