1) Who are you and what is your website about?

I’m Miraz Jordan, author of hundreds of practical Tips and tutorials  for users of Apple products. MacTips.info has been running for more than 10 years now. It holds hundreds of step by step guides, screenshots and videos to help ordinary people make the most of their Macs, iPods, iPhones and iPads.

2) Why did you start your blog?

I was training Mac users, way back in the day, and they used to ask me the same things over and over. I realized other people would have the same questions and I could provide a useful service by making my answers public.

I started with a mailing list that I was archiving on the web, but now the website is the main deal. A couple of years ago I added YouTube
videos with many of the weekly Tips.

3) What has been the most explosive post on your blog and why?

It’s interesting how things happen. Back in March 2009 I wrote about how to arrange apps on an iPhone . That Tip got about the same number of visitors as any other post —until 26 December (New Zealand time — that’s 25 December US time).

On that day the visits just skyrocketed — that one post received about 500% as many visits as the previous day. Obviously everyone got an iPod or iPhone for Christmas and they all wanted to know how to rearrange the apps.

That post still gets far and away the most visits of any on the site.

4) What is the craziest/most interesting exchange you’ve seen in your blog comments and why?

I’m just an enthusiast who’s been using and teaching about Macs for 20 years now. I don’t work for Apple, and they definitely don’t give me products, or discounts on products. They almost certainly don’t even know I exist.

Some commenters on the site seem to blame me, or accuse me, for things that don’t work on their Mac how they want them to. They tell me *I*
should let them set options how they want and go on to say things like: “had I known you would force these kind of changes I wouldn’t ever …”.

I can’t force anything on anyone. I’m not Steve Jobs, just a person trying to share what I know.

5) What is the best article for a new reader on your blog to see?

New readers should start with one of my recent Tips: How to access your files from anywhere – with Dropbox . I’ve picked that one because Dropbox lets you share your files between devices and machines (eg a PC at work and a Mac at home, an iPad, iPod touch or iPhone), while it also provides a backup and version control.

Using Dropbox is one of the single smartest things you can do as a Mac user, even if you only have a Mac and no iOS devices. You may not realise how useful the backup and version control features are — until you need them. And then you’d see they’re essential.

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