Lovely essay by the BBC’s North American Business Correspondent, on the Apple religion. He even brings up Umberto Eco’s insightful religious metaphor for the Mac/PC schism:

The Italian philosopher, Umberto Eco, once wrote, tongue only partly in cheek, that Macintosh is Catholic while Microsoft computers are Protestant.

Macs, Umberto Eco opined, were “cheerful, friendly, conciliatory,” traits he associated with Catholicism. More to the point, though, their way of operating was different from Microsoft’s, giving more guidance to users.

Macs would, as Umberto Eco put it, “tell the faithful how they must proceed step by step to reach – if not the Kingdom of Heaven – the moment in which their document is printed”.

He saw that as like Catholicism, in contrast to the Protestant faith which he thought, like Microsoft computers, would “allow free interpretation of scripture, demand difficult personal decisions… And take for granted that not all can reach salvation. To make the system work you need to interpret the program yourself”.