if you ask me.. they do it for the attention. it's easy to like apple products. lots of people do. you're just one of the crowd. publish an article with the headline "the ipad is amazing!" and who cares? no one. you're one in a few hundred of similar articles.
now. say you hate the ipad. jobs is the devil. apple is rotten. there you go. now you can sell headlines. "what? someone doesn't like apple?" ever notice that these articles seem to make more news because of their headline than their actual content? news segments on tv cause more of a stir when they're trashing apple than praising them. the trolls get a lot more attention for coming on here and talking trash than they do when they say something positive. we all give them some attention they crave when we tell them to go away or try and counter their pointless arguments. bloggers do it for the page views. page views translate into ad hits. ad hits translate into cash in their pocket.
i don't have a problem with people disagreeing with apple, microsoft, or any other company. i've been in the it business almost 40 years. no company is perfect. they all have their flaws. companies rise (Apple right now) and companies fall (where is IBM these days?). life goes on. but if you're going to criticize, and you want to be taken seriously, do it rationally, have a point to say, and be prepared to back up your arguments with facts. saying "i hate apple because steve jobs sucks!" is just silly and you look like a fool. saying "apple only has 28% of the mobile phone share and rim has 35%, rim is more popular!" and
attributing your source, at least then we know why you have the opinion you do and that you've done some relevant research. i may not agree with your point of view, but i'll respect it and respect you.