Dave Horrigan, a tech columnist who lives in San Diego, just sent a note from Southern California’s fire-scorched front lines. He writes:
“I’m about 1 mile downwind of one of the fires in San Diego and as such have been watching the news closely. I see images of many people evacuating with their iMacs but I’ve seen no one evacuating with a PC in their arms. Of course its Rancho Santa Fe, but surely there is some rich guy here with a PC he wants to save?”
Leander Kahney is the editor and publisher of Cult of Mac.
Leander is a longtime technology reporter and the author of six acclaimed books about Apple, including two New York Times bestsellers: Jony Ive: The Genius Behind Apple’s Greatest Products and Inside Steve’s Brain, a biography of Steve Jobs.
He’s also written a top-selling biography of Apple CEO Tim Cook and authored Cult of Mac and Cult of iPod, which both won prestigious design awards. Most recently, he was co-author of Cult of Mac, 2nd Edition.
Leander has been reporting about Apple and technology for nearly 30 years.
Before founding Cult of Mac as an independent publication, Leander was news editor at Wired.com, where he was responsible for the day-to-day running of the Wired.com website. He headed up a team of six section editors, a dozen reporters and a large pool of freelancers. Together the team produced a daily digest of stories about the impact of science and technology, and won several awards, including several Webby Awards, 2X Knight-Batten Awards for Innovation in Journalism and the 2010 MIN (Magazine Industry Newsletter) award for best blog, among others.
Before being promoted to news editor, Leander was Wired.com’s senior reporter, primarily covering Apple. During that time, Leander published a ton of scoops, including the first in-depth report about the development of the iPod. Leander attended almost every keynote speech and special product launch presented by Steve Jobs, including the historic launches of the iPhone and iPad. He also reported from almost every Macworld Expo in the late ’90s and early ‘2000s, including, sadly, the last shows in Boston, San Francisco and Tokyo. His reporting for Wired.com formed the basis of the first Cult of Mac book, and subsequently this website.
Before joining Wired, Leander was a senior reporter at the legendary MacWeek, the storied and long-running weekly that documented Apple and its community in the 1980s and ’90s.
Leander has written for Wired magazine (including the Issue 16.04 cover story about Steve Jobs’ leadership at Apple, entitled Evil/Genius), Scientific American, The Guardian, The Observer, The San Francisco Chronicle and many other publications.
Leander is an expert on:
Apple and Apple history
Steve Jobs, Jony Ive, Tim Cook and Apple leadership
Apple community
iPhone and iOS
iPad and iPadOS
Mac and macOS
Apple Watch and watchOS
Apple TV and tvOS
AirPods
Leander has a postgrad diploma in artificial intelligence from the University of Aberdeen, and a BSc (Hons) in experimental psychology from the University of Sussex.
He has a diploma in journalism from the UK’s National Council for the Training of Journalists.
Leander lives in San Francisco, California, and is married with four children. He’s an avid biker and has ridden in many long-distance bike events, including California’s legendary Death Ride.
You can find out more about Leander on LinkedIn and Facebook. You can follow him on X at @lkahney or Instagram.
22 responses to “Fire Evacuees Saving Macs But Not PCs”
Hey, where was this shot? Great photo. I live in SD (luckily out of harm’s way so far) and I was trying to figure out where this picture was taken. If it is in RSF, where exactly? Just curious.
MacGuyinCali
HAHAHHA I LOVE IT
This is totally random, but I wonder if some people opted to pop out their HD and leave the rest of the box behind… I mean, if I was tasked with grabbing all my data before the fire hit I may go with the lightest option (I.E., just the HD) Macs are a little more cumbersome in this regard….
The Macs (Mini and MacBook Pro) were the first thing I packed, followed by my cameras, but in the end, I packed the PC towers too. Though not as cautiously as I did the Macs.
I live in San Diego (Scripps Ranch) and was evacuated, but thankfully am back home. One of the first things I grabbed was my MacBook Pro, Wireless Mighty Mouse, and my Western Digital external hard drive. Can’t leave home without my MBP! This thing in my baby! Oh, and awesome looking photo!
Do you think it might be because the Macs cost 30% – 100% more than the PCs to replace?
Its ironic though, that to begin with, the fire probably started from another exploding macbook battery :-)
This is just the sort of BS reporting that fuels the fires (sorry) about bigoted Mac zealots who cannot do anything but flame (oops) writers who say anything negative about their beloved computers. Heck, I’m as much a Mac fan as anyone, and I don’t own a Windows machine, and I see you filed this under humor, but really… get a grip. As for rescuing a computer from a fire, I’d just grab the back up drive.
There was a “dumpster amnesty day” recently that included a spot where people could drop off computers for recycling. I saw lots of PC desktops, but nothing that was obviously a Mac.
Weak. Just not even funny in light of the tradgedy unfolding in SoCal.
It looks like it might be the Harris Fire at the base of Mt San Miguel.