I wont lie to you all. For the majority of the last few years, I had fallen in as an Apple fanboy. Over the course of my life, I’ve had a string of terrible Windows computers (including two Sony Vaios – a laptop and desktop.) Then, upon moving to Osaka in 2006, at my wits end with all things Microsoft, I bought a Macbook. It was a revelation. Things worked. I didn’t have to worry about viruses and random dll errors. It was bliss, and still is.
My Apple addiction didn’t take long to dig its claws in, so when I saw the first screens of the iPhone my mind went blank and all I could see was a gadget that I needed to own. Luckily, I was still in Japan, so the first gen iPhone was able to pass by without any battles between my self-control and my credit card. The iPhone 3G was released about 2 weeks before I left Japan and returned to the States, so of course buying one was my first act upon leaving the plane. The first 6 months or so were bliss, but things began going downhill quickly.
I was forced to continually jailbreak with each software upgrade, because the device simply wasn’t allowed to do what I wanted. The more I saw, the more Apple’s arbitrary and obtuse approval process annoyed me and completely put me off. Here was a device that was revolutionary, but at the same time held back from its full potential by Steve Jobs’ draconian practices. Only apps that he deemed acceptable could run on the device, it could only sync with iTunes (obviously), no apps could duplicate built-in features (anti-competitive), and huge parts of the system were cut out of the official SDK only allowing developers to do what Steve said they could. Couple that with being bill-raped by AT&T (you want me to pay extra for SMS? f*** off,) and I needed out. I bought a Nexus One, got switched over to T-Mobile, and just like the moment I bought my Macbook, it was a revelation.
Yes, the iPad looks pretty, and it has all of the apps and everything just like the iPhone/iPod touch, but it also still has all of the problems, but now on a bigger scale. Let’s put aside the fact that it’s a first gen Apple device, which are notoriously flawed products. This thing has the guts of a netbook, and a beautiful interface, but it’s still cut off at the knees because it’s locked down. The App Store has unknown and constantly changing review criteria, though the anti-competitive policies are well known. It can’t multitask (except for the anti-competitive multitasking with first party software.) It can’t run Flash. It isn’t expandable. Consider this on that last point: this is a 16Gb micro SD card. That card costs about $40 and equals the storage capacity of the lowest rung iPad. Given the size, there is no way Apple could build a slot for that? Of course not, because then they couldn’t charge you an extra $100 to jump from the 16Gb iPad to 32Gb iPad.
Here’s a dirty little secret everyone: the iPod was almost never the best MP3 player on the market, but you were so stuck in the web of iTunes, you couldn’t break free, and never knew what you were missing, couple that with the Apple branding juggernaut, and to this day all MP3 players are called “iPods” by the casual consumer. The same is now true for the iPhone. It is nowhere near the best smartphone on the market. It was the first one to be beautiful and to rope in the luddites, and now that those people are trapped in the Apple web, they aren’t going to get out, because people are inherently afraid of change. So, here’s the answer: don’t buy an iPad, don’t get stuck deeper in that web. The iPad, like the iPod and iPhone, will be the first tablet on the market to get it right, but that doesn’t mean it’s the best, and more to the point, it will not be the best tablet on the market by the time the year is out.
Sometime this year, the Notion Ink Adam Tablet PC will be released and that will blow the iPad out of the water. Here are some of the differences:
Notion Ink Adam Tablet (NIAT) will have a dual core processor, and therefore be able to easily multitask and run Flash, the iPad cannot do either (except for crippled multitasking which is only allowed by Apple software). NIAT has an amazing screen which will not only offer better resolution and battery life than the iPad, but will also be able to switch to a mode similar to E-Ink (think Kindle) for more comfortable reading and even better battery life. NIAT will support Android OS, Ubuntu Linux or Google Chrome OS, giving you access to anything you would want to do, whereas the iPad will run iPhone OS, limiting you to the App Store (and remember apps are rejected if they duplicate functionality, so no alternatives to Safari, Mail, Calendar, and maybe not even the iWork that comes bundled.) NIAT will also have a camera that swivels 180 degrees, whereas the first gen iPad has no cameras. And, to top it all off, NIAT will be cheaper than the iPad.
Not sold? There will also be plenty of tablets coming out running Windows 7 (not some form of the Zune or Windows 7 Phone software, full on Windows 7,) Linux, and Android. So, you can choose a tablet that runs Windows 7 and can use all of the software that goes along there, or a tablet with all of the benefits of Android (open development).
The iPad will act as a gateway for content providers to charge you for everything. Hulu is planning an iPad app, but it won’t be free, even though Hulu turned a $100 million dollar profit last year, and expects to double that this year from ads alone. NBC is considering a paid app for the iPad as well.
But wait! you say? The iPad will have custom built apps for the New York Times, Wall Street Journal and other newspapers, plus the iBook store! It will revitalize the sinking print business! First of all, why do you need access to thousands of books in your pocket? You need one book, and you can get that one book you will read at a time from a library, for free if you want. Owning a Kindle or iPad will simply lead to impulse buying of books that you won’t read and won’t feel guilty about because they won’t be staring at you from the shelf, they’ll be hidden away on your tablet.
And, here’s a crazy question: maybe the newspapers are dying for a reason. Maybe they are still clinging to outmoded ideals and business practices and want you to pay for their inability to evolve with the times. Consider this: these apps that are supposedly going to “revitalize” the industry are simply repackaged newspapers, and they will charge you subscription fees. These companies are just repackaging the stuff you already don’t buy. We don’t need newspapers, we don’t need the packaging, we just need the content, and we can access that content redistributed in hundreds of different sources. The Times and WSJ don’t have anything that you can’t find elsewhere, but they want to charge you a fee as if what they are giving you is some sort of precious commodity. The news is not a rare commodity, especially not in the world of the Internet. These companies are not giving you paper (an actual commodity that could easily become limited,) they are giving you information that has been digitally distributed and copied. It is nothing special. WSJ is going to charge $4 per week for full access on the iPad. Alternatively, it only costs $2 a week to subscribe to WSJ online. Double the price for what? The privilege of owning an iPad? B.S. They know the target market of the iPad: people who don’t know that there are better options, people who won’t notice that they are living in Musolini’s Italy.
Sure, with the iPhone and iPad, the trains will run on time. But, that doesn’t change the fact that you don’t have full control over the device you bought, it is purposely crippled, and the apps available are subject to the whim of dictator Steve.
