Believe it or not, I have other interests besides music. In fact, my other “main squeeze” is my computer- or more specifically, my Macintosh. I thought that it would be a cool idea to write more about that, so I interviewed Jennifer Ho, reviews editor for MacAddict, an excellent Macintosh users’ magazine that offers a unique combination of fun, yet informative articles coupled with great design. And the best part is that you can buy it anywhere, even the mall or supermarket. It really seems more like a fazine than what I usually think of as a “magazine,” and I think that MacAddict serves as an example of how all magazines should look and read. Plus, Jennifer gets points for answering my questions in less than 18 hours! How’s *that* for prompt?
I think that a lot of people are under the impression that working for a magazine like MacAddict would be nothing but fun & games. I suspect that it is actually a lot of really hard work. What would an average day at work be for you?
It IS a lot of work. As reviews editor, I have my work cut out for me. When I get to the office after a long commute, I answer mails and phone calls for an hour, then I review products myself, edit incoming reviews and layouts, and answer more emails, all for 6 hours or more, and I often attend meetings—you know, a developer comes to the office, so I’m in there for another hour. If I’m reviewing a game, I go home and play that for a couple of hours. Sometimes I play it until 11 PM, so no, it’s not all fun & games.
Conversely, I would imagine that even though it’s probably a lot of work, the MacAddict offices are probably more fun than the usual magazine. True? How would you say the MacAddict office differs from the average magazine?
I’ve never worked at another magazine, but yes, it IS fun. I like our office because I can wear jeans and a T-shirt unlike staffers at another Imagine publication, Business 2.0. They’re far more dressed up for work than us Mac heads. Also, we’re not separated by fattening pens (aka cubicles) so we can chat or talk about news or just whatever.
It seems like most computer magazines (even Mac ones) are so stuffy and boring, when they could be funny and entertaining like MacAddict. To me it reads more like a fanzine than a “magazine.” The design is much better too. Is it that other magazines are designed to be boring on purpose, or they just aren’t as creative as you guys are? Seriously, is it just that other magazines won’t let the writers be funny where your editors will?
Well, we’re trying to find the line between being funny like an entertainment publication and a real consumer magazine that’s supposed to help readers. You’re right, though. It’s important to be fun because no other Mac magazine does it. We ARE Mac fans, but boosterism is best left to Apple’s PR and its PR agency. Some critics of MacAddict would say that we’re not a good consumer publication because we’re not dealing with issues seriously. (You know, we’re-preaching-to-the-choir kind of thing.)
Will it make you mad if I ask if you’ve ever read that “Hack MacAddict” “e-zine” floating around? You’ve got to admit, it *was* kind of funny!
I’ve never read it, but I wouldn’t be mad. What is it?
Since Imagine also owns PC magazines, what kind of raids do you stage on the enemy offices? When are you going to go to the Next Generation office and beat them up for never having any Mac (or Saturn) coverage? Have you noticed that they took the “Macintosh” off the cover in favor of Dreamcast, when Dreamcast doesn’t even EXIST yet? (Just for the #record, NG is the second best magazine in existence)
Speaking of Next Gen, they’re starting some Mac coverage on their Web site, Next Generation Online. Well, no raids so far, but friendly bickering with Maximum PC for their chip-on-the-shoulder Mac coverage. I mean, I can’t believe they gave the iMac a 2 out of 10 when the little gumdrop did rather well in their benchmarks.
So somebody actually gets *paid* to make the Staff Movie?? How do *I* get this “job”? Seriously, what advice would you give somebody who’s looking to get a professional writing career started?
Start writing for me, for example. Well, the movie making has TRADITIONALLY been the CD-ROM editor’s task, but anyone of us could make one. Robert Capps made the Overclockers movie. The CD-ROM editor’s job doesn’t involve the print publication as much as our print editors.
Do you think that Apple should make a line of salad toppings called MacOS? (Get it, like Bac-Os? Har har) Or how about a Beanie Baby that’s a litte monkey called the Macaque-intosh? What other novelty products should Apple introduce?
Yes, I would love Mac-OS salad toppings. They would be really tasty. I’ve been wishing for Apple to launch its own line of PowerPC potato chips (fat-free means CISC-free).
What records are on your play-list these days? What’s your all-time favorite album? Did you ever see that five-year French kid that had that rap song called “It’s Hard To Be A Baby” about 3 or 4 years ago, Jordi I think his name was?
I’ve been listening to French alternative music. For example, my latest favorite album is La Tordue’s “T’es fou.” That means “you’re crazy.” Yes, I know of Jordi. In French his song was called “Dur dur d’être bébé.” That was a marketing coup! My all-time favorite album? That’s a toughie. I love so many, Finn!
What would you choose as a theme song for MacAddict and why? (You can’t use “Eye of The Tiger,” that’s reserved for Rocky)
Maybe Oingo Boingo’s “Grey Matter,” cuz then you could sing “MacAddict, MacAddict, oh oh oh oh.” Or maybe an Opera Man rendition of “O MacAddict mio”...
Why are Mac users such rabid fans of their machines? I’ve never met a PC user that really *loved* their PC as much as most Mac users love their computers (i.e. as a member of their family). Could it be because PC users have, in the words of Marat Fayzullin, a “vegetable-like mentality”? Could the popularity of “Deer Hunter” on the PC be further evidence of this?
I can’t answer for every Mac user, but I’m an enthusiatic fan (not rabid as I’ve never been bitten by my flopppy drive) because the Mac redefined the human/computer relationship. The Mac was the first and IS the only truly affective personal computer. By making the Mac what it is and by continuing to improve its operating system, Apple has created a new modern computing paradigm. Microsoft still can’t make an OS anywhere near the Mac OS in terms of its human interface. On the other hand, I applaud Be for making BeOS a real alternative.
Getting back to the important issues (i.e. video games), is the iMac going to improve the state of Mac gaming as much as Apple is saying it will?
Yes and no. Core gamers (defined in the gaming community as someone who buys 12 or more games per year) wouldn’t buy an iMac because of its lack of expandability. I wouldn’t because I have 3 graphics accelerators. However, the iMac can bring new casual gamers into the mix—hey, the more the merrier—and more buyers of games means more profits for developers, which means continued Mac titles. Bottom line: The iMac will help a little, but it won’t cure the other problems (e.g. slower 3D, no native OpenGL support, a slow(er) PCI bus, to name a few).
You mentioned that you played computer games all the time- do you ever get into console or arcade games? Which ones? Is “ET” for 2600 your favorite game of all time?
Yes. I still go to the arcade now and then. My particular favorites have been Primal Rage (cool dinosaur fighting action), Alien vs. Predator, classics (I used to be really good at Tempest), and on the Mac, Battle-Girl is one of my all-time favorites. I’m at 1,369,345 right now—that’s my current high score. I need to practice some more, huh?
A lot of people are saying that a lot of games these days just substitute fancy graphics for gameplay. What’s your take?
You can have your cake and eat it, too. Look at Unreal. It’s got an awesome engine, and most of the shooter PC titles coming out (and may be ported to the Mac later) are using the Unreal engine. Unreal’s gameplay is awesome, too, because the AI is clever. I’ve been fragged plenty of times by bots in deathmatch mode. The only games in which fancy graphics dominate gameplay are those silly puzzle games such as Riven. I can’t stand those puzzles — I don’t consider those titles as real games, you see.
I don’t have a very fast Mac, and it certainly doesn’t have any 3D board. Do you think it’s kind of bogus that more and more games are starting to require hardware acceleration?
No. The truth is, apart from the few original Mac titles (Battle-Girl, aGORA, Gridz, etc.), most Mac games are ported from the PC, and PC 3D titles are beginning to require hardware acceleration. So in the future those ported titles will look like crap (crap = giant pixels and jagged edges) in software rendering mode on the Mac. Apple needs to include top-notch hardware acceleration for its onboard video whether or not it’s used for pro graphics such as 3D modeling. My other take on that would be there is a $99 Voodoo board coming to market, and that’s not a ridiculous price to pay for decent hardware acceleration.
Do you remember during the NES’ golden age when they had Nintendo cereal (I ate it), underwear, and that dreadful cartoon? What is your favorite peice of video game nostalgia?
PacMan lunchboxes and DigDug posters!
My least favorite “feature” of PCs is how jumpy the mouse is, because even if you turn the speed down all the way, it still jumps across the screen at the slightest flick of the wrist. What’s your “pet PC peeve”?
Why can’t you boot from a CD? What happens when you hose your hard drive? At least on a Mac you can boot from a Norton Utilities CD, a system CD, or even that rinky-dink emergency startup floppy, or for that matter, a Zip disk (I’ve done that a few times).
Wasn't that a great interview?? Now you can go look at the MacAddict page!