You started with some awful retorts but then you got into your stride. It helps that the ZDNet article is pretty dumb and not at all written by someone who had his thinking cap on.
I'm a bit concerned about your casual defense of the DRM/LockIn aspect of this device. It's a big, big, big deal, and it's not good for the future of tech. Further replies point-by-point inline. On Mar 14, 2:46 pm, Karsten Silz <[email protected]> wrote: > [Content owners are forcing the DRM on apple] Okay. I'll just hack around it. Oh, oops. Can't. Taking for granted that DRM is part of the price of admission for apple is fine, but combine this with the closed nature of the device and it actually matters this time. > Lock-in > All platforms lock you in, only the degree varies. Duh. How is that relevant, though? The point is, the degree at which the iPad locks you in, is *very high*. Also, as the Google Chrome OS "Hit switch to engage tinker mode" shows, as well as software equivalents of same, it's just plain false to state that a closed system gives a better user interface. The iPad user interface is going to be what's going to cause it to sell like hotcakes. It's very _good_, it's just that the user interface does not require a locked down system. That's the falsehood. > No Flash support Indeed. No argument from me there that the ZDNet article over- estimates the importance of flash support. That's the one thing in the all the arguments that's not going to matter, and it's also one of the many reasons I didn't find the author of that ZDNet article particularly convincing. If you browse the web with an iPhone today you already notice the lack of flash exactly never. For video, the world will move to dual HTML5/flash lickety split; it's a trivial javascript drop in these days that finds video tags and adds flash embed code to it, and writing the HTML video tag is nicer for the guy writing the HTML. Combine this with some pressure due to non-trivial amounts of visitors from non-flash platforms and video is a non-issue. Ads, well, there lack of flash is only an advantage, which leaves games. Flash, particularly games, require a mouse*. iPads don't have one. Therefore, flash games aren't going to happen regardless of a flash runtime on Mac OS Touch devices. The games in the app store, on the other hand, those are fantastic. That leaves websites built with flash. These are generally too ugly to even attempt to look at. There also aren't many sites that fall in this category; most big sites with flash (example: google finance) offer a slightly simpler alternative if you don't have it. *) It doesn't require require it, in that you could theoretically write a flash app that works just fine with a touch screen, but the entire flash API presumes it, and as a result there's a vast army of flash programs that aren't usably controllable without one. You can't differentiate between drag, follow, click, and point very well with (multitouch) touch screening. With a mouse you can. On the other hand, you cannot easily pinch, modal-swipe (one, two, or three fingers giving different effects), draw, or rotate with a mouse, but those things are easy on a multitouch pad. Also, mice use relative coordinate systems. touch screens use absolute ones. The UX *HAS* to be designed around these differences. > No removable storage Similar red herring. 1) There's the network, whose moore's law factor is very large and 2) The thing does have a dock connector, and 3) if this really does become a problem, adding a MicroSD reader will fit in iPad v2. Mostly though, only geeks give a crap. Normal users don't need more than 32GB, and don't have to move around massive amounts of data, other than camera phones, which is handed better with a dock- connector-based cable. > No USB support Well, there's cameras, keyboards, *syncing your iPhone* and a few other things, but mostly you're right. USB support on a device with such a completely different OS is going to lead to a lot of disappointment. The idea seems to be to release specific cables for each class of devices that makes sense to wire up to an iPad. As a hacker this bothers me to no end, but only a very small percentage of the market is like me in that regard. Not that big a deal though I wouldn't be surprised if some USB ports show up in iPad v2 when they've managed to miniaturize some more parts. > Built-In battery Yet again, only tech journalists give a crap about this. So, you're right, this just doesn't matter. An important aspect is: Will the battery 'break' (drop to 75% capacity or less) within a few months, and the answer is generally no: Apple's sorted that out. As a practical matter it makes the device look far, far prettier, and average joe considers a prettier, more robust device (less creaking) that's somewhat smaller and more resistant (less seams to worry about) vastly more important than the extremely hypothetical scenario of replacing the battery. Not having a replacable battery is a no- brainer, especially considering that at an apple service shop they can actually replace that battery rather easily, of course. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "The Java Posse" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/javaposse?hl=en.
