I had to chuckle when reading this article on TUAW last night which says Mac users are less likely to let friends try out their new gadgets than users of other platforms. The TUAW folk said they let others play with their toys but I have to admit that I am a little bit on the “stingy” side where my techy stuff is concerned…but not exclusive to my Macs either it has to be said. In the TUAW poll I voted “They can try it out for a few minutes while I supervise” - and it looks like 69% of people who voted agree with me.

I don’t mind anyone touching the iMac G3…well, as long as they’re over 18 and have washed their hands I frequently let family members/friends use the G3 to browse the net and check their e-mails, but I always stand guard over my iMac and even my PowerBook. My other half sometimes uses my iMac for a quick net look-up if he doesn’t have time to boot up his laptop and I am cool with that, although I have been known to ask “Are your hands clean?”. I guess part of this ‘don’t touch my stuff’ comes from when my Brothers children grabbed my (then brand-new) SONY Cybershot camera and promptly covered the LCD screen in sticky fingerprints which wouldn’t totally wipe off. I was not happy and eversince then I have kept my cameras at arms length, allowing them to look and not touch. That’s how it should be with kids anyway, along with the “seen and not heard thing”…but even the seen thing is taking it a bit too far. I’m a fun Auntie really

But yeah, trying out my gadgets while supervised sounds about right to me. I’m a clean person (not in an overly freaky way) but I like to keep things in good condition and free from grubby fingerprints. Yeah, I’m never going to let that one go…