Editorials @ Applelust

Becoming a Rumor Idiot

"Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me."

But what about the fifth and sixth times?

One of the rules the writers and producers had for "Seinfeld" was "no one learns anything." It was supposed to be funny, the essence of humor bordering on tragedy. They get into the same messes every episode, learning nothing, and over time it became more and more silly, or rather, pathetic. Pathos. Look at George, who lies, gets caught, and yet keeps lying, getting caught again. Why? Because he was, technically speaking, an idiot.

Idiot, from the Gk. idiotes, meaning "private person, common person," so became "ignorant person" meaning "commoner." Technically: Noun — one who does not learn well, e.g., from past experience and mistakes.

Yes, it is easy to bash Rumor sites — they are wrong so often. Yes, it is easy to blame them for what appears to be a lackluster keynote — they build up false, not just unreasonable, expectations, expectations which, when not met, we blame Apple and Steve for, and not the rumor sites themselves. No, they get away every time Scott free, and when the next Expo is around the corner we flock back to those sites all over again, like a herd of blind beasts which have lost its wits. And so the cycle goes on ... idiocy, technically speaking. Or let me put it like this: It has become idiotic and more idiotic over time; it does so with each dashed Expo expectation and unfulfilled wish we place in a rumor. Have we become a bunch of Georges? Learning nothing?

Rumors ... I am not saying they are solely to blame for an apparent lackluster (read: not applelust worthy) keynote. There just wasn't that much that was ready I guess. And, if you think about, one cannot schedule innovation — it is an intuitive, spontaneous process, and sometimes the laws of physics slow you down. But believe me, rumors of LCD iMacs, colored iBooks, and "Son of Pismo," and 9.2 being unfufilled don't help and give amunition to Apple bashers, in which some Mac users are included. But I do think they have something (not everything) to do with the negative reactions to the keynote we've seen here and there.

Rumors ... they're bad. They're bad for Apple. They're bad for Mac users. They're bad for Expos. They're bad for shareholders. They're good for Dell. They're good for Gates. And yet, we keep going back and seem to learn nothing from incidents like the Pismo fiasco that happened a few years ago. Remember that? Everyone was sure, because of rumors, that the Pismo was going to be released at an Expo, and it wasn't. It was released at the next Expo, but that means nothing because the first prediction was wrong. Did we learn anything? No. Will we go back tomorrow to see what scrumptious bits the rumor mills will have for us? Yep. Why? We're idiots, that's why.

We get tripped up a few times by rumors. Sure, that I understand. Been there. But the really sad thing is that we keep getting tripped up. We have learned nothing. Yes, dear reader, I have succumbed to this — I was actually excited about flat panel iMacs. I was an idiot, too. Why?

It's not as though we all sit down and say, "Hey, let's be idiots." No, an idiot doesn't get up in the morning, look in the mirror and say, "I am going to be the best idiot I can possibly be today." No, he doesn't do that because, well ... he's an idiot. Idiocy, some of it anyway, is something that happens to us, not something we do.

To wit ...

How to Be a Rumor Idiot

[Note: I cannot provide instructions for becoming an idiot, since idiots can't follow instructions.]

Rumors eat away at us after time. Everyone is talking about them and we feel left out. We don't want to be behind the times. We have to take a peek; we have to lift up the skirt and take a look-see, if even just a flash of the knee. The temptation is too great. The rumors, though, eat away at what we think we know, they eat away at our strength to endure and resist error; they feed what we want to believe, or dreams, and our wildest desires, floating high above all evidence. It is a slow process that takes time. We hardly notice until ... the keynote.

Then it hits you: "I'm an idiot."

Becoming a rumor idiot seems to be something that happens to us, not something we do. We form beliefs and they start to affect the way we see things. Our feelings and hopes gradually change over time. We hold on as long as we can, as we try to resist false beliefs and expectations. But soon our energy runs out, and our unreliable feelings and hopes overtake us. As our defenses break down we forget about past failures and fail to judge reliability. It doesn't matter anymore: We'll go to a rumor site and like voyeurs we watch with guilty curiosity, not realizing that over time we become idiotized. We might try to resist, but Applelust and hope and the attraction of the new drag us all the way to Idiotville.

What we do have control over is the situations we put ourselves in, the evidence and reports we expose ourselves to, that assist in reliable belief-formation. If we have a false belief because we lack evidence, then it's because we didn't seek the all the evidence (or it was unavailable to us at that point for some reason, and so we had to use good judgment and background beliefs).

We are not in control of beliefs, directly that is. We are in control of belief-forming situations, however (as I just suggested). So, if we are in control of belief-forming situations, and rumor mills provide false belief-formation situations, then the best thing to do is not put ourselves in those situations so we don't acquire the false beliefs, and expectations and the rest. That is to say: We need to avoid rumor sites out of our own epistemic duties, duties to ourselves to take responsibility for how our beliefs, expectations and the rest are formed. It's about epistemic virtue.

Anyway, enough philosophy ... (Cherish it, I don't say that often!)

I state right here right now — there will be an OS X 10.2. I am not sure of the time frame yet, but mark my words: 10.2 will be released at some point. I have the best evidence there can be, viz. the laws of succession in the natural numbers. You see, '2' comes after '1,' and I can guarantee that 10.2 is on the way. I promise.

I doubt that rumor sites are responsible for the AAPL tumble. No, financial reports and knee-jerk reactions to them are responsible for that. And yes, some things were right on. One site, I don't recall which one, had a picture of QuickSilver last week. (If I could remember I would link. But I can't so I won't.) Some of the speed bumps were, to say the least, predictable if you just pay attention. And everyone knew that at some point OS X 10.1 would be released. So why not just start saying it now and make it look like you are a prophet among men? Successes are, in other words, educated guesses or pale predictions. The failures still outweigh the "successes," just look at how many people are pounding Apple because of no new iMac, i.e., failure costs more, like the skin off Steve's back the Mac Web is trying to exact.

It's time to take responsibility for our own epistemic practices and stop bashing Apple.

Don't blame Steve because he did not introduce new iMacs. It's not like he broke a promise to us or anything. HE never said there would be LCD iMacs. No one at Apple did, as far as I can tell. No, the only ones who did were the those who love unsubstantiated facts and pass off speculation as if it were history, those for whom Applelust is weakness of the will and fantasy slowly becomes reality. Apple is not to blame if they didn't introduce a new iMac, or a "Son of Pismo" as Go2Mac reported, or colored iBooks because they never promised them to us in the first place.

But we're idiots. It doesn't matter. We'll keep doing it, we'll keep believing rumors. We'll keep being disappointed. It's our nature, I fear. I don't know though.

We like to play with odds, to dream, and fantasize. Imagination is a god thing. As a species we love to gamble. We're bored and make up games to play. We have too much time on our hands. All this I is fine. Nothing wrong with it at all. Play all you want! Even I have thought about the perfect Mac for me. I just don't publish my dreams as a fact or future certainty. Sure, there are disclaimers, so called, on rumor sites. But it doesn't matter because we're idiots, technically speaking — we keep going back and making the same mistakes, ever, never learning.

We caught a lot, and I mean a lot, of flack from the masses about our call for real journalism on the Web. Never mind that many who read it failed to get the point anyway (showing us again that our schools are failing us, and the Web builds low expectations and poor readers).

(Take note: Do not read anything on this site quickly, or you'll cheat yourself.)

Forget about that. No, rumor sites and the flack that Apple is getting right now because of flatly false reports is one reason we called for some real journalism out there. After all, a REAL journalist would check his facts and sources and not just publish any old thing that comes across his desk, as is the habit of so many Web editors. This is what a journalist does — he must make crucial decisions about truth and error, the reliability of sources and stories, and the ethical demands of headlines. Not an easy job. A real journalist, that is to say, would have nothing to do with rumors, and the fact that so many did shows the lack of the profession on the 'Net. Sure, speculate all you want, and have fun! Knock yourselves out! Just don't try to pass it off as "reporting and journalism." It is neither. It is sloppy thinking and sad, miserable reporting, plain and simple and one more reason why Democracy doesn't work! (And hey, even "real" journalists got it wrong - see here. Even ZDNET was engaging in rumors and got 'em wrong, and they are supposedly a legit "news organization.")

Oh yeah, OS 9.2, LCD iMacs, and colored iBooks. Well, think again. No, scratch that — just think. As Santayana said, "Those who forget the past are bound to repeat its failures." And we have such short memories, don't we?

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