2010
What they wanted: a MacBook Pro with no keyboard for $799.
What they got: a big fucking iPod Touch for $499.
OMGWTFBQQ!!!!1111!! HOW COULD HE DO THAT TO US? OUR BELOVED STEVE!??!
Now, anyone who could possibly mistake me for an Apple apologist obviously doesn't know me or read anything I've written in the last... oh... 5 years. There is absolutely no way I will defend that company, in any way, shape, or form. But that said, I think that the iPad is exactly what it is advertised to be: a big fucking iPod touch. In that context, if you need a big fucking iPod touch, you're in good shape, because there is one now. If you don't, believe it or not, you don't have to buy one. There's no law that says you do.
For what I do, which is make music, and make software to make music, the iPad is pretty fucking cool, bordering on heaven-sent. I can easily think of about 20 ways this will be handy for me, and if you gave me a little time to think about it, I could come up with dozens more. For the times I'm not making music or making software to make music, I'm either sitting outside or sitting on my couch, staring at the tiny screen of my iPhone as I play games. This will be a nice replacement for that.
I'm not going to try to read anything else in to it. It's just a big fucking iPod. Peter Kirn would have you believe that the Sky Is Falling, but he obviously doesn't recall the original Mac, which was as closed as a computer can be, yet beget a fairly robust line of products. Besides, we've heard that story before.
How different would the stories be today if they had just called it the iPod Pro?
This ability for this device to be a highly adaptable conduit to an untold myriad of media, internet, and new UI experiences is not lost on me. To simply call it a giant iPod Touch I think is short sighted though. If I may be so bold, the iPad is kind of like the iPod of life in general. It's really not a stretch to see this device become the single hub of tons of people's day to day lives whether they use it to email, to watch movies, to surf the web, to play games, to read books, to make music, to control other software, to navigate, to WHATEVER. Sure it's powerful out of the box, but the intriguing shit is what happens when developers start making those apps that will make this thing BE the one device everybody needs.
The fanbouyz are all limp-dicked now, but they will undoubtedly be in line to buy one, maybe not day one, but eventually.
posted January 28, 2010 by rollmottle
I agree that Peter sounds a little grandpa to me, but I kinda thought the idea of this thing introducing a sea-change was a bit on the wild side too. Bigger Plinkton, awesomer Jasuto, more useful TouchOSC, and much better Kindle -- yes.
posted January 28, 2010 by MrBiggs
It's the ultimate machine for user friendliness ;)
I also disagree with CDM on the lack of openness because I don't need it. I've got a number of computers that I can user configure to death if I so care. I"m sure that hot on this trot there will be a multi touch pad for the Linux brigade.
Meanwhile I'll be rocking TouchOSC on this baby when it arrives!
posted January 28, 2010 by johan
While I appreciate smartphones, and have been a smartphone user about as long as there have been smartphones, I've never found them to be more than a passable substitute for what this thing is: a truly portable complete computing solution. This does everything the Touch does, and does it better. (Web surfing on a Touch? Please. Games? Barely. Making music? Neat, but a gimmick. This is a vast improvement in all categories.)
But the bonus is that you can actually read books on it (yeah, whatever, Kindle users. Your days were always numbered, and you need to accept that fact.) You can actually surf the actual web, rather than pinching and zooming your way through a miniature version.
No Flash? Who gives a flying fuck? Flash is an improvement over Java only inasmuch as you don't have to learn a computer language in order to have a gaping wound of a security hole on your system or kill your CPU. HTML5 gives that tragedy the death it so richly deserves anyhow. All the big video sites have HTML5 proof-of-concept players up now; by this time next year, Flash will be a bad memory.
No camera? Well, you got me there. But it'll come. In the meantime, this is an actual computer that can actually compute. You'll see it make massive inroads almost immediately for the boardroom types (Keynote with a tele-strator? Win!) photographers (its ability to dump camera files directly and a fairly good photo browser are just the tip of the iceberg; we'll see mid-level editing in no time), musicians (obviously, it has incredible potential as a synthesis platform), bloggers (much better to do any text input on this with the keyboard dock than any smartphone), and the list goes on.
To describe how much of a win this is in simple words is difficult. It won't appease the endgadget set, but nothing does, because that's apparently a side-effect of massive doses of Ritalin.
-CR
posted January 28, 2010 by Chris Randall
posted January 28, 2010 by Pop Heroes
I'm wondering about the horsepower and what it will actually be useful for. I think it might be a nice controller or score viewer. Given its lack of I/O and horsepower, I am skeptical of its utility as a virtual instrument.
But I'm sure we'll see all sorts of "Bloom"-ish/Tenori-On types of things.
Given the price for the base model and its obvious around-the-house utility, I'm pretty sure I'll end up with one. No 3G radio, and minimal memory. It's for talking to other devices, not storing its own stuff.
It's a big friggin' iPod Touch. Nothing wrong with that if it's what you want.
posted January 28, 2010 by Jinsai
Then the iPad comes out, and everybody bitches that it's not a keyboard-less laptop with a laptop/desktop OS.
At least all of these blog posts will make for good reading three years from now.
posted January 28, 2010 by RidleyGriff
That said I think the funniest thing about the reactions of people like Peter is that they all seem to be laboring under the idea that Apple still sees itself as a hardware manufacturer. Apple makes hardware to facilitate people buying content from them. If it weren't for the itunes store they wouldn't bother with ipods. Nor would there be an iPhone if they hadn't come up with app store. The sole reason for the existence of the ipad, is the print and video sales tie-ins (and probably a good bit of Steve's ego).
posted January 28, 2010 by noisegeek
The sense I get from this device is that Apple made it because they felt cornered into doing it. So they came up with something that's pretty nice, but won't usher in a sea change any time soon. That sea change was what every one was expecting, hence the argle bargle of the tech blogging set.
I just wish they had announced a new, completely redone version of iTunes yesterday. I hate that piece of shit more than I've hated any software in the last decade.
posted January 28, 2010 by shamann