by Laser Quasar Absolutely

(That's not really my real name ... but does it really matter? I mean, really?)

IF YOU THINK (DIFFERENT) ABOUT IT, APPLE Computer has more brain power at its disposal than any firm -- indeed, perhaps any institution whatsoever -- has ever had in the entire history of the world.

This brainpower resides in the Mac's millions of loyal, generous and, for the most part, brilliant users. (After all, they did choose a Mac over a PC, didn't they?)

If you consider all the Mac users out there, can you doubt that they comprise a body of people whose combined thinking potential puts to shame the faculties of Harvard, Princeton, Yale, M.I.T., Caltech, Cambridge, Oxford, Tokyo University, the RAND Corporation and SANDIA National Labs -- all put together?

Not only do Mac addicts think, they even Think Different. (Didn't the media claim the "Think Different" ads were targeted at the already-installed base of Mac users, rather than those sitting on the other, Satanic side of the fence?)

And not only do Mac users Think Different, they are extraordinarily generous with their thoughts and ideas, at least as far as their cherished Apple Computer, Inc. is concerned. Which group of people do you know -- at least since the days of early Christian Church -- whose members go to bat for their favourite ideology as enthusiastically as do Mac aficionados? Heck, some of them even call themselves "EvangeLists"!

So why isn't Cupertino taking full advantage of all this thinking brilliance?

What Apple.com should do, if it really is serious about Thinking Different, is to harness this enormous reserve of Good Will and Brain Power to its advantage ... and to ours. Surely our Dearly Beloved Utterly Fearless Visionary and Extraordinarily Wise iNterim Leader for Life, Steve Jobs (More Power To His Elbow, and May His Shadow Never Be Less!), is acutely aware that the primary ingredient going into the best computer in the world has got to be the best thinking in the world. (Hey: he was there at the Mac's inception, right?)

Let Cupertino set up a Web page where any and every Mac maven -- and this means You! -- can offer his or her best and brightest suggestions, e-mailed to Apple at the click of a mouse. And let's have a team of, say, seven of the best and brightest brains at Cupertino, reporting directly to the iCEO, reading every suggestion carefully every day, culling from them the most valuable, and presenting them in outline to the Big Boss for consideration during the morning meeting.

Even if a full 90 per cent of all ideas submitted are either impractical, fanciful, whimsical, utopian or downright useless and no good, don't you think the 10 per cent left over will be so extraordinarily valuable as to make all this exercise worth its weight in gold, ten thousand times over? 

And let Apple reward all the good ideas with a Web Wall of Fame, where everyone who has contributed has their name displayed in prominent letters for all their friends to see. And if a suggestion is actually accepted and incorporated, let there be some sort of genuine encouragement for its originator: not necessarily monetary (after all, most of these guys have the brains to make a good living all on their ownsome!) but some sort of recognition, a plaque or medal, say, given at a posh televised ceremony once a year in California (like the Oscars, maybe?) to which all of them are invited from around the world, all expenses paid. (Hey: There are some things money can't buy.)

Which of us wouldn't put in our two bits, then? And in five years' time, tops, there'd be so much good thinking incorporated into the Mac that no other computer would even stand a chance. Why, even the B-2 Bomber and the F-22 Fighter, along with the Space Shuttle and the International Space Station all put together, wouldn't stand a chance, if you could compare the quality of thinking that would by then be incorporated into the Mac!

And best of all, this exercise would cost Apple next to nothing, except some time spent each morning by the top brass -- and in any case they could write it off as PR. (Compare even the cost of the ceremony with the $100 million or so which I hear they spent advertising the iMac alone.) But wouldn't it give Apple a reputation the envy of the corporate world? Which company do you know of that actually listens -- and listens not just to its employees, but to anyone and everyone? Wouldn't the good will alone be worth all the stock the richest man in the world owns today? And in the end, wouldn't the Mac, with all the good thinking as well as the good will going for it, make absolute mincemeat of the competition?

... (not his real name -- but you figured that out already, right?) ... calls himself a "Thinker", especially about the future. He thinks that's where he'll be spending the rest of his life (but who's he kidding, eh?  Doesn't he realize it's always going to be now?)

Most people say to him "You can't be serious" -- and they're right, he can't. (But then, who can be serious about the future, seeing as how anything can happen in it, and usually does ... er, will?)

His best book -- indeed his only book -- is entitled The Seventh Generation, and its shareware version in Adobe Acrobat format is available for download from his alter-ego's web site (under construction right now) at http://cpu2308.adsl.bellglobal.com. It's all about the next 150 years or so, and where technology might take us in that amount of time. (Just $5.00 -- cheap! And well worth it, though he says so himself). Check it out.

And send him e-mail: he loves feedback!

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