Eh, I'm not too sure about what to think of Lion. From what I've heard and seen on Apple's website, Lion seems like they're trying to force some concepts that should stay on a mobile device and put them onto a desktop/laptop computer. An Applications folder works well enough for me in tandem with Spotlight; I don't need a springboard or "Launchpad" as they call it. Maybe I don't want some apps to be fullscreen; whatever happened to the concept of "multitasking?" Maybe we don't want a walled garden for our Mac apps or Apple raking in 30% of our earnings for the apps that we spent many hours working on and debugging. Maybe we just want our Macs to remain Macs, not some horrible conglomerate of iOS and OS X.
At the very least, give us alternatives. Let us turn off those new features in System Preferences. Let us customize our Macs with third-party alternatives that can replace the core functionality of these new iCandy addons (heh, get it? iCandy?). Give us theming options for OS X, and by this I mean full UI customizations (default font, icon sets,
window design (oh wait they're moving to full screen nvm) and system sound replacements that don't require knowledge of the delicate inner workings of OS X to change).
However, Mission Control looks like a good idea. Nice to see they're remembering Spaces here.
Also, MULTITOUCH. I'm running my Snow Leopard on a 2008-era MacBook that doesn't have support for all of those fancy swiping, pinching and zooming functions. Why alienate those people who have computers that don't support multitouch? Last time I checked, many people don't have enough money to buy the latest and greatest hardware every time they release some superficial new feature that probably won't affect our workflow but will suddenly become a core feature of the OS (multitouch. I mean, two-finger scrolling on a MacBook (Air/Pro) is basically all it's good for. Unless you're actively zooming in or out/rotating an image in Preview, I don't see what the point is in it). My computer at the time of purchase cost upwards of $2000 and several months after I got it Apple put the new multitouch trackpads into the revised frame. I'm a student in high school. I can't afford to purchase a really expensive (albeit pretty) new computer every time they do a hardware revision.
Chances are I won't become a Windows convert anytime soon, but at the rate Apple's going with their desktop OSes, they might just make me one. iOS should NOT mix with OS X. That's my viewpoint.
HAHA!
Every single point you said I thought off and agree with!
I am just going to ignore that event really and stick with my i5 macbook pro 15". It does the job more than enough!