Posted by athompson on 2/1/2009 3:32 PM Life, Technology   

Function.

I don’t care what my cell phone looks like, as long as it performs its job.

I don’t care that my computer looks like a boring beige box. Or that it doesn’t match my monitors. Or that my laptop isn’t hewn from a solid piece of gold.

I don’t care what my word processor software looks like. If I need a new job, it had better be able to produce an updated resume. End of story.

All these things are tools. Should I care what my hammer looks like? It has a job, do it.

Not to say that I don’t like the latest toys, I do, but I’m more concerned about getting the job done. I think that people who know me might find this hard to believe, because I  will never have the “base” version of anything.

When I wanted a mountain bike, I purchased a used Mongoose NX 7.1 – with the ‘good’ Newman-designed frame, before they became something you buy at Target.

My philosophy is that if you intend to get good at something, you should never start out with something you are going to grow out of in six months.

And having the correct tools for something makes learning much easier.

Take photography. I shoot Nikon and have a D70s, D200, and a pre-owned D2H. When I am on the sidelines at a college football game, that used D2H makes the D200 seem so inadequate. For sure, the D200 can get some shots, but the D2H makes it so much easier – for that scenario. At 8 frames-per-second you are improving your chances over shooting 3fps. I’m not advocating a spray-and-pray approach, rather that there are horses-for-courses. In the studio the D200 is my choice. I did use the D70s at the National Championship/Rose Bowl game in 2006, but that is another story — you use what you have at the time.

I suppose form-over-function is the Mac versus PC argument. I am a PC user and have never used an Apple product in production. Certainly I can’t think of a reason to favor a Mac over a PC in my field (web design, web application development, photography, video editing); perhaps  five years ago, but not now.

I don’t care which platform people use. Really. Don’t care.

I do care when they can’t give me a reason for having to have one over the other. No respect for that.

The iPhone is the classic example. OK, I get that it is thin and you can play $0.99 games on it. But no (native) cut-and-paste? That is not a business tool. But if you want one, buy one.

I choose function.