Me, A Fanboy? Me No Think So. You? Mebbe

As I wade my way through roughly three weeks’ worth of RSS backlog, Joel Durham Jr’s June 28 writeup in ExtremeTech particularly resonated with me. It’s an excellent description of a situation I also often find myself in. Write something negative about Apple (or, conversely, positive about Microsoft) and legions of Steve Jobs groupies toss cyber-grenades my way. Same goes for when I dare to point out a shortcoming of the mighty PlayStation 3 or Wii. Interestingly, when I’m critical of Microsoft, far fewer folks grumble….something about automatic reader bias against a market share leader, and for the underdog? But I digress….

I’l reiterate what Joel says; I’m not biased (beyond the admitted objectivity limits of any human being), and I’m definitely not on anyone’s payroll (aside from EDN’s, that is). My continued professional livelihood depends on my dispassionate analysis of various products, both absolutely and relative to competitors, and both at any particular point in time and over the products’ life cycles. Trust me, folks, this is a great gig I’ve got; I’m not going to risk its demise by slanting my coverage in exchange for some free gizmo.

I own and enjoy an Xbox 360 (and Xbox), a PS3 (and PS2), and a Wii (but not a Gamecube). In the portable realm, I possess a Nintendo DS and Gameboy Advance, and two Sony PSPs (one intentionally frozen at the homebrew-friendly v1.5 firmware revision). I build and buy computers based on AMD and Intel CPUs, containing ATI (sorry….AMD) and Nvidia GPUs….and there are actually more Macs than Windows-powered systems under my roof. My cell phones and cellular data cards run on both GSM and CMDA (and in the latter case, on both Sprint and Verizon) networks. I watch and enjoy both Blu-ray and HD DVD discs, as well as good old red laser DVDs. And I’m ashamed to admit (therefore I won’t) how many portable audio players are sitting on my shelves, both iPods of various flavours and those supporting Windows Media Audio.

No favouritism here, folks. I figure if I get as as many emails from Apple (or pick your favourite vendor) bashers as I do from Apple (ditto) supporters, I’m doing my job….and I do. If you think I’m biased, try turning the spotlight on yourself instead. If you’re honest, you might find the true source of the slant to be coming from a surprising source….yourself. Capiche?