While the iPad can certainly be debated as a product, people on the internet are discussing not the product, but the shift devices like the iPhone and iPad represent: a shift away from a computer being accessible to it being something closed and impenetrable. Is this a future we want for ourselves?
In a beautiful piece called “Tinkerer’s Sunset“, Mark Pilgrim writes about how devices like the iPad will eventually mean the end of ‘tinkerers’. It starts with the cringe-inducing anecdote about DVD Jon, who ended up in court over breaking CSS on DVDs. He was accused of “unauthorized computer trespassing”, and DVD Jon’s lawyers logically asked the prosecutors the following question: “On whose computer did he trespass?”
“His own,” the prosecutors answered.
Mull over that one for a second.
Just like Pilgrim, I grew up in a household with computers – albeit much later than him, of course (since I’m considerably younger). We got our first personal computer in 1990 or 1991 (I was 6 or 7 years old), a 286 with MS-DOS and Windows 3.x. I still have the incredibly detailed manuals for this machine, from monitor to motherboard, to dot-matrix printer and more. I also have two gigantic manuals for MS-DOS and Windows 3.x, which also came as part of this machine, as well as the original, pristine 3.5″ floppy disks for DOS and Win 3.x.
The father of a friend of mine ran a computer shop during those days. I didn’t know him yet back then, but a few weekends ago, that friend surprised me with promotional materials and price listings from those days – and it turned out it was about, among others, the exact same machine I had as a child! Reminisce abound (supposedly, they have a few old 286 and 386 laptops lying around from those days, so hopefully I’ll be able to get my hands on one for OSNews).
Back in those days, I, too, dabbled with programming. I don’t know why, exactly, but at some point I decided not to pursue that particular past time. Coincidentally, this was around the time I got a NES for my birthday, and on top of that, I pretty much spent my entire childhood playing outside anyway.
Pilgrim’s path is different, obviously, and I’m sure many can relate with him. One day, when Pilgrim was 10 years old, his father came home with a computer, an Apple ][e. “As it happens, this computer came with the BASIC programming language pre-installed. You didn’t even need to boot a disk operating system. You could turn on the computer and press Ctrl-Reset and you’d get a prompt,” Pilgrim writes, “And at this prompt, you could type in an entire program, and then type RUN, and it would run.”
“By age 12, I was writing BASIC programs so complex that the computer was running out of memory to hold them,” he adds, “By age 13, I was writing programs in Pascal. By age 14, I was writing programs in assembly language. By age 17, I was competing in the Programming event in the National Science Olympiad (and winning). By age 22, I was employed as a computer programmer.”
Pilgrim argues that you don’t become a programmer by hacking, but by tinkering. “It’s the tinkering that provides that sense of wonder,” Pilgrim states, “You have to jump out of the system, tear down the safety gates, peel away the layers of abstraction that the computer provides for the vast majority of people who don’t want to know how it all works.”
The paradigm that the iPad and similar devices present do not enable this tinkering. While that may not be a problem for people who already are programmers, it will become a problem for people who don’t yet know they’re programmers. Yes, you can develop for the iPad too, but you need to pay for it, which will give you a certificate – which is actually a cryptographic key giving you slightly more access to your own computer.
Sure, you can jailbreak, but that’s besides the point, Pilgrim argues. “I don’t want to live in a world where you have to break into your own computer before you can start tinkering,” he writes, “And I certainly don’t want to live in a world where tinkering with your own computer is illegal.”
I find it very hard to disagree with him. Do you want to live in a world where there’s no such thing as “your” computer? Where you can go to jail for breaking into “your” computer? A world where children are discouraged from learning how “their” computers work? It seems that this is clearly the direction Apple is going towards. I wouldn’t be surprised to see that 5-10 years from now, Macs will be just as closed as iPhones and iPads.
“Apple has declared war on the tinkerers of the world,” Pilgrim concludes his post, “With every software update, the previous generation of ‘jailbreaks’ stop working, and people have to find new ways to break into their own computers. There won’t ever be a MacsBug for the iPad. There won’t be a ResEdit, or a Copy ][+ sector editor, or an iPad Peeks & Pokes Chart. And that’s a real loss. Maybe not to you, but to somebody who doesn’t even know it yet.”
Contrary to popular belief – there are competing products to many (if not all) of Apples products.
So if you don’t like Apple’s closed nature then the answer is simple: support someone else.
The problem is that Apple’s early history was all about tinkering and hacking the device. The very first Apple I was all about it, that was the original purpose!
Whilst I believe the iPad should have OS X installed instead, perhaps in the future it would.
I don’t disagree with you that the locking down the device is deplorable on its own. And the vast majority of Apple’s customers don’t care if it is locked down.
Just like any business, Apple is in the business of selling products for a profit. While today it seems that Apple is alienating their original customers, the hacker (using the original definition of the word, not what the media uses these days).
Is this Steve’s doing? I don’t know. Though it seems like it is the exact opposite of what his mantra is, perhaps they will make more open products.
I really can’t see them making the Mac into an iPad like device, that only way to install software is to use an App Store.
That will single-handedly destroy the company and the shareholders won’t be pleased.
I think what people expected the tablet to be was too high, but in this case, I really think using iPhone OS was a mistake and unfortunately, I don’t think Apple will get it that changing the OS would make it more successful. Enough people use Mac OS to know how to use it already.
Not sure that using OS X on the iPad would’ve worked all that well. Sure, the os would most likely run (wouldn’t surprise me if Apple has an ARM version of OS X hidden away) but none of your Mac apps would work without a recompile. In the case of the free and/or foss apps this probably wouldn’t be an issue for long, but a lot of the commercial apps people are relying on would probably take longer and, I’d bet, charge an additional cost for their ARM versions. An os is nothing without apps to run on top of it, and the iPhone OS clearly wins on an ARM-based device like the iPad since all current apps for it will work automatically.
I’m not disagreeing, I would’ve very much preferred to see OS X on the iPad myself. That would’ve pretty much made my dream netbook/tablet. I do think it made more immediate sense to use the iPhone OS instead though. Whether it makes the most sense in the long term I don’t know.
I don’t know if making the application store the primary method of loading software onto the desktop and laptop would kill them. I’ve long argued that if Microsoft wanted to really benefit the end user, they’d setup software repositories; vetted and verified software packaged for easy install from a central trusted storage. If hundreds of people can manage to keep the repositories solid around Linux distributions then MS and Apple can surely provide similar software delivery (the challenges are business executive related rather than technological).
Apple could do a lot worse than centralizing software delivery through a managed repository. Mind you, they’d have to allow competitive software and be a little more clear than they are in managing the current app store business.
It would be idiotic to declare war on the tinkerers.
When will these organisations learn – you cannot beat the collective knowledge, determination and resources of the entire hacking globe.
Bring it on Apple.
And all those hackers buying iPads to hack. Apple will be crying all the way to the bank.
Jailbreaking is akin to software piracy. It maintains the status quo instead of giving free and open alternatives a fair go.
The problem in this is that I think the iPhone is one of the best smart phones at this time -but- I don’t want to support Apple because I don’t like their closed nature so that’s why I bought a Blackberry and a Zune HD.
Now, I’m not saying Blackberry or Microsoft have an open nature, I just don’t like Apple’s closed nature AND I don’t like them as a company so I would never buy anything with their logo on it.
Still, when I see people work with an iPhone and see them use all the great and funny apps that you can download to it a voice in my head says to me I want one, but that would go against all my principles.
So I rather buy something else even though it isn’t as good as Apple’s products but most of the people wouldn’t think this way, they go with the hype.
Apple is already in control of like 35% of all smart phone users and that’s a bad thing. People should think more before they buy something although I guess you can’t blame them.
I do wish I could find an alternative to my iPhone, but I can’t. It’s a bit of an odd situation for me: I hate the lockdown, I don’t want to support Apple’s practices and yet they make the only accessible device out of the box. To turn anywhere else for me, i.e. Symbian or Windows Mobile, would require an extra $300-$400 for the software I’d need to make the phones accessible. SO I don’t want to support Apple on one hand, but I feel they deserve my support on the other hand. In my case, the pragmatic hand won: they make a device that I can use, and I use it. If there comes an alternative that’s as good, I’ll jump on it. Until then, guess I’ll just have to put up with Apple and my iPhone’s restrictions. I’d sure like to find something else, as getting the 3gs to work with Linux is a royal pain, and Ubuntu 9.10 has come sufficiently far enough for my needs that it could replace OS X in every other way for me.
Sounds like your miss some alternative along Symbian and Windows Mobile, and not the most closed one, quite the contrary: what about Android or webOS-based smartphones!?
There is alternative. Like always, switching to alternative to the major platform requires to be ready to do some trade-off. It’s every one call.
Um, if that “trade-off” means I can get no use out of the device, then I’m sorry it’s not a trade-off I’m willing to make. WebOS has no tts accessibility features whatsoever, and Android simply is not ready. I can’t even browse the web accessibly on Android yet. It’ll probably get there given time, but at the moment that’s a no go. Looks like I’m stuck with Apple for now. Believe me, I’ve looked into everything extensively. I haven’t missed any alternatives, they just aren’t there unless I want to shell out more money than a Symbian or Win Mo phone would be worth. No joke, the software I need costs more than most phones. For now, I guess, I just have to put up with the lock-in if it means I can use the device to its fullest. Guess that’s a different kind of lock-in
.
I stand corrected, as I didn’t know about your accessibility needs.
I’ve no such needs myself, but regarding trade-off, I don’t have either any need (yet) to access Internet from wherever I am. My trade-off is that I wait until both the need and an alternative to lock-in product raise. In my situation, the second part exists already, in your, I agree, it doesn’t.
Question is do people actually need to access Internet from everywhere. Beware, will and need is not the same. That another trade-off too, resisting to the (consumerism) desire to have something which you actually have no need for…
Maybe in the US!
Of the 53 million smartphones sold in 4Q 2009 (Global):
Apple sold 8.7 million Iphones so that would give them a market share of 16.4 %.
RIM sold 10.7 million BlackBerry so that would give them a market share of 20.2 %.
Nokia sold 20.8 million smartphones, so that would give them a market share of 39.2 %.
Yes, it is true that there is a marketplace of products and ideas; but I think you’re missing a critical point:
Apple’s choice to continue down this path sets a terrible precedent in expectations about openness. True, Apple has been a walled garden for a while now, but the company’s choice in doing this will legitimize further restrictions in the minds of the ignorant. You can’t forget that, like it or not, some legal venues in the United States do use contemporary social values and trends in their judgments. Do you really want the rest of society thinking that such paternalism is really healthy?
Exactly. That is why I have never bought anything Apple, nor I am planning to buy in the foreseeable future.
Right – and, if they happen to be your children, you get to decide what you buy them. If you want your child to become an engineer, don’t buy him an apple product.
Edited 2010-02-01 21:21 UTC
Yes, there are alternatives but are they as good as what Apple provides? but you are right, if people don’t like the ‘trap’ then don’t purchase the product. I’ve just recently had a look at the Cowon players whose audio output quality is superior to iPod Touch and cheaper as well – so there are viable alternatives in some cases.
IANAMP, however, I would find it hard to believe that Apple is single-handedly killing any and all tinkering in the world. There are plenty of other companies and even industries that are doing quite will (Think RIAA) in their attempts to stifle any innovation outside of their neat, tightly controlled laboratories.
It’s really quite sad if you think about it, considering that MANY major computer/technology players got their starts in garages….
I guess I’ll have to start digging out a secret bunker in my house so I can start cracking devices on the ‘low low’ for fear of the government agents parachuting down on me & confiscating my “Hackintosh”, or whatever project I tend to be working on at the time… <sigh>
Amen. The topic makes my eyes roll and peg to the back of my head. We geeks have been making grandma’s life Hell for 29 years. I don’t see Apple killing off the build-your-own, Dell, HP, ThinkPad…just offering an alternative for those that don’t want to tinker. Those other users just want to browse, watch some media, read, and email.
Please, stop the fear mongering.
HAQGSR (= Hmm. A quick Google search revealed):
IANAMP = I am not a movie player
IANAMP = I am not an MMO programmer
IANAMP = I am not a morning person
Which one is it? 🙂
IANAMP = I Am Not A Mac Person
At best you can think of it as a lease. They tell you what you can and can’t do with it. What you can use it for and what you can’t.
I know this isn’t true of all Apple products, but it is certainly the feeling I get with the iPhone/iPad. This might make a lot of economical sense for them to go this route, but I would like a larger sense of ownership of my gadgets. Which is why I am happy there are alternatives out there.
The role of the iPad is that of an appliance, not a general purpose programmable computer. The Macs are computers, and I don’t see Apple stopping production of them.
So, if Microsoft makes their browser default on a “computer”, that’s reprehensible and anticompetitive, but as long as Apple’s is an “appliance”, then they can do whatever they want, including bundling their browser and locking out all competition using cryptographic technology?
I think you forget that Microsoft’s a monopoly over the computer industry. Apple isn’t exactly that big with that much influence.
Bender pointed out that MS has monopoly status within the market which means they have extra scrutiny since the company is capable of very real harm to that market. Apple, while retaining full control of there product lines, does not have monopoly status within the markets they sell to.
Here’s the other difference: Apple is a retailer, Microsoft is an OEM. Apple sells a final product that happens to include there in house produced OS. They don’t sell OEM parts to a third party who will then assemble the final product. One could compare Apple to Dell or HP but comparing MS and Apple, though fun, is barely valid even in the marketing commercials.
So, Apple telling Apple what software it can include on it’s hardware; fine.
Microsoft telling Dell what browser and OS platform it can include on it’s hardware; not fine.
Tired and wrong the first time I heard this rant and still tired and wrong. Microsoft had +90% of the installations and threatened to bury a competitor if they didn’t sell to Microsoft.
Apple has <4% of the market and competes with ideas, not threats.
It’s inevitable that this move away from tinkering would happen some day. The PC industry has moved to a point where the tinkerers are no longer the main users of their products. Of course the crowd here would prefer a device that they could do anything on, but the vast majority of the users just want something to enable them to do what they are intending to. I am not arguing that Apple’s implementation is the best, or even a good one, but I don’t consider this a bad thing, as long as there are still ways for the interested ones to delve deeper.
For the obligatory car analogy, Lancia started because some friends decided to stop making bikes and start making cars. In their backyards. Sounds awfully close to the “Nerds building huge empire from their garage/dorm”. 100 years later everyone can enjoy products of the automotive industry because they have moved to a more streamlined approach. Sure, no one can start a car company on his backyard anymore, but the benefit outweighs the cost.
I’m not mechanic and know to stay away from the breaks and steering. I can still open the car up and have a look though. I’m not restricted by risk of lost usability or legal action for doing so. I can take the bumper off one model of car and weld it to the front of another without GM or Honda lawyers being involved. Provided that machine remains certifiable for road use; I’m good.
By contrast, Apple trend would be to lease you a car limiting what driving you can do with it and what you can see of it outside of the paint job interior fabric selection. I’d also have to send it back to the manufacturer for all work needed. Maintenance; that’ll be a visit to the dealer. Oil change, tank replacement, tuning..
Actually this brings up a rather dark issue that the auto industry is adopting from the computer industry; DMCA. This legal abomination is being used to make it illegal to not return to your dealer for all auto support. The corner mechanic can’t afford the specialty tools, computer and licenses related to reading the car computers. Each car manufacturer changes the codes just enough to make sure it’s non-standard.
The Smart Car has a model that sells in Canada and a model that sells in the US. If one owns the Canadian model, they can’t get service in the US. Smart Car mechanics don’t even have the computer codes let alone qualified but unaffiliated mechanics. It’s not because a diesel engine is somehow new and needing specific training to work with. It’s purely because abuse of the DMCA abomination is good business for the car manufacturer not the owner or independent mechanics.
It is great that automobile are available to anyone with a qualifying license; fantastic that one does not require an engineering degree to simply drive. The horseless carriage has revolutionized modern transportation. We can still tinker if we choose though. Simplifying systems so that there are now computers for every age from six months onward is also great. That can be done without removing users right to there own purchased products though.
Really, my biggest concern is that both the computer and car industries develop into the consumer hostile living wet dream that manufacturer’s lust over.
What you’re talking about is more like changing visual themes in an operating system, or installing some shareware desktop utilities.
It’s next to impossible to legally give a modern car more horsepower as modern car motors are like monolithic black boxes controlled by software that you may not (legally) modify. At the very least, doing so will void all kinds of warranty and possibly even insurances in case of an accident.
True, I thought I included a bit about the freedom to make one’s own car uncertifiable. Even so, we don’t have laws that say mechanically uninclined people can’t hack at there car. Instead, we have DMCA being used to lock the car owner into closed vender services. Researchers can’t legally reverse engineer the meaning of car computer codes without running fowl of the DMCA. Wouldn’t standardizing or publishing the return codes improve things? Is there some justification for gouging mechanics for specialized tools, computer consoles and code lists? Should a diesel Smart Car purchased in Canada be unservicable all over the US? This is somehow improving vehicle technology?
If we were all using the same engines and the same computers in all of our cars, then there’d be no problem. But since all the car companies are in competition with each other, I’d EXPECT them to have differing computer control codes and routines in order to keep the competition from knowing their trade secrets.
And as for your Diesel Smart: since there are NO diesel Smart cars sold in the United States, why would you expect to get service on a vehicle that the dealers haven’t been trained on and may not have the equipment for?
Good God! GM will discover that Ox38B means Honda’s oil light is on. The competition; they know everything now!
I couldn’t resist.. but seriously:
I think that’s a false sense of security.
The codes are available and the devices to read them out of the car computer are also available. They’re simply sold at a prohibitive price. This is what threatens local mechanics without the big budget. GM, however, would have no problems getting hands on the codes and reader if they desired. That would be the end of the competitive advantage from the computer code secret sauce.
Standardizing computer codes may not be possible due to differences in engines but codes can be published. If GM is waiting for Honda’s computer code publishing, it’s not GM’s competition; at best, it’s a generation behind. We’re not even talking about handing over the source code; just the codes read through the sensor tool. Also, if some geeks in a hobby shack can reverse the codes and understand what they are saying; hasn’t GM a lot more budget if they chose to release a Handa car checker tool? (obcd, odcb.. something like that isn’t it?)
This comes very close to the usual “but if we release the code, you’ll see our secrets” crap about drivers or “FOSS is less secure because we can see the code” drivel. AMD published ATI’s driver interface specs and delivers open source drivers now I believe. Nvidia keeps the driver source hidden but they could just as easily put the secret sauce crap on the board in a flash chip allowing the driver and interface specs to become public. Claiming that publishing computer codes for cars will be the end of competition. It’s actually even less compelling than computer hardware or software given that a new car model takes longer to spit out of development and fabrication. My video card may only last me a few years but I’m sure not going consider a car purchase every few years.
The end result is still a chilling effect on non-company mechanics, less competition within the car support market and higher costs for the car owner.
This being the result of a dubious law meant to prop up poor business models by manipulating the market rather than allowing good business models that adapt to market changes.
One of the regulars along with the host have discussed the topic frequently on Off The Hook. The hosts issue is the diesel SMART that can’t be serviced in the US due to US mechanics not accepting the gouging for for the code keys and reader. The regular’s issue is DMCA blocking valid geek projects and un-blessed mechanics by locking the customer into a vendor specific supply chain. I wish she’d done a talk I could post a link to because she knows a heck of a lot more about the issue than I.
I think that it’s important to remember that although the iPhone, iPod Touch and now the iPad are computers, they are also appliances. They’re not intended to be used or ‘tinkered with’ as desktop computers are. This isn’t a good or bad thing. It’s a feature, or differentiator. It suits a lot of people to have it like that; comparing the ‘closed bonnet’ of the iPad to ‘DVD Jon’ is a red herring. Trouble-shooting or updating and maintaining reliability in a complex device used by computer-illiterate users is easier and more reliable when there is a degree of appliance lock-in; and the OS is not yours.
If people want a more traditional computing product, then they should buy one, rather than decrying the fact that Apple made a product which specifically hides the nuts and bolts of the OS and UI mechanics from the user. A big part of the success of the iPhone OS is precisely the locked-in simplicity.
I’ve never heard of anyone complaining that modern TV sets don’t require each channel change to be manually tuned, every time, but it’s what we’re seeing with the iPad.
Flawed comparison, I think. A more apt comparison would be that if you buy TV sets from say, Sony, you could only watch the channels or networks that Sony approves. That’s more along the lines of how Apple is operating.
That’s a good point, but it’s in a sense you’re already dealing with that already; the software for the TV set comes from Sony, and you have a choice of source (eg decoder box) for your viewing. But controlling the App Store is part of the package with Apple appliances, and both good and bad come from that. The bottom line is that it gives Apple a single access point for software to get on to their appliances, and a degree of simplicity and quality control.
Whether I agree with it personally is another matter, but there’s no question about how successful it has been for the consumer and for Apple. It’s the model the other appliance developers will follow.
It’s an appliance that only runs Apple’s approved content.
Looks like censorship for me. My country lived censorship a few years ago, and I can say it isn’t a nice thing having someone to tell what you have to watch or buy.
It is not a censorship, it is control.
You’re free from viruses, from malware, from low quality software. And software companies are protected against piracy. Win-win situation.
If one prefer open hardware/software to play with, there are plenty of it available.
Ok, ok. You’re ABSOLUTELY free to run ANY malware and spamware you want on YOUR PC. There are millions like you 😉
Virus and other malware ain’t a problem for other platforms either. But on other platforms you can buy an anti-virus suit just to be on the safe side.
If you read the analysis by 24/7 Wall St. There are still plenty of piracy going on.
http://247wallst.com/2010/01/13/apple-app-store-has-lost-450-millio…
This apply only for closed operating system.
Anyway, I agree with you: those devices are not sold as computers but devices. You can’t expect to be able to program them yourself in any usal way. And there’s concurrent products that does allow it, if you need such openess.
Now, on a larger view, as the consumer electronic market is moving more and more toward embebded computer-like devices, one could indeed fear that the trend will be about more closed technology than before. Aka the end of tinkering for free.
That’s a trend, but not a big one yet. Most majors IT hardware actors are still not selling devices but components: Intel, AMD, NVidia, Broadcom, Realtek etc are not devices manufacturers. And their hardware programming interfaces are still far more open than the closed ones used in hyped geeky devices.
And if you look better, there is not that much companies selling closed software exclusively running on closed hardware. Many does it only on software level, or hardware level, though.
So, nothing really new under the sun: Apple have a hardware *and* software lock-in market strategy!? What a surprise.
BTW, welcome Apple as the new IT “evil” company.
Don’t worry, there should be one, anyway, so, you, Microsoft, Google, whoever.
I just don’t care about them (as they do about me, i guess 😉 )
I’d say it’s closer to removing buttons from the remote control. We had TVs with remotes that had numbers, direction pad, channel, volume.. now we’re seeing the Ipad remote with channel up/down and on/off.. those extra functions will be managed for you. It’s limiting functionality that could otherwise easily exist
(Nokia provided a way for owners to jailbreak there maemo devices if they choose to go above and beyond the set consumer “blue pill” uses.)
Rubbish. It’s a general-use computer. The fact that they’ve convinced you otherwise just goes to show how clever they are at getting you to drink the proverbial kool-aid.
Definition of Appliance:
-an instrument, apparatus, or device for a particular purpose or use.
See that? A particular purpose or use..or put another way…a specific application. The iPad is obviously not for a particular use but rather for general use…whether it’s to check your mail, write a note or watch a movie. You can install software, just like a regular computer, connect peripheral hardware (with the dock) just like a regular computer…the list goes on.
Not that I care all that much as I’m not about to shell out my hard-earned on such a hamstrung device, but trying to convince people that having less control over their own possessions is a good thing by simply calling it something else is disingenuous.
This is, with all due respect, splitting hairs about the exact definition of appliance. No-one has convinced me of anything, I believe it is an appliance because that to me is what an iPhone is, and this is just a scaled-up iPhone. You’re right, you can customise it to adapt to other uses, but that doesn’t take away from the fact that it is a streamlined multi-function consumer device, for people who don’t need or want to see ‘under the hood’. I know that it has OS X underneath, and so it could in theory do all those things that people here are looking for, but that’s missing the point. Just because it’s a computer and Apple makes it doesn’t mean it should be treated the same as a notebook from them or anyone other manufacturer, and it doesn’t mean that they should automatically open up the OS for everyone to play with, on the device.
I have a Linksys hi-fi router here. I could reflash it and install an industrial strength router, as well as a web server and other functions on it, but like most customers of the device, I only need what it currently does. It’s an appliance. And if I want to develop for it, I need to do it on my Mac, because the router doesn’t support development, even though it’s a computer which can run programs.
Lastly, a disclaimer (which I should have put in the first post). I have an iPhone, and a Mac (which I use for development, and require to be as open as any desktop OS needs to be). I don’t intend to get an iPad because it is a luxury and doesn’t do anything I can’t do with either iPhone or a full computer, but I can see how I would use it if I did.
Edited 2010-02-02 09:19 UTC
What they convinced me, was that they were the first company to build:
1. A computer my mom could use. She barely touches technology beyond what’s in the kitchen and TeleText on the TV. She doesn’t respond to my computers, but she does to my iPod Touch. She can tell what I’m doing with it. I’ve not ever seen that before.
2. A computer that you pick off the coffee table, press a couple of buttons on to get the single piece of information (stock ticker or today’s weather) you want, and put back on the table in 10 seconds. No time for multitasking (!).
3. A way to have the computer not being treated like an altar that you have to put your full attention to, sit in front of or maintain, other than charging it. It shouldn’t be more imposing than flipping through a magazine.
No booting, no shutdown, no computer understanding, no viruses, none of that crap which requires downhanding of knowledge from a computer technical person. People have been trying with settop boxes and remotes, but the user interface is always cumbersome and not very stable.
This isn’t any different than the phase where early cars had specific mechanics attached to it, if the driver wasn’t savvy enough to fix issues on the spot. I would bet back then that those mechanics (us!) didn’t imagine cars eventually becoming very easy to drive and use for almost everyone, and probably were resistant to it.
Alan Kay’s been dreaming about someone building this device since 1968, when he came up with the Dynabook. But unfortunately, the computer industry constantly came up with ideas where you were expected to be a computer science person, just to be able to use the thing. It’s like if car manufacturers (us!) kept building only Formula-1 cars, because surely… we don’t want regular people driving cars, do we?
The low tinker-factor of the iPad is not really an issue. It’s time to move on.
I think the problem extends beyond technology. We have a less open society as a whole. We are so afraid of some terrorist blowing us up that we allow the government to take away our basic freedoms in the name of security. Security should never be at the cost of freedom. But people seem willing to trade it away. Case in point, a couple weeks ago, an 11 year old boy brought a home made science project to his science focused school. It was an empty gatorade bottle made into a motion detector. Lock down, bomb squad, typical over reaction. Even after they realized it was harmless, they STILL searched the parents home. What do you think would have happened if it had been my kid? Well I would be in jail under the Patriot Act. Why? Because I am a geek and parts of my house look like I could be building anything. If you have an interest in electronics and computers, beware, you may already be guilty.
EDIT: Back to the main point, with people giving up so much freedom, who really notices that they can’t do anything but what Apple allows with the iPhone/iPad?
Edited 2010-02-01 17:19 UTC
Computers were created by technical people. They were used by technical people. Technical people understood them and, even when they tried to “dumb them down”, their prejudices and interior understandings bled through.
That’s given technical people a huge advantage. And one they don’t want to lose. Non-technical people are looking to solve a problem or use a device. Computing appliances have been increasing in usage for one simple reason – they accomplish that goal.
The vast majority of people don’t want to crack open their Tivo. The vast majority don’t even think about the fact its a computer. It’s the same with DVD players and cell phones.
Apple (and Google) want to provide people with a general-purpose device that still functions like a computing appliance. One that people don’t have to call a help line to work. One that doesn’t get slower the longer you use it. One that doesn’t need regular reformatting. One that is easy to use and difficult to screw up. And tinkerers be damned.
The paranoid will tell you that Macs will go the same path. No they won’t. That’s where the software gets written.
Complaining about the locked down nature of these devices is to ignore why they are locked down. Locking up users and software isn’t the reason – it’s to prevent people from screwing up the devices.
Stop being so selfish and wanting what you want to the detriment of the vast majority of people.
Sure, its just selfish on our part. Forget that Apple is making billions off of the fact that you HAVE to go through them to install software. Sounds like Apple PR. There is no technical reason why the user cannot still have access to the device while making it just as easy to use. After all, its not the average person who is going to tinker. So no big deal. The tinkerers aren’t going to have problem with their devices, they are smarter than the average user by virtue of the fact that they tinker.
seems the most appropriate.
“Now it seems [Apple is] doing everything in their power to stop my kids from finding that sense of wonder. Apple has declared war on the tinkerers of the world,” whimpers Pilgrim. Grow the f–k up. Apple has no more “declared war” on your children than Henry Ford declared war on colors besides black.
Full access to the device makes piracy and malware easier.
Buy a different device if you want to tinker. We have far more options than in the Apple ][ days. There is no war against tinkerers, my god what a stupid headline.
The “but it’ll enable piracy” is about as tired and valid an excuse as the claim that osX is invulnerable to malware. With everything including HDMI lockdown, copyright infringement is as big as ever. Actually, it was removing restrictions from music that has been seen to reduce infringement while books and movies, DRM’d out the who-who, continue to see more infringement.
Locking down the hardware feeds Apple’s profit margin while doing sweet all to stop people motivated to steel content.
Giving someone root access makes piracy infinitely easier.
Being able to run programs outside of a central repository makes malware easier.
You’re deluded if you think otherwise.
Yes, because limiting access to the tablet’s shell will magically stop people from ripping movies using other machines and/or viewing them on the tablet right? Or where you thinking people would use the tablet to somehow rip and crack DRM protected content?
Lots of things make copyright infringement easier. I don’t think locking a user out of there legally purchased hardware as being the great kingpin holding RIAA and society together.
Limiting shell access makes piracy of purchased digital goods more difficult. I’m sorry if you have such a hard time with this basic reality.
It also makes copying external movies files far more difficult. The goal is never to stamp out piracy 100% but to making it cumbersome to the point that the vast majority will choose to purchase digital goods legally.
You seem to be in denial that DRM can be highly effective in reducing piracy. Just compare pc gaming to the ps3. Giving people an open system encourages piracy, end of story.
http://arstechnica.com/gaming/news/2008/11/acrying-shame-world-of-g…
Edited 2010-02-02 17:46 UTC
If that’s the case, why does the Iphone not just turn on and work? One has to pair it with Itunes on a big computer before it’ll do anything beyond dial 911. Does this lockdown benefit the consumer in some way? The only functions the phone does not do onboard is sync to a bigger computer and show advertisements. Otherwise, everything done through the forces pairing with Itunes could be done directly on the device.
I just don’t see locking the owner out of the device as a required part of delivering a simplified experience. As I’ve said many times, Nokia’s Maemo comes in a locked down state with set list of user functions but as the owner, I can also choose to enable those blocked functions. Apple could easily do the same with an obscure jailbreak setting and; “You are about to unlock your device during which time it may not be serviced by Apple. Continue? [Y|N]”
This is the same old whining that some people do whenever Apple releases a new product. How is it that a company with a whopping 5% of the PC market share and 18% of the “smartphone” market share is “killing innovation?” (Source: http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/09/11/03/canalys_q3_2009_iphon… )
If the author wants to gripe about a company DOMINATING the market with their closed-source operating system and oppressive and draconian tactics, then he should talk about. . . oh, wait. . . THERE ISN’T ONE.
Nokia has DOUBLE the market share of Apple, but Apple is somehow “killing innovation?”
Give me a break.
Well, if you look at mindshare rather then marketshare, Apple easily wins, and that’s the dangerous part of it.
Yes, because a company building a desirable product, selling millions of them and making a profit is a “bad thing.”
There are literally THOUSANDS of other devices out there for “tinkerers.” Apple hasn’t built devices for “tinkerers” since the very first Macintosh.
mindshare doesn’t pay the bills 😉
Maybe I misunderstood, but I think the author was referring to the general trend of not being the true owner of any device and/or software that you buy. Being sued for “trespassing” your own device is plain stupid, IMHO.
Without getting into a whole discussion about copyright: Don’t you think that people who create intellectual property have a right to profit from it? We can all sit around and claim innocence and “fair use” when it comes to copying our DVDs and software, but the plain truth is that a LOT of the copying was and is for piracy, plain and simple.
By keeping a closed ecosystem on its products, Apple is basically covering their asses and protecting their investments. Yes, Microsoft is the dominant player in the PC market, but at what price did that dominance come? Rampant viruses, trojans, buggy software & drivers, and a less-than homogenous user experience.
Apple is dead on in it’s attempts to lower the learning curve and make computing simple and easy for everyone. Sure, there will always be people who want more out of their devices, and there are plenty of other devices out there that allow users to put any operating system and any program they want on them.
I think that what people are really mad about is how computers are turning into “appliances.” But that’s really the nature of the business. Look at your automobile: 30 years ago, you could put whatever accessories you wanted on your engine to dress it up, increase horsepower, etc. But over time, manufacturers realized that the majority of owners simply wanted a safe, reliable car that they didn’t have to work on. Look in the engine bay of a modern car, and there’s nowhere to bolt on that carburetor, supercharger or headers. But on the upside, you’re guaranteed consistent reliable performance for over 100,000 miles.
The majority of computer users don’t care about all the “cool” add-ons, alternative operating systems and upgrades available for their PC. They want reliability and stability above all else. They don’t want to re-program their routers, they don’t want to install Linux on their iPods or cell phones, and they don’t want to use their desktop keyboards to play “Rock Band.” Apple and many other companies understand this, and they are delivering what their customers want. If their customers didn’t want this, then Apple wouldn’t be a $50 billion a year company.
I’ll bet 30′ old car reliability was very similar than modern ones, if not better: all embedded electronics didn’t improve reliabilty that much. Your car don’t refuse to start due to mechanical issue like in past today, but due to electronics (sensors, crappy firmwares or bad communication cables). Big deal.
But, in the meantime, while 30 years ago you could ask any car auto repair shop to fix issue, these days, thanks to “closed ecosystem”, you’ve no choice but to do it on the car manufacturer’s shops. Where you can’t put their price in concurrence with alternative repair shops.
Does it ring some (ressemblance) bell!?
You bet it. Same business model: lock the customer to your trade.
I may have no choice in car market, but I’ll keep away from it as much as I can in IT one.
30 years ago, if you told someone that you expected your Chevrolet to even MAKE IT to 100,000 miles, you’d have been laughed out of the room. Cars back then could be expected to last 50-60,000 miles, and you were lucky to get a warranty that covered half of that.
Nowadays, Chevrolet is GUARANTEEING that your powertrain will last 100,000 miles, thanks to all of those computers and sensors that you claim to not like. I don’t hear anyone complaining that they can’t install Linux on their engine control computer because Chevrolet uses a “closed ecosystem.”
First, I don’t know about american cars average milage and reliability level, but my grand-family own a Citroen 2CV and did over 150000 km with it (~100000 miles) without that much issue. Many families did the same too, as at this time changing the car every 2-3 years wasn’t even financially possible. So, my mileage vary 😉
Second, you succeed to avoid my point, which was *not* that powertrain reliability improved due to embebbed electronics these days, but the *overall* car reliability, which I claim didn’t improved that much, thanks to complexity added. My apple-car-analogy point is that the closed ecosystem in car manufacturer has far more to do with locking customers to their own repair shops network than with improving car overall reliability. Otherwise, why one will need to repair his car *ever*!?
It’s not in car manufacturers to make their cars too much reliables. But it’s in their interest that 1) it will need to be repaired sometimes – but not too often, or they will lost customers – and 2) it could be *only* in their own repair shops, not someone else.
See some analogy?
Really?? Your family really owned and drove a Citroen for 150,000km without EVER having to work on a carburetor, adjust ignition points, adjust ignition timing, lubricate the chassis, change the spark plugs, cap, rotor or spark plug wires??
Impossible.
On a modern car, you don’t have to touch ANY of those things for the first 150,000km. All you have to do is put gas in it and change the oil, which can be done by anyone anywhere.
And if someone is offering me GUARANTEED performance, then YES, I will take it back to where I bought it to get it fixed!
A modern automobile is so complex it boggles the mind. It has multiple computers controlling multiple things – all for the safety, comfort, reliability, performance, economy and cleanliness that the buying public and the government DEMAND.
And if I were a car manufacturer, there’s NO WAY I’d EVER let some random mechanic start poking around in my newest creation that I just spent a BILLION DOLLARS developing.
Because ultimately, if something goes wrong and the mechanic is unable to fix it, or does a poor repair job and the problem comes back, the one who looks bad is the MANUFACTURER, NOT THE MECHANIC who didn’t know what he was doing because he ASSUMED that everything works the same way it did on last year’s model.
Nope. But:
1) I never claimed it,
2) you didn’t claim it should (until now)
3) I know zero car manufacturer who guarantee (not need to go uppercase/loud mode) their customers that the car will run up to 150,000km with just gas and oil resupply.
What I claim is they did it without being locked to maintain their car only in Citroen repair shops, while having a reliable car with limited repair/maintenance costs.
Never heard of car battery locked by proprietary screw or hidden under some sealed block, which force people to change the car battery in an official repair shop? And obviously, your brake pads don’t erode either during 150,000km, as several moving pieces are self-lubricating too.
Oh please.
Just gas and oil until 150,000km. Yeah right.
And as everybody knows, complexity and reliability are playing in the same team, like synonyms. Always was, is and would.
Sorry, but no.They’re not the owner of the sold car anymore. They have no right to forbid the owner to do whatever he wants with his car. It was a sale price, not a lease one.
What they could do is limiting the warranty under strict conditions, indeed, as the gouvernement can force car owners to pass strick technical controls to allow them to use it on public roads. Outside these limits, a car owner can do whatever with it: he buy it, he don’t lease its usage.
Oh please. Histories of manufacturers who refuse to take under warrant their own repair shops poor jobs are legions! Whatever happened, they always try to avoid to honor the warrant, even when they were the only one to ever had access the car internals.
I don’t deny that there is some security concern to let potentially unskilled third party change something on a modern car, but I claim that’s not the #1 reason behind the closed-design they’ve all moved toward during the last two decades. While the sale price tag didn’t raised that much, car design and building cost had exploded. Their only mean to make enough profit now is to sale the car *and* enough repair services with it.
To go back on topic, Apple don’t need that to cover their sale cost. But they do make bigger and bigger profit doing it. Thanks to locked customers.
I agree with one of the first post: you don’t own an Apple product. You lease it. Except you pay it more than concurrent *sold* products…
Edited 2010-02-02 15:31 UTC
They don’t need it to cover their costs, no. But they DO need it to maintain their brand image and customer loyalty.
People who buy Apple products WANT that simplicity and convenience. They don’t care if they can’t get root access to install some third-party operating system or program. The product does what it was advertised to do, and they are happy with it the way it is.
As I said in my other posts, there are THOUSANDS of other products that do not follow Apple’s business model, and the consumer is free to choose one of them as an alternative.
Exactly: Most people don’t give a damn about tinkering with their devices and that’s fine. There’s no reason whatsoever to prevent me from tweaking the freaking device I bought with my hard-earned money. As long as I don’t infringe any laws (copyright, patents, etc), I’ll do whatever I want with the goods I buy. Even if I void the warranty.
As I said, getting sued for getting the most of the goods I bought is ridiculous.
The difference between the company whose supporters now say, you don’t like how closed it is, don’t buy it.
And the one that introduced and supported Hypercard all those years ago.
Its the difference between the Party that had Bakhurin as the ‘darling of the Party’, and the Party that lay down in front of Stalin and killed Babel.
Of course, that element was always present, but whoever thought that the pigs would become quite such good imitations of men, and in many ways, more manly than even the most manly of men? More manly than the farmers the animals fought against, back then.
Honestly, I think the premise of this article is all wrong.
What the iPhone, iPad, NES, Wii, PS3, and yes, even Laptops, represent is mass appeal and a desire by the user to simply consume and interact rather than be wrapped up in the details.
I include the laptop because it is also effectively a closed system due to complexity and miniaturization no matter whether you buy one from Apple, Dell or Acer.
Apple is simply at the forefront of turning what was once a mainframe into something every single person in the world can find useful and entertaining.
It’s not a threat to tinkerers… there will always be computers to tinker with as long as tinkerers demand them (and the full power of computing hardware is needed). But lets face it, most of us humans are *not* geeks who want to overclock their RAM timing so that we get the maximum MIPS out of our quad core CPU.
WHO CARES. Just plug me into iTunes so I can watch Scrubs!
I too enjoy to build my own PC´s, use Linux, and keep control over my computer stuff…
Right now I am on Windows 7, as it is simply very impressive, but I can still mostly do all my FLOSS apps on win7…
I dislike all Apple products, as it is always closed and dumbed down… I never liked Mac… I never liked OSX…
My take is that geeks will stick with Linux, and the rest will make Win7 the OS of choice of the planet… Easier to pirate than XP
Apple is mostly for sophisticated snobs, sorry, no offense…
Yeah you don’t need to master registry editing
or know all the obscure textfile configs out there.
So it is dumbed down =)
Apple is for people who are not searching for problems =)
The Registry is not part of Linux. As he said, he uses Windows or Linux.
Please, please, do not reiterate crappy Apple FUD every time someone mentions a non-Apple computer. It’s tiring hearing the same old registry excuse every time. Heck, even if you don’t use an alternative OS, there is no reason to fiddle with the Registry. Unless you want to blow your OS to pieces.
That’s why I mentioned Windows Registry and Linux textconfigs burried into nested directories.
LOL. Registry is just a big config file.
There is nothing explosive in it.
Some settings, even important ones (like disabling Vista “virus”-autostart feature) can be configured in Registry only.
Hold on up there partner.. He said “registry” (Windows) and “Obscure text config file” (LINUX.) RTFC next time, yeah? No need to vent.
None taken, Linux is for unsophisticated snobs.
The impenetrable iMac, should have been a clue. The ipod has been almost impossible to access for years now, without the right tool. The rapings for swapping batteries….the lack of external SSD slot on iphone. Need I continue? None of this should be a surprise.
Apple knows better than us, they will dictate how a device is used, and upgraded. They will own/control the process, and we will like it. Hell, they’ve been dictating very specific hardware requirements on software since way before anyone heard of an iMac.
They didn’t rake in 3.5 billion in profit last quarter, by being an “Open” company. They don’t care about “you”, they will design/market/hype, and you will buy it.
And yet they’re making money hand over fist. Interesting, isn’t it? They definitely know how to work the market in their favor. The most interesting part is Apple’s presence considering their marketshare really isn’t that big.
Yeah, given the amount of money their taking in….I’d say that they actually do know what people want/need out of a PC, or media device.
I’m reserving judgment of the iPad until I get to actually use one. I know someone at work is bound to buy one.
I still say the AppleTV is a failure, though.
The problem with the AppleTV is it requires too much of the end user. I already have a collection of DVDs. I don’t want to transcode them… Additionally, I pay for cable. If you can’t DVR my favorite shows don’t attach yourself to my television!
I fail to understand the premise of the article. It seems to suggest that you cannot write software for your iPad or your iPhone but this is untrue.
I can certainly write software for an iPhone and an iPad at a cost of only $99. Actually, to ‘tinker’ I can run the software on the simulator at essentially no cost, other than the computer I am using, because all the software is free from Apple.
Indeed, I happen to have several home brew apps running on my and my wife’s iPhone (which are not on the App Store).
There is also a number of great new platforms, that use other computer languages, that I can also use to tinker with the my iPhone and I expect the same to be true of the iPad.
One might argue that the issue is that I cannot write a piece of software on the iPhone itself but, really, on which phone can you do that and would you really be able to do anything significant on a miniature keyboard?
]{
You can’t write software for iPhone or iPad except on a Apple’s provided hardware *and* software system and via Apple’s AppStore.
If Apple don’t want to expose some feature (hardware or software) of the iPhone/iPad, you’ll never know, and you will never discover it yourself, as you will never learn how features can be used without Apple will to reveal their existence. If Apple don’t want your software to be available to peaple (see recents examples, as the Skype iPhone client for instance), you wont be able to publish it at all.
That’s the lock-in issue at point.
Understand me well, it’s not a surprise, Apple does it since day one, and it should be of no surprise for anybody but people too young to know Apple’s behavior history.
Apple is not the only IT company who does (or did) that, but it’s clearly today one of the biggest to lock software and hardware on a main stream mass market that way.
Nothing really new, only the scale has changed.
But saying one can write software for iPhone, iPad (or even MacOS X) without being under some Apple control on what to do and how to do it is plain false, sorry.
Technically you can write anything you want for the iPhone. What you can not do is use Apple’s infrastructure to distribute anything you want though it.
It is not the development model (heck all the tools are free for those so inclined to write apps), it is the distribution model which may be the issue regarding “lock in” for apple mobile products.
If you do not agree with the model, either as a customer or a developer. There alternatives, android being the first one which pops in my head.
Write anything (many does that, in fact 🙂 ), yes, write it on any platform, no. You need access to MacOS X to write anything for the iPhad (ooops). And, what a coincidence, to access a MacOS X system, you need to have a Mac computer.
Sorry, but no, the “tools” are not free, software tools are, but the hardware allowed to run them is not. Far from it, in particular when you already own one or more computers with same CPU, same SATA storage bus, same USB bus, PCI bus, RAM bus, same GPU, same firewire chip etc than a Mac computer, all those perfectly able to support and run the software binary, except for booting MacOS X on it. Why should I bough a Mac to cross-compile for ARM target some iPhone app, when clearly any x86 platform of the shelf could do that too technically speaking ? What would you say if Microsoft Visual Studio only run on Sony, HP & Dell computers, but not on home-made PCs!?
Why I should resort to an unofficial (open) toolchain to write software for iPhone without having to buy yet another computer which I don’t need otherwise?
That’s the point in every Apple product: everything is locked together. For the better for end-user customers (and Apple profit), indeed, but for the worse for others, ranging from power-users to developers.
I don’t care about Apple business model. I care about *my* developping costs & profits. And since few years, Apple’s answers in that area are not good enough for me.
You are all forgetting a simple thing. We don’t only tinker with computers. People tinker with everything! Have you ever heard of MacGyver?
We are full of products that can be extended very far from it’s designers thoughts, like the paper clip, the post-it and many others.
Now, is this Apple mentality of controlling everything healthy? What if this model succeeds and other non-tech companies starting copying it? Do you wanna live on Aldous Ruxley’s “Brave new world”?
Do not confuse “not targeting” a specific market, with “declaring war” on said market.
Geeks are a small market, and Apple decided not to target them. I am most definitively underwhelmed by the iPad, but it is simply because as a device it does not fall into my realm of interest. Should I figure out Apple is personally targeting me in whatever fictitious war they are engaged against me? No, as a normal person I simply understand that Apple’s marketing is not interested in my money, and I move on…
Apple, Microsoft et al offer products, if they don’t fit your area of application and/or interest… one is free to not purchase them. Unless there is a mandatory need to do so, in which I assume one would have an actual complaint (and that is where anti-monopolistic actions should come in). But unless apple is putting a gun to your temple, or forcing you to use the iPad in any shape way or form. They are not doing anything that could be even remotely be portrayed as a war declaration on anyone.
Why can’t we have more articles about operating systems instead of Thom’s daily anti-Apple post? His reasoning why Apple is trying to destroy the universe are even more far fetched than all those reasons why year X is going to be the year of the Linux desktop.
Who buys an iPad anyway only to complain it doesn’t include BASIC? If I want to program stuff I’d use Linux or my Commodore 64. Things like an iPhone or an iPad are devices that just need to work.
Yea no kidding I don’t expect to program on an ipad anymore than I expect to program on my hdtv. Just because they both have cpus does not mean they should be used for programming. The iphone is also locked down and I would much rather have a game library that includes GTA Chinatown wars than the ability to run a BASIC compiler.
I learned a long time ago that there would be two classes of people in the future – those who tell the computer what to do, and those who are told what to do by the computer. I decided then and there to be in the former class. It’s very much like literacy. The ones who are managed by their computer will be considered illiterate.
Apple has always catered to the latter crowd. Don’t worry about files. Don’t worry what’s under the hood. In fact, we will make it darn near illegal for you to do so. Just keep staring at the “wizard on the screen”.
“I’m sorry, Dave. I’m afraid I can’t do that.”
I didn’t want to weigh in on the Apple jihad anymore, but your post addresses human-computer interaction, which is a rare on-topic discussion for this site.
I strongly disagree with the whole idea that Apple wants the users to be sheep, protecting them from all that might hurt them and guiding them by the hand through their computer use. I understand this perception, but it is a side effect of good design and not a design goal.
What made the NeXT os, and now OS X, great was superior design. It is not about dumbing down anything. I still have a shell prompt. All the unix stuff I would have on any BSD, linux, Solaris, etc is there. I’m talking about superior GUI design. Simple is better. Simple is good design. Simple does not equal stupid. It means the designers did a good job and their interface facilitates your use of the device.
Good interface design is easy for someone who is not technically savvy to use. I am very technically savvy, and I also appreciate good design because it saves me time and often presents me with a way to accomplish something that is notably elegant. I really admire good interface design, and ultimately it has nothing to do with how the interface looks, but how it facilitates my work.
You can not expect the average user to understand what is under the hood of their os. Computers are a means of work, communication, entertainment, etc. I don’t expect my wife to write cron jobs or shell scripts. Those of us who do so are a very small minority of users.
Hate Apple all you want, it’s a free country. From where I sit, their os has a superior experience, whether you are a geek or not. Nothing dumbed down or restrictive about it. It’s just good design.
I agree with your assessment of Mac OSX to an extent – I too agree with the concept of great design making a product easy to use. That’s one of the reasons I keep coming back to Ubuntu. Even though I know my way around the command-line, I don’t want to HAVE to do that just to get basic things working. My experience has been the best with Ubuntu. 1 point for you.
However, since the wild and wooly days of Darwin and OSX, I think Apple is moving towards a more closed economy. The iPOD was really designed for iTunes, especially with the original DRM songs. Think of simple things like batteries. Just send it in to Apple. Think of the Apps on the iPhone/iTouch. Better get them via the Apple store. And now we have the iPad, which cannot even bother to provide a USB port (or SD, etc) for external storage. If you want a little more storage, buy a new unit!
It’s a trend, but I think I get 1 point.
Tied!
FWIW, I was really surprised that iPad was all that Apple had up their sleeve. It is a very ordinary product, an unsatisfactory ereader, just all around meh. As big a mess as I think Android is, there are far more compelling tablets coming on that platform in 2010, some of which use display technology that will make them excellent ereaders in addition to tablet computers, eliminating the need to have two devices.
Past experience made us believe that Apple would have some ideas on the tablet experience that we hadn’t thought of. That were brilliant. Not this time. Very ho hum device.
On the other hand, that very competition gives us great product from other corners. Look at all the cool Android phones coming this year. There is a Palm Pre in my pocket instead of an iPhone. Why? Because WebOS utterly destroys iPhone and Android and I want the best experience, not a brand. iPhone showed us the way, but if they don’t keep doing so others will be happy to step in and take over.
You make good points that I hadn’t thought of in regards to Apple. The whole iPod battery thing is kind of ridiculous. I have always that Apple was within their rights to do what they had to protect their brand, but they have become very weird about it all.
I really don’t care. I have used some Macs in the past, and I have found out that they don’t work the way I want them to work. When I discovered Linux it was love at first sight: open software, source code I could compile, a computer I could choose.
Apple does not offer me anything. I find it very strange that people think the iPad is such a great thing. It is not. It is a crippled piece of hardware which misses a number of things one has gotten used to nowadays. To claim this would be an advantage is silly. People who actually believe this are even more silly. Yeah, it’s a device made by grandpa for grandpa.
It doesn’t matter to me. And it surely won’t change the way the net works. Thank God, it’s only Apple
They have always been that way.
I remember when I was in elementary school, we had Apple in our computer labs.
My father despised them because they were closed, less peripherals, secretive, you couldn’t buy a card from the store and stick it in an ISA slot, etc.
He was a VAX/VMS kinda guy but we ran Windows at home because 1) it was better, and 2) you “owned” the computer and could install hardware / software.
Now, look at how things have changed.
Lets look at Apple now… they have the better OS. When I say better, I mean better in purely an operating system standpoint (managing processes). They have much better peripheral support, though not via PCI, only through USB / firewire.
Now, look at Windows. You might as well be running one process at a time like DOS. You get a process to hang your CPU, you can’t open the task manager to kill it until its done doing what its doing. Even then, how many times do you need to “End Task” before it actually gives you control of your computer back? Windows hasn’t done anything but add polish.
So, Apple progressed, but didn’t fundamentally change. They are still opposed to tinkering. You still don’t own anything that says Apple on it. But because Microsoft hasn’t innovated or improved (other than polish) people started leaving Microsoft and going to Apple. Now those people are upset because Apple doesn’t behave like Microsoft.
Before:
Microsoft : Less Evil, better product.
Apple : More Evil, niche product.
Now:
Microsoft : Less Evil, worse product.
Apple : More evil, better product.
I’m the only one old enough here to remember that we ALREADY HAD closed appliances and that, thank God, they died in hell ?
Do I need to remember that once we had other and stuff AND PCs and PCs won because they were open?
Like the old saying, those who didn’t learn are keen to repeat…
I was writing Point of Sale software for Apple ][‘s when many of those who grace these pages with their presence were not yet at kindergarten, and I was supporting business networks when many of you were in grade school. I have first hand knowledge that one of the “benefits” of tinkerers was software from such obscure companies as Microsoft and Adobe / Aldus breaking with new OS releases because they decided to use undocumented entry points and function calls, things they discovered through tinkering. The benefits I speak of were of course to the software companies in question, who raked in millions for upgrades to products that their tinkering broke in the first place.
While some people only want to see the roses, realists can also see the bed of manure they’re growing in…
Yes, but they were working WITHIN the framework of the software/operating system environment. Not to mention that there was no software industry to speak of, and computers were really the sole domain of hobbyists, because they were too technical and confusing to the average person.
Joe User is…and Joe User doesn’t care.
The whole reason the iPod/iPhone/iPad are so successful is because they are closed. Like a console, developers know what to expect, the tools are provided and so is the marketplace. The users get a slick product that ‘just works’.
And developers (the ‘tinkerers’) love it. The users definitely love it.
If youre in the tiny minority that have a problem with Apple policies, why spend your time whining about what apple is doing? Why not create apps or hardware for the Nokia Maemo, Palm Pre, Google Android or the plethora of custom Linux-based embedded hardware platforms out there?
Why would Apple change when you can’t demonstrate any benefit whatsoever from them doing so?
Wheres your killer app for android that doesn’t exist on the iPad?
Wheres the killer android device with the full linux OS, with the power and simplicity that makes iPad owners want to switch?
There are hundreds of manufacturers in the world making thousands of products, all easily “hackable,” mod-able, and open. It is a “tinkerer’s” PARADISE right now; especially with the Android phones, “netbook” computers, and the like.
But ONE computer company, with a total of 13 products for sale somehow manages to raise the ire and fury of “tinkerers” everywhere. Hell, if you group them into families, then the list gets even smaller: laptops, desktops, iPod, iPod Touch/ iPhone/ iPad (since they run the same software), AppleTV, and XServe. That’s six product families.
And people are up in arms over the closed ecosystem surrounding those six items.
Oh, wait. . . I forgot that you can install WHATEVER OPERATING SYSTEM YOU WANT on your laptop & desktop, and people have already installed Linux on iPods. So, that leaves iPhone/iPod Touch/ iPad, AppleTV and XServe. Three product families. Three.
There are so many other manufacturers out there making so many products that do so many things that I can’t even count them all!
But no, let’s all trash-talk Apple because we can’t get “root” access to three items. Oh, wait. . . the XServe uses standard PC hardware, so that leaves two.
DAMMIT! I just forgot that they’ve already got Linux running on an AppleTV, so that leaves ONE.
One product family. Three items. Three out of thousands.
Give me a fraking break.
Modded you back up… Some people can’t take the truth, I guess. OMG the evil Apppppple will enslave us all. Meanwhile, let’s bend over for Google. They have our best interests at heart and aren’t evil. They even say so! W00t!
I tried loading a FreeBSD cd in my Sony blu-ray player and nothing happened.
It looks like Sony expects me to use it simply as a blu-ray player. Those bastards don’t want to give me root access and have ruined my plans of turning my blu-ray player into a firewall.
I’ll write an article later about how Sony wants to enslave the children of tinkerers and possibly eat them. That is unless I come up with something even more outrageous and sensationalist.
A company that has less than 5% of the worldwide PC market and an even smaller percentage of the mobile phone market is somehow single handedly going to shut down the tinkerers of the world.
Right, well, if you say so.
Lets just think about the tinkering for a bit. While there have undoubtedly been benefits to all the tinkering, it also lead to decades of viruses and trojans, and therefore loss of data, time and money. With each new release of Windows people have applauded Microsoft for making the OS more secure – and with each security improvement comes tighter control – something which Apple built in to the iPhone / iPad OS. Modern operating systems also support security certificates for installers, and it would be trivial to make them mandatory – which would put then in exactly the same league as iPhone apps, so please don’t try to paint this as something that is just Apple’s creation.
You are also not locked out of the hardware on the Mac or the iPhone so you can install other operating systems on them if you so wish, operating systems that allow you to tinker as much as you please, just like you can install various operating systems onto generic hardware. After all, most tinkering is done in order to see what other things you can make the hardware do.
So in reality this article isn’t at all about Apple shutting out tinkerers, it’s about Apple not making their operating system to your specification, so that you (or whoever) can play around with it.
Real news must be hard to come by these days…
You can still download the tools from Apple for free, and run apps in the emulator. Heck, you can jailbreak it, or simply choose a more open platform, like Android or Nokia.
I, too, was a tinkerer as a child, and after exceeding the memory limitations of my ZX Spectrum, I dropped BASIC and jumped to Z80 machine code. It’s actually much easier these days, because high level languages are so much more powerful, and all the information you need is available on the Internet that I didn’t have access to back then. I barely had a few old books that didn’t satisfy my hunger for knowledge.
What makes it harder today is that video games are so much more addictive. Back in the day games were so dumb that it was way more exciting to write programs than to play. That’s no longer the case today.
I’m an Apple Fanboy of sorts (I have been using them since 1990 as a first grader), and I have to admit, this article is one of the better OSNews has had about Apple. It is interesting, and really thought provoking. I am nowhere the type of tinkerer that Pilgim is (I like install Linux and what not to see what the other stuff is like from time to time…), but as an educator, he brings up a good point. The vast majority of people are visual/audio learners. The most special learners (both high end and low end on the I.Q. scale) are usually kinesthetic learners and need to have their hands on an item to learn the most they can about it. There is a lot to digest here. Very good article!
Edited 2010-02-02 18:38 UTC