Anybody who's spent more than ten minutes on USENET has seen it: a discussion thread which keeps popping up every now and then, in which proponents of various personal computer platforms argue why their particular favourite is the only one worth using, and the others are so much rubbish. (The most common case involves users of Intel-based machines running Microsoft Windows versus those who prefer the Apple Macintosh.)
Usually you will see interjections from self-righteous individuals, complaining at this waste of bandwidth, rehashing a topic which has already been fruitlessly rehashed so many countless thousands of times, and wondering why the platform advocates have nothing better to do with their time.
Arguments for the pointlessness of the advocacy debate commonly bring up the following points:
This Essay will demonstrate that these seemingly reasonable-sounding arguments are in fact fallacious, and that, like it or not--believe it or not--the platform advocates do have reason on their side.
Those who proclaim "Use the Right Tool for the Job" seem to think of computers as being like screwdrivers. Screwdrivers come in a range of kinds, flat-head versus cross-head, big ones, small ones and so on, each suited to screwing and unscrewing a different kind of screw. It helps to use the right screwdriver for the job, otherwise you can cause yourself a lot of grief. You can buy screwdrivers in convenient sets, so you can always have the right one for the job at hand.
If only personal computers came in sets, like screwdrivers! If only you could buy several of them, and keep them all handy on your desk, so you can always use the right one for the job at hand...
Unfortunately, computers don't work that way. Even assuming you have enough desk space, most of us can't afford to buy more than one personal computer. We make the choice based on our needs at the time of the purchase, and then we spend the rest of the life of the machine trying to make it fit the new needs that arise. Questions of "suitability to the task" are irrelevant: the machine we have is the only tool available for the job.
Until, at some point, the fit between the capabilities of the machine, and our needs, becomes so bad that we junk the old machine and buy a new one. And the cycle starts over again...
People who say "Why Can't We All Just Get Along?" seem to have a rose-coloured view of the computing industry: they think it is big enough that every clever idea can find its niche somewhere-- perhaps like a big meadow where all varieties of sheep may safely graze.
Unfortunately, reality isn't like that. The personal computing industry, both hardware and software, is a dog-eat-dog world where smaller, niche players are eventually squeezed out of existence, and only the mainstream vendors survive for very long. And "mainstream" here ultimately means that you're Number One: everybody else is "niche" (or a "loser").
Thus, every decision by someone to buy a particular computer platform contributes to the weakening of the competing platforms. There is no "getting along" in the winner-take-all environment of the free market. So you see that the advocacy debates are, in part, an attempt to sway potential purchasers into one camp or the other: the more people who buy the same platform as you, the stronger your side is, and the better the support you get from third-party software suppliers, makers of hardware add-ons, publishers of books and so on.
But if not enough people buy your brand to keep your vendor afloat, then you pretty quickly end up with an orphaned machine, that no one wants to know about, and your ability to continue fitting it to dealing with new jobs (see the previous section) becomes severely curtailed. The advocacy debate is, when it comes down to it, a matter of life and death.
In the end, the advocacy debates are advertising campaigns. They are unusual in that they are being waged by the customers, not (usually) by the vendors; nevertheless, publicity is what it's all about. Think of it as capitalism in action: the people are doing it out of enlightened self-interest. And like any other kind of advertising, there's no way you can put a stop to it.