Those Sneaky Footnotes

Yesterday’s article on OS X Lion’s full-screen mode included the following footnote from Apple’s Lion preview page:

[Some features are only] available with apps that have been developed to work with Lion.

I’ve added “some features” to represent the asterisks which are spread through the page, linking certain features to the disclaimer above. The explanation of Lion’s new auto-save feature, for example, reads like this (in full, including footnote):

Lion saves changes in the working document instead of creating additional copies, making the best use of available disk space. The lock feature prevents inadvertent changes from being saved and automatically locks documents after two weeks. And the revert feature returns you to the state the document was in when you last opened it, so you can feel free to experiment with confidence.* [Jump to footnote] Available with apps that have been developed to work with Lion.

English translation from legalese: this feature might not be available in non-Apple apps. Here’s a list of the features from the Lion preview page which won’t automatically work with non-Apple apps:

  • Full-screen apps
  • Auto save
  • Versions
  • Resume

Ok, so. Apple are doing what every other profit-making business on the planet does: they’re emphasising the great new features of their shiny new operating system, and they don’t want to spoil the show by shouting about how, you know, whether or not this stuff works in the apps you use is actually down to the work of third-party developers. Just installing Lion isn’t enough.

I don’t have a problem with this. But I do think it’s interesting how many people will take Apple’s promise that feature X will be available in Lion as a promise that feature X will be omnipresent in Lion. I guarantee: three minutes after Lion has been released, someone will be blogging about how they’re angry at Apple because their non-Apple app won’t go full-screen. Come back at the end of 2011 and take away my blogger’s license if this doesn’t happen.