Jon Stewart was Right: they are Appholes

Let me please take a minute to do what blogs were really designed for -- angry rants towards large corporations to minuscule and insignificant audiences who don't really care, all simply for the purpose of making me feel better.

So, recently, John Stewart recently went off on Apple. A brilliant monologue -- that was no surprise -- but I thought that Mr. Stewart had gone a little bit too far in saying that "…It wasn’t supposed to be this way – Microsoft was supposed to be the evil one! But you guys are busting down doors in Palo Alto while Commandant Gates is ridding the world of mosquitoes! What the fuck is going on???!!!"  I thought that this was a bit over the top until I actually had the pleasure of visiting a Apple Store.  You see, my iPod has suddenly decided that I really don't need to hear music in both the left and right ears.  One should do fine, thank you.

Let me take another second here to say that this is the third iPod I have owned and the third one that has broken down in less then a year.  The first was actually a present, so when that one decided that it didn't want to do anything except show the damned Apple logo on it's useless little screen I sort of cut my losses.  The second one was used and after it decided to become a $200 paperweight I decided that I would never own an iPod again.  Then a friend came around and sold me an iPod Touch after getting an Android, and well, I couldn't resist.  I mean, I figured that it was a totally different bit of machinery and I was willing to give iPod another chance.  Big mistake.  I don't see my Microsoft is so intent on building an "iPod killer"-- the damn things are committing suicide just fine on their own.

Anyway, I went to the Apple Store knowing that I was most likely going to be very disappointed.  My used iPod does not have AppleCare© associated with it, so I was pretty sure that the Apple Store was going to tell me to either fork over more money then my iPod was worth or get the hell out.  As it turns out, I didn't even get that far.

No, I got to the store and as I attempted to walk in, I was stopped by not one, but two mall security guards.  There were three at the door, and the third was chatting up the Apple guy who was lounging outside the store.  As the guard asked me what I needed, I looked over his shoudler assuming that someone was going bonkers with an uzi inside-- the only reason that I could think of that a store would need to have four men manning it's gates.  Turns out that this was not the case, this is just stardard operating procedures for an Apple Store nowadays.

I told the guard that I needed to have someone look at my iPod, and the guard indicated-- no, bowed, actually, at the Apple worker and told me that I would need to "talk to him first."  The guard told me that this god-like man "may or may not choose to let me in."  Excuse me?  Did I hear that right?  Let me in?  Is this studio fucking 54 now?  Would it help if I were a blonde bimbo?  I waited a good thirty seconds while the Apple guy talked to the guard about some restaurant that he'd gone to before Mr. Apple God finally agnowleged me.  When I told him what I wanted, he pulled out an iPhone and asked me in a snooty maitre'd sort of a way if I had an appointment.  No, I told him, I don't have a damn appointment, all I need is for some AppleCare moron to tell me that they can't fix my iPod.  The Apple Maitre'd offered to make an appointment for me.  When I asked if I could get in that day he just laughed at me.  (I am being totally serious.)  I turned around an walked away and Mr. Maitre'd Apphole remembered something he read about customer service and called after me to have a good day.

Like Mr. Stewart, I am also feeling a bit put off.  Aside from the fact that I haven't owned an Apple Computer since 2001 (when I went to work for MS), I did support those losers when their stock was worth less then a candy bar.  I spent my hard-earned money from working at my college cafeteria on a damn PowerMac 7100, for god sakes.  And now they won't even let me in the store to fix my broken iPod.

Screw them.  My next mp3 player is going to be... oh, who am I kidding.