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There is a Horse in the Apple Store

blog.frankchimero.com

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Re: There is a Horse in the Apple Store

#51

Post by bruceboughton »

Qz wrote: post #26
sbaqai wrote: post #14

Great article. The author coins the term "tiny pony" to describe the tendency of becoming acclimated to certain exceptional things. ie: There's a pony in the apple store and no one seems to care. Because its always there.. Maybe its because we're so focused on ourselves? I still have a regular brick-type cell phone. So its a lot of fun for me to play with an iPhone or iPad whenever I'm at the store, or when my friend…

I got an HTC Incredible which is about on par with an iPhone (in between the 3g and the 4g), and it still seems like magic when I use it.

I think this speaks more to your attitude than to the model and brand of phone.

Re: There is a Horse in the Apple Store

#52

Post by pbhjpbhj »

naner wrote: post #16
ugh wrote: post #2

I know it’s not the topic of the submission but I would have very much liked to get an explanation. Is it maybe a guide horse? See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guide_horse

Yes it is an assistance animal[1]. It is kind of sad that the guy never figured it out. At least he didn't go and try to pet it or something. [1]: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/04/magazine/04Creatures-t.htm...

>Yes it is an assistance animal[1]. It is kind of sad that the guy never figured it out.

Are you sure. Why could it not be a pet? The image in the OP doesn't appear to show a harness (as in the NYTimes article) as is usual for an assistance animal. In my country assistance animals usually wear some high-vis in public too.

Re: There is a Horse in the Apple Store

#53

Post by greengarstudios »

This reminds me of the time I saw Steve Jobs in the Apple Store, Palo Alto. No one was looking at him, except me. Eventually, I walked up to him and said hello. Then, I showed him Whiteboard: Collaborative Drawing, the iPad app I developed, on the new iPad I had just bought.

To modify part of the article to fit my experience...

I asked one of the Apple Store employees: "Do you realize Steve Jobs is behind you?"He sighs at me and says, "Yes, he’s in here all the time."

Re: There is a Horse in the Apple Store

#54

Post by DavidSJ »

But there are no children in the Apple Store, for the same reason you would not see a child in a jewelry store: things are small and fragile and expensive and shiny.

In my experience, there are usually quite a number of children in Apple Stores.

Re: There is a Horse in the Apple Store

#55

Post by philk »

pyre wrote: post #44
philk wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure how being fitted with two entirely standard pieces of tack (a breastplate and a bridle) counts as horrible abuse .

Well, now we're talking in terms of relativity. You're saying that it's not 'horrible abuse' because it is standard treatment, but this says nothing of whether or not standard treatment is 'horrible abuse.' For example, The Jews that weren't killed in the concentration camps "didn't have it so bad" compared to the ones were. But this says nothing of whether or not overall treatment of Jews in concentration camps was…

I'm saying that it's not "horrible abuse" because:

a) I've spent a reasonable amount of time around horses;

b) Can see nothing in that photo to suggest the horse has been mistreated or is distressed; and

c) Find this kind of trivialization of animal abuse by someone who has little experience with horses to be offensive nonsense.

There's real "horrible abuse" out there, and this is most emphatically not an example of it.

Re: There is a Horse in the Apple Store

#56

Post by retube »

aaronbrethorst wrote: post #50

Maybe I'm just drunk, having just been kicked out at bar time from the place around the corner[1], but this resonated with me: "When does the magic of a situation fade? When do we get acclimated to the exceptional?...We define a pattern, no matter how exceptional, and acclimate ourselves to it?" I'm surrounded by exceptional situations every day and they just seem mundane. Tonight I congratulated a guy who just signe…

There is a well-known corollary here with happiness. People think that if they are million- or billionaires, or have a super-fit girlfriend, or drive a ridiculous car or live in a massive house or whatever they'll be happy, or at least happier. However all studies have shown that rich people are not happier than poor(er) people. And more interesting is people that have suffered catastrophic accidents or contracted disabling diseases: on average these people are no less happy than anyone else.

Re: There is a Horse in the Apple Store

#59

Post by nl »

10ren wrote: post #28
_delirium wrote: post #25

For me personally, some of the not-being-that-excited-ness is that I grew up reading sci-fi and cyberpunk, and basically always assumed these things were possible and likely, just a matter of implementation details. A device that can translate any language at a button-push? Sure, I heard about it when I was eight. A device you carry around that instantly connects to some sort of communication network? Yeah, I've prob…

> The instant gratification provided by being able to have almost any question answered immediately is a tiny pony. Apart from reference questions (like dictionary meanings, map look up, programming syntax, wikipedia), we are an awfully long way from this.

Apart from reference questions (like dictionary meanings, map look up, programming syntax, wikipedia), we are an awfully long way from this.

I'm not clear what you mean, but it seems to me that we're pretty close to the point where most things that have an actual answer can be found by typing a question and clicking a button (using a search engine, with fall back to asking a question in a relevant forum)

If you are talking about more philosophical questions, then perhaps - but I think you can gain just as much enlightenment from the click of a button as you used to be able to from months of philosophy classes.

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