firecat | Class signaling via Apple products

Umm.

I see the point of the original statement. Around here? It means you go to school at Mizzou, because they get a deal on the MacBooks. But only if you are the Right Kind of Student. The rest of them schlep their Acers and pray the things hold up the full four years.

It may be a different section of the well-to-do, but it is still very much a well-to-do population that carry the Macs. Not like a decade and a half ago when you scrimped for a Mac because they were geek-cred and so what if you couldn't ever afford to get a new one for ten or more years again, they lasted.

It may be a different section of the well-to-do, but it is still very much a well-to-do population that carry the Macs.

That makes sense.

Yeah, I have to agree with the original comment. A certain type of person carries around a Macbook Pro, even around where I live.

It's funny, when I read "carries around a Macbook Pro," I think I might consider carrying one around and using it in public to be a status marker, more than having one you use mostly at home or in an office.

Sure but the original post that quoted comment comes from also has this bit: Displaying your Apple stuff proudly is just yet another of our culture's myriad ways to engage in a little subtle classism. and to me, that implies carrying it around and using it in a coffee shop, library or cafe.

"If a status symbol falls in the forest...?"

...it gets eaten by the Rodents Of Unusual Size.

I don't think it's directly comparable to driving a BMW or carrying a Louis Vuitton bag, but Apple products do serve as class signifiers to an extent. I would consider the iPad and iPhone to be more significant signifiers (if that makes sense) than a Mac laptop or one of the simpler iPods. They're still shinynew in a way that laptop computers or mp3 players just aren't, any more. (The iPhone is starting to move out of the shinynew category and its class meaning can cut both ways depending on the other signals given by the person holding it.)

(And I wonder what my beat-up 4+ year old Macbook says, class-wise, with the flimsier bits of plastic on the case starting to chip off. Part of the assumption of the conspicuous brand consumption model of class signage is that the branded products are in new/like-new condition, implying that the person has the money to replace these items on a regular basis.)

I would tend to agree that iPads/iPhones are more of a status signifier than Mac laptops.

Hmm. I do definitely think it's a status marker, but I also think that "as much of a status marker" isn't the same thing as "marks you in the same class group as".

I mean, the cheapest you can buy a new MacBook Pro is over a thousand dollars, so there's definitely a status thing going on there, as much as with the Louis Vuitton bag or the BMW -- but also as much as owning a pristine 1970 Plymouth Barracuda. Maybe you bought the BMW used, maybe you spent forty years babying the car you inherited when your older brother joined the military, maybe you got a busted MacBook off Craigslist for $250 and fixed it yourself, but wanting and having these things does indicate voluntary membership in the group of People Who Want A [BMW|1970 Barracuda|MacBook Pro].

"as much of a status marker" isn't the same thing as "marks you in the same class group as".
That makes sense.

I can't imagine anyone carrying a Vuitton for any reason other than that it's a Vuitton. And I know people who swore they had a BMW because it was the best car available. I also know people who leased one when they couldn't really afford it because it was de rigeur for their profession. I don't know if that means Vuitton is more of a status markers than the other things, or if I just don't know squat about Vuitton. (In contrast, I know that Coach bags are status markers and also pretty high quality. Of course, "I only buy The Best" is a status marker in itself...)

It is totally a class marker. In part because people who are not well-to-do (especially as their year of birth recedes) learned about computers based on what was available to them in classes: what their schools had, what their libraries had, what they took remedial classes in, and so on.

And largely, if you're going to train someone to be employable, you do it on a Windows machine. So unless your school board/public library had a deal with Mac, not Windows, Mac literacy is a sign that you could afford your own Mac to play around with, and could afford the blanket >$1000 to pay for a Mac machine. On the other hand, it's possible to buy your own Windows machine for much cheaper.

Edited 2012-04-18 20:49 (UTC)

That makes sense. Although I thought a lot of schools had Macs. But I don't know, and maybe it's only elite schools.

Mac made deals with a lot of schools, yeah. But to me, "only knowing Windows" also implies class to me, because it's all about access to/use of different kinds of computers. If you're all university students, it's not nearly the kind of class marker as if you're all grocery store clerks.

If you're all university students, it's not nearly the kind of class marker as if you're all grocery store clerks.

True in several different ways, yeah.

I think an iPad or iPhone is more of a class marker. I think that Macbooks and other Apple computers tend to be seen as a geek cred thing. Sort of a "I finished learning all the good shit on Windoze, so I moved up to an Apple" thing.

That's my impression too. Although it's certainly true that Mac laptops are more expensive than Windows ones, so if "being seen with something expensive" = "status marker" then...

In certain circles, it might be.

Things I think when I see someone has a Mac:

1) They might be an artist. (There is a lot of design software that apparently just works better on a Mac. Unfortunately I don't work better on a Mac.)
2) They don't like fixing their own computers and don't mind doing without it for the time it takes the Apple Store to get it done, because whooboy will Apple not help you fix your own.
3) Somebody had a lot of money at some point in time.
4) They may or may not be technically inclined, but they sure aren't hardware hackers.

Things I think when I see someone has a Mac AND all the up-to-date Apple entertainment devices:

1) Somebody has a lot of money.
2) Somebody is content to let Apple track them everywhere or doesn't know that they are doing it
3) Somebody doesn't care if Apple knows and rearranges every media file they own.
4) Somebody cares an awful lot about having the newest/latest/best/coolest/shiniest

I don't necessarily think high-tech professional, for though I know that many high-tech professionals use Apple devices, people who are really into hacking their boxes use Linux often, and a lot of development is done for Windows machines.

Things I think when I see Louis Vuitton:

1) Somebody has a lot of money
2) Somebody doesn't have much imagination. Vuitton is boring and stuffy and mainly impresses other rich boring people that you are the right kind of rich and boring person. American fashion trends these days are influenced as much by Japan as Europe.

(If you want a purse to last forever you buy Coach plain leather; I associate THAT with genuine old money.)

I care a lot about fashion though. A whole lot.

Edited 2012-04-18 22:58 (UTC)

From inside the "high tech professional" class/subculture, the main thing I think when I see people using their iThings in public is that they have newly acquired a new model of iThing. There's a grace period (which is determined by how long you've had it, and how new that particular model is) where you're allowed to show it off to everyone at the dinner table, and then after that you're supposed to keep it in your pocket/bag.

By high-tech professional, I don't mean hacker so much as "person who works at a company that sells hardware/software or runs web site(s)." A lot of such people don't know a lot about the innards of their machines or OSes.

I agree with the nuanced parsing " that 'as much of a status marker' isn't the same thing as 'marks you in the same class group as.'" Mac products stand out, and i do think they mark the user. I think there is probably a great deal of context that affects how the marker is read, but i certainly pick up on whether the computer shown is Mac or not in TV shows and movies.

I have to say all three of those consumables are not what i think of as distinctive class markers but more --- there was a term used for Starbucks lattes... conspicuous mass consumption? Other than the cash, i don't see them as as much as a class marker as impeccably tailored clothes, manicures that go beyond the mass mani-pedi options, and perfectly coifed hair. There's something about having the luxury to take the time to be tailored and groomed that i pick up on in places like Los Altos that seems much more significant than brand status. You can't simply buy that presentation, you have to have the time and access to the providers of the services.

conspicuous mass consumption

I like that phrase.

You can't simply buy that presentation, you have to have the time and access to the providers of the services.

Wearing tailored clothes saves time in the long run, but you have to (a) care enough to bother, and (b) understand where to find such services and how to navigate them.

But I know people of all classes who get regular mani-pedis and hair styling. A lot of sales clerks get them because they are supposed to look put together.

I think it's the (b) part that i think of as a class signifier. How do well tailored clothes save time in the long run?

I will have to remind myself when i'm feeling intimidated by someone's well coifed presentation that perhaps they aren't judging me dismissively as hoi polloi but they might be considering me a sales target.

For a while, my mom had her clothes tailored. It can be a timesaver because once the tailor has your measurements and your preferred styles of clothing, all you need to do is pick the fabric. You don't have to go out shopping for what happens to be on the rack this season and try on one thing after another to see if they fit. If you are a non-standard size and want to dress in form-fitting clothes, it's even more of a timesaver.

I was a bodyshy child and despised being surrounded by people with measuring tapes, so I got away from all that as fast as I could.

I try hard to act as if people I interact with are not being judgemental of me, because if I start thinking about all the ways they might disapprove of me, I'd never be able to open my mouth.

I know I didn't pay more than $800 for my (refurbished 15") MacBook Pro. It is the most expensive thing I own, aside from my car, by a long shot. (I think next is a $120 textbook, then my $85 hiking shoes.) I have two iPods, both from 2007 - and I didn't pay for either of them, and one I loaned to my sister for four years after her old mp3 non-iPod player broke. This is a lot of technology, I think! It more than meets my needs. (My loftiest desires? Nah. I'd have to live in a tech store for that.)

My landlady, on the other hand, has an iPod touch and a new iPad, and she can barely use either of them. I've messed around on other people's devices-of-that-nature and offered to teach Landlady how to do whatever she wants to learn how to do on her own, but she turns me down with "If you can't afford one, I don't want to learn how it works from you." She carries these with her to work and pretty much everywhere else and sits there pretending to work on them despite not actually being able to use them. That looks like status marker to me, and that's behavior I associate more with the non-laptop Apple products. (Or, increasingly, the MacBook Air, but in my experience, not the regular MacBooks or the Pros.)

But I have my Pro because I love the Mac interface. Half my previous-college was Mac labs, half Windows. But I also went to a super-nerdy high school where we had access to about a gazillion different operating systems, so when it was laptop-buying time, I knew what I liked best, and I shopped for something that would suit me long-term.

And yes to what someone said in one of the comments - I find every single one of my graphics-related programs works better on my Mac than on comparable PCs. (Not that I'm an artist; I just mess around with stuff. But. It works faster and is more easily controlled and just has a nicer interface or whatever. idk.)

Ooh side note re fashion. I have two friends who carry big-name purses. One uses the same purse every day and treats it like, y'know, a thing that carries stuff but also looks nice. Carry it on a shoulder, half-under an arm. The other has at least forty purses, and each of those purses has either NAME IN LARGE FONT ON SIDE OF PURSE or NAME ON TAG HANGING FROM PURSE HANDLE. These purses are carried by the handles in one hand, arm held at what looks to me an extremely awkward angle to get that purse up there in eyesight. Set on a table in the restaurant when everyone else has purses on the booth beside them. Always with that BRAND NAME facing out. I think that's an (extreme but useful) example of useful object vs status marker - and it all comes down to how the people use it.

(I love my uncle's BMW because it handles really nicely. I didn't notice it was a BMW until after I'd already fallen in love with driving it. I'm observant.)

BMWs handle well. I wouldn't buy one because I don't want to be "a person who drives a BMW." So there's status-related behavior for you.

"If you can't afford one, I don't want to learn how it works from you."

WHAAAA?

I'm either oblivious to "PURSE BRAND NAME FACING OUT" behavior or I don't know people who do it.

I don't get people who have 40 purses. I HATE transferring things from one bag into another.

I agree with your commenters who point out that "is just as much of a status marker" doesn't have to mean that it signifies the same things about the status.

But also, there's another interesting question. Do the people choose and display the things at least partly in order to have a status marker? Or do they carry them for other reasons, but inadvertently declare something about themselves because they do?

I bought my first iPhone (the first model available in Canada, on the second day they were available) at least partly to impress people and say something about myself. It used to work that way too! Now, it doesn't say as much. I carry it for a lot more reasons now, but it is still a status marker too. It doesn't say early-adopter Apple-fan, but it does say that I have money and value ubiquitous connection.

On the other hand, I didn't choose to get an MEC brand backpack and carry it around for nine years in order to send a signal of "this here is a Canadian, someone who believes in non-profit co-ops, someone who is active outdoors and pays for expensive-ish things but keeps them for a long time." I got it because a family member had the same one in a different colour, and I kept it because it works - but it does signal all those things above to someone in the know.

I wouldn't recognise a Macbook pro as distinct from any other kind of portable Mac computer, and I wouldn't recognise a Louis Vuitton purse either. If you told me that a character in fiction had a Louis Vuitton purse, I'd assume that it was a woman, that she was wearing makeup, was at least 40, and probably had old money. If you told me that a character in fiction had a Macbook Pro, I'd assume that the details of the computer mattered to the character, that he or she probably upgraded frequently in order to do something for self-employment or non-paying passions.

Do the people choose and display the things at least partly in order to have a status marker? Or do they carry them for other reasons, but inadvertently declare something about themselves because they do?

I also have this question: how many people think they are doing something for personal reasons but are actually (also) being influenced by the status message they think it sends? I think I use Apple products because I'm used to them and drive a Prius because I like saving money on gas. But maybe the status messages matter too in a way I'm not aware of.

Now that you mention it, there's some ambiguity in "just as much of a status marker." Until about ten minutes ago, I thought it simply meant, "it marks status just as clearly" [as the other thing.] It's only when I saw how you recoiled that it occurred to me it might also be read as, "it marks just the same status" [as the other thing], or something like approximately the same status.

Good point. I wouldn't recoil from "it marks status." (Although I don't actually know what status means, so I'm a bit uncomfortable with that.) I recoil from "use of it is primarily status-seeking behavior" and I recoil from "it marks just the same status as [BMW, Vuitton]."

I think carrying around anything known as a status marker (Vuitton, Mac Pro, whatever) makes you vapid. Yes, I said "vapid". No, I don't really care if this hurts some Mac Pro carrying person's feelings. You know what I see when I look upon these things? A person whose stuff is more important in identifying them than their own personality could ever be.

How seriously can I take anyone who expects me to figure out who they are, what I can expect from them and what they stand for by looking at what they carry? Not too seriously.

"Look at me: I carry a seriously overpriced piece of cloth with an outrageously priced piece of aluminum with electronics stuck on it sticking out of it so I'm better than you are!"

For me, that's more of a laugh riot than an opportunity to learn where I stand in the pecking order. I work with the public and I can't tell you how many times a day the Vuittons and Mac Pros parade by and I look at the faces attached to them and just try not to smirk.

When your stuff makes you who you are, you've stopped being anyone at all.

Yeah, I do the same thing with some things I think of as status markers, but I worry that it's unfair prejudice. I don't actually know why everyone driving a BMW is driving a BMW. There might be reasons other than "I want to say I'm superior to other people." On the other hand, if I hear them brag about their BMW, then I don't worry so much.

The only problem with this is that anything can be meant as a status marker.

I find this all really fascinating, because living in a very rural area makes me completely out of the habit of parsing this stuff. Status symbols where I live are good nails and "done" hair, cars with mag wheels, really big utes and grandchildren.

It's a good point that status symbols vary a lot depending on what kind of community you live in...

I often see people possessing all three in the Bay Area places I breeze through.

Wow, I'm feeling a bit defensive now.

There are at least three pieces to the notion of status symbol - the possessor of said objects deploying them as such, the way those objects are perceived by others, and the extent to which the producers of the objects deliberately craft a public image and attempt to sway public perception of their objects and, by extension, the consumers thereof.

Generally, I think the author of this piece is assuming a lot of intentionality and neglecting a lot of practical concerns. On the first point, the deployment of objects by users, I think the laptop is different from the other products. iPods and iPads are pricey toys (though you can actually create content on an iPad, not just consume it, I'm aware that's not how most people use them), but laptops are tools. There are loads of reasons why someone would choose a MacBook Pro that have nothing to do with social status. If one is an artist, a graphic designer, a filmmaker, or in related industries, Macs are the industry standard and yeah, the software works better.

I own a MacBook Pro. I did not choose it because I think it makes me cooler. I chose it because 1) I prefer OSX to any other operating system out there right now; 2) I do enough desktop publishing, photo editing, design, and statistical analysis that I do actually need this much memory and computing power; 3) I'm a graduate student at a giant state school at which, the IT department tells us quite frequently, the average time it takes for a computer on the local network to get infected with a virus or spyware or otherwise invaded is about 10 minutes; given how much of my work is stored in this machine, the dearth of viruses and spyware for Mac is a significant selling point. Also, my partner works for Apple, so we're pretty much a Mac-only household; it's what he's most familiar with, we both like them, and I get the added benefit of expert, in-house, 24-hour tech support. :) But fundamentally, I have this laptop because it best suits my needs. For me, as a savvy end user who can usually fix my stuff when it breaks but would rather not, straight-up UNIX is impractical. And Windows flat sucks. The story I always tell is that when I went to DC to intern several years ago, I was sitting next to a another intern who had a Dell-made Windows laptop. It took her almost an hour to successfully get internet access - I can't remember at this point what all the various issues were, but she was heaving huge sighs, cussing, and fiddling for more than 45 minutes. Me? I plugged in an ethernet cable. Took me about two minutes, and it only took that long because I had to unroll the cable and then crawl under the desk to plug it into the wall. That's the thing - the Mac just *works* the vast majority of the time, and it lets me do my actual work instead of fucking around with the tools I need to do my work. If I'm going to cook a meal, I don't want to have to re-attach my knife handle to the tang three times, you know? I just want to chop my damn onions.

I take my MacBook Pro to coffee shops and cafes because I have meetings in those places for which I need my laptop. I often need to meet my advisor, people I'm interviewing for projects, people with whom I am working on community organizing/activist projects, etc, and it is convenient to meet at coffee shops. I know several freelance graphic designers and artists who do the same thing. We all do this because we work from home and we need relatively safe public spaces to meet people for work purposes - particularly those of us who are women and/or queer and thus extra cautious about putting ourselves in situations where we are vulnerable to strangers. I know some writers who take their laptops to public places just to get out of the house and out into the big world. None of these actions are about plumage display; they're about the practical day-to-day details of many kinds of knowledge work. Of course knowledge work is linked to economic and education privilege, but that's a different matter than hipster showing off of shiny titanium toys.

I am aware that some people deploy Apple products for status purposes. I am also aware that Apple products are coded in the public sphere as connoting individualism and creativity, which are associated with leisure and education and therefore with the upper classes; I think at least part of what's going on there is the fact that Mac is the industry standard in several creative fields, and the marketing department at Apple knows this and leverages it to sell a certain amount of coolness by association. The individualism/iconoclasm piece has been a part of Apple's internal culture and the image it chooses to project since the company's inception. Intertwined with the class issues here is the notion of authenticity, which is generally associated with lower classes. It seems to me that part of what many people find distasteful about Apple products being used out in public is the sense that the user is a poseur - if you're not *actually* an artist, you shouldn't get the coolness cred. And maybe even if you are an artist and own one of these laptops, you're still a poseur because artists aren't supposed to be able to afford them; they're supposed to be poor and suffering.

And as an aside, I'm pretty sure the biggest reason most people use the white earbuds is simply that that's what comes with the iPod/iPad and they work well enough that it's not worth the effort or expense to replace them.

There are at least three pieces to the notion of status symbol - the possessor of said objects deploying them as such, the way those objects are perceived by others, and the extent to which the producers of the objects deliberately craft a public image

This is an excellent point.

I have Apple stuff for several of the same reasons you do. It didn't ever occur to me before that someone would identify me as a brand-for-the-sake-of-brand consumer for using it in public.

As someone who has been a Mac user since the very first 128K Mac, and who bought Macs through alllllll of the dark years, I am both mystified and delighted that it's come to this. ;)

-J

Yes, that.

Interesting comments here; not read the article yet, but I might at some point.

Being a guy, I just don't get the whole female fashion thing, especially not when it come to big name labels like Louis Vuitton. I do know some women how have a down - or more - different purses and/or handbags and swap them around to go with their outfits, but it seems too much hassle for me and most women I know.

As to BMWs, I know a lot of folk like them for their reliability how comfortable they are to drive. One company I worked for gave all their Regional Managers and above company cars and they all picked either BMWs or Mercedes. As a pedestrian, I've come closest to death by car most often under the wheels of more expensive cars (like BMWs and Mercs), which seem to be more prevalently driven by idiots. YMMV, if you'll pardon the pun.

Some people do indeed treat Apple products as status symbols, especially iPhones these days, although that has always been the case for new and shiny mobile phones - it's just that the tech fashions have changed over the years. Most Mac laptop users tend to own them because they like them and/or get best use out of them; all the designers at my last company used Macs without exception as Mac software is the industry standard for design, graphics and publishing industries.

I'm working for a software testing company now, so I'm getting a lot of exposure to Mac OS. Personally, I don't like how it works and the look n feel of the UI, but that probably because I've used Windows, UNIX and Linux far more over the last 20 years.

I'd say there's another class of "hi-tech professionals" who make a point of using Linux systems as a way sticking your fingers up at the The Man. However, because you can run it on any hardware and it's not as blatantly styled/branded as Apple products are, you can't tell it's a Linux system unless it's up and running and even then it's not always obvious as most programs are cross-platform these days (he says typing this in an Opera browser tab on his Linux netbook).

The whole status symbol thing mystifies me. Cars, computers, and luggage are things I acquire because I need them; they are not me, and I wouldn't spend any more than I have to on any of them. I can't imagine paying $80,000 for a car that has to stand up to years of road salt, potholes, and Massachusetts drivers.

Now Apple computers are well made, dependable products. It might be interesting to buy one and see if I could get it to run a radio station. But I prefer Linux to OS X, and Apple has a "fascist" corporate attitude I don't want to endorse. I admire the iPad, though, and would love to run Linux on one.

I've spent so much of my life trying to stretch dollars, both for myself and my employers and clients, that the habit has become hard to break. Conspicuous consumption isn't my thing.

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Class signaling via Apple products

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