Here is the difference:

I happen to currently own, for example, a Sony TT, which itself replaced a Sony SZ [my only two Sony products to date] and save for the fact that the TT was - by any measure - quite expensive it has been a great machine, not perfect, but does pretty much everything I need it to but - and this is a big but - if it comes to pass a Sony [or any other] product I own has some type of problem I expect Sony to fix it, ameliorate, or compensate me for the problem or I will look elsewhere next time I am in the market.

What I don't do is go into reflexive defense mode to try and soft-pedal the fact that they made a mistake because I am afraid that admitting there is a problem in some stupid tech product I just bought somehow reflects badly on me as an individual. I could not care less if someone wishes to post on the web that they think Sony products are crap, I couldn't care less if people post that they think that Sony is evil incarnate. Such criticism means nothing to me, it doesn't affect me nor does it in any way undermine my confidence in having made that purchase.

You could answer this post by saying that the Sony TT was a $3K POS and that the CEO of Sony was a neo-Nazi who kills puppies in his spare time it it wouldn't affect me in the least.

The same cannot be said for a large cadre of Apple fans.

Anytime - anytime - someone on the web posts even a minor criticism of Apple or their products, even ones that are valid and verified, there will inevitably follow a torrent of Apple fans logging on to attack the poster who dared to criticize Apple, to use emotion based arguments to "explain" how that person doesn't know what they are talking about, how Apple is the best at everything they do, and that said poster isn't even worthy of owning an Apple product.

Just read the comments section of any news article that discusses the iPhone 4 problems, CNN, NYtimes, Engadget, CNet. The responses from the Apple loyalists - and that is an apt description of - make them sound like a bunch of fundamentalist religionists. Apple themselves have even scrubbed comments critical of the iPhone 4 off of their forums.

If that isn't indicative of "hive" behavior then I don't know what is.

Oh, and I hope that Apple does fix the iPhone 4 before I am in the market in the next two months as it looks like otherwise it could be a front runner.