Macsurfer just linked to my article.
It looks kinda bad that Apple Korea is totally selling out its pro users to sell iPods.
If you don't support pro users, then just say so. We'll stop buying pro equipment and order it ALL from Apple USA.
It's really too bad that Apple Korea smells the quick buck and starts converting everything over to iPods and the cute white Macbooks and totally abandons the high-end users.
With the move to Intel chips, now's a crucial time, Apple Korea.
Most pro users still use OS 9, because the print shops don't want to use the newer versions of Quark, the page layout program, because the OS X version doesn't come out in Korean, and there are apparently compatibility problems with fonts between systems 9 and 10.
But with the new Intel computers coming out, OS 9 will no longer even run – even in emulation – on these babies.
That means that either 1) high-end places will stop buying Macs, or 2) the print shops are going to have to switch over to OS X, finally.
I think that scenario 1 will take place, since if I were the printers having to deal with a technological/platform switch anyway, I'd just bite the bullet and go Windoze. At the time when Chungmuro and the rest of the printing/graphics world was forced to use Macs, it had little choice, since in the late 1980's and early 1990's, Windoze sucked too much with the graphics programs.
Macs literally cost 3 times what they did in the States at the time, but design and media shops in Korea used them anyway, since they didn't have a choice. Not at all.
Now, Windoze sucks considerably less and you can do just about anything you can on a PC that you can on a Mac (although for a million reasons, it's still much better to do on a Mac).
Faced with having to change the way things are done – now that the Intel chips in the Macs makes the OS 9 world history, and hence, these houses can't use any of them at all with OS 9 – I say that pro Mac users are about to go the way of the dinosaurs in Korea.
And Apple Korea knows it.
Admit it, Apple Korea – you're abandoning the pro user market because you read the signs and are only nominally supporting the higher end stuff, since you know that market's about to collapse.
Your main store in Coex has closed, replaced by Apple counters in other retail outlets selling white iPods and Macbooks, but have no hi-end stuff. The people at both counters didn't even know what I was talking about when I asked for Mac Pro accessories, and all of your higher end programs are no longer to be found in retail outlets.
When I tried to buy a copy of Soundtrack Pro separately last year, the retail people didn't even know what program I was talking about.
When I asked the service center at Yongsan about it, they said to call Apple Korea.
When I called the official Apple Korea customer service line, the operator actually insisted that I give her the serial number from my computer to confirm whether or not I could use the card she found on the American site. I told her that there was only ONE type of Mac Pro (although different combinations of bells and whistles) and for her to just look and see if the wireless card that went with it was available in Korea. She was obviously covering her ignorance of the Mac Pro with the silly insistence on me giving her the serial number to my computer. A Mac Pro's a Mac Pro – why the hell do you need my serial number? That's stoopid.
And that's Apple Korea's official customer service line. If they don't know what the hell I'm talking about, who would?
Even when I bought my Mac Pro in Myeongdong, the boy behind the counter seemed flabbergasted. He was able to talk all sweet and technical to the girl inquiring about an iPod before me, but couldn't answer a single question about that damn computer: How many RAM slots? Do I need an HDMI adaptor? How many hard drives can I put into it?
I mean, I could have found out by looking around the site, but I thought that the guy selling Macs in the Mac store might know. Well, he knew nothing, and I eventually went to the site. I can't call him an idiot, since the fact has now become obvious that Apple Korea isn't really selling anything other than iPods and other stuff under $2000 and comes with colorful cases.
Am I wrong? Is the increasing ignorance about pro equipment and the sudden glaring absence of any pro Mac accessory in retail outlets pointing to something? Of course it is.
Mac retailers are going where the bucks are and Apple Korea itself isn't stocking shit that is too pro, too expensive, and doesn't sell well.
I thought that the popularity of the iPod mixed with the adoption of Windoze-compatible Intel chips would mean that Apple Korea would try to break openthis market, which would be quite possible, given the right publicity, which I talked about in a previous post. What has Apple Korea done? Jack shit.
Instead of pushing the new Macs in the Korean market as a true alternative to PC's – why get a Sony VAIO for over $2000 when you can get the cute little white Mac that matches your iPod that will run Windoze AND Mac? It's a no-brainer and is why Dell is shaking in its boots back Stateside.
Apple Korea is just selling iPods, man. Take the money and run.
Even Apple Japan has even adapted the "I'm a Mac. I'm a PC" campaign into a Japanese version.
Apple Korea? Hello? Anyone home?
Apparently not.
Until I am proven otherwise, I'll say to anyone reading this to NOT BUY PRO MAC PRODUCTS IN KOREA. Any part you need for it will have to be ordered from the US, so just buy it in the US, where it'll be 20% cheaper. Foreigners, buy your pro stuff before you get here and declare it to be personal use, which will be true.
I think it's ridiculous to buy something like a computer part that will take weeks to get here, and then probably get stuck in customs after they x-ray it, then have to pay the 30% VAT on it.
Notebooks and stuff, you can buy in Korea. Pro stuff, you're on your own.
I've called Apple Korea about my post Friday, and will call them about this one today.
Not that they care. I'd be shocked – but happy – to hear a response from Apple Korea. Prove me wrong!
Is Apple Korea not abandoning the pro market? Come on, Apple Korea – prove it.
