iPad Is That In-Between Device

Now that the new Apple iPad has been fielded tested for a couple of months now, we're starting to hear stories about it beyond "look how cool this new thing is." We're hearing real-world applications of the device, and talk of future applications of such a device are starting to emerge.

It seems that Apple's vision for the iPad -- neither a tablet nor an iPhone -- is coming true. I see that people are starting to accept the iPad for what it is ... well, an iPad. It's truly a new type of device. That presents some pros (new market, new applications) and cons (may canibalize sales of MacBooks, fierce competition to come), but so far, I'm liking what I'm seeing.

The potential future applications for such a device are truly endless: sales force, doctors, hospitals, assembly line, presentations, etc. While I'm still holding out for the eventual next-gen iPad, I am impressed with this first version. What do you think?

Apple vs. Adobe, Round 3

Remember when Apple and Adobe played nice while thousands of scruffy graphic designers happily used Photoshop to retouch images on their Macs ... and all was right with the world? Well, it all seemed to go downhill over the Great Flash War of 2010.

I saw inklings of trouble when Adobe continued to not fully optimize their CS suite of applications for Mac's Cocoa OS framework throughout most of this past decade. And when the iPhone was released without Flash support, you felt there was trouble brewing. But now, it's getting ugly.

Apple and Adobe have gone tit for tat on the subject. The latest have involved Steve Jobs's open letter regarding Flash, and now Adobe has published founders' Chuck Geschke and John Warnock's open letter in response.

My take ... Is Apple right for not allowing Flash to run on their devices? Yes, it's their device, and Flash is a resource (battery) hog. Is Apple right for restricting creation of iPad and iPhone apps to Apple development platforms? No, that's just plain selfish; Apple's not the only one who knows how to make apps. Is Adobe right for whining about others trashing Flash (which they didn't even make, by the way)? No, Flash is showing its age in an era where computing is becoming more and more portable, where the need for battery life exceeds the need to play Farmville.

And Adobe's argument that Apple should support Flash because it has a 99% install base holds no merit. I'm sure the manufacturers of asbestos had a 99% install base at one point. That didn't make it a good thing. (Okay, that example was harsh, but you get my point.)

iCade

Since its announcement I knew that I wasn't going to buy the first iteration of the Apple iPad. As I noted, it was still lacking too many features for my liking. That all may change after seeing the iCade.

The iCade is an "arcade cabinet" for the iPad, which makes the whole thing look like a classic arcade machine. This is one of those add-on products that's nearly as ingenious as the original product (remember the Palm Pilot keyboard?). The iCade comes with the big joystick and two red buttons that graced just about every arcade game from the late 80's. Included are hundreds of classic arcade games like Donkey Kong, Dig Dug, and Q*bert. At $149.99, it's a bit pricey, but for a hardware/software combo, you can't complain too much.

I wonder if it comes pre-stained with a cigarette burn.

Update on Friday, April 2, 2010 at 10:59AM by Matthew Snodgrass

Shame on me for falling for this April Fool's joke, but PLEASE MAKE THIS ANYWAY!

Apple and Flash

There's been a lot of talk as of late about the battle heating up between Apple and Adobe. In particular, Apple's decision not to support Adobe's Flash plug-in on some of its best-selling devices like the iPhone, the iPod Touch, and the upcoming iPad.

At a meeting with Wall Street Journal executives, Apple CEO Steve Jobs called Flash a "CPU hog" (it is) and didn't build the iPad to support it. Adobe retaliated on its blog, pointing out how the iPad isn't really a good way to experience the Internet if so much of the Web uses Flash (it does).

Frankly, I think this less about Apple's quibble with Adobe and more about their storied tradition of abandoning technologies that, frankly, were on their way out. Apple just sees these demises sooner than most and usually gets pilloried for their efforts. Let's take a look:

• Floppy drive: In 1998 Apple officially dumped the diskette with the introduction of the iMac. Thank you!
• SCSI: The only thing more confusing than configuring SCSI devices was ... okay, there was nothing more confusing than configuring SCSI devices. I'm serious.
• Serial port: Hey, the printer's not printing. Can I unplug the serial port and plug it back in? No, that's worse than crossing the streams.
• ADB port: Okay, the Apple Desktop Bus was their fault in the first place. No harm, no foul.
• Modem: Anyone who remembers what "baud" is, has no love loss for modems ... or this sound.
• Firewire400: It was getting slow, and if you accidentally plugged it in backwards, you could fry your device.
• PCMCIA: This laptop cardbus was about as fast as physically shoveling the data onto your computer. Apple did the right thing by dropping it for Express34 and then the wrong thing by dropping that for SD.

Perhaps Flash is just another in a long line of soon-to-be-aging technologies in which Apple is first to recognize their inevitable obsolescence. If you've ever checked your task manager (Windows) or activity monitor (Mac) while running a Web page with Flash, you've seen how much of a resource hog it can be.

My Take on the iPad

In case you hadn't heard (he said with a fair amount of sarcasm), Apple announced its tablet PC, the iPad, the other day. Since we're drowning in post-announcement commentary, the likes of which we've not seen since we found out who shot J.R., I'll just stick to the top-line stuff here.

Overall, I like it. It's sleek, simple, and ... Apple. While some of the negative post-event buzz has been that it's an "oversized iPod Touch," I say, is that a bad thing? The iPod Touch (and iPhone) is awesome. Why not have a larger version of these mega-hit devices for bigger browsing, bigger e-mail-checking, and bigger content-consuming? The iPad seems like the perfect "schlep-around-with-you-everywhere" device.

PROS:

• Super thin and super light
• Touch keyboard that's like the iPhone/iPod Touch, only full-sized
• Expect some pretty cool iPad-sized apps coming down the pike
• Really good battery life
• Great new iTunes experience
• Cool print content experience, like the NY Times they showed
• Fingerprint-less screen

CONS:

• No SD card slot built-in
• No USB (not even USB micro)
• No built-in GPS
• No camera
• No drag-and-drop file management
• No file creation -- only viewing (I'd love to be able to edit documents and presentations with it.)
• No OLED screen (seemed an obvious choice at this stage of the game)
• No 16:9 aspect ratio for viewing wide-screen movies
• Touch keyboard (for those of you who won't give up your Blackberry-style keyboards)

Let's face it, at this point, Steve Jobs could have taken a dump on stage, and people would be ooh'ing and aah'ing, their stock would have gone up 5%, and David Pogue would be fawning all over it. In the end, Apple does do these product innovations pretty well. They haven't stumbled in a long time. Bottom line ... I want one, and so do you.