Hate Mail and the New Religious Wars in Tech

Interestingly, the same phenomenon that makes people write those emails can make them "double down" on a tech choice. A friend defaults anti-Apple so refused to buy the "Jesus phone". After four Android phones, each less reliable than the last while his sister's still rocking an iPhone 3GS, he switched last week ... To Windows Phone 7. He just paid $500 for a phone that, 3 days later, was announced would not be upgradable to Windows Phone 8. All because he is determined that Apple users are smug fanboys.

(Personally, I think he should have gotten a Google Galaxy Nexus if he wanted his sister's mockery about constant obsolescence and non working hardware to stop.)

Casual Apple user here - it entertains me to no end how quickly everyone is to denote all Apple users to be fanboys to such an extent that they are downright anti-apple fanboys.

In reality I think more Apple users would ditch Apple as soon as something significantly better came along, than Android users (who chose to use Android, not people who bought a "generic smartphone") would ditch Android should something better come along.

There's something very specific about the tech industry that seems to attract this kind of vitriol. I mean, you don't often hear people saying, "Oh, you bought a Camry instead of a Civic? You're a fucking idiot!"

But when it comes to technology this type of flaming is all over the place, even as times change: yesterday's Windows vs Mac has become today's Android vs iOS, and programmers are constantly arguing about static vs dynamic.

What is it about tech culture that makes people so attached to their decisions, and so willing to attack others who happen to have made a different decision because they happen to have a different opinion?

Nah, the cure for this angst is not to care so much about whatever consumer electronics you're using.

My phone is a bit crappy. There are definitely better ones on the market. But I don't care, it does the job. There are better TVs than my TV, better ovens than my oven and better vacuum cleaners than my vacuum cleaner, but they all do the basic job for which I bought 'em and their imperfections don't cause me any huge grief, so who cares?

I'd cut it right back to people merely being weird and antagonistic for no reason. It's easier to realize sometimes you're just the latest random target of a touchy, unstable human animal and drive away as if in a safari park.

We had a woman come up to us on vacation and say our 2 year old daughter was an "evil little thing" merely for chattering away while eating lunch. I said nothing and just grinned at her until she popped a vein and stormed off. There are plenty of antagonistic oddballs out there, just grin at 'em (or don't reply to their e-mails) until they go away or start being civil and rational.