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IPad is Steve Jobs’ final victory over Steve Wozniak

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Re: IPad is Steve Jobs’ final victory over Steve Wozniak

#71

Post by jrockway »

gloob wrote: post #18
jrockway wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But of course those demos were very limited in scope, because the development techniques used to create them were impossible to scale up.

Forgive me if I'm being dense, but I'm not certain what that has to do with the point being made. Could you explain it in greater detail? My understanding is that there are entire classes of programs where "let's put it on a website" is not a viable method. You can write many types of apps that way, certainly, but you pretty much give up anything so much as pretending to be performance. Additionally, it prevents you…

The point that was made above was, "there has been no progress because demos from 15 years ago had as good as graphics as HTML5 games have today".

But the difference is that HTML5 games are games, and demos from 15 years ago were demos. Writing an entire app like you write a demo is quite difficult; hand-optimized assembly takes a lot longer to write than Java. The improvement over the last 15 years is in the programming language tools and runtimes, not the graphics that the programs produce.

Re: IPad is Steve Jobs’ final victory over Steve Wozniak

#72

Post by ryanhuff »

abstractbill wrote: post #34
houseabsolute wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Let's just tune in and watch the sales of the iPad starting next month We already watched the sales of the iPhone, and we saw how that went. Same type of device, same type of complaints by openness advocate, and what was the result? Are you guys going to just keep on saying this stuff until some closed Apple product fails, then say that's proof that people want openness, ignoring the litany of preceding closed devi…

Android gained 5.2% of the US smartphone market between December 2009 and February 2010, while the iPhone lost 0.1% ( http://www.mobileburn.com/news.jsp?Id=9184 ). Of course I'm not going to declare the iPhone a failure - it's clearly done very well. But I think it's still a little early to call it a winner.

Considering that the Android product options prior to November were pretty weak, the momentum in Android is partially based on decent products finally being available to consumers. Unfortunately, I think Google's N1 distribution strategy isn't helping matters.

Re: IPad is Steve Jobs’ final victory over Steve Wozniak

#73

Post by stan_rogers »

nkassis wrote: post #36

After reading this book about Commodore: http://www.amazon.com/Edge-Spectacular-Rise-Fall-Commodore/d... and a few other good accounts of the period, it really annoys me that Apple get the credit for inventing the personal computer. They were not even the most popular personal computer of the 80s (or 70s). I have a hard time finding anyone who own a Apple II but most of the people I work with were Commodore 64 owners…

The winners get to write the history -- and in the end, more people had more to do with Pagemaker, Illustrator and Photoshop (which were, in practical terms, Mac apps) than they did with the far-more-spectacular (for the time) Video Toaster and Caligari (Amiga). It's never been the machine; it's what people can do with it. If prosumer video was more accessible and lit more imaginations at the time, we'd be singing a different song today.

Re: IPad is Steve Jobs’ final victory over Steve Wozniak

#74

Post by whatusername »

xiaoma wrote: post #65
crux wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's with this constant invoking of the 'faithful'? I work at a place that sells the iPad and I've had a lot of people ask me about it. The people who are buying the iPad aren't exactly fanboys, who have been slavering over anything that Apple would put out. They're normal folks. A lot of them don't know any real specifics about the iPad, but they have the feeling that it would really be more enjoyable to use than…

The iPhone is really open and functional compared to the phones that preceded it. Just downloading a ringtone for most prior phones was more expensive than full-fledged games on the iPhone. The app store is far from perfect, but it's a very open market compared to anything I've seen out of Nokia or any of the Japanese handset makers.

You lost me at ringtone.

My 3210 (10 years ago!) you were able to program your own ringtones (in the little beeps that it could produce)

Most other nokia's (my 6110) - to use a ringtone it was a case of put an mp3 file on the phone - then select the mp3 as the ringtone.

Do you know what you have to do to get a ringtone on the iPhone?

Re: IPad is Steve Jobs’ final victory over Steve Wozniak

#75

Post by btilly »

abstractbill wrote: post #45
houseabsolute wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Android is neither as easy to use or as sexy as the iPhone. The dismal sales of the nexus one despite it's superior spec sheet and androidness are proof of this. But I do agree with you, most people buy things out of which they get the most utility, and ease of use an sexiness are a big part of that. But the person I was responding to mad the claim that people won't buy the ipad because it is closed. It would only be…

I think the effect is real, but of course it's not as direct as this. Now that the iPhone has a viable competitor that's more developer friendly, it seems likely that apps will start to appear first on Android, and then only later on the iPhone. I think that might effect consumers' perception of which is the sexier device.

Is the Android really more developer friendly? A very profitable application category on the iPhone are audible applications. That category is a nonstarter on the Android because Java latency causes noticeable sound artifacts.

Re: IPad is Steve Jobs’ final victory over Steve Wozniak

#76

Post by pyre »

whatusername wrote: post #74
xiaoma wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The iPhone is really open and functional compared to the phones that preceded it. Just downloading a ringtone for most prior phones was more expensive than full-fledged games on the iPhone. The app store is far from perfect, but it's a very open market compared to anything I've seen out of Nokia or any of the Japanese handset makers.

You lost me at ringtone. My 3210 (10 years ago!) you were able to program your own ringtones (in the little beeps that it could produce) Most other nokia's (my 6110) - to use a ringtone it was a case of put an mp3 file on the phone - then select the mp3 as the ringtone. Do you know what you have to do to get a ringtone on the iPhone?

A lot of carrier-branded phones have features like that disabled in favor of only allowing the user to purchase ringtones from the carrier's marketplace where you pay upwards of $3-$4 per ringtone (i.e. ringtones, at 30s or less, cost more than buying the entire song on iTunes). It is/was vendor lock-in at it's worst: create a captive audience, and then price gouge them because they don't know any better (i.e. "My old phone didn't have ringtones, but now I can buy ringtones from Verizon! Yay!"; without realizing that the phone itself supports user-created ringtones that you don't have to pay for).

It's sort of the same for the iPhone now. People think it's great because they are used to phones with limited functionality, openness and usability. Compared to those phones that iPhone is a breath of fresh air. Apple's just playing a game of, "what they don't know can't hurt them." People don't sit down and think about exactly what their ideal device is like. They see the iPhone/iPad and thing that it's neat and mold their expectation around what they see (especially if their expectations were lower to begin with).

Re: IPad is Steve Jobs’ final victory over Steve Wozniak

#77

Post by xiaoma »

whatusername wrote: post #74
xiaoma wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The iPhone is really open and functional compared to the phones that preceded it. Just downloading a ringtone for most prior phones was more expensive than full-fledged games on the iPhone. The app store is far from perfect, but it's a very open market compared to anything I've seen out of Nokia or any of the Japanese handset makers.

You lost me at ringtone. My 3210 (10 years ago!) you were able to program your own ringtones (in the little beeps that it could produce) Most other nokia's (my 6110) - to use a ringtone it was a case of put an mp3 file on the phone - then select the mp3 as the ringtone. Do you know what you have to do to get a ringtone on the iPhone?

>Do you know what you have to do to get a ringtone on the iPhone?

Yep. They're free. Just download them as podcasts. http://macmost.com/free-iphone-ringtones

Or even use iTunes to make them out of music on your computer: http://www.ehow.com/how_2160460_custom-iphone-ringtones-free...

Re: IPad is Steve Jobs’ final victory over Steve Wozniak

#78

Post by rjurney »

xiaoma wrote: post #65
crux wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's with this constant invoking of the 'faithful'? I work at a place that sells the iPad and I've had a lot of people ask me about it. The people who are buying the iPad aren't exactly fanboys, who have been slavering over anything that Apple would put out. They're normal folks. A lot of them don't know any real specifics about the iPad, but they have the feeling that it would really be more enjoyable to use than…

The iPhone is really open and functional compared to the phones that preceded it. Just downloading a ringtone for most prior phones was more expensive than full-fledged games on the iPhone. The app store is far from perfect, but it's a very open market compared to anything I've seen out of Nokia or any of the Japanese handset makers.

Its funny how easily people forget this - Apple created the first MARKET for mobile apps. Thats openness. Before the iPhone the mobile game was one big scam, with someone reaching into your pocket at each and every step in a long chain.

Re: IPad is Steve Jobs’ final victory over Steve Wozniak

#79

Post by ajross »

thought_alarm wrote: post #16

It's funny how so many people are suddenly mischaracterizing the Apple II or the nature of early personal computers. The very first personal computers, like the Apple II, were sold as development kits to developers/hobbyists because these were the only people who would even think to buy a personal computer in 1976 and 1977. These development kits contain all of the information one would need to create software and ha…

The Apple II was not a kid (though there was a board-only version available if you asked). You're thinking of the Apple I. The Apple II was a complete, assembled system in a box from the factory. You bought it, plugged it into your TV and tape deck, and started coding. Frankly it was the most out-of-the-box-integrated programmable hardware available at the time.

Re: IPad is Steve Jobs’ final victory over Steve Wozniak

#80

Post by mahmud »

orangecat wrote: post #13
philips wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Always Innovating's Touch Book is probably close to what you want. The hardware specs are open, there are pins for serial on the board, and it can run a variety of ARM based Linux distros (Android, Ubuntu, etc).: http://www.alwaysinnovating.com/touchbook/ Plus the disassembly instructions are provided by the manufacturer: http://www.alwaysinnovating.com/wiki/index.php/Top_part

That looks very nice, except for the abysmal 1024x600 resolution. I'll give Apple credit for having the iPad resist the inexplicable war on vertical pixels.

I will trade vertical pixels for freedom any day.
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