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I’m not even sure what people see in the iPad… It’s really just a big iPod with no Flash and no camera… Why on earth would Apple not allow people to use Flash on their product? Apple is overrated. I agree they look great, but they are trying to be something that they are not : the next generation of electronic devices. They are secluding their product from other markets.

iPod touch is a fantastic little handheld computer, so it’s no bad thing if iPad is a scaled up version of that. In fact, it’s a lot more than the sum of it’s parts.

It’s easy to resent Apple and a part of me always will. However, Apple is staggeringly successful on merit, whereas Microsoft, for example, is staggering successful by default. There’s a big difference.

Let’s wait and see what happens…

I wouldn’t say “by default”.  I’d say they are successful on the merits of people and products that the current management has had nothing to do with.

Microsoft floats on the profits Windows, Office, and their Server products.  Since Gates left they can’t seem to work together properly to allow them to innovate or attack a new segment efficiently like they used to.

Look at Windows Mobile. They finally went for broke with something fresh and clean and actually exciting.  But it took how long for that to happen while Apple, Google, and even Palm managed to do exciting things.  Microsoft now has what looks like a great entry to the Smart Phone OS market but they are a year or two late to the party.

Jamie

I wouldn’t say “by default”.  I’d say they are successful on the merits of people and products that the current management has had nothing to do with.

Fair point, but on the other hand MS has been burdened by a catalog of bad decisions from the Gates era: the Internet took some time to show up on their radar; IE getting its claws buried deep into the OS; long term security faults shot through the Windows DNA; DLLs(!?!); really bad mobile OS? I’m no expert, so there must be plenty of better examples than this.

I don’t really agree on all of those.  IE and Windows Mobile especially.  For their time both of those were actually quite good products.  The problem is that the stagnated.  But when IE 6 was released it actually had better and more standards based Javascript and CSS than any of the competition.  That it then never got better for 8 years is where the problem happened.  I don’t have inside information on why that was the case but my guess is that it was right around the same time that Gates seems to have lost his interest in continuing to run the company.

Why he then gave the lead to Balmer we may never know but that definitely signaled the beginning of the end.

Jamie

I don’t really agree on all of those.  IE and Windows Mobile especially.  For their time both of those were actually quite good products.  The problem is that the stagnated.  But when IE 6 was released it actually had better and more standards based Javascript and CSS than any of the competition.  That it then never got better for 8 years is where the problem happened.  I don’t have inside information on why that was the case but my guess is that it was right around the same time that Gates seems to have lost his interest in continuing to run the company.

Why he then gave the lead to Balmer we may never know but that definitely signaled the beginning of the end.

Jamie

I agree that IE6 was quite good at the time and to say the lack of innovation between IE6 and 8 was bad, really is an understatement. My point is that architecturally, IE was buried deep into the OS and that caused major problems for years to come and we are still suffering from the fallout as many corporates are still unable to upgrade without presenting themselves with a major technical nightmare.

Windows mobile has always been awful but there wasn’t anything significantly better to put it into perspective, until the iPhone turned up. WinPho7 looks really promising, so if Ballmer had anything to do with that, he might have redeemed himself…

I think it will be a great tool for showcasing general design, photography and websites to clients. It’s certainly going to offer a better experience than showing your work on a laptop.

How is it going to offer a better experience than showing your work on a laptop?

The Flash argument is really getting old.

And that makes it less valid how?

Until Adobe manages to get it running on a smart phone with the kind of performance and stability necessary the argument is moot.

Nah, I don’t think this is an engineering decision. It’s marketing and politically motivated.

Exactly. I’m surprised that more don’t understand that benefit. That is the whole point of why we use a computer in the first place. To get things done. My usage of my MacBook dropped like a rock after I bought an iPhone. Why? More mobility. More apps better suited for the mobility.

That’s all fine and dandy, but the point is it could have been so much more to more people. Can it replace my Notebook on business trips? No, for lack of a camera. Otherwise it’d be ideal, for light text processing, presentations, email… you get the idea. At least one USB slot would’ve been nice, too.

Exactly. I’m surprised that more don’t understand that benefit. That is the whole point of why we use a computer in the first place. To get things done. My usage of my MacBook dropped like a rock after I bought an iPhone. Why? More mobility. More apps better suited for the mobility.

That’s all fine and dandy, but the point is it could have been so much more to more people. Can it replace my Notebook on business trips? No, for lack of a camera. Otherwise it’d be ideal, for light text processing, presentations, email… you get the idea. At least one USB slot would’ve been nice, too.

It will get a camera, don’t worry.

What are you going to plug into the USB port?

It will get a camera, don’t worry.

I’m not worried, I know it will 😊

What are you going to plug into the USB port?

Digital camera, USB stick, external HDD, cellphone, external keyboard ...

It will get a camera, don’t worry.

I’m not worried, I know it will 😊

What are you going to plug into the USB port?

Digital camera, USB stick, external HDD, cellphone, external keyboard ...

There’s an attachment for the camera and the USB stick. Why the HDD? Cloud is the future. The cellphone should be the iPhone and there’s a connector for that. The keyboard should be bluetooth.

I’m not saying those are the right solutions, but guaranteed SJ thought of all of those.

There’s an attachment for the camera and the USB stick.

I know. I just wished there wasn’t another proprietary adapter to carry.

The cellphone should be the iPhone and there’s a connector for that. The keyboard should be bluetooth.

I like choices. That said, yes, BT would probably work for the last two cases.

I’m not saying those are the right solutions, but guaranteed SJ thought of all of those.

Yeah, and chose to disregard them 😊 Makes me want to go out and buy one right away…

I’m not saying those are the right solutions, but guaranteed SJ thought of all of those.

Yeah, and chose to disregard them 😊 Makes me want to go out and buy one right away…

I guess you are not the target consumer then.

The Flash argument is really getting old.

And that makes it less valid how?

Until Adobe manages to get it running on a smart phone with the kind of performance and stability necessary the argument is moot.

Nah, I don’t think this is an engineering decision. It’s marketing and politically motivated.

It makes it less valid because for all of the whining everyone does I’ve yet to see any phone based solution proven to be worth the drawbacks.  In most cases I’ve seen a Flash implementation that brings the phone to a crawl.  Adobe’s demo on the Nexus One was the first time I saw an almost acceptable frame rate.  And it was a demo of a product that doesn’t exist yet (it won’t launch on any android phones in that form for some time still).  Likewise it doesn’t answer the stability issues yet.  Only prolonged use can do that, but experience tells me the current Adobe will not solve that problem.

I also didn’t say it wasn’t maybe marketing/politically motivated.  Knowing Steve Jobs it probably is to some degree.  But I did mean, and stand by it, that until Adobe can prove that he’s wrong about their performance and stability issues than there’s no point in arguing for it.  In it’s current forms I simply don’t want Flash on my iPhone and won’t until the situation is drastically changed.

I mentioning that many groups politically motivated to make Flash work (and thus differentiate themselves from Apple) have found that they can’t do so with acceptable performance.

Whatever the case you obviously aren’t someone who feels the same way as me on this so I’ll leave the discussion now I think.

Jamie

I guess you are not the target consumer then.

Sometimes we pundit and gadget watchers tend to forget that the universe does not revolve around our perspective of the gadget world.

Apple is a business, not a personal technology valet who caters to our every gadget feature whim. Apple’s view of the world is not necessarily the same view as many of us who follow what they do (and buy some of their products). Apple’s success at creating and selling products over the past 10 years would seem to indicate that there are plenty of customers who like their products and stand in line to buy them (even those which we pick apart with ridiculous precision—What? No floppy disk? That’s crazy. What? No USB? That’s dumb. What? No camera? What? It doesn’t even run Windows!).

I once worked for a miserable, pathetic, slimy, sleezy boss who seemed to loathe his employees and his customers. But his company made money. It’s difficult to tell someone they’re doing it all wrong when the end result is a perch high up on the Plenty ‘O Profit Tree™.

So, why no user facing video camera on the iPhone or iPad? After all, Apple has iChat for audio and video. Skype audio and video is immensely popular. Apple must be stupid not to include such obvious features. What were they thinking?

Maybe, just maybe, they’re thinking ahead. You know, ‘skating to where the puck will be, not to where it was.’ Does anyone think that AT&T or other cell phone networks have enough capacity to handle millions of customers using bandwidth intensive video chat on their smart phones? Not today, obviously. Maybe next year.

It should be obvious to most Apple watchers that the company is constantly pushing the envelope of what is considered acceptable. We may not agree with some of their decisions today, but if history is a good guide, a few years from now we may see the wisdom in the light of a different day.

As noted, my iPhone has cut down the usage of my MacBook substantially. Will an iPad replace some of what I do on my iMac?