The iPad Luddites
roughtype.com
roughtype.com
The almost paranoid and unduly aggressive control Apple exerts over its platform is worrisome, particularly for a company poised to dominate an important emerging platform. This is why, as much as I respect Apple's engineering and design prowess, I do not use its products. After two decades of a suffocating Microsoft monopoly I'm not eager to spend the next two under another.
Because people will install apps that don't work and then blame their iP(ad|od|hone) for misbehaving. If they could figure out a good process for it, I'm sure Apple would certify their developers before letting them develop applications.
Why the absurd secrecy around the sdk and developers agreements?
What absurd secrecy? AFAIK, the only threatening legalese was removed in 2008 [1]. I don't know for sure, but I imagine it was there left over from the developers that knew about it before the SDK was announced.
Why the seemingly arbitrary rejection of apps that in some way impinge on functionality Apple reserves for itself to implement?
Because people do get confused about things you might think are obvious. If you give people two "dialer" apps, I guarantee you they'll sometimes launch the wrong one. And again, frustration against apps is frustration against the device.
1. http://www.telecoms.com/5294/apple-removes-secrecy-oath-from...
I don't buy that. What seems much more obvious a reason is that, they can't make money on selling applications outside the "AppStore"
Millions of people using OSX disagree with you.
Anyone remotely tech savvy is going to comprehend this fact, and you're likely going to have to be somewhat tech savvy to be willing to hunt down sites supplying non-store software.
I wholly agree, there are quite probably untold millions who are savvy enough to comprehend the limitations of their devices.
Ah, but it's not if you want to sell content. As most jailbroken iPhone users show, the first order of business is to download every app that sounds interesting - for free. Now, I am not anti-piracy. Applications have often become popular through piracy, and that results in eventual conversions. But in the past, the default has been a lack of protection with great effort required to enforce copyright. This favors the establishment who has the capital to develop protections and enforce them. The iPhone/iPad is a different model, where commerce is the default. Want to sell a $1 app? Trivial. Want in-app commerce? Trivial. Where once you had to build a web service that required 24/7 support, you can now build a standalone product and be done. This is the lone developers dream.
But it is also the hobbyist's nightmare, and that's why the makers are up in arms. Since we happen to be hanging out in their camp, it sounds like this is an unnecessary evil, preventing us from "owning" our devices! But really, you need to see both sides to this: by enforcing copy protection by default, Apple has created a panacea for the starving developer. Write something good, something useful, something fun, and you will get paid by the masses. And when it's all said and done, you don't even have to use one yourself.
Yup, Apple's consumerizing computers. It's about time, really. I'm rejoicing: I won't have to help fix people's iPads with network settings, app install/uninstall/reinstall, rebooting, or anything else. It'll solve their simple problems without unnecessary complexity.
And I won't buy one. It's that simple.
Instead, I think it's a wonderful time to hack. I really don't understand what the problem is. Gnome is actually pretty nice now (before OS X I was a linuxer from ~1995 to 2001, coming back now it's pretty nice!). My Nokia N900 is a wonderful little linux-based phone, and it's the stock software stack on the stock hardware!
I still mourn Sun, and will for a while. I'm looking at replacing my beloved Ultra 40m2 with a stock supermicro mobo/case combination. Linux will fly on it.
If I don't want that, I can build arduino kits up myself! If I want more power I can pick up a high-powered arm dev board with a display controller, wifi, ethernet, and plenty of storage and ram to hack! Otherwise I have a pc, with an open OS!
In my book, us geeks have been hogging computer technology for too long. We have everything we need, and it's time we stop making everyone else suffer for our thoroughly-satisfied needs for openness.
Hopefully it won't be long before linux is available as a 'third party option'.
"Doctorow is not the only Geek God who's uncomfortable with Apple's transformation of the good ole hacktastic PC into a sleek, slick, sterile appliance."
Though it's an anathema to most here I think the majority of people want their computer to act more like their stove and less like the highly hackable Apple ][. That's exactly where Apple is aiming to go with the iPad.
Honestly, I personally don't have a problem with that. One thing that's been proven in recent weeks is that there will also be bushels of hackable Android tablets out there so I say let the masses have their iPad and stop complaining.
As many have pointed out, allowing third party software (i.e. not apple approved) does not make OS X into a malware infested unusable mess. Why anyone would assume it would turn an iPad into one, I do not know.
The iPad could be just as good for "the masses" as it is right now, plus make developers happy by allowing them to develop for free, with no threat of being rejected for overlapping with Apple's own market, or just for rubbing Apple the wrong way.
In any case, I don't see why I have to care about progress if that progress doesn't care about me. Maybe because of the iPad I'll be back to becoming a weird minority again? So what, as long as I'll have fun doing what I do.
That’s your progress, right there. You know, that’s enough sometimes.
I am pretty sure that touchscreens before iPhone also had some specific UIs.
What's new is the form factor and the long battery runtime (which netbooks already had to some extent, too). It still remains to be seen if the form factor is even all that useful.
For example a touchscreen in a desktop PC might be nice to have, but probably wouldn't be very ergonomic for long term working.
Locked down? Check.
Can't use with programs that haven't been blessed by the device manufacturer? Check.
Can't develop your own programs for it unless you pay again? Check.
Between that and the internet TVs which are accruing hype by the day, I think the distinction is largely going to be moot.
Basically everything is just going to be a content portal with some ancillary proprietary benefits (it has an app store, it plays xbox games, etc).
The only distinction will be the form-factor and screen size.
There is no difference. Those all suck too, for the exact same reason.
There is a reason why most good games come out for the PC first, followed by consoles "later".
Most stuff these days is simultaneous or console first.
By comparison, you're not supposed to change your iPad's battery by yourself.
Suffice to say, not all manufacturers are the same and not all products are the same. And frankly, so long as the tinkerers are being serviced, I don't see society as having lost anything yet, just because a single more appliance-y product has hit the market.
And --specifically to the matter at hand-- particularly not when the appliance-y product in question has a first-class, standards-compliant web browser.
Specifically, those friends and family who constantly call you for tech support are friendly enough when they see you, but they deeply resent having to deal with you every time their computer breaks down. It's not personal. They just hate that it's "their fault," or that they have to lie because they really were surfing sketchy porn sites. The iPad solves that need.
I think that's just it: it seems (and for most people, actually is) far harder to learn to work a computer in a powerful way than it is to learn to read and write. The number of facts you have to know to properly administer a modern OS is staggering. One could reasonably argue that the iPad has gone too far in the "easy" direction, but it seems difficult to argue against the idea that computers thus far have been "too hard". If we can provide the ability for people to achieve powerful results with their computers without having to learn the intricacies of their OS/hardware, we're doing good and unleashing precious talent. Every minute spent (by anybody who's not a sysadmin) dealing with file system errors and driver conflicts is a minute not doing productive or creative work.
I say that I am disappointed in it because of the App Store and suddenly I'm the one being called a luddite, being accused of wanting to keep the poor masses down, and other silly things.
I think any technology enthusiast will tell you that they would love nothing more than to never have to do tech support for peoples computers. I assure you, that part of the iPad is universally loved.
The disappointment some of us feel is because we were hoping for a tool for us to use as well, and it's not really what we were hoping for.
"What is this GUI thing? What good is it for? What can it do that can't be accomplished by the CLI?"
And it would be wise to see how that played out. That there would be certain situations where a CLI or a GUI and now a touch-based interface would be the appropriate means to accomplish certain tasks.
Well said. The hobbyist also won't necessarily like the money making form of it. Does that sound familiar?
It is a common and somewhat legitimate reaction, to say that geeks just want computer systems to stay geeky so that they have more control and power. However there is a very real non-hobbyist problem with closed systems. I don't think anybody would agree that it was great that Microsoft was able to stymie the growth of the entire internet with their domination of the browser market. And IE / Windows was relatively open, compared to iPhone OS and Safari. The damage done by holding back the growth of the internet has hurt consumers enormously, even though most of them don't know it and couldn't articulate it if they did. Apple is essentially setting the stage for the same thing to happen in the mobile space but far worse since they have quite literally given themselves veto power over any application making it to consumers.
That's a ridiculous strawman and I'm amazed that so many people believe it. Most geeks would be thrilled if more people could perform basic computing functions without constantly asking for help.
Apple is essentially setting the stage for the same thing to happen in the mobile space but far worse since they have quite literally given themselves veto power over any application making it to consumers.
Exactly this. Microsoft was only able to delay the rise of the web; with the power to prohibit disfavored applications they very well might have stopped it completely, or twisted it into a proprietary architecture deliberately dependent on Windows. If Apple has Android shut down in the courts and is able to form a cozy duopoly with Microsoft, we won't be seeing that sort of innovation anymore and we won't even know what we've lost.
I think this is overblown. If Apple gets too high-handed, some Chinese company is going to come out with a cool new platform slick, cheap, and open enough to support the next killer app.
Instead of Hobbyist, perhaps he should have written "non-consumer." Afficianado? Pro-Sumer? Perhaps the slant changes with the term, but the basic idea still stands.
The 13 year olds here have iphones, I bet they don't have a bose sound system in their bedrooms.
More likely an iphone dock with a bunch of speakers attached.
Not so long ago people were talking about how the App Store had ushered in a new age of bedroom programming. Some of this commentary is getting truly grotesque - the Guardian had some muppet saying if the iPad catches on 'we will have reached an Orwellian future through Huxleyan means, and have only ourselves to blame.'