Marco Arment is well-known and well-regarded in Apple fanblogger circles. He's both a developer (he was CTO at Tumblr, and then created Instapaper) and a pundit whose articles often contain footnotes, just like David Foster Wallace. The main thing to know about passionate Apple bloggers and podcasters like Marco Arment is that Rule Number 1 is that you never say anything bad about Apple. That's why today the world of Apple lovers has been shaken to the core — because Marco Arment has violated the prime directive, and declared that Apple's software, well, kind of blows:

"Apple's hardware today is amazing — it has never been better. But the software quality has taken such a nosedive in the last few years that I'm deeply concerned for its future. I'm typing this on a computer whose existence I didn't even think would be possible yet, but it runs an OS riddled with embarrassing bugs and fundamental regressions. Just a few years ago, we would have relentlessly made fun of Windows users for these same bugs on their inferior OS, but we can't talk anymore."

Strong words! Arment blames the marketing department. Tim Cook needs to wake up!

"I fear that Apple's leadership doesn't realize quite how badly and deeply their software flaws have damaged their reputation, because if they realized it, they'd make serious changes that don't appear to be happening. Instead, the opposite appears to be happening."

All joking aside, this is kind of a big deal.

[Photo: Wikimedia.]