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Apple iPad's iBook rips off indie dev's creation

wired.com

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Re: Apple iPad's iBook rips off indie dev's creation

#11

Post by Zev »

dcurtis wrote: post #10

Wil Shipley responded to this very eloquently: "As a creator, part of what I seek is recognition, immortality. I don’t work for Apple or Google (I’ve been offered jobs & buyouts) because I want the fame myself. It’s my shot at immortality. My designs are my children. So it stinks when I feel like Steve might get the fame for my innovation. I lose my children, as it were. But your children aren’t really yours. They ha…

Theres also this quote that he tweeted earlier today, that I'm becoming partial to: If Delicious Library were just a pretty set of shelves, I’d be really pissed. But it’s a lot more, and very different from iBooks. - http://twitter.com/wilshipley/status/8290423381

Re: Apple iPad's iBook rips off indie dev's creation

#14

Post by tlrobinson »

peyton wrote: post #6

Wow, I'm surprised Apple didn't just buy Delicious Library outright, like they bought SoundJam MP for iTunes, or Cover Flow for Cover Flow, or plenty of other small developers for features.

No, they went for not buying it just like they didn't buy Konfabulator for Dashboard, and probably dozens of other examples.

Re: Apple iPad's iBook rips off indie dev's creation

#15

Post by Towle_ »

"[I]ts similarities ... are beyond the realm of coincidence."

Though certainly far from their most avid reader, I must say I generally enjoy reading Wired's content quite a bit. That gem right there, however, made me want to throw up.

Is anyone familiar enough with Wired's writers to declare this an isolated incident? Maybe then the nasty taste in my throat would go away, and I wouldn't have to worry about coming across this level of obvious dickishness in their articles were I to start reading them more regularly.

"The 3D page-flipping effect looks almost exactly the same." How many ways are there to animate a flipping book page? It's not like we're talking about tons of different moving parts. There's like...one.

Re: Apple iPad's iBook rips off indie dev's creation

#16

Post by KC8ZKF »

dcurtis wrote: post #10

Wil Shipley responded to this very eloquently: "As a creator, part of what I seek is recognition, immortality. I don’t work for Apple or Google (I’ve been offered jobs & buyouts) because I want the fame myself. It’s my shot at immortality. My designs are my children. So it stinks when I feel like Steve might get the fame for my innovation. I lose my children, as it were. But your children aren’t really yours. They ha…

  Therefore the Master 
  acts without doing anything 
  and teaches without saying anything. 
  Things arise and she lets them come; 
  things disappear and she lets them go. 
  She has but doesn't possess, 
  acts but doesn't expect. 
  When her work is done, she forgets it. 
  That is why it lasts forever.
-- Lao Tzu

Re: Apple iPad's iBook rips off indie dev's creation

#17

Post by dcurtis »

earl wrote: post #12

Yes. Who would possibly think of a bookshelf as a metaphor for your collection of books.

To be fair, there are two other things at play here.

* 1. No app had ever displayed books on a bookshelf in this way until Delicious Monster did.

* 2. The designer who designed the bookshelf UI at Delicious Monster was poached by Apple to work on the iPad team.

(And because I'm irritated by comments on Hacker News lately, I just want to point out that sarcasm is the simplest form of humor.)

Re: Apple iPad's iBook rips off indie dev's creation

#18

Post by ghshephard »

I was just inspired to go download the (free) instance of Classics. It had an odd page-turning automation graphic (both pulling up too much of the screen, distracting, as well as not being very controllable - hard to turn a page a bit without moving it all the way).

For the _life_ of me I couldn't figure out where to find the options on how to change the font size - obviously it's there some place (nobody makes an ereader without the ability to change font size ) - but no amount of clicking, checking in settings, or otherwise scanning could reveal it.

Regardless, I feel reassured in my $9.99 investment in Eucalyptus - which has all of the above (page turning, font size) nailed - better than the Kindle App, actually.

Re: Apple iPad's iBook rips off indie dev's creation

#20

Post by phillryu »

tlrobinson wrote: post #13

A book reader using books on a bookshelf as a metaphor? Phil Ryu is a master of marketing. Making a fuss about this is just another press opportunity.

I just want to note that I am listed as co-creator of this app for a reason, and marketing was an afterthought with Classics after creating a really great reading experience.

That having been said, I sympathize with your disbelief. Yeah, what we did was obviously a direct port of reading real books. But you have no idea how much crap we took for doing exactly that – what I considered the obvious. To a lot of people apparently things like a page flip port seemed completely idiotic. To me it was an integral part of the enjoyment of reading books that had been lacking in most ereader experiences.

We did reap the rewards too, so ultimately I can't really complain, and we always joked that Apple would eventually rip off the page flip since it just makes sense. All those TV ads Apple featured Classics in now seem strange in retrospect though, presuming iBooks was designed and under developed before our app's release.

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