Sunday, September 30, 2012

War and Peace: The Battle Between Mac and PC

If my topic were made into a novel, it would be about opinions, history, and comparisons. It would be a book that would not try to prove which one is better or worse, but it would pull all of the facts together, present them in a way easy for the reader to understand, and then it would invite the reader to make a decision based on the facts. It would highlight the strong points of each platform, along with the cons. The research that would need to be done for this book would be hard to do though, each article or comparison does have somewhat of a bias to it, even if it is not meant to be there. The chapters would go together maybe somewhat like this:

Chapter 1: The History of the Big Debate
Chapter 2: Popular Mechanics: The Ultimate Lab Test
Chapter 3: Apple: Why You'll Love a Mac
Chapter 4: Dell, HP, Acer: Why You'll Love a PC
Chapter 5: CNN, FOX, YouTube: The Straight Scoop
Chapter 6: The Personality Stereotypes May be True

I actually think that this might make a good book, an idea has been born.

I do agree with Manovich, we have an innate desire/need to form narratives and organize information. That may be why search engines have "top ten" results, we went from having a lack of information in history to the now of having so much information we have no idea what to do with it. Organization, databases, and narratives have never been more important and relevant than they are today. However, he does say that databases and narratives are natural enemies. Narratives organize things by "cause and effect trajectory of unordered items and databases make lists "and it refuses to order the lists." Each are still relevant, but depending upon where each application is used, one may be more successful than the other. In business, customer orders may do well on a database, but product RMAs may do better in a narrative.

I can't help, but to compare narratives and databases to Mac and PC. Each are relevant and do well in their own realm of tasks, yet natural enemies :D Oh yeah.

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3 comments:

  1. P. Brady FishOctober 1, 2012 at 10:08 AM

    Chapter 6 seems to be the chapter that would be the best to read. All of the stereotypes. You could get some good memes on that subject for sure.

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  2. StephanieOctober 1, 2012 at 10:44 AM

    Agree....I wanna read more about chapter six. Especially with that stunning Barney vs. Ted picture right there. But I like that by these chapters you can tell that that the first few google responses are pretty inclusive of both sides. I would think that PC would be losing on this battle. Yes indeed, an idea has been born.

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  3. AnonymousOctober 2, 2012 at 8:57 PM

    i also agree. i read the title for your chapter six, and was immediately intrigued. personality stereotypes! what a cool concept/thing to apply to your project. i've never thought of mac vs pc to be consistent with certain personality types. you've summed up manovich well. i kind of thought, coming into this class, that there wouldn't be a need to think of all the critical and cultural theory i'm accustomed to in my other classes. oh how wrong i was. but it's a good thing- all of my learning is connected! college is so delightful.

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