Comment by PaulHoule | Hacker News Reader

Comment by PaulHoule | Hacker News Reader

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Apple is centered around the iPhone, it's hard for them to make anything that isn't a peripheral of it. The best idea they've had in the last ten years is the Apple Watch, but I'm using Garmin because I don't have an iPhone.

The Mac benefited from all the work Apple has done on the iPhone CPU, but the software scene on the Mac has been deteriorating because developers are using the same tools and the same toolkits to develop desktop applications that are motivated by mobile. The article mentioned here

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42930025

claims to be about the deterioration of desktop interface but it's by someone who's so steeped in the Apple culture that they don't get it is really about the deterioration of Mac interfaces.

Apple doesn't care if you buy a Mac, in fact they'd feel most comfortable if the Mac became a peripheral of the iPhone. It's hard for them to picture developing a new peripheral for the Mac, even something straightforward like the Magic Mouse. A peripheral for the Mac that's groundbreaking? It doesn't fit into their world view.

Macs obviously have an outsized mindshare and market share in Silicon Valley but globally make up like 5% of PC sales. In Apple’s own books the entire Mac division accounts for 8% of revenues. Apple is serious about the line, sure, but it doesn’t have anywhere close to the importance of iPhone for the company.

I wonder if that's a 'kill your startup' pattern, that is, develop an app for Mac because you're surrounded by Mac users, but then you don't sell many units because the market is too small.

I had a time when I was involved with startups of various kinds (sometimes West Coast, sometimes Research Triangle Park, more often NYC or upstate.) I was a Windows user in a MacOS world and the most important accessory I packed was whatever I needed to hook up to mini-Displayport.

I think this might be happening more for iPad Pro style apps than for MacOS style apps now, but the failure pattern of building great software for small market hardware is historic. It was a bigger deal before IBM Compatibility.

My take is that tablets are underrated, however I'd like to see more 'higher end' applications aimed at at 'lower end' tablets.

For me the magic of tablets is that they are low cost, so I'm not afraid of losing or breaking them. They don't become a nexus of further expensive consumption: adding an expensive case, particularly one with a an expensive and special purpose keyboard, just takes something sleek and easy to handle and makes it klunky and awkward.

Go to a hackathon? Get any Bluetooth keyboard and mouse and a $5 plastic clip from Amazon Basics and you've got something sleeker and more stylish than any Macbook or gaming laptop with which you can connect to a powerful desktop computer or a cloud instance that is anywhere from 50 cents to $4 an hour depending on your thirst for power.

I started out with a B&N Nook, then Amazon Fire Tablets (amazing value for the money), then iPads, I had bad luck with my last iPad (either lost or stolen) and figured I'd use an old Samsung Galaxy tablet I had kicking around. Every time I got an iPad I looked at my options, hypothetically I thought I might like the Pro but a new Pro is crazy expensive (I couldn't afford to break or lose it) and an old Pro in my price range is old technology.

(Note I'm a little weird because I've never owned a smartphone with a plan. Carriers choose not to serve my valley, why should I get an expensive plan? My data plan is WiFi, and my phone plan is Skype)

The Pro, like the AVP, also seems hobbled by Apple's short-sightedness. A device that expensive, with hardware as capable, should be able to do 100% of what a MacBook can do. It should be able to completely outdo the Microsoft Surface, but it doesn't.

I mostly agree with everything you said. However at this time I wouldn't risk my business by releasing software primarily targeting tablets. The rate that people pay for iPad specific software is too low.

95% of the development work I've done in the past 25 years has been for the web platform. I don't see that changing. If you make desktop web site that are WCAG AAA compliant they also are great on tablets for XR. (In the limited sense of "windows hang in space that you can use like an app)

I haven't wasted a minute arguing with the app store if I'm allowed to do this or that. For what? So I can add an icon to an over-crowded home screen that is already crowded with twisty little icons that all look alike? So I can spam people with unwanted notifications?

I can even use the web platform to make real immersive applications for XR, though I'm currently trying to figure out the exact memory limits to make things work on the MQ3. I've got a vision in my mind of an app that provides a visually intense and expressive experience on phones but also puts you in a world if you've got the hardware for it. The web platform is totally up to it, I just have to figure out to do it.

> but globally make up like 5% of PC sales.

This may be true globally, but isn't necessarily reflective of actual market share for the markets targeted.

If your startup is selling to people in say, United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Australia or New Zealand, then Mac marketshare is 20% to 30% of all computer usage (depending on which nation, how you count, and whose measurements you use, etc).

It's not even just SV. Go to pretty much any tech conference. Many of the attendees are not SV and you'd still conclude that Macs were the dominant laptop platform.

I got one, a shell you can put your phone in, so you can slide your phone around your desk AS your mouse. It can provide vibration feedback, alerts, sounds, etc. It can use the macro lens and the IMU for tracking its location across the desk. Would also serve as biometric auth for websites.

Prior Art for

    G06F 3/0338 - Computer mice, trackballs or similar devices for computer control
    G06F 3/041 - Digitisers using touch-sensing
    G06F 21/32 - Biometric authentication

See, you can have peripherals tha

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