Mac Geekery

I overheard the most unbelievable conversation today. There’s this little southwest restaurant not far away from Apple’s Cupertino HQ (just down Steven’s Creek, actually) where Apple guys sometimes hang out for lunch when Cafe Macs is completely full, or they simply want something more southwestern than the Cafe Macs burritos.

So I’m there having lunch with a friend (the stewed pork burrito, if you must know) when some guys walk in talking iPods and dangling little Apple badges from their hips. Sweet. So I just sit there at my table near the door, chewing a little quieter as they guys just lay it out in their discussion what’s coming on Tuesday. I mean, they’re being quiet and all, but they still lay it out as they talk to each other. I didn’t have a way to record it while I was there, but here’s some tidbits my friend and I could remember afterwards. The words may be a little different but the ideas are the same. If we couldn’t remember, we didn’t dictate it.

“I’m totally selling my TiVo to some unlucky PC bastard.”

“I wonder if we’d have done this if they [Tivo] were quicker about TiVo-To-Go for Mac?”

“Let’s hope the initial schedule has more than Desperate Housewives and Lost on it.”
“Oh, it will. I think I saw That’s So Raven on there, too.”
[laughter]

Man 1: “I just wish it was a little bigger.”
Man 2: “You can hook it up to one of those portable TV/DVD players you know.”
Man 1: “Yeah, I know, but that really defeats the point; it’s so bulky then. And that totally blows plane flights with the cords and batteries and so on.”
Man 3: “I think it’s big enough to watch.”
Man 2: “And you’re sixteen, too. Quick, what’s the VIN on that car?!”
[laughter]

“So, what, it’s the Mac maxi now?”
“Dude, I think they’ll pick something else.”
“Yeah, I can see that not going over well with a certain demographic.”
“People with gag reflexes. ‘Hey, just put this in your maxi ...’”
[laughter]

Man 1: “So, I didn’t catch something. What about shows I’ve bought at the current ratio?”
Man 2: “They’ll be in a vertical letterbox…”
Man 3: “We’re not going to be selling 16:9 anytime soon.”
Man 2: “Yeah, so much has already been encoded for 4:3.”
Man 3: “That and we don’t have the bandwidth. We’d kill Akamai.”
Man 1: “I doubt it’s that much. They’re bigger than that, aren’t they?”
Man 3: “I would have thought, too.”

“Whatever happened to just playing music?”
“That’s so 2001.”

I was just kind of sitting there by now, having finished my plate, my friend and I not having talked for about fifteen minutes as these guys just sat there talking. When we finished up we had some wicked grins on as we walked out the door.

“I’m so blogging this.”

Yeah, they heard that. Too late, though.

Update: Put the correct date on the story. The date was set about a month ahead for some reason or other. Why would this be in April? Hrm. Oh well.