Article: Why Do We Do What We Do?

This article has been something that I’ve been kicking around for months. I never could really formulate the entire thing previously, mostly because of dead-ends, but I had a chance to really think about this. I’ve been running this site for almost 7 years, and have been writing on various other sites for a good chunk of it. I decided it was high time to take stock in it.

These days, anyone can set up a blog or other site and share their thoughts about Macs, iPods, or even just technology in general. Fact-checking can disappear, as well as actual thought, but many sites have been pandering to the booming Apple market. This is one of the reasons MacWeekly has been put on hiatus. Many times TV shows are shelved without any word as to why. In this case, this demonstrates why the Web is different than television—communication is a two-way street. We have our professional side of things—the reviews, any news items, and most of the articles. We also have our personal side—articles like this where I get to share my own thoughts.

With all the recent articles regarding Apple vs. various bloggers and the question whether or not it’s really “journalism”, many people are wondering what the point is, who lies where, and things like that. I had been thinking about why I keep doing this day-in and day-out along with my “day job”. The answer is simple: The reason why we do what we do is the people and experiences. Money from ads and donations are just icing on the cake and keeps our little sites afloat. Whether it be the crew over at a small site like MacZealots or this one, or the teams at TUAW or iLounge, we all have that same thing in common.

This might sound a little cheesy, but without even having to actually go anywhere, we’re part of a vast community of people who understand what it takes to run a site, or even just write for one. We put up with the bashing of the very thing that brings us together—bits of plastic, metal, and silicon, more commonly known as a Macintosh computer. The fear that thousands or even millions could be reading what we write is long gone and instead there is a bit of pride. The best payment is the feedback we get from readers who might agree with something we wrote, have a suggestion, or might have learned something new.

This is the reason why the Macintosh platform will not die in the next 5 years, even if Apple were to discontinue it or go under. Someone out there will keep the older machines chugging along, or work to make an alternative to Windows that’s actually viable, even if it only gets 3% (or whatever it is) of the market. Because of that devotion, we spend countless hours thinking about, talking about, and testing just about anything related to Apple.

Thanks for staying with us…we really appreciate it.