Th[e] excessive demand for the types of services BMUG provides suggests various things about the computer industry and computer education at the University level. There is a tremendous need for a source of objective and realistic advice to the user and to the potential computer user. Most common sources of information have little incentive to remain unbiased. The dealers try to sell you the product that's most profitable for them, while magazines tailor their reviews to accommodate their advertisers, and high-priced consultants distort information to make it sound so complicated and mysterious that you couldn't possibly get along without them. Additionally, there are the online computer services which want to charge you for as much logon time as possible....
This general lack of an honest and objective information service and the myriad false and distorted presentations made by dealers, consultants and commercial magazines have lead [sic] to an atmosphere of confusion and mistrust in the microcomputer market place....
The information presented by BMUG is definitely (and intentionally) biased but we aren't selling anything (except perhaps the information itself or our views of the world or ourselves, but hey, we're just doing it for fun anyway). We try to provide through BMUG the information that we wanted to find out for ourselves, but couldn't, without help....
Things in the Mac world have obviously changed over the last year and a half as well, clearly distinguishing the Mac as the best general purpose micro computer available for those planning to use their computer for a variety of things the Mac is also becoming the best micro for several special-purpose applications (particularly spreadsheets, printed graphics and page layout). The software and hardware has gotten better and much more abundant.
The closed hardware architecture that the uninformed still complain about was proven to be imaginary by the numerous companies offering add-on multi-megabyte memory upgrades, internal DMA hard disks, video output ports, RGB and NTSC color video interfaces modems, color plotters, graphics capable laser printers, Photo Typesetters, and so on. Many don't realize that the Mac offers all of this hardware expandability while maintaining the incredibly important standard user interface and maintaining superior software compatibility across all possible hardware configurations. This combination is found nowhere among IBMs, Apple IIs, VAXen, and all other "open" machines, namely "those with slots."
With all these improvements, the Mac is becoming a much more productive tool for real world jobs (pun intended)....
One of the most valuable aspects of BMUG are the weekly meetings. For those who can't make it to the BMUG meetings in Berkeley, and don't already have access to any local users group, we suggest that you start one.... You will really find it is well worth your time and effort to meet with other Mac users in your area.