Do we like Apple? I think we do!

Hi. My name is James and I'm addicted to Apple's products (sort of). I invite you to read my blog where, possibly, you'll find the history, the future and the cure for the habit.

Let's address the third part first, since it's the easiest to deal with; I'm going to keep feeding the habit. After all, I enjoy it, it gives my brother something to complain about (he's never really got over Apple's software-eject feature for 3.5" floppy discs on their early Macs) and it keeps me off the streets (where, you may rest assured, I'd be fermenting popular revolt if I had the time).

Describing the history isn't all that tricky either. My first contact with Apple was a university programming course using Modula II on the Macintosh Classic in 1993. That went reasonably well but there was no love lost between me and the Classic; the nine inch monochrome screen seemed like a backward step after the full-colour Amiga 1200 I was used to. I didn't really touch any Apple hardware after that until the wife acquired an iPod (20Gb U2 Special Edition) in late 2004 and I started ripping CDs into iTunes.

Another long break followed as all sort of factors (not least a lack of desirable products) conspired to prevent me from increasing our Apple collection. During this time our music collection moved, via iTunes, from the living room to the computer and use of the CD player steadily declined.

In 2008 this all changed with the arrival of the iPhone 3G. Finally, here was a product that was desirable (to me, rather than to the wife), affordable and practical. In late July, after struggling to find stocks of the iPhone, we splurged, buying an Apple TV (160Gb), an iPod Touch (for the wife) and an iPhone (for me) in a single day. It was an orgy of fruity goodness and it finally killed our use of the living room CD player and signalled the end of the DVD player; silver disc spinners were on their way out.

So that takes us through to 2009, which is a good place to take a break. In a forthcoming post I'll give you a quick overview of the rest of our Apple collection, some hints about where we plan to go in the future and a few comments on third party accessories. It's thrilling stuff, so stay tuned!