They saw the Mac as reassuring, and enjoyed the feeling that they could turn away from rules and commands and get to know the computer through tinkering and experimentation. And, from what I remember, Apple was considered more user-friendly than IBM because of its good interface. Others objected to this. Turkle uses transparency and opacity to make points about modernism vs. postmodernism. Modernism being the culture of calculation, canalization, and rules.
Postmodernism is surface over depth, simulation over the real, play over seriousness.
Now, with the introduction of Microsoft Windows in 1985, the modern and postmodern aesthetics of computing became curiously entwined, using the MS-DOS operating system some feel of the Mac interface. Virtual reality is simulated reality. Simulated by rapidly updating images for your eyes so that when you move your head, you feel like you are making the changes you are seeing. The idea of VR is the sense of being somewhere when you re not, or making your eye believe you are somewhere else. By mimicking these cues, the eye could be fooled.