The Apple Beat: Happy Birthday OS X!

Apple faithful and crafty prospectors line up for iPad 2 in Buffalo :Photo by Sixian ZhengBy Gadjo Cardenas Sevilla

The iPad 2 is finally coming to Canada tomorrow afternoon and Apple Retail Stores will once more see long lines of excited customers. Many will be first-time buyers who waited patiently for the iPad to go version 2.0 before plunging into the tablet space. Others are rabid upgraders hungry for the latest and greatest and as always, there will be also shrewd prospectors out to make a few hundred bucks.

Line Culture

The long lines that form on the eve or early morning of a major Apple product launch have become the stuff of popular culture. It is partly the shared expectation of being in line for something special and at the same time touching base with like-minded and tech-passionate people with whom you share so much in common. 

No other company can get people to line up like happy sheep, endure hunger, ridicule from onlookers, inclement weather and general discomfort and yet give them such a surge of joy at the end of the quest.

In fairness to Apple store employees, they do make it a point to make the experience comfortable for their guests  by offering a lot of encouragement, some hot coffee and water as the day progresses.

Call me a masochist but I've been to almost every major Apple product launch where early lines are involved. The first one, the release of the iPhone 3G to Rogers was an unmitigated disaster. 

I, along with a couple hunderd other people, endured a brutal nine-hour wait at the Yonge and Dundas Rogers store only to realize that the system being used to activate the iPhones was completely down. Sensing a riot and feeling nauseated from hunger, I bailed on that line and decided to give Rogers a call, they sent me an iPhone a few days later.

I was there, too, when the iPhone 3Gs was released but this time the line wasn't all that long even if activation headaches were still ever present.  When I finally got my turn, they gave me an I.O.U and told me to come back the next day when the servers were working. Those are another five hours I'll never get back.

For the iPhone 4, we shivered our tech loving butts off in the cold while we waited for the Eaton Centre to let us in. I was there at 4:00 AM, feeling certain that I'd be like the 12th or 15th in line but boy was I wrong. I was the 70th intrepid soul out that morning and thankfully since I decided to purchase an unlocked iPhone 4, the ordeal was over in around six hours.iPad prospectors sell the devices at three times the value overseas

The iPad 2 launch had me driving to Buffalo on an early Friday morning in the middle of what seemed to be a flash freeze, then I was 40th in a queue that grew steadily as the day progressed.

The line was made up of all sorts of folks like students, designers, parents and even grandparents all hoping to get the iPad 2.

There were also prospectors who were buying iPads to resell and asking people in the line only getting one unit to get extra units, which meant less chances for other buyers.

Line tips

If you'red doing the line thing this year, here's some advice. Bring food and water, wear comfy shoes and bring a pillow or something to sit on (but not a folding chair as mall cops tend to get prickly about that).

Bring something to read, bring a WiFi enabled device (Apple Stores have free WiFi). Make friends in the line so you can have someone reserve your spot for bathroom breaks or Timmy runs.  Make friends just because it's rare you'll have a chance to meet people as passionate and devoted as you.

Big 10 for OS X

OS X is ten years old this month and the OS is at a crossroads as its next iteration, OSX 10.7 Lion, will take on some of the characteristics and features of iOS.

It's ironic that Apple’s senior vice president of Mac Software Engineering Bertrand Serlet, has recently decided to leave Apple to pursue other interests.

Serlet is credited as the "father of OS X" his career spans time spent at think-tank Xerox PARC (Palo Alto Research Centre- birthplace of the mouse and GUI) as well as Steve Jobs's NeXT Computers before applying NeXT's OS into what would become OS X. Serlet's spot will be taken by Craig Federighi who is VP for Mac Software Engineering and another NeXT veteran. In a press release from Apple about Serlet's departure, he looks back on his working relationship with Apple CEO Steve Jobs.

Bertrand Serlet - Father of OS X

“I’ve worked with Steve for 22 years and have had an incredible time developing products at both NeXT and Apple, but at this point, I want to focus less on products and more on science,” Serlet explained.

“Craig has done a great job managing the Mac OS team for the past two years, Lion is a great release and the transition should be seamless.”

Federighi worked at NeXT, followed by Apple, and then spent a decade at Ariba where he held several roles including vice president of Internet Services and chief technology officer.

So, with Serlet gone, what direction will OS X take and will we eventually see more integration beween the desktop and mobile devices? Its hard to tell at this point.

The good news is that OS X is stronger than ever, has a larger share of users than ever and continues to be a rock solid and elegant OS. We're just wondering what will happen when Apple runs out of big cat names for the OS come OS 11.