One of many Apple tablet mock ups (via Gizmodo)

The hype surrounding Apple’s potential tablet release this year has gotten to be pretty unbearable over the past few weeks. The ever-contentious Joe Wilcox argued that the world doesn’t need tablets, John Gruber wrote that it may potentially be “Apple’s reconception of person computing“, while many others are treating it like the coming of the Messiah.

Now many sources are reporting that Apple is set for a “major product announcement” on Jan. 27th, and that a French developer has received a beta of the iPhone OS4 SDK, which includes options for scaling applications to tablet screen sizes. The Wall Street Journal also lends further credence to the tablet news by reporting that Apple is set to unveil the tablet device later this month, with a release in March. Hopefully once we get some concrete info on this thing, the tech blogosphere will calm down a bit.

Over the past few months, I’ve written a bit about tablets over at Royal Pingdom. In December, I asked “Who needs tablet computers anyway?” While my title may sound similar to Wilcox’s above article, I approached the question in a very different way. I don’t deny that tablets will eventually become a widely useful computing segment, but I think it’s going to take some time for them to find their place in our computing lives.

Several months ago, I also wrote about how great it is that Microsoft’s Courier device is taking a completely different approach from what we hear about the Apple tablet. Personally, I want a Courier more than any other tablet I’ve seen thus far.

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Did You Hear? I Think Apple’s Releasing a Tablet!

• Looking Forward to the Android Takeover
• My Thoughts on the Palm Pre
• The iPhone 3G is a Call to Arms for Mobile Computing
• The Roku Netflix Player, The Shape of Things to Come
• Why The Magic Mouse is the Most Important Apple Announcement Today

It’s no surprise that Apple has launched a new series of ads to compete with the launch of Windows 7, but the one above in particular really makes me want to smash my head into my desk. It starts with PC saying that Windows 7 is “not going to have any of the problems” Windows Vista had, and then proceeds to repeat that mantra through past versions of Windows (all the way back to Windows 3) while PC’s clothes get further outdated. All the while, Mac remains typically hip.

Now I know that Apple isn’t aiming for realism here–but pretending that the Mac OS didn’t have issues throughout the 90s just like Windows is pretty much rewriting history. I would argue that Windows 98 and 2000 were far better than anything the Mac had to offer until the release of OSX. And let’s not forget that the company wasn’t truly hip until Steve Jobs came back 1996. But then I suppose that doesn’t make for a cute commercial.

You can check out the other ads in the series over at All Things Digital.

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Apple’s New Anti-Windows 7 Ads Hurt My Brain

• Why The Magic Mouse is the Most Important Apple Announcement Today
• Did You Hear? I Think Apple’s Releasing a Tablet!
• My Thoughts on the Palm Pre
• Thoughts on the September 09 New York Tech Meetup
• Gamestop Dropping Zune, What Exactly is Microsoft’s Zune Strategy Now?

I suppose its no surprise that Apple’s latest hardware announcements have taken over the tech news waves today. After all, the announcement of sexy new 27″ iMacs, coupled with the future availability of Intel’s next generation Core i5 and i7 processors, is sort of hard to ignore. There were upgrades across the board for the Macbook, Time Capsule, and Mac Mini as well–but strangely enough, the most compelling announcement to me was that of a lowly input device: The Magic Mouse.

In general, I don’t hold too much fondness for Apple input devices, specifically their mice. Ever since the release of the “hockeypuck” Apple USB mouse with the original iMac, it seems as if Apple has aimed to purposefully torture their users. The Apple Pro mouse was an improvement (insofar as you could actually use it without wanting to harm yourself and others), but it was still stubbornly one buttoned–a trend Apple didn’t waver from until the two-buttoned Mighty Mouse in 2005. And yet, the Mighty Mouse remained far from ergonomic, and the rubber nipple scroll-ball was more a novelty than a true competitor to the scroll-wheel.

Basically, it seemed as if Apple was almost willfully ignoring the advances being made by the likes of Logitech, Microsoft, and other input device manufacturers. I’m honestly not sure why Mac users never raised a stink about it, but then I suppose it’s similar to how most people don’t realize how much the standard iPhone earbuds suck.

In contrast to their dubious history, the Magic Mouse appears to be much more ergonomic, and it eschews the rubber nipple for multi-touch capabilities. Wireless connectivity via Bluetooth is also the standard now. Just two weeks ago we saw some info trickle out about multi-touch mice being developed by Microsoft–but of course they were years from ever hitting the marketplace. As is often the case, Apple has leapfrogged the competition by releasing today what many considered years away.

The multi-touch gestures seem intuitive, and as a PC user the functionality actually makes me a bit jealous. I know that Windows 7 has multi-touch built in as well, and I’m hoping that someone eventually releases drivers to bring the Magic Mouse across the OS pond.

Check out a video demonstration of the gestures below:

The Magic Mouse will have a resounding impact on input devices moving forward–more than anything announced today. We’re going to see many different attempts at bringing multi-touch to the desktop, but once again we can thank Apple for being first and giving everyone else a swift kick in the pants to speed up their own innovation.

The Magic Mouse will be included with the newer iMacs announced today, and will be available separately for $69 at the end of October. You can hear me discuss the Magic Mouse, along with Apple’s other announcements, on episode 15 of the Symbiotek Podcast (coming soon).

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Why The Magic Mouse is the Most Important Apple Announcement Today

• The Roku Netflix Player, The Shape of Things to Come
• Will Sony Ever Stop Playing Catch Up with the Playstation 3?
• Gamestop Dropping Zune, What Exactly is Microsoft’s Zune Strategy Now?
• The Android T-Mobile G1 is the Real Successor to the Helio Ocean
• Windows Mobile 7 with Zune Integration Coming Soon?

Okay, so it’s been a while since I’ve posted, but I’m working on remedying that right now. Without revealing too much, let’s just say I’ll be making some time to do a lot more tech writing in the near future. If you’re interested in what I’ve been working in for the past few months, check out my work on the /Filmcast podcast, /Film, Twitter, and my Tumblog.

Along came the Palm Pre–a phone I like to refer to as the first real “iPhone killer”. I know that’s a loaded statement, but in this case I think it truly applies. The Pre is of course building on the iPhones success, but its improvements over Apple’s platform are fairly significant. Whereas the iPhone is media and gaming focused, Palm is taking things back to what made them famous with the Palm Pilot–productivity.

This may just be me, but I find the focus on productivity is something I’d appreciate on my phone moreso than (battery draining) media and games. Palm’s emphasis on getting things done starts with the Pre’s physical keyboard, and continues to the phone’s multitasking capabilities and the Synergy data sharing across a variety services. From everything I’ve seen, the Pre’s aim is to make your life in our information saturated world a bit easier. It’s an objective that directly builds upon Palm’s beginnings in the PDA market, and it also shows how serious they are about reclaiming smartphone marketshare from the likes of the Blackberry and Windows Mobile.

I know I’m late to the party with covering this, but I just had to express my excitement over the Pre. Not only is it a great looking device that could give the iPhone some much needed competition, but it’s a great story as well. Palm’s future is based upon the success of this phone. So just as we geeks are eagerly anticipating every bit of information about this device, I’m sure that Palm is anxious to see how well it performs.

Palm’s been very careful about releasing any information on the Pre’s pricing and availability, but word is that we’ll finally know the details in the next few weeks. I should hope so, because Palm is surely working hard to get this thing on the street in June. The release is perfect timing for me since I’m looking to replace my Helio Ocean, and it should also coincide with Apple’s latest iPhone refresh.

Like many, I will be making an epic purchasing decision between the Pre and iPhone, and I can only hope that the Pre lives up to the hype.

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My Thoughts on the Palm Pre

• The iPhone 3G is a Call to Arms for Mobile Computing
• Windows Mobile 7 with Zune Integration Coming Soon?
• Lamenting the Death of Helio, and How the iPhone Helped Kill It
• The Android T-Mobile G1 is the Real Successor to the Helio Ocean
• What nVidia’s Tegra Means for Mobile Devices, and Why You Should Care

(Honestly, I was waiting for the release of Google’s Android phones, but knowing that they wouldn’t show up until the end of 2008 (at the absolute earliest), I decided that the Ocean would tide me over for the next few years.)

But, like every underdog tech product/company I’ve loved (see: HD-DVD, the Rio Karma), it looks like Helio is ready to call it quits. They’re selling to Virgin Mobile, who will be getting rid of the Helio brand and making all Helio customers Virgin subscribers.

Honestly, I can’t say that I’m entirely surprised. While Helio has offered some great software improvements since the Ocean launched in May 2007, and they’ve even released a new handset recently (the Mysto), Helio simply couldn’t compete with Apple’s massive influence in the cellphone market. Sure, it took Apple until the iPhone 3G to match most of the Ocean’s features, but it was the iPhone that became a cultural phenomenon due to its groundbreaking user-interface.

(This is actually very similar to how the iPod took over the MP3 player market, even though Rio led the initial portable player charge.)

Now that the iPhone 3G is on its way, and practically every cellphone manufacturer is aiming to catch up to the iPhone’s innovations, Helio just can’t seem to do the same. Sure, they’ve got the mystical Ocean 2 on the way (some good spy coverage here), but it simply looks like a slimmer Ocean. Unless it has a bigger screen, along with touch capabilities, it won’t fair too well against the post-iPhone smartphones/mobile computing devices.

It’s a shame that Helio was never that successful. Their initial phone offerings weren’t all that great, but I appreciated their mission–to bring the high-tech phones from Korea to the America’s barren cellular marketplace. With the release of the Ocean, they succeeded in doing just that. 

I know many knock the Ocean for not looking “sexy” enough–which I suppose is true if you consider sexy to be an anorexic nightmare like the Motorola Razr–but the Ocean is sexy to me as a geek. It screams of well thought out industrial design with its unusual oval shape, the infamous dual slider design (which still gets me “wows” to this day), and the gorgeous screen. Hell, I even love the Ocean’s every-so-satisfying thunk when closing the phone. For those interested in an in-depth look at the Ocean’s fascinating industrial design process, check out this excellent cover article from Technology Review (registration required).

Software-wise, the Ocean launched with a decent feature set, but it is the upgrades that came later that really make the phone shine. Helio has since added a great mobile Youtube interface, push e-mail, and, taking a cue from user hacks, support for Mobile Opera. It aimed to compete with T-Mobile’s trendy Sidekick, and it put up a heckuva fight–the only problem was that they didn’t see the iPhone coming.

For now, I’m not itching to get out of my Helio contract just yet. Assuming Virgin doesn’t start disabling Helio services, and doesn’t start charging me more for my monthly bill, I still think I can ride out my contract and wait for an Android phone.

If anything, Helio’s demise has shown me that I truly have a knack for liking scrappy technologies. I’m not quite sure what to make of this yet…

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Lamenting the Death of Helio, and How the iPhone Helped Kill It

• The Android T-Mobile G1 is the Real Successor to the Helio Ocean
• My Thoughts on the Palm Pre
• Looking Forward to the Android Takeover
• The iPhone 3G is a Call to Arms for Mobile Computing
• Windows Mobile 7 with Zune Integration Coming Soon?

photo credit: _Andrish_

The iPhone 3G announcement has come and gone, and it seems like the main take-away for many is the $199 price, along with the new 3G and GPS capabilities. Of those three, I think the surprisingly low price for the 8GB iPhone 3G is the most important. Let’s face it, while 3G and GPS are new features to the iPhone, they’re not exactly fresh technologies in the cellphone market.

But while I’m all for a cheaper iPhone, I’m personally more interested in the iPhone software announcements from the WWDC than anything else. Everything from the SDK, to the application store, to the new MobilMe synching all cement the iPhone as a major mobile computing platform. And now that Apple is actually taking enterprise users into account, it has the potential to trump Microsoft’s Pocket PC platform and become a major competitor to RIM’s Blackberry domination.

Saul Hansell at the NY Times Bits blog (someone who I’m finding myself linking to a lot these days) seems to agree. In a recent column, he writes:

The most important battle here isn’t between the iPhone and the latest from Samsung or Nokia. The fighting now is over what will become the dominant platform for mobile computing. In that fight, Apple is competing with Microsoft, Symbian, Google’s Android, Palm and R.I.M. The company’s play is to make the iPhone, and the tools to develop for it, very closely related to the platform it uses on the Mac and on the Apple TV.

Indeed, it seems that the hardware changes to the iPhone 3G are practically irrelevant compared to Apple’s improvements to the iPhone platform. This is especially true if you consider that all of the software improvements will also benefit users of the original iPhone. I wouldn’t be surprised if this is the tactic Apple takes for the next few years–minor hardware updates to the iPhone itself (next year, expect a better camera, faster processor, more RAM, etc.), all the while spending more energy on solidifying the iPhone platform.

The iPhone was such a fresh take on cellphone hardware upon its launch that other manufacturers are still struggling to catch up. This head start allowed them to coast on the hardware for this past year, and give us features that honestly wouldn’t have been difficult to implement at launch. But it’s obvious from their platform announcements that Apple wasn’t just twiddling their thumbs–they’re aiming to dominate mobile computing, and frankly doing a damn better job at it than Microsoft’s “Origami” ultramobile PC project.

When it comes to mobile computing, the only other competitor to Apple that has the potential to compete with the iPhone’s features and ease of use is of course Google’s Android platform. Check out the video below to see one of the many ways I think Android will outdo the iPhone. You can find more Android videos and images over at Android Community.

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The iPhone 3G is a Call to Arms for Mobile Computing

• The Android T-Mobile G1 is the Real Successor to the Helio Ocean
• Lamenting the Death of Helio, and How the iPhone Helped Kill It
• Looking Forward to the Android Takeover
• Windows Mobile 7 with Zune Integration Coming Soon?
• Did You Hear? I Think Apple’s Releasing a Tablet!

I think we all agree: The Macbook Air is a gorgeous machine. During his keynote presentation, Steve Jobs whipped the entire Macworld audience into a fervor with his trademarked Apple enthusiasm for this new member of the Macbook family. With the Air we have an insanely light computer that still manages to fit in a 13.3″ screen and a screaming fast Core 2 Duo CPU.

But while it’s undoubtedly a singular machine, is it really worth the $1799 price tag when you can get much of the same functionality with Asus’s $400 Eee? I understand that the Air is more in competition with Sony’s TZ line that Jobs mentioned in his keynote, but it seems foolish not to compare this sleek new laptop to Asus’s wunderkind subnotebook.

[Note: Please take notice that this article was written in January 2008 and is a comparison of the original 7" Eee, not the later models. Although I would argue the later models prove my case even further.]

Here’s a quick rundown of how they compare:

	Macbook Air	Asus Eee
Size (H x W x D)	0.16” – 0.76” x 12.8” x 8.94”	1.38″ x 8.82″ x 6.5″
Weight	3lbs	2lbs
Display	13.3″ LED-backlit LCD	7″ LED-backlit LCD
CPU	1.6-1.8Ghz Core 2 Duo	900Mhz Celeron Mobile
RAM	2GB	512MB
Hard Drive	80GB 1.8″ (or 64GB solid state flash)	2-4GB solid state flash
OS	Mac OSX Leopard	Custom Linux Distro
Price	$1799	$300-$400

Let’s go over some of these topics to further inspect the differences between these two tiny titans.

Size

The Air is being advertised as “the world’s thinnest notebook”, and for good reason. The machine is certainly going to draw its fair share of stares when it starts popping up in coffee houses in a few weeks. Its paper-thin design has set new standards for industrial design, which is not at all unusual for Apple. Unfortunately, that thinness has also led to all of the compromises that Apple has had to make for the machine.

The Asus Eee is nowhere near as thin, but its smaller screen allows it to be significantly smaller than the Air overall. When it comes to choosing ultraportable computers, the key of course is portability. The Air, while thin, is still going to require you to carry around a laptop sized sleeve, case, or bag throughout the day. Its thinness can also be a problem if you’re carrying it in the same bag as heavy textbooks.

The Eee, on the other hand, can be treated more like a paperback. Its small size means you have far more options when carrying it around, and as we’ll discuss later, it also has many hardware features which should make you worry less about jostling around your bag all day.

Weight

Here’s one area where the Eee has a considerable advantage over the Air. It’s also something that may make a significant difference to someone considering an extremely portable laptop. While it may not sound like much, the difference between 2lbs and 3lbs in your backpack is the sort of thing that’s noticeable over the course of a day.

Display

This may end up being a deal-breaker for some. The Eee admittedly has a small screen which may be too difficult to use for some users. It also has a tiny resolution compared to the Air, which means it would be less ideal for multitasking and working with photos and other media. Still, for web browsing, word processing, and other productivity-related tasks, the Eee’s small screen is adequate.

If you absolutely need a high resolution display, either for watching movies or for the breathing room when working with media files, then the Air is the clear choice for you.

CPU

The processor differences is another area where the Air has a clear advantage over the Eee. Sporting a custom Intel Core 2 Duo processor that is the “width of a dime” and “as thick as a nickel”, the Air packs a lot of power into a minuscule package. While it’s nearly a full gigahertz slower than the chips in the Macbooks and Macbook Pros, it’s still fast enough to handle media encoding and high-definition video playback.

The Eee, on the other hand, has a processor that’s often belittled among technophiles. The Celeron was never a very strong chip, but what it lacked in processing capabilities, it made up for in low power usage and cost. For the simple purposes of the Eee the Celeron chip is more than enough. In addition, using this chip is one of the best cost-saving decisions Asus made when developing the Eee.

RAM

The Air comes with 2GB of RAM standard, compared to 512MB of RAM with the Eee. The Eee is upgradeable to 1GB of RAM, however. While these numbers may sound like the Air is trouncing the Eee memory-wise, the truth is not that clear cut. The Eee needs less RAM to perform optimally than the Air due to its Linux operating system, whereas OSX Leopard eats up quite a bit of memory on the Air.

In addition, I’ve stressed that the Eee is meant to do less than a fully-decked out laptop or desktop. Since the practical use of the Eee is more limited than the Air, it’s a given that less RAM is required.

Hard Drive

The difference in hard drives is another wide disparity between the Air and the Eee. The Air uses an 80GB hard drive that is also found in Apple’s 80GB iPod Classic. There is an optional 64GB solid-state flash disk available, but at a $999 premium, it’s not worth the cost just yet. The Eee uses a 2-4GB solid-state flash disk, depending on which model you buy.

The size difference is certainly significant, but as I’ve stressed already, the Eee’s purposes are very different than the Air. For working with small documents, the Eee’s solid state disk is more than enough space. In addition, you can always expand the amount of available space by using a separate USB flash disk. With the rise of online office suites, I also suspect we’ll start keeping far less data on our computers than before.

The other benefit of the Eee’s disk is that it has no moving parts, which means less of a chance for data corruption when traveling around with the computer. In addition, the Eee’s flash disk is a much faster storage solution than the Air’s 1.8″ hard drive. As this Tom’s Hardware article shows, there is a significant performance penalty in using these sorts of hard drives.

While the Air seems like a clear choice for multimedia work because of the larger hard drive space, its 1.8″ hard drive may end up being too slow for people looking to do advanced multimedia editing and encoding.

Operating System

The Air is running Apple’s latest operating system, OSX Leopard. The Eee is running a customized version of Xandros Linux. There’s a lot written online about Leopard already, but simply put, if you’re a Mac lover your mind is probably already made up. If you want an operating system that’s well-known and compatible with a variety of popular hardware and software, then Leopard is the clear choice as well.

Asus’s chosen operating system, on the other hand, is more fine-tuned to take advantage of the particular strengths of the machine’s hardware. It consists of open-source applications like Mozilla Firefox and Open Office, and other useful software like Skype. You can install some other programs using the Eee’s rudimentary package manager, but it appears as if the choice of new applications is currently slim.

Both the Air and Eee are capable of running other operating systems as well. Techie types can still use Boot Camp to run Windows on the Air as well as take advantage of Mac Linux distributions. As for the Eee, you can easily wipe out the included operating system and install any version of Windows or Linux that you’d like.

Price

Here is where the Eee clearly triumphs over the Air. For a smaller, albeit less powerful, computer, you end up spending at least $1300 less for the Eee than you would for the Air. The Eee is clearly a much better value, especially if you only need basic computing capabilities in an ultra-portable format.

The Air’s $1799 retail price also puts it in competition with Apple’s own Macbook and Macbook Pro. For $1099, you can get a Macbook with a faster processor, faster hard drive, and a weight gain of only 2lbs. For $1999 you can get an even faster overall machine, the Macbook Pro, with a dedicated 3D graphics card, bigger and faster hard drive, and a weight gain of only 2.4lbs.

In short, it seems that the Air is a bit of a luxury item that I honestly wouldn’t recommend to any of my friends on value alone. On the other hand, I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend the Eee to someone looking for a cheap ultraportable laptop.

In the Air’s defense, it is priced competitively with the lowest priced Sony TZ ultraportable laptops while offering a bigger screen.

other considerations

I’ll throw the Air a bone and take some time to discuss its features that don’t fall into the above categories. Perhaps most importantly, the Air features a full-sized keyboard, which is a rarity among ultraportable laptops. While I know I can get used to typing on the Eee’s small keyboard, I could see it being a showstopper for some folks.

And let me just be frank about the Air: It’s a dead sexy machine in ways the Eee could never hope to be. If you’re the sort of person with money to spare and a penchant for high fashion, I’m sure you’ve already preordered your Air. The Eee is a cute machine, but it simply does not exhibit the sort of commitment to industrial design and drool-worthiness that Apple has built its reputation on. Then again, the Eee is also a truly amazing machine in its own right given what it offers for the price.

The multitouch trackpad is also another noteworthy feature of the Air, but I assure you it will be popping up in future revisions of the Macbook and Macbook Pro. If that is at all a major factor in your decision to purchase the Air, then I suggest waiting a few months until it’s transitioned to the other members of the Macbook family.

Final Words: Eee for value, Air for style

After comparing the Macbook Air and the Asus Eee, it’s clear that Apple’s new notebook is not that great of a value compared to Asus’s surprise hit. The Air wins in overall sex appeal, raw horsepower, and a bigger screen. At the same time, the Eee is simply a more practical machine for those who only need a secondary machine to word process and browse the internet on the go.

CrunchGear is running a great article on the “uselessness” of the Air which boils down many of my issues with it succinctly:

The MacBook Air is not a subnotebook. The Eee and Everex, and Redfly are subnotebooks. They are tiny, basic, and are designed from the ground up to be micro-sized and limited. The Air is trying to be a regular notebook but failing – what Apple has done is take a regular notebook and flatten it (very well I might add), while simultaneously crippling it.

In addition, it doesn’t fair that well compared to other ultraportable laptops like the Sony TZ series because it lacks an optical drive, and many connectivity options.

I’m a practical person, and the Air is simply not a practical choice. Your money is better spent with the Macbook, or Macbook Pro if you’re looking for a dedicated computer. And if you’re just looking for something to accompany your desktop, then the Asus Eee is by far the superior choice.

Update: Battery Follow-Up

It’s been pointed out countless times that I forgot to compare the battery differences of these two machines.  Silly me:

In the comments below, Wing pointed out the biggest difference between the two battery-wise:

One big thing that some sites mentioned was that the Air doesn’t have a user-replacable battery. [Emphasis mine] It can be switched by an Apple tech but that’s only for when it dies. The eee on the other hand has a user-switchable battery. I can imagine it being very useful when you;re on the road (where you will be taking these things) and need an extra battery or two. Asus is also coming out with six-cell batteries which will probably last quite a bit.

It sounds like Air users will run into the same inconvenient issue as iPod users whenever their batteries die.

As far battery life, this Laptop Magazine review of the Eee reports that it gets around 3.5 hours of uptime. Ars Technica reports 5 hours for the Air, which seems to be on par for other ultraportable laptops. Since the Eee’s battery is user replaceable though, you could easily take along an extra charged battery for double the battery life. This is a common strategy among road-warrior types and is unfortunate for Apple since they’re also the perfect target market for the Air.

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Apple Air versus Asus Eee: A Comparison

• Asus Starts the USB 3.0 & SATA 6Gb Hype Train
• Why The Magic Mouse is the Most Important Apple Announcement Today
• The iPhone 3G is a Call to Arms for Mobile Computing
• The Android T-Mobile G1 is the Real Successor to the Helio Ocean
• What nVidia’s Tegra Means for Mobile Devices, and Why You Should Care

It’s long, but oh so worth it. Much has been written praising Apple for their industrial design sense already, but Turner’s article is by far one of the most enlightening. I especially liked this:

“Critical to Apple’s success in design is the way Jobs brought focus and discipline to the product teams,” ­Norman says. “[Jobs] had a single, cohesive image of the final product and would not allow any deviation, no matter how promising a new proposed feature appeared to be, no matter how much the team complained. Other companies are more democratic, listening to everyone’s opinions, and the result is bloat and a lack of cohesion.

“The difference between BJ and AJ, Before and After Jobs, is not the process,” he continues. “It is the person. Never before did Apple have such focus and dedication. Apple used to wobble, moving this way and that. No more.”

While Apple consistently churns out great products, it sounds like it would be a truly awful place to work if you cared about your opinion mattering when it came to design elements. And although I’ve decried it in the past, it seems that Steve Jobs’s tyrannical management style is also the key to their design success:

“Jobs is a dictator, but with good taste,” says Norman. “He is good and driven to the perfect experience. He doesn’t want good design; he wants great design.” Brunner similarly lauds Jobs’s “driven, singular focus.” And Rolston says, in what is perhaps the best explanation of Apple’s design ascendancy, “It’s a happy coincidence at Apple that the designer in chief is the CEO. He has a fantastic sense of what people want. And after all, that is design.”

Although Jobs sounds unbearable to work with, it’s talk like this that makes it apparent that he really is the single most important part of Apple. I don’t necessarily think this is a strategy that every company should adopt (you need Jobs’s charisma to really make it work), yet there are lessons from this singular top-down approach to design that Microsoft and others should recognize. It’s definitely part of the “magic” of Apple.

I also love that this article really makes Noah Wyle’s portrayal of Jobs in “The Pirates of Silicon Valley” all the more telling:

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On Apple’s Industrial Design

• Lamenting the Death of Helio, and How the iPhone Helped Kill It
• Ubuntu’s Fiesty Fifth Birthday, And Linux As A Desktop Solution
• My Thoughts on the Palm Pre
• Did You Hear? I Think Apple’s Releasing a Tablet!
• Do Verizon’s “iDon’t” Ads Miss the Point?

Earlier this month Steve Jobs posted a response, entitled “A Greener Apple”, to the various allegations against Apple’s eco-friendliness by Greenpeace. In the article, Jobs lays out a more transparent view of Apple’s current and future plans towards being green by noting their efforts to remove toxic chemicals and recycling of older products. He also spends an inordinate amount of time saying that their processes will only get better in the future. (Somehow, I think this is obvious, but no matter.)

It’s certainly nice to see Jobs finally responding to Greenpeace. The group has been dogging Apple with environmental complaints since 2004, even going so far as to create a dedicated website to voice their complaints and allow consumers to join in. It did certainly seem ironic that Apple, a brand synonymous with everything hip and progressive, and a company that has held Al Gore in its board of directors since 2003, has taken so long to address the situation.

I was content with Jobs’ response until I had the pleasure of opening a few packages from the Apple Store at work this past week. The order was for a wireless keyboard and a 13″ sleeve for a Macbook, but you couldn’t guess that judging from the boxes that arrived. Not only were the boxes disproportionally large, but to make up for that they were also stuffed to the brim with filler paper. Needless to say, it was disheartening to see a supposedly “green” company rely on such innefficient packaging practices.

Here are some pictures of the items ordered next to their packaging. Overkill is the word to keep in mind here.

Thankfully, all of these packaging materials are recyclable. But while I give them kudos for that, it still seems incredibly wasteful. I’ve never seen packaging like this for any of my orders from Amazon or Newegg. Given my job in desktop support (not to mention my geeky proclivities), you should know I’ve seen many variations on the art of package shipping.

Now to give you an idea how much paper was stuffed in these two boxes, I present to you my recycle bin: It was only 1/4 full when I opened it, but after stuffing the paper in the bin was completely full! This isn’t a small bin either, I would wager that it’s slightly over 5′ tall.

I’m not entirely sure if this is a widespread problem, but I will definitely be keeping a closer eye on future Apple Store orders now. While their computers are shipped in very compact and form-fitting boxes, it just seems that the same doesn’t appear to hold true for peripherals.

I think this picture best illustrates what I’m trying to say. The box on the right was for the wireless keyboard, and the other for the laptop sleeve. As you can plainly see, the height of these boxes are far beyond that of the items they’re holding. What I’m most annoyed about is the horrible inefficiency of these packages. All they really needed was smaller boxes!

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An Example of Apple Going Green?

• Apple’s New Anti-Windows 7 Ads Hurt My Brain
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I’ve invited my friend, fellow geek, and former college roommate David Chen to discuss Apple’s recent announcement of the iPhone. Dave also blogs at More Than Fine. If you have been away from civilization and haven’t heard about Apple’s latest, you can read more at Wikipedia and ogle pictures at Engadget.

Devindra: So first reactions: Wow. Of course this is usually my first reaction to every major Apple announcement though (see the unveiling of the Core Duo computers, the potential of Boot Camp). The device is shockingly futuristic-it’s the sort of thing we expect in science fiction, not real life.

David: Agreed. The geek in me found the keynote address riveting. Steve Jobs is a consummate speaker and showman, and you could just feel the excitement in the room, through the video on your screen. The iPhone looks like the next big must-have item, with the potential to be an incredibly disruptive technology that will shake up both the cell phone industry, as well as the portable music player industry (again). But they also have a lot of challenges ahead of them; they’re basically entering a whole new market.

One of the concerns I have is in the execution. Will the execution be pitch perfect, as Jobs makes you believe it will be? The iPod has come a long way since 1G; technologically and stylistically, the new nano is light years ahead of the original ipod with manually moving clickwheel. In many ways, the advancements (i.e. its new, sleek style and great usability) are what has made it so successful. How drastically will iPhone v.2 differ from v.1? Can the battery life really last as long as they say it will? Will the three types of sensors really work flawlessly? There was an awkward moment during the keynote when Jobs was waiting for the web browser to “catch up” to him moving around the screen…obviously what was shown of the web browser is impressively more advanced than what’s available now (especially with the great screen), but will the execution really be as smooth as Jobs claims’?

Devindra: I wouldn’t worry so much about execution. If there’s one thing we can be sure of from Apple, it’s that they will ship a quality product. Their products may not always better than their competitors, but they are still quality products in the end. It’s a better track record than most big-name tech companies.

Still, your concerns are valid and I’m sure they’re also on the minds of most other technophiles. You’re right about the iPod, there have been significant design changes in only a few generations of the device’s existence, so I’m sure we’ll see something similar with the iPhone. I don’t think the differences in future revisions of the iPhone will be as drastic as the iPod though. At the time of the first gen iPod everyone was still coming to grips with usability and aesthetics for portable players. After making significant progress in those areas I think Apple is bringing a lot of their previous experience to this device, subsequently, there should be less major changes to the iPhone over the years.

Just as with any portable device, I’m really worried about the battery life for the iPhone. Even though Apple claims 5 hours for talk/video and 16 hours for music those are most definitely ideal numbers that don’t take into account realistic usage of the phone. It also runs into the same issues every multi-functional phone comes across, chiefly of which is the conundrum of pairing a device that often serves crucial functionality with entertainment features. If you only have 5 hours of talk time (which is still pretty good for a cell phone) would you really want to waste any of that by watching videos and listening to music? When you’re stuck in an emergency situation with no battery life, I’m sure you’ll be kicking yourself for indulging in that last “Desperate Housewives” episode. The iPhone may be the one multifunctional device to rule them all, but it certainly doesn’t signal the death of specialized devices.

As for the touch sensitivity, I’m taking a wait and see approach with that. I’m fairly certain it’s going to be just as intuitive as it looks though. They’re basically taking mouse gesturing a step further by using your finger as the pointer-you can’t get much more intuitive than that.

David: Two other issues with the execution I wonder about: How will that expensive screen stay clean and protected? Will cell phone screen protectors work with it? And also, what about people with fat fingers dialing on that tiny screen keyboard? Will there be a voice that says, “The fingers you are using to dial on your iPhone…are too fat. To order a special dialing wand, please mash the keypad now…”

Devindra: I’m sure there will be screen protectors, although I wonder how that will affect the touch sensitivity of the screen. My DS Lite’s screen protectors don’t bother the stylus much, but then it causes a lot less friction than your fingers. I also need to see much more of that screen-based keyboard before I can tell if Apple has truly eliminated the need for a dedicated keyboard.

David: It also costs 2x as much as the iPod.

Devindra: Cost is certainly a problem, but it’s also pretty competitive when compared to Treos and Blackberry’s. It’s not going to be anywhere near mainstream for a while though.

David: Indeed. I can’t emphasize enough that I think their key challenge right now is how well they handle entering this new market.

Devindra: What exactly is your point with that?

David: Well, people have different consumption patterns for phones than they do for portable music players. For example, people often exchange ipods for birthdays or as Christmas presents. But people don’t do that for phones as often, both because of the price and because of the nature of the product. People consume it differently, meaning they buy it in differing frequencies and for different purposes. They will, consequently, expect it to do different things. So I’m saying, if it can compete in the same market as palm and treo and outdo them, then you probably have a winner on your hands. However, even if it doesn’t, it still has a chance for success because of Apple’s sky-high brand loyalty.

Devindra: Okay. The thing is that Treo’s and the like are traditionally business oriented. Apple? Not much so. This is more of a sexy consumer device than a classy business utility. I’m also unclear what you mean by this:
“People consume it differently, meaning they buy it in differing frequencies and for different purposes. they will, consequently, expect it to do different things.”
Yes, people consume phones and iPods differently, but how does that correlate to your point?

David: I’m just trying to say that people have different expectations for each one, and therefore, you can’t say that just because they’re successful in one category, they will be successful in another.

Devindra: But if you look at the device, 80% of it is something we know they can do. The only things we’re not sure of is the phone technology and the cross functionality between all of its features.

David: Yup, so that’s what the big question is. Again, my initial reaction is the same as yours, which is “Wow…that thing is cool, and I want one” (if I could afford it). But yeah, there are many factors to take into consideration before I’m willing to declare it a success

Devindra: Fine fine. But that’s entirely from an analytical standpoint. I’m just a bit more interested in the potential for change that this phone holds. It just amazes me how easily Apple can just put something out there and completely change our mindsets–and this is coming from someone who is not generally that fond of Apple. MP3 players existed before the iPod, but it took that device’s combination of style, simplicity, and a well-timed debut to make digital audio players the successor to the Discman. I’m not a fan of the iPod, but I recognize it’s influence on our society. I just wonder what we’ll see now with the iPhone…

David: One thing that bothers me is that the whole announcement raises as many questions as it answers. Specifically, I wonder about their business model. The business model for cell phones is completely different than with ipods. IPods are profitable right out of the box (Apple makes roughly 50% profit on the price of every nano that it sells). For cell phones, typically the cell company eats a huge amount of the cost of the handset, in exchange for signing up a person to a long and painful contract (which the company then can make back their money on). I wonder what iPhone’s model will be.

Devindra: I’m confused by that as well. $500-$600 with a two year contract? That’s the price of new phones before subsidy!

David: Not even…that’s more than a typical a phone without subsidy would. A new Motorola Razr is like $250-350. I got mine new for $0 with a 2-year contract. And I like my Razr!

Devindra: $500 for the latest tech isn’t unusual. I’m thinking of the crazy-cool phones being released in Asia though. I’m just wondering if there is any sort of subsidy going on here, or does the device actually cost upwards of $800 to make? And then there is the phone plan, which is usually the biggest money sink.

David: So I have to wonder: Will there be any special subsidies for the iPhone when it comes out? What is the target market for this thing (current iPod users?)? And when will non-Cingular people get to use this thing?

Devindra: Not much detail, but we know it’s an exclusive Cingular contract, and it will most likely stick with them for a few years.

David: Their goal is modest and definitely achievable: 1% of the worldwide cell phone market. But I think we can agree – the day that people jump ship from T-mobile and from Verizon just to get an iPhone is the day that you know this thing is a success.

Devindra: I don’t think they’ll be able to get 1% in a year, but once the price falls to the $300-$400 level, probably sometime next year, I’m sure we’ll see wider adoption.

David: But going back to the contracts, many questions remain. If iPhone users are locked into a two-year contract with Cingular, what happens when the next version of the iPhone comes out? Two-years is like eternity in Apple-years, in the sense that in the past two years, the iPod and iMac and Macbook have all gone through many different iterations. I wonder what their timetable will be like for iPhone, v.2, or the iPhone Nano and so on.

If they keep cranking new editions of them out like they have been with the iPod, you may end up with some very sad people, i.e. people who switched over to Cingular, spent $500 on the phone, then are forced to watch as the newer, cooler one comes out a year later, forcing them to re-up with Cingular for another 2-years just to be able to spend another $500 on the new iPhone.

This was never a concern before; with iPods, there was never any contract for you to sign. You paid for your iPod, Apple made its profit, and that was it. People already resent their cell phone companies and their draconian contract restrictions; it will be curious to see how this resentment may bleed over as they start to consume Apple products. In any event, we can all agree that the iPhone has the potential to change the way cell phone providers and makers operate by changing the way people think about their phone.

Devindra: I can only hope that Apple realizes they’re playing in a different field and keeps the hardware revisions to a minimum. I also think Cingular wouldn’t let them pull anything crazy with multiple revisions either. At the very least, we should only expect one revision per year, which is pretty much what we’re seeing for most cell phone product lines. There’s always a cost for early adopters, and it looks like that cost will be particularly high for buyers of this first generation iPhone.

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iPhone: A Tag-Team Discussion

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The author goes on to mention that Apple tries to do the same, but is inevitably more authoritarian with their users. This isn’t really surprising, the only true competition Apple has is itself–they simply operate on an entirely different level than Microsoft. Steve Jobs is the dictator mastermind of his own little computer utopia. He simply has a level of control over Macs that Bill Gates will never have over Windows, let alone PC hardware.

This leads me to question why there are no true Windows zealouts as there are Mac zealouts. Taken as a sort of religion, Windows lacks a key icon like Steve Jobs for its fans to worship. While most everyone knows of Bill Gates, he certainly doesn’t carry the charisma that Jobs does. Just look at what Jobs did with the iPod Shuffle: Few could have marketed such a device, a music player without a screen, with the effectiveness of Jobs.

This, coupled with the larger install base of Windows, leads to the general negative opinion of Windows. Thus, I can only really consider myself a Windows apologist. Perhaps in a few years the public will be able to look back and see how much they owe Windows for bringing computers into the mainstream.

Switched On: The contractor and the architect

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Does Microsoft Care More About You Than Apple?

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We know that they will continue to develop Office on the Mac for the next five years, but what of their bread and butter, Windows? Sure, the technically inclined users will have no problem creating an NTFS formatted partition and dumping a Windows install like on any other PC, so I’m not as much concerned about them. Consider this though, what if MS actively advertised this capability to general users?

Imagine seeing ads for “Windows XP for Macs”, while a bit of a non-sequitur, it would also enable Microsoft to target a market for Windows that it normally couldn’t touch. They could even release it as yet another variation of Windows XP, with a graphically and functionally upgraded installer for timid OSX users, a foolproof boot loader, and complete support for Apple’s new hardware built in. Why would Microsoft do this? I think simply because it’s in their best interest. Their situation is very similar to Apple’s in this case, there really is no good reason not to do it. Sure it may help sell a few more Macs here and there, but never enough to dent Microsoft’s massive user base, and if those users are buying Macs solely for the purpose of dual booting them with XP then MS has absolutely nothing to worry about. In the end this new version of Windows XP could target Mac-only users as well as dumb Windows XP users–it’s win-win for Microsoft!

Honestly, I think this is a far more possible outcome than Apple releasing OSX for generic x86 machines. It is said that Apple has gone to extreme measures to make sure that the forthcoming Intel OSX CDs will only boot on their hardware, which sends a clear signal for their intentions. Anyone who wants to run OSX on their PC will have to suck it up and rely on the hacker scene for their fix.

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Windows XP for Macs?

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