Apple is no angel

Sam Varghese
Thursday, 14 June 2007 07:25

Opinion and Analysis

Microsoft Office 365

And if we do need to have the mandatory link to Apple, then how about an additional link to the page that provides news about security fixes? Judging by what was discovered during the first few days after the release, there's going to be a lot of code coming down the software update tube pretty soon. Or would Apple prefer that we just see beauty and not the beast?

I also find Safari annoying in that it makes it quite difficult to block the mass of flash animations and ads that seem to dominate the web these days. A user-defined style sheet would not work. Ah, but making it easy to block ads - as Firefix, that gift to the web user, does - would not play well with the corporate world, now would it?

But the issues with Safari are just symptomatic of ways in which Apple seeks to pretend that it is in some way different from other proprietary software companies.

When it comes to security vulnerabilities, Apple is as bad as Microsoft in divulging details. Fixes are quietly released. Until then the general practice is to deny that X, Y or Z is "actually" a security problem.

When it comes to reacting to leaks, Apple is even more draconian than Microsoft. I don't have to go to into details here - the cases of Apple Insider and Think Secret are well known.

Lest the Apple faithful leap to conclusions, let me state here that Apple does produce excellent software that is much better than that which comes out of Redmond. I find OS X many streets ahead of some other operating systems.

Many people refer to Microsoft as the devil. All that I'd like to remind people of is the fact that Apple is no angel.