Too iPad, or not too iPad, that is the question!

Wow what a week of Apple fantasy and fury!! It’s been a long while since I sat down to blog about anything, yet this subject positively SCREAMS out for it!

So, after months of unbelievable science fiction worthy hype around the fabled tablet machine from Apple, that day has finally come. It comes in the form of the iPad, a rather unique take on a tablet computer. Where does one begin when one hasn’t even seen or touched one in person?

That, my friends is quite simple! One starts with the insane amount of web based, flittering and fuming, reactions to the embodiment of the hype. I am absolutely flabbergasted by the outpouring of lambasting and bashing that is happening online. I can’t recall there ever being such visceral reactions to a device…. oh wait yes I can! The comments and articles I have read in the past 24 hours are EXACTLY the same reactions that were to be found during, at least, the 24 hours following the announcement of another “destined to fail”, “no Flash” having, “typing on glass”, “no 3G!?!” having device known as the iPhone. You remember that thing that made it nowhere, changed nothing and left people feeling cheated?!

The iPad is, almost literally, no less game changing a device than the original iPhone, or iPod touch for that matter.

First Thoughts

Being human as the rest of you out there, I am certainly not immune to the hype, rumors and “analytical theory” that always creeps up around an Apple media event. What will it be? What will it do? What will it look like? what is it?? Naturally, being that I am an Apple Certified Consultant and Technician, I was immensely intrigued, if not ludicrously excited about the infamous tablet device that was possibly headed our way yesterday morning (Jan 27th, 2010). This thing was, according to all of the above mentioned sources, going to change the world! Yet I have learned one thing about Apple events from the past, which is to keep myself grounded in expectations. Yet the hype machine was in FULL blast leading up to the event yesterday here in San Francisco. They had hit an all time high of hype this time.

Now, when the event finally rolled around, I was practically foaming at the mouth in anticipation. I could not wait to see what would unfold. So I saddled up to my MacBook with a cup of coffee awaiting the “live-blogging” of the event to begin. (Honestly, what I do not get, AT ALL, is why there is no live video coverage of the events. In this day and age and with Apple’s media strength, why must we rely on people blogging with, if you are lucky, still images of the item(s) in question?) There I was all ready and eager to read away. So I fired up Safari and headed to my regular Mac news sites with several tabs open, one for each site. Even a couple of tabs open for the likes of the New York Times and SF Gate to chime in. I was READY!

What happened next was ultimately frustrating. They all seemed to be starting nice and smooth before the event, which was ok. Then the event began, and that’s when the troubles began across the board! This, if I am not mistaken, is 2010, is it not?? So my main question was, why is the entirety of the Mac news world having SUCH a difficult time getting this info out. What I noticed immediately is that a few of the heavy hitters were using the same “Live Event” web software to do their blogging, and it wasn’t working for ANY of them. The system completely choked. Then there were the less than immensely popular sites I check out that were using their own servers for the live blogging. The problem there was that the servers they were using could not handle the kind of volume that was needed for this event, and they too choked HARD. I found myself yelling at my screen, switching between Firefox and Safari to no avail, and switching between the three Macs in my home, again to no avail

The big savior of the morning for me was Engadget, those guys had it going smooth as silk with great images popping up at a furious rate. They did a hell of a job keeping up with the volume and the system barely hiccuped with the volume. So a huge thanks go out to the folks at Engadget for their coverage, although I could have done without their opinions on what was happening  on stage. Overall though I rather enjoyed their coverage.

The i—WHAT??

On to the big event, “the Latest creation”, The iPad. Hmmmmmmmm what a curious name they chose?! I was really digging the name iSlate that the rumor mills had made up for it, but no they went with the iPad. In itself it is not a horrible name, matter of fact it really seems to fit naturally with their naming convention of their portable devices. What struck me initially was that it was awfully close to iPod, which I inevitably called it several dozen time over the past 24 hours. iPod has been a part of our culture since 2001 and it’s name just rolls right off of your tongue without effort. Needless to say I am on the fence about the name.

Just to make a quick observation about the comments and a few articles I have read out there, I must say the following. One thing that never even came close to entering my mind was that the name iPad would be synonymous with a feminine hygiene product, the maxi pad. I mean I suppose I could see how maybe a woman would catch that before a tech hungry guy would. However, this has led to an enormous amount of comment posting that is, to say the least, in excusably immature. It really seems like 14-year-old boys have taken over the comment boards on most articles about this unique device. Could we maybe try to at least act like adults on these things?? Ahhh well, maybe I am just turning into an old man. I digress.

I waited for… THIS!?

All naming, commenting and hyping aside, the event finally rolls on smoothly. Upon first seeing the iPad I was, of course, not surprised at the sheer beauty of the design. The iPad is without a doubt stunningly gorgeous! Yet I could not help, initially, thinking that it definitely looked like a large iPod Touch with an awkward black bezel around the bright and beautiful screen. I thought, “Wow, what a waste of screen space?!” Mind you I only had still images of the thing just as the rest of your out there. Then I said to myself “just wait to see what it does.” So that I did, I waited for the specs of the device itself, I waited for demos of what the great Hype machines out there were touting, a mashup of Mac OS X Snow Leopard and the iPhone OS. I waited for mind altering software to be present on the iPad…. I waited!

The first half of the presentation was all about the Web Surfing, which was a nice thought. (Again there was no way to see how it actually worked by looking at still images on a blog.) Then Steve talked about the email, and I was rather pleased to see that they had truly redone the mail interface from the iPhone/iPod Touch. To me this was all very nice, yet I could only think “Yeah, OK we get it, It’s is a beautiful web experience. NEXT!!” My impatience was setting in strong at this point. And then the stills of Jobs lounging in a chair on stage demoing the iPad started rolling in. Cool but kind of odd. (Jobs looks like a skeleton, by the way, definitely to be expected considering his recent health problems. Yet he definitely had more color than he had the past few times we had seen him.)

Next Jobs introduced Scott Forstall to talk about the SDK (Software Developers Kit) and the App Store and what they meant to the iPad. I thought, “Now we are getting somewhere!” So the iPad could handle “nearly all apps on the App Store,” awesome, great news indeed. The stills, however, were showing the apps on this big black rectangle with the apps running in their native iPhone screen size…. kind of lame looking really. Although it did give you a sense of the size of the iPad itself. Then came the pixel doubling effect available to all iPhone apps, which make the apps fill the screen of the iPad, a nice touch indeed. That is until you see a text based app like FaceBook in the pixel double mode, the effect makes the text look exceedingly large and awkward. Mind you this is all still being seen by me through still images on a blog, but i got the idea.

Here I am 45 minutes into this event and all I could think was, ” I waited for… THIS!?” A big iPod Touch!?!?!? I also rolled through many of the sentiments expressed by the angry commenters out there. Such as “No Camera?!?!?!?”, “No Flash Support?!”, “Where is Snow Leopard on this Thing????” I was steaming myself up beyond belief. I thought, “this is no tablet computer at all, just a big ol honkin iPod Touch. WTF?? “This is the revolutionary tablet computer sent from the mouth of God to the hands of Steve Jobs??” HA!! what a waste, I thought.

The Game Changing Moment(s)

The next people to show up on stage were four App developers that had been asked to demo what they had been able to put together for the iPad in just 2.5 to 3 weeks. This was now starting to get interesting. First up was The New York Times, and what a lovely job they did on the App for the iPad. I have the iPhone app already, and many times throughout the day I will jump over to the site for news. Both of which are excellent experiences. This iPad app is already shaping up to be quite the over the top experience for readers. (Again I am still in still images on a blog here.)

Then came Gameloft, a company that has about 60 apps on the App store as it is for the iPhone/iPod Touch. Not only that but I own 6 of their titles on my iPhone and LOVE every one of them. These guys do typically derivative titles based on many popular games for the X-Box, PlayStation…etc. They do them so beautifully, that you end up forgetting you are on a tiny iPhone screen, and you become fully immersed in the worlds they create. Love them! So I was very excited to know that Apple featured them as an iPad developer. From the stills I saw, the game  looked SWEET! (Did I mention I only had stills on a blog to go by?? hahahahaha!)

Next up was the folks over at MLB.com to show the Baseball game they worked on for the iPod. I am not really a fan of sports in general, but I know enough about them to get by. That being said, their offering looked wonderful, incredibly well done. The graphics looked very nicely polished and the game play, I imagined was just as nice. They had even mentioned that you could get live playbacks of the game while still in the game itself. Very nice use of the screen real estate! Like I said though, I am no sports fan, so whatever.

Finally the people from the legendary gaming house EA sports popped up to demo their work in the form of a car racing game. Again, not a huge sports fan, but I looooove me some driving game. This one appears to be no slouch either. But that was my only opinion as you cannot tell what they, or any, of the developers mentioned here did with the interaction and general feel of the products with still images.

Jobs then popped back into the limelight with the introduction of iBooks and the iBook store. Simple idea, you download books from the iBook store right to the iPad and they instantly show up an the graphical bookshelf within a small time frame. Then you tap a book to open it up. There are definitely other options for book reading out there, like the Amazon Kindle and the Barnes and Noble Nook. Yet in my opinion they are severely limited and awkward things to use. Plus they are primarily in black and white only. From the images I saw the books look AMAZING in the iBook app. They actually look like a printed book right down to the pages and book bindings. When you turn the iPad to landscape mode you see both pages of the book in full glorious color. They have also included two buttons where you can skim chapters and also change the size of the font. A lovely design and a great way to read a book!

What came next was what really shined through as making this iPad stand apart from the iPhone/iPod Touch. Phil Schiller took the stage to talk about an Apple App worked on specifically for the iPad, iWork. I personally find the suite of programs indispensable on the Mac. I do all of my business writings and documenting with it. I find that it is a vastly greater user experience than the dominant, only because 95% off all businesses use it and are afraid of moving away from it, MS Office. On the Mac, in my not-s0-humble-opinion, iWork is the only way to go for word processing, spreadsheets and presentations. Though I will admit that it not really suitable for everyone’s needs.

Phil told us that the iWork team completely redesigned the entire suite specifically for the iPad, and boy did they ever! From what I could tell at that point yesterday, Apple’s team had truly outdone themselves! The suite looked amazing and supposedly worked as smooth as you could ever imagine with the touchscreen of the iPad. This suite, to me, was what made the iPad more of a workhorse than the iPhone/iPod Touch. Bravo!! Finally!!

The Specs

Naturally, as a Mac Tech and Consultant I was ever so excite to hear about the innards of the iPad. I must say that I was a bit disappointed at how little time they spent talking about the actual specs on stage. The website has much greater detail if you are into that sort of thing, and I am! What Jobs did say though was rather intriguing. He casually said that the chip that makes the iPad move was “our own custom silicone” and barely touched on what that means. What it means, though, is that early last year Apple acquired a company called PA semi, which made processors, and called it their own. Thus the A4 Apple 1ghz chip was born, and it’s the heart of the iPad. It handles the processing, the graphics, the Wi-Fi and the accelerometer all in one little chip. Quite impressive I would say.

The screen is a 9.7″ capacitive touch surface, backed by LED and ISP technology. That means that it is less power hungry, brighter and has a a very wide viewing angle. The trade off on the shape of the iPad is that instead of a 16:9 aspect ratio (what you might find on your flat-screen TV), they went with a 4:3 aspect ratio (what you would find on all older TVs). I am not sure that is a bad thing, otherwise Apple would have had to make the iPad a much more awkward device to hold and use. The glass they went with is similar to that of the iPhone 3GS in that it is oleo-phobic, meaning it repels oils on our fingers and faces making it easier to clean.

The iPad will ship in six different flavors. First there are three sizes of storage, 16gb, 32gb and 64gb. You can get these three sizes with two different options either with Wi-Fi only or with Wi-Fi and 3g built in. nice enough options, yet I would have liked to see a built in SD card slot to expand the storage options. However, we all use iPhones/iPod Touches with the same, or smaller amount of storage built in and that suits most of us just fine. Especially considering that most Apps are very small in size. Media that we put on the devices are what consume the most amount of space.

The more interesting and thoroughly exciting part of the announced specs was without a doubt, the PRICE!! Most “analysts”, as well as the press were expecting it to be priced at $1000, as did I. Then Steve drops the entry price of $499!!!!! This, of course is for the 16gb option with Wi-Fi only, still a fantastic price indeed! Then if you want to add 3G to the iPad you simply tack on $130 to each model. The thing about the 3G is that the service here in the US will be handled by…  wait for it… you guessed it Verizon, shoot actually it’s AT&T. Which you may know from my blog post, I am NO fan of. Although I must admit that the 3g here in SF has definitely improved since my posting about them. The two things that make being tied to AT&T again are the prices ($14.99 a month for 250mb, or the most likely more popular choice of unlimited data at $29.99 a month. Verizon charges a minimum of $50 a month for there 500mb a month plan, so it’s quite a deal.). The other, and perhaps more phenomenal thing is that there is NO contract attached to this offer. That means, come and go as you please, or if Apple ever gives other carriers the option to carry their devices you can switch without termination fees. That is HUGE for AT&T!!

My really big disappointment regarding the iPad is the lack of connectivity. The only connection points are the headphone jack and the standard iPhone Dock. Which limits things quite a bit. As a technician that means the device really fails for me in my work. Yet it does keep things much more simple for the user. So it’s a trade off that I am willing to accept. I mean what can DandyMac do about it anyway??

Apple also talked a bit about the accessories they will offer, they have a simple dock for it ($29). They also have a much more appealing dock ready to go for it, this one has a full keyboard fused to the dock and has some special function buttons related to the iPad itself ($79). The more interesting offers to me are for connecting a digital camera (do we really need to say digital before camera any longer?) or an SD card, the devices plud directly into the dock connector and therefore protrude from the bottom of the iPad. I am uncertain whether or not Apple has decided to allow the SD card reader to allow for extra storage for the iPad or not, would be REALLY sweet if they did. (The pair of connectors sell for $29 combined). Also Apple is offering a case designed by them which not only acts as a case, but it also doubles as a stand for the iPad. Meaning that you can stand it up in portrait mode by folding the case back and you can then put it in landscape mode too for easier typing ($39). I would imagine the case will most likely not do that well when the third party accessories start pouring out of the woodwork. Yet I still think it’s a nicely designed case.

The Real Mental Shift

Now that you have labored your way through my immense postings. I must say that at first I was a bit disappointed in general with the iPad, as I and thousands of others have said, it seemed like a Huge iPod Touch. But then last night I decided to check out the QuickTime video Apple posted of the event. I spent the afternoon contemplating what they had released, back and forth between “it’s cool!”, and “what the hell would I do with it?” WOW!! You really cannot get a good idea of what the iPad does until you watch this video, the stills are nice but NOTHING like watching it in action! (Not to mention what it must be like to actually hold one and use it!!)

The video shows a GORGEOUS piece of work, I mean it is large and polished looking, and it fits in with their design motif on the Macs. Suuuuuper thin (0.5″ thin), weighing in at 1.5 lbs, with a LARGE 9.7″ screen that is BRIGHT! When you watch Jobs surf the web, although still a bit odd, you really see what they mean by “the best web experience.” It is a full web browser with beautifully designed “modal” drop-down and pop-up windows for bookmarks and the like. It moves FAST and smooth as well, proving that Apple’s A4 1ghz chip really can SCREAM!

Then he shows of email, AMAZING design again!! It’s what you would want your iPhone to look like when checking and writing emails. Matter of fact, I am now wishing that OS X Mail looked like email does on the iPad. I did not catch whether it has a unified inbox function (for more than one email account), but what I saw was glorious! I would buy the iPad based on that fact alone. Yet it kept becoming more and more amazing as I watched the video.

Next up was the other two communication tools we rely on so dearly, Calendar and Address Book. They have completely redesigned both apps to look nothing short of stunning. Almost as though you have actual physical books right in the device shielded under glass for protecting their glory. You get Calendar views of not only daily, weekly and monthly views like we are all too familiar with (frustratingly so for some of you out there), you can also have your daily schedule on one “page” while having the weekly or monthly view on the opposite page. Something MANY of my clients dream of having on their Macs at work or home. It looks to be a far more functional version of the Calendar App as well. Address Book has garnished the same respect and overhaul as well. Though it was not really showed as much, so the features are a bit more uncertain at this point.

Then the Apps portion I talked of earlier in my postings came around. Forstall is not my favorite presenter, but he does OK in this event. The real stars were the developers I had mentioned earlier as well, The New York Times, Gameloft, MLB.com and EA sports. These guys did highly impressive work in a VERY limited amount of time. Most impressive to me were the Apps from The New York Times and Gameloft, these guys really leveraged the technology of the iPad to a beautiful height. The Times app really looks like their print edition, right down to the grain of the paper. Plus, forget Flash kids, they have embedded video into the pages as though it were printed like that, the videos look wonderful!! Navigation was rather impressive as well. I will own that app when it hits, no doubt in my mind.

Gameloft solved the obvious problem of playing a game in a device of that size with that wide black bezel between your hand and the screen. (The iPod Touch and the iPhone both have screens that go to the edge of the devices so you have easy access to the screen) There first solution was for on-screen controls, many games out there utilize this functionality as the means to move about the environment, pick things up, drop things, jump, choose weapons or tools, fire weapons…etc. There answer was to allow the user the option of placing those controls wherever is most comfortable for them, a very nice touch (pun intended). Next up they came up with a method for dealing with multiple objects, in the game they showed it helps you deal with many enemies at once, by drawing a circle with your finger around the enemies and then the guns take over and take out all of the enemies at once. GO GAMELOFT!!

Now for the iBook App, what a beautifully designed App for reading! It sounded nice during the live bloggin, but it is a different experience to see it in action. The books look beautiful, just as they did in the stills. But what you don’t get from the blogging is the action of the app. You can tap either side of the book to “turn” the page or you can use a finger to, as fast as you like, flip through the pages. It is incredibly elegantly done. You can also, with the tap of a button, change the font size or even navigate through chapters. Kindle be damned people, this is a close to the real thing as you can get. The iBook store is laid out much like iTunes and you can get a book to the phone FAST, depending on your connection speed of course.

I could go on for days here. iWork is a completely different beast when you watch the video as opposed to the blogging. They did a simply SUPERB job of completely redesigning the suite for the iPad. Really, this is reason enough for me to pick an iPad up. I am blown away by the design and usability of this old friend of mine, iWork!! My fingers are aching over here…

SOOOOOOO

In conclusion (I know, FINALLY!! hahahaha!), I have done a 180 degree turn on my thoughts of the iPad, simply by watching the video.

These are my caveats with the people out there complaining at any given chance:

1. The non-existent camera. This device to me does not at all call for a camera. While I suppose I could see the benefit for say video chats, I do not see how this could be effectively implemented. The size of it and the way one has to hold it would make for some very shaky video chats. Also to use it as a still camera would be a nightmare. Think of how hard it is to hold the iPhone camera steady to get a clean shot. As an Amateur/Pro photographer I will always prefer an actual camera for that task.

2. No multitasking. Wow, where to start. First off you CAN multitask with Apple’s own Apps. Second, Do you really want to bog down a device by allowing many apps to run at once?? There are reasons behind Apple’s choice to not include multitasking on the iPhone/iPod Touch and now the iPad, that reason is… PERFORMANCE!! I could understand if it took sooooo painfully long for an App to quit or launch, but that is just not the case. The Apps are light, responsive and FAST. Not a deal breaker in my opinion. Until the technology of multiple processors can happen in these small devices, there is no point in enabling multitasking. Get over it or Move On!

3. Read or Watch the event. Nowhere is it stated that the iPad would REPLACE your laptop or your iPhone. As a matter of fact in the first five minutes Jobs explains (not to mention, he spelled it out literally in black and white!) EXACTLY what the iPad is designed for:

BROWSING

EMAIL

PHOTOS

MUSIC

VIDEO

GAMES

EBOOKS

People please, THINK BEFORE YOU POST!!

The iPad is a huge leap in personal communications and internet technology. While it does have an obvious big brother to the iPod Touch feel about it, it seems to me after much personal deliberation, that once people get their hands on it (just like with the iPhone) they will no doubt WANT one of them for themselves.

Also, If you are basing what you feel about the iPad on what you read yesterday during the announcement, please take some time to watch the quicktime video of the event. It really really changes your perspective about it. If you listen to what Jobs says about what the device is intended to do, the iPad is SPOT ON!! I cannot wait to give it a shot! I will doubtlessly, and cannot wait to, end up owning the iPad!!

Oh, and p.s.: Flash is a serious resource drain! What really needs to happen is that Adobe needs to pull there collective heads out of their, let’s say, backsides and rethink that monster to make it more friendly for mobile devices. Then, and only then, do I see Apple adopting that ancient technology. Granted it is used all too often on many websites, but that is no excuse for poor design laziness on Adobe’s part.

As a side note, please notice that Firefox mobile has removed flash support as well.

WAKE UP ADOBE!! You guys are resting on your laurels, which always ends up hurting more then helping.

to the commenters blaming Apple, if you want a less slick and slower device, then go with Android (not that there is anything at all wrong with Android, I am actually a fan. But it does really slow the speed of web use on those devices dramatically. Apple’s goal is to have the best user experience possible, period. They are not willing to compromise speed, battery life and ease of use for the ability to run Flash based web technology. To be honest, neither am I. The real future should indeed be an implementation of HTML5, already in use by Apple, Google and You tube… It’s time for a change kids. Not to be too corny but, Yes We CAN!!

Both Developers and Users, take control of what you want!! Viva HTML5!!

Long Live the iPad!!

Palm Pre-meditated

Pre-amble

Oh my, Apple finally up and did it! With the release of the iTunes update today, as expected, the Palm Pre is no longer able to sync with iTunes. At the very same time they managed to unleash yet another round of free press! Not to mention a torrent of very upset Pre owners brash, and often completely unsubstantiated comments. It’s a truly bizarre thing to me that we seem to lose a part of our rational minds when things that are expected to occur actually happen. Such is the case with the Palm Pre and iTunes syncing break.

I mean honestly, what freaks me out the most when I read the comments to articles about the break in syncing the Pre with iTunes, is that Palm has somehow become “the Victim” in this scenario?! Well let’s just have a look at the plain facts in this case.

Pre-conceived

First off there is Apple, a company who has been around for a long time in the underdog category of personal computing. They finally stumbled upon a great winning formula with the iPod and it’s software companion, iTunes. There had been other mp3 players before the iPod, and certainly after. The iPod then became a huge success for it’s ease of use, as well as for its fantastic sync manager iTunes. The formula worked so well that other companies wanted a piece. So Apple developed a means for third party MP3 players to sync with iTunes, called an API (Application Programming Interface) for software/hardware developers. The API is accessible via licensing from Apple. Since then Apple has been making improvements to iTunes, iPods and now iPhones. They make these improvements via software updates available for all, should you choose to do so.

Also as a huge bonus, Apple fought the recoding industry giants to sell music without DRM (Digital Rights Management) protection. They now sell all of their music without DRM, meaning that you as the consumer can now play the music through any device that supports the AAC format. (Which the iTunes Store sells all music as these days.)

Now let’s talk a bit about Palm. Palm had a huge success in the 90’s with their Palm Pilots, and have grown to provide high quality smartphones for business people. They have also typically provided their own proprietary software for Mac and PC users to manage syncing data between Palm Pilots/smartphones and your computer. As a consultant and technician I can safely say that this is an area where Palm did not do so well. The software was usually awkward, bloated and clunky, and often did not work anyway. Yet they have typically well designed hardware.

These days, Palm is not doing so well as a business. They needed a hit bad, as their smartphone sales have dropped steadily since the onslaught of RIM’s Blackberrys and of course the iPhone. So what did they do? They hired a guy, who worked with Apple for some 15 years, to help them design an “iPhone Killer”. The Pre was the device that Palm came up with. Now, the Pre has some great features in its OS that the iPhone is glaringly missing (multi-tasking, Synergy…etc.). They touted seamless syncing with iTunes right out of the box, which would have been a good move for them had they chosen to use the API that Apple licenses. The thing that struck me, and most anyone else who noticed, as a very odd choice, is that they chose to be incredibly sneaky about it. They made the decision to put in some software that would fool iTunes into believing that the Pre was an iPod. The Pre would actually show in iTunes as an iPod?!?! Really?? Yes, really.

Un-Pre-pared

Really, I am not writing a blog about whether Apple or Palm have a better product. Nor am I writing about which company is a bigger corporate monster. What I am actually compelled to write about is the comments on articles that I read, and how off point and uninformed most of the comments are. Today I read comments about the Pre no longer being able to sync with iTunes, so these commenters are fresh on my mind.

I am certain that it was an awful feeling to realize that they could no longer sync their iTunes with their beloved Pre. Matter of fact, had I not read a stitch about the Pre and iTunes when it was released –which, considering the amount of press coverage on the topic before the pre was released, is quite an accomplishment in itself– I would have been just as pissed and may have posted comments about it today too. The difference is that I would have maybe poked around, on the very same internet I am putting posts on, just a bit for some facts first.

Which, I am sad to say, is mostly just not the case for a great majority of the posts I read this afternoon. I believe that if the majority of posters today had just done a tiny bit of fact checking before posting, they would have realized that Palm is not the victim in this case. Palm is in fact the culprit behind promising you that your Pre would sync seamlessly with iTunes. It was not Apple saying that it would sync with iTunes. You should all be flooding Palm with complaints, not posting factually incorrect comments online. Also urge them to provide you with the means to sync your Pre with your music, LEGALLY! After all, by posting such ill-Pre-pared comments, you are not helping your cause at all. You are only serving to make yourself look bad.

R.I.F. (Reading Is Fundamental)

UPDATE!

So it seems that Palm is back at it again. Today they relased webOS 1.1 software for the Pre. Which, among many bug fixes, enable “seamless syncing with iTunes” once again. Do these guys really not think that Apple is already working on braking that hack too? Do they not believe that Apple’s legal team will pounce on them?

Well, I for one, believe that Apple HAS to sue them already. They are really starting to look soft by allowing yet another hack to enable third-party unauthorized syncing with iTunes. Seriously, Palm, get it together! why not simply build your own software for syncing with computers?

This is all just a bit silly, I must say.

iFoniness

Ok, let me start this off by stating that this is a BLOG, meaning that this is article of opinion with facts. That is to say that this is not reporting in any way. Which is really what I am writing about here. This article, or post rather, is about a couple of different thoughts regarding the state of journalism in today’s ever increasing online society. Being that I am a huge Apple fan, consultant and technician I am focusing on the current barrage of rumors, ‘reports’ and comparisons surrounding the iPhone.

Obviously I am a gigantic fan of the iPhone, and an avid user of it as well. I am still using an original 4gb version of the phone, and I have been holding off upgrading until the next generation of the device is released. I seriously hope that the rumors out there about the release hitting during next week’s WWDC. I mean I REALLY want it to happen, as my screen has been cracked for nearly a year now. On a positive note about he crack, it hasn’t affected the performance or sensitivity of the phone. Which is a testament to the quality of the build!

The Hype Machines:

Now, let’s talk a bit about the rumor mill and ‘analysts’ predictions. I will first admit that I do enjoy speculating about the features, changes, and release date of desired Apple products. However since the release of ‘the Jesus phone’, things have just escalated FAR out of control. Seriously, I am half expecting to hear that the next phone will make me breakfast, cure cancer and promote world peace. As I said though, I enjoy a fair amount of the rumors, but can we give it a rest already? Nobody REALLY knows what will or will not be released except for Apple themselves, or anyone that Apple has legally bound by full NDA.

Next, and definitely far more annoying, are the analysts out there. Can you even believe that they get paid to make predictions?? I certainly cannot. I can only liken their type to that of your garden variety Palm Reader. Normally I would have no problem with what they do as analysts. The main problem I have is how their BS affects the general population, the companies who’s products they are analyzing, and the overall economy! These guys are sincerely screwing up the country in general, let alone technology.

The rumor mills and the analysts aside, what has been under my skin lately is the so called Press and the bloggers that work for them. This to me is the number one problem in our country today: The press is supposed to be comprised of people that have been educated in the art of journalism, people that are impartial and non-biased, people who’s only desire is to inform the public of actual facts without slant. To me, anything less should only be considered opinion, and should be treated as nothing more. This is so very very far from the kind of ‘reporting’ that we are all exposed to in these online times. ( Speaking of the times, a prime example of the misleading and wrongful reporting I am writing about here can be found in today’s New York Times web site here. It’s not so much the full article that I have an issue with as much as the title itself. The title is contradicted several times on the first page alone.)

Blogging… what can be said, as I am (reluctantly) one myself? My blogging is primarily about Mac tips, thoughts and opinions based on personal experience as a consultant and technician. I would in no way consider myself to be a reporter in anyway, shape or form. This is where my problem comes in with blogging, it is not reporting. Knowing that it not reporting, why is it that bloggers are picked up by major journalistic institutions? Why do blogs make the headlines of the NY times?? This practice is incredibly misleading and wrong. I am not opposed to people making a living off of blogging, matter of fact I am all for it. But let’s keep blogs in their own section of the newspapers, as newspapers would for articles about food: in a specific section of your preferred news source. If I want to read articles about technology, I will go to the technology section of my preferred source. Can we stop putting blogs in with the headlines already??

Devise-ive

What I really want to write about is the iPhone and it’s competition, which is dominating almost every technology news source I rely on. More specifically I want to write a bit about the upcoming release of the Palm Pre. I am not trying to say here that the Pre is an inadequate device at all. But the press’ hype machine is in FULL gear over this thing. Some of the major players in technology review and reporting are absolutely making themselves look ridiculous out there over this thing. For example, David Pogue’s review of the Pre is almost silly, and unfortunately not fully factual (not his fault really). I find his review of the Pre to be a bit too gushing, just as I felt his review of the original iPhone was. Almost as though he were slipped and extra grand to get the positive word out. It’s sad because I really dig his style in general.

The one common piece that all smartphones seem to share at this moment is the design factor. Almost every single phone manufacturer now has a rectangular, large touch-surface, large screened phone. Where did this design factor come into play? From a company that had no previous experience in developing phones at all, Apple. Since the iPhone was released it has completely flipped the game on a stale industry. To date, there has not been one company out there that has managed to even come close to having the strong impact on the phone industry that Apple has had. We all know that copying is the most sincere form of flattery, right? So that makes Apple one seemingly endlessly flattered company by all of the phone industry. I personally would have hoped that Apple would have spurned innovation more than it did copying.

As far as the Pre is concerned, from what I can tell it may be the closest thing to competition that the iPhone has out there. I am certain that Palm has a quality piece of software on their hands with the Pre. They have been in the phone game for quite some time and most people that use their phones love them. I think, once again, that the design of the phone itself is yet another iPhone wannabe, aside from the slide out physical keyboard that is. (what’s up with no on-screen keyboard? You have to slide out a cramped keyboard every-time you want to type anything?)

I believe that the real star of the Pre is it’s webOS. From all of the reviews out there I have read it sounds like they have a winner on their hands, for about three more days that is. No seriously though, I do like the ‘cards’ idea. ‘Cards’ give you the ability to run several apps at once and flip through them with a swipe of your finger, which enables more efficient multi-tasking. Definitely a great idea. however, sadly, they are just too late. I have read several (too many) reviews of the Pre and all of them are touting this feature as “unparalleled”. Yes, it is currently unparalleled. Again, for only three more days, which is when iPhone OS 3.0 is due on the scene.

One thing about all of the reviews that baffles me is that not one of them mentions the fact that, a few months ago, Apple had a special developer’s event where they announced iPhone OS 3.0. During this special event they talked about these “unparalleled” features (enhanced multi-tasking and smart notifications) that reviewers are saying the Pre has, plus another 98 new features the iPhone will have. Apple has addressed making multi-tasking much more efficient by allowing apps to run in the “background” from servers instead of using up all the resources of the iPhone itself. Meaning that the iPhone will have more ram and processor power available to the task at hand, thereby making the iPhone more powerful and business friendly. Finally we will even see push notifications as promised at last years WWDC.

The absolute most suspicious thing I have heard thus far about the Pre is it’s “integration” with iTunes. We have all come to find out, which should really have palm worried, that this “integration” is nothing more then a hack of iTunes code that makes iTunes see the Pre as an iPod. This is so very sketchy. Has Palm not heard of licensing??? I do believe that they will hear a lot about licensing from Apple’s legal team in the near future. They will also, doubtless, hear about changing code to block any Palm device from syncing with iTunes in the very near future. To me this is the move that may ultimately sync, oops I mean sink a company that is very close to going under as it stands. One would think that a company facing bankruptcy might have been much more careful in making certain that they were completely legit.

Finishing touch

I am not one to condemn people for using their own judgement and choosing to buy any of the other smartphones out there over the iPhone. Matter of fact I give people who go against the grain huge respect for doing so. (I mean isn’t that how Apple came to be?) I would just hope that you are making your decisions based on facts and research and not from the great Hype Machine that is ever so ingrained in our daily lives.

Congrats for making it all the way to the end of this LONG blog!