Tech Inertia

Apple goes all 'Deckard'...
- 21 Oct 2011
- 0 Responses
- views
- iPad Android Google Steve Jobs iPhone
- Edit
- Delete
- Tags
- Autopost
I'm going to destroy Android...

An early sneak peek of Walter Isaacon's Steve Jobs biography, let's slip the reasoning behind Apple recent moves to sue Samsung and others.

"I will spend my last dying breath if I need to, and I will spend every penny of Apple's $40 billion in the bank, to right this wrong," Jobs said. "I'm going to destroy Android, because it's a stolen product. I'm willing to go thermonuclear war on this."

That 'wrong' clearly being allowing Eric Schmidt on the board at all.

It's well documented that Google did a 90 degree turn when then first saw the iPhone. Their phones up until that point were Blackberry clones, after the iPhone shook up the industry, their phones discarded the keyboard, became multi-touch capable and basically, ripped off the iPhone.

Now, lots of people argue that this 'ripping off' is hogwash and there are numerous viewpoints that support and go against that fact.

One thing that seems to have been forgotten, is that whilst Eric Schmidt was on the board at Apple, they hid the iPad's development from him.

This is very significant.

Why? Well it's also well known that Google have had a lot of trouble in re-imagining the Android OS for a tablet form-factor - it just wasn't built from the start with a tablet in mind. It has had to be hacked to get it there - and it shows.

To me, this points towards the fact that the Android OS was built to be a phone OS, not a mobile OS that could be re-scaled easily.

The reason for this is because when Eric Schmidt took the iPhone to Google and said "this is the future - copy it", they copied what they saw - a phone, not understanding the underlying construction to be scaled at some point into a tablet.

That's because Eric didn't know the tablet existed.
- Tweet
iOSification of the Mac...
- 18 Oct 2011
- 0 Responses
- views
- Mac Mac OS X Mac market share iOSification iPhone
- Edit
- Delete
- Tags
- Autopost
I haven't upgraded to Lion yet.

At work I have a very complicated set up, ranging from PPC G4's (yes G4's - still working as print servers), through to 10+ PPC G5 main workstations (running Leopard) and a new Xeon MacPro running Snow Leopard Server.

At home, I have a very well used and happy 2010 iMac (Pre-Thunderbolt), running Snow Leopard.

I haven't upgraded to Lion mainly because of software - Lion doesn't run Rosetta, so a few pieces of software are currently a dead-end.

What has forced encouraged me to upgrade is iCloud.

I want/need iCloud, but seeing as MobileMe tied together work and home systems, a lot is going to have to be rethought.

I'm not exactly happy, but they are the cards we've been dealt - and I 'aint moving to Windows.

All that upheaval is for another post however, this post is about what has happened to the Mac OS - what's been called, iOSification.

A lot of what is deemed bad about Lion is to do with the iOS UI elements that have infiltrated the Mac OS. I've yet to have a hands-on with Lion, but in reading reviews, things like the scroll bars, Mission Control, Launchpad, Multi-Touch Gestures etc are all there for a very good reason.

iOS has become a force of nature at Apple. Let's face it, they're on to a winner here. The sheer sales numbers speak volumes - anything with iOS on it sells like hotcakes, usually beating all records.

Apple sells computers as well, but they just aren't as popular as the iOS devices, and they want that to change.

What better way to get your average iPhone/iPad user to switch (or to actually feel that a computer is for them after all), than to make the 2 OS's as close as possible?

It has to work - some would say it's already working with 13%+ market share and climbing.

So although as a Mac user since the late 1980's, I'm more than happy to see a few UI elements creep in from iOS (you can turn most of them off), if it means more and more people choose a Mac as their next PC.
- Tweet
That Apple 'something'...
- 16 Oct 2011
- 0 Responses
- views
- iPad Appstore PDF RIM iPhone
- Edit
- Delete
- Tags
- Autopost
It's very interesting being surrounded by people who don't 'do the Mac', or 'the iPhone'.

I'm not talking about your dyed-in-the-wool PC evagelist, but the neutral people, who didn't even realise that having an opinion on whether your computer was a PC or a Mac (or a RIM or an iPhone) was even an option.

I've recently observed with interest a guy who decided one day that an iPad just might be of use to him in his work.

He travels overseas a lot and needs to view PDF's and other documents at trade shows and finds even a netbook to be just too bulky.

He asked his IT Manager for an iPad, and basically got, "ugh, what is this Apple iPad of which you speak?".

Not deterred, he bought one himself, from his own money, and manages and troubleshoots it himself.

It's the comments he gives when you ask him about it that surprises you.

When you ask anyone about some new toy or gadget they have, their reaction is functional and technological - "it's got lots of memory, it's really fast" and err, that's about it.

His reaction to his iPad isn't like that, it's an emotional response.

"It's just amazing, it's fantastic, it's incredible, it's wonderful" is his response (I expect a 'magical' will come along eventually).

He doesn't know about the chip it uses, how much memory it has - it really doesn't matter to him.

He's found the app store and he's gone 'app crazy'. I'll tell him about updating to iOS5 maybe next week and we just might get a 'magical' out of him.
- Tweet
They really don't know...
- 15 Oct 2011
- 0 Responses
- views
- Apple Mac RIM Shazam Steve Jobs iPhone
- Edit
- Delete
- Tags
- Autopost
A lot has been said about Steve's passing, and even more will be said about whether Apple will continue it's meteoric rise, and continue hitting the ball out of the park.

To tell you the truth, nobody can predict the future, (although I'm sure there will be an app for that eventually), all we can do is observe and comment.

I observed recently 2 friends who were exclusive Blackberry users. They didn't use them at work, they were their personal phones and chose them mainly for the hardware keyboard, with the comment that, "they could never use one of those touchscreens."

Well I met them recently for a meal and guess what? they both pulled out iPhone 4's.

I wasn't too surprised, but what did surprise me were the reasons why they chose one.

Their contracts were up for renewal and they walked into their local phone shop, and were persuaded by the staff to get an iPhone.

Their comment was, "we didn't go in wanting an iPhone, but they let us play with them for a while and we're hooked!"

Since then, they have gone 'app crazy' showing me various cat apps, apps for Halloween, Christmas, joke apps, you get the idea.

I showed them Shazam whilst in the restaurant - they were gobsmacked and downloaded it immediately.

This isn't really unusual, as Apple's user experience is excellent, but the thing to take home here is this:
- They don't know who Steve Jobs is
- They don't know Apple's history
- They don't know (yet) how the Mac differs from Windows
- They just know what they like
You could say that the reason why people choose a Blackberry over and iPhone and a PC over a Mac, is because of the legacy of opinion that surrounds both topics.

It's going to be pretty easy to topple RIM, they haven't had a chance to get ingrained into people's habits.

The reason why the Mac is finding harder to topple Windows, is because it's been around much longer, and has had a chance to get into people lives, habits and personalities.

Just give us time.
- Tweet
Research In Motion?
- 14 Oct 2011
- 0 Responses
- views
- iPad RIM RIM outage iPhone
- Edit
- Delete
- Tags
- Autopost
It's been an interesting few days for RIM. How things can change in such a short time.

Apple release the iPhone 4$ and almost in parallel, RIM has it's most serious outage in it's history.

Nobody seems to think that the proprietary, walled-garden of RIM's messaging network could ever be a bad thing (those thoughts are saved for the Apple platform generally, and especially it's new iMessage service).

It seems as long as the IT Manager says that RIM's closed-off network is OK, then it must be fine, don't worry.

Where I work, I'm surrounded by Windows and RIM devices, running a small Mac-based studio, and usually when this happens, people just give the 'Microsoft' response, which is, 'oh well, watcha' gonna' do? Get used to it, it'll come back on eventually.'

The IT staff grunt, and the normal users just go and make a coffee, stand around the water cooler, talking about how their PC at home does just the same thing, so this is nothing unusual.

This time it's different. For the 1st time ever, the chorus has been, 'When are we going to get iPhones?'

Director's and Chairmen are having semi-heated discussions with IT Managers as to why this has happened. Some are satisfied with the, "it's RIM's problem and it's worldwide", some are not, even at my very conservative company.

Towit - a few 'key' staff now have shiny new iPhone4's in their excited little hands.

A couple of staff members have brought their iPad's in and use them extensively (keeping them hidden when the IT staff sniff around of course).

How things have changed - and will continue to do so.
- Tweet
IT'S TIME TO BEGIN AGAIN...
- 8 Oct 2011
- 0 Responses
- views
- Apple Steve Jobs iPhone mac os ken macdailynews philip k dick the mac geek gab twitter
- Edit
- Delete
- Tags
- Autopost
My last post was almost a year ago, and I must admit, I thought I was done with blogging.

Twitter had seemed to replace much of what I wanted - blogging is all about you, it's your personal spin on events, and what better (and quicker) way to do that, than to post short messages with a link to the event in question.

The past 2-3 days have made me realise that I'm not done with blogging, and I have much more to say regarding all things Apple and tech in general.

Of course, as you've probably realised, the event that has spurred me on, is the sad death of Steve Jobs.

I'm based in the UK, and I learned of his death in the most abrupt and weird way possible. My iPhone awoke me at 5.45am with an alarm, and I had set up notifications on The Boy Genius Report app, and there, in a little sad blue box were the words, "Breaking: Steve Jobs dead at 56".

Numbness and the day's working trawl followed. I quickly went to MacDailyNews to confirm, and then left it at that, not really wanting to confront it.

I surfed Twitter occasionally through the day, looking at other's inevitable reaction, but I didn't want to react myself.

The next day, I tried to listen to Mac OS Ken Live, but could only get through about ten minutes of it - too upsetting.

The Mac Geek Gab is the first content I fully absorbed regarding Steve's death, and it was a great show - 2 ordinary guys talking about how Apple changed their lives. In many ways this was the final reason I was looking for to start commenting again.

I'll post again as often as I can, I may comment about Steve in more detail, I may not, but I've tried to come up with a sound bite that sums up what Steve Jobs means to me, and I'll say this:

PhilipKDick was once quoted as saying,

"Eveything I see is plastic and glass, and gaudy colours and strangely made, and [therefore] human beings begin to take on the same sort of plastic oddness, and our eyeballs seem to take on a glassy look. The entire world seems to take on a fake, artificial 'made' quality. The natural question therefore comes to mind is - who made it? why is it so crummy? why is it so degraded and falling apart?"

The unique technologies that Apple and Steve Jobs create, driven by innovation, passion and the desire to make devices that not only look beautful, but act beautifully as well, stop that statement from becoming true.
- Tweet
RIM and Microsoft were in denial, shock; thought Apple was lying about original iPhone...
- 27 Dec 2010
- 0 Responses
- views
- Apple Microsoft RIM iPhone
- Edit
- Delete
- Tags
- Autopost
via macdailynews.com

Great article over at MacDailyNews via Shacknews. choice comment is here:

"The iPhone did many amazing things, but what stands out in my mind was how it proved that these assumptions were flat-out wrong beyond any reasonable doubt. Apple pretty gave everyone the finger and said, "Fsck you guys we can build your distant impossible future today.""

For those paying attention Apple's been doing this since the Apple I.
- Tweet
We are the 1 in 20...
- 17 Aug 2010
- 0 Responses
- views
- Adobe Apple Flash iOS iPhone
- Edit
- Delete
- Tags
- Autopost
We are the one in 20,
A number on a list,
We are the one in 20,
You can pretend we don't exist,
Once nobody knew me,
But I was always there,
A statistical reminder,
WITH NOW 48% MARKET SHARE...

Lyrics courtesy of UB40.

Article courtesy of TUAW.
- Tweet
Why the Hell Did Apple Pull Camera+ From the App Store?
- 12 Aug 2010
- 0 Responses
- views
- Apple Camera+ Gizmodo iPhone
- Edit
- Delete
- Tags
- Autopost
via gizmodo.com

Gizmodo, fanning the flames of Apple hatred.

Here's your answer Gizmodo:

"It's because Apple wants to avoid the bad press/lawsuit (that will no doubt be promoted by sites such as yours) that will happen when someone turns up their volume too high, puts their headphones on, plays a song, tries to urgently reduce the volume and instead takes a picture."

The volume button has to be the most important button on any music playback device - Apple is right to stop that default behaviour from being changed.
- Tweet
The significance of FaceTime...
- 7 Aug 2010
- 0 Responses
- views
- AT&T FaceTime Leo Laporte iOS iPhone iPhone4
- Edit
- Delete
- Tags
- Autopost
via tipb.com

iOS 4.1 beta 3 features: FaceTime connections via Email | TiPb.

Of all the features that the iPhone 4 and it's corresponding iOS 4 has, FaceTime seems the most misunderstood.

Leo Laporte (there's that name again), has dismissed as (and I'm paraphrasing here), 'the most pointless feature of the new iPhone'.

Not surprisingly, he misses the point and because he's distracted by Google's shiny offerings and because, well, he does absolutely no research for his shows.

The principle behind FaceTime, and on the surface one of it's shortcomings, is the fact that it runs only on wifi, 3g is not allowed.

This has caused howls of bad press and is one of the reasons why the current jailbreak is so popular - there's an app that allows FaceTime over 3g.

Under the encouragement of pundits such as Leo, many people will jailbreak and install this app - and then complain loudly when their phone bills come through - it uses 3mb a minute in data.

The quality through 3g is terrible as well, and this coupled with the AT&T's lacklustre network, has meant that FaceTime is wifi only - for now.

However the killer feature with FaceTime is it's seamless, there's no configuration. Once you have established a FaceTime call, the phone remembers the setup, and it's this design that leads us to the next upgrade to FaceTime.

In the next iOS release, you'll be able to FaceTime with anyone with an email address.

Think about that - Apple have just created a flawless, simple to use, auto-setup video conferencing, video (and audio) phone system and you don't even need a phone contract, just an available wifi hotspot. There's nothing to stop an iPod Touch, and iPad or even a Mac from communicating visually.

With Apple releasing it as an open standard, you can see where this is going.

Can we just give credit where credit is due? Only Apple, with their end-to-end solution could have done this.

I doubt that this will have any impact on Leo however, he just doesn't seem to grasp the magnitude of this. When he does, expect him to laud praise on Apple yet again.
- Tweet
« Previous 1 2 Next »