I'm having trouble understanding what point you're trying to make. What, exactly, is "entirely inaccurate" about the comment? How is your rendition with physical cars similar? How is it snobbish in the least?
"Joe Sixpack" makes sense to me. Someone who thinks computer experts are elite, and doesn't know much about computers.
The "tech savvy" only differ in one sense: they are incredibly more delusional about their choices than the rest of the planet. I certainly haven't taken the time to study Chrome's design in depth (or for that matter Firefox's), and probably never will. My reasoning for using Firefox is due to a vague-warm-fuzzy ideological alignment I seem to have with Mozilla and their approach to software. Nothing quantitative, and certainly nothing adequately logical that I could use it to command authority over anyone else on the planet. In fact exactly the kind of thought processes that "joe user" experiences ("I like the icon.. it bounces"). 23 years spent in front of a machine, and that's still pretty much me.
but, if someone says that, you know exactly what they mean. seems like a valid response to me any way you slice it.
p.s. this kind of attitude is part of the problem.
How so? It does not tell you if it's Firefox, Chrome, IE, Opera or Safari. My mom refers to the Internet as "google".
that's how she browses the internet then? in her case the application wouldn't matter to greatly if her point of reference is the Google search box
To make the example clearer, I've personally had the experience of asking someone what browser they use and getting "Yahoo" (as in the Yahoo.com homepage) as an answer.
This highlights your confusion. The set of people that have average computer savvy contains all kinds of races and economic standing. It has nothing to do with "working class," wealth, or racial status and everything to do with computer skills.
> You don't have to have a college degree and a six figure income to be discerning about technology.
I'm not going to point any fingers, but I just want to say someone has some massive insecurities.
> The set of people that have average computer savvy contains all kinds of races and economic standing
How is that different from what I'm saying? Saying the "unwashed masses" don't care about what browser they use is inaccurate. That's all.
To the users, browsers are mostly homogeneous, and choosing one over the other incurs in almost no cost (real or of opportunity). It stands to reason that most people (regardless of class) don't have any incentive to care, and therefore they don't.
The market share of IE (and the usage habits of people of both normal and more advanced tech knowledge) points to the fact that people frequently DO use IE (or safari) because it's pre-installed and only change when it just happens (chrome getting installed and set as default by various other installers being a good example)