Minimal Mac

Computing Simplicity? →

When I published my post titled, “Dear Mr. Jobs” last week, I heard a couple of comments about my “cluttered” menubar. It got me thinking about the current move towards minimalism and simplicity in regards to our digital tools. It’s a movement that I’m greatly in favour of. It has been wonderful… to see a work like Patrick’s Minimal Mac receive so much attention and success.
But at times, I wonder if it isn’t just the next fad. It’s certainly partly a backlash to the personal productivity movement, with GTD at the centre. But maybe it’s also the new GTD. Instead of doing work, people are still tinkering. But now they do so under the guise of ‘reducing’ or ‘simplifying’. But in the end, it’s the same issue. The boring tasks that you need to do are still on your list. But we have a whole new generation of singly focused, minimalistic tools that tempt us to switch from whatever we’re using now.
Please don’t take this the wrong way. I love what Patrick and others are doing: helping people focus on what is needed and avoiding what they don’t. But the whole genre is vulnerable to going down the same path that personal productivity did.

And so, back to the comments that were made about my menubar. Cluttered? Only if I didn’t use the items that reside therein. Which I do.
I prefer, when possible, to keep an item in my menubar rather than in the Dock. I prefer a tool in my menubar over a Dashboard widget. Why? Because it suits my preferences and fits my workflow.
I’m fairly sure I could lose 2 days of work looking for ways to configure those tools to be accessed in some other fashion. But why? Just so I can post screenshots that will cause others to say, “This guy is so zen. He’s must be in the zone all. the. time!”
Minimalism in computing is not about how your computer looks. It’s about how you use it — ensuring it has everything you need and nothing you don’t.

It should come as a surprise to no one who has really been following along here for the past several months that I agree with Chris 100%. I have said as much here, here, here, and even more I will not bother linking to (seriously, search around, I say this stuff all the time).

See, I am in this weird position. I feel like I kind of helped to start something that has nothing to do with what I believe in (which is what I have said I believe in and what Chris believes in, as he so elegantly stated above). Yet, the only way for me to combat it is to show up every day and continue to express what I believe in. Which, inevitably, some people myopically think is something other than what I believe in.

Believe me when I tell you this stuff weighs on me heavily. Like, really heavily. It is the reason why you see no posts for a day or two at times. I just not sure I want to contribute to all of these people who think the key to “minimalism” and “simplicity” is killing off their menubar and dock. I can’t tell you how many times my finger has hovered over the delete account button… Sigh.

Just so we are clear…

I believe the most minimal computer is the one that is optimized for you. How you work. The menubar items you need. The dock items you need. The applications you need. The system you need. The peripherals you need. The tools you need to get the job done.

I believe most of us do not take the time often enough to evaluate what that need is. The entire mission of this site is to help you ask those questions and find the answer that is right. The only answer that is right. The one that is right for you and only you.

Update: I have added this info to the about page.

Update #2: Chris and I have had this back and forth before. Resulting in pretty much the same response by me… Good times.

Posted February 23, 2010 at 4:39pm || home