Sorry, I’ve been preoccupied for the last 24 hours or so. I finally bit the bullet and decided to get myself a tablet computer, and what better than to get the king or queen of tablets, the iPad itself — something that everyone seems to go quite “gaga” about. (It makes sense, doesn’t it?! Alas, not so!) So I went out and bought one, and spent the rest of yesterday fiddling with it and seeing how it might fit into my workflow. If you’re not familiar with the iPad, as I wasn’t, you’ll soon discover that the iPad is all about selling apps (viz., applications), movies, songs and other things that are supposed to make your face light up with joy. It’s certainly not designed for someone like me, who doesn’t like to be managed and regulated by someone else.
For, not to draw this out too far, the only thing I got for my bother was a headache, and a sense of irritated frustration that almost had me signing in to the local psychiatric ward. Why is there so much song and dance about this benighted company? The only way — aside from a few pieces of software that promise much more ease of use — to get something on to your iPad is to go through iTunes, and that loads everything you ever had on your iPod (which I had given up trying to understand years ago), plus the few things that you really want to add to it, and then there is no simple way to get it off again, since the iPad doesn’t have a simple file manager that lets you copy your stuff to it, and then delete it when you want. Oh, no, you have to go back to iTunes again, and the trauma continues.
Now, I know this isn’t my usual fare. Usually I have someone to roast, like Micheal Ruse — who’s always such a handy target on a dull morning — but this time all I have is this piece of technology straight from hell. In fact, instead of Sartre’s other people, it seems to me that the horrors of hell would much more appropriately be described in terms of an eternity trying to make sense of Apple’s completely idiotic system. I suppose some people might find this easy and intuitive, but to me, it’s like dealing with a demon straight from electronic hell. So, it’s back to the store for now. Tablet computers will have to wait until another day, when I’ve recovered from my latest encounter.
So, if all I’ve got to show for the last twenty-four hours is a short tirade against Apple, and its entirely idiotic way of managing files on a tablet computer, a way that doesn’t let you get near the file system of the beast, chalk it up to Apple’s rather — dare I call it — “Catholic” way of dealing with its customers. Just take it from Pope Steve Jobs (peace be unto him), since he obviously thought he knew best. If it isn’t somewhere in the Apple Magisterium it must be false. I’m used to getting my hands dirty, actually accessing files, loading files, erasing files, and simply managing files all on my own, that this kind of patronising, “We won’t let you anywhere close to the file system lest you cause some problems that you won’t be able to solve on your own, and we have a program that does it all for you,” is irritating almost beyond reason. Last night I tossed and turned and cursed the darkness of the Apple underworld that I had been led into by the hype surrounding everything of Apple’s that comes on the market. Little did I dream that it hadn’t grown up, and left its childhood pram or crib, when they made iPods this way too, and caused me such consternation even then. I put some music on my iPod, after a great deal of trial and error, and now it sits in its dock and plays at least that much music over my stereo system, but I haven’t connected it to iTunes since.
So, goodbye to Apple once and for all. There must be some explanation for all the excitement that people display every time Apple comes up with something new. And, possibly, just possibly, all this is reasonable to some people. But I like to have control over what I do, and dislike intensely being led around by the nose by some engineer dreaming up the best new way of keeping the faithful in leading strings, waking up every morning with “Lux Aeterna” on one’s lips, and paying one’s due thanks and praise to the silicon gods of 1 Infinite Loop (a company whose head office is a perfect circle has more than ordinary hubris!). Is it just the cachet that keeps people loyal to Apple and all its latest gadgets, or do some people simply like this kind of torture? Anyway, it’s back to the PC/Droid world where I can actually do things myself, without so Computer god looking over my shoulder every time I want to make a change. The iPad is going back to the store, and I am going to try to forget the nightmare experience that I endured while I had it.
Back tomorrow sometime with a new post on my usual subjects, but, as you can see, for now I am still obsessing about the inanities of the gadget from hell that made my yesterday such a horror! It does seem relevant, however, to much that I do write. Apple is distinctly catholic in its attitude to consumers (or members of its particular sect) with its Curia, Magisterium, Vatican and all, whereas Windows and Linux are Protestant and expansive, much more adaptable to changing circumstances, and more in the control of the individual. Phew! Just made my getaway! I swear — another 24 hours — and I’d be suffering from acute PTSD! I’l be back with something a bit more substantial later, but — I swear — just trying to make sense of the iPad over about ten hours of yesterday, before in frustration I simply pushed the reset button that set the iPad back to its factory defaults, simply emptied my mind of anything more substantial than how to escape from Apple’s clutches!
I`ve always thought that Apple products are like modern sports cars: very swish and stylish, probably well made,all moving parts completely hidden from all but the illuminati (who charge by the minute)
Windows is more like a morris 1000- unstylish but sometimes fixable with a hammer and OK to carry bags of cement
What a delightful ditty, refreshing almost.
I’m writing this on my favourite tablet, an Asus Transformer 101 with a keyboard dock, which gives me a small computer with latest Android and 12 hours of battery, USB ports, even HDMI, extra SD card port, and all sorts of file managers in the app store, most of them free. It’s Linux, it’s a file system, and easy to fiddle with. In fact, I haven’t yet had any reason to root this thing, which speaks volume.
I can tell you that this little machine is freaking *perfect* in my world, because I like to move about *and* also write. I’m writing a book on this thing, as well as articles and, ahem, the odd blog comment. The keyboard is really great,. You could also go the Transformer Slider way which has the keyboard slide out from underneath-ish the tablet, which I’ve tried in shops to much satisfaction, however I love the dock idea and the extra battery and ports in it.
Thanks for that post.
I had been wondering about getting a tablet. The hope would be that it could be used for the same things that I use my laptop, but would be a bit lighter to lug around. You have disabused me of that idea.
In all honesty, I am mostly a linux and command line guy, so my expectation was that the laptop would still be better for my kind of use.
LOL.
I have never liked the apple way of doing things. I spent some time playing with an early MacIntosh (owned by my employer). I had the same kind of reaction. I couldn’t tell what was happening. When a message popped up about the disk, the message was so vague that I could not tell whether it was reporting a hardware failure or merely a need to defrag. It felt like the old mushroom treatment (“keep them in the dark and feed them horse manure”).
If you don’t want to be managed by other people, don’t buy anything from Apple. Why do people like it? Because it works. Compared to Windows, Apple works, has few if any problems with viruses and the stuff it does and doesn’t do is well documented. Different strokes for different folks. If you don’t like it, don’t use it. Other people do have very good reasons for using Apple products. (Personally, I spend most of my waking hours, and even most of all of my hours, at a computer, but neither Apple nor Windows nor Linux. I am happy.)
I’m writing this on a friends iPad. It is her all time favorite thing. It is almost all things but what it isn’t is a computer so you shouldn’t try to use it for one.
I won’t be getting one for myself just for that reason.
I don’t know if Eric was being sneakily amusing or was simply unaware of what his subconscious was speaking, when he used the phrase ‘bit the bullet’ which originates from Rudyard Kipling’s book titled The Light That Failed . The story is a tragedy about an artist that creates masterpieces, only to slowly turn blind, just before creating a ‘masterpiece’ Melancholia, which was then immediately destroyed by the model he painted.
What a perfect allegory to Steve Jobs.
I have to agree with you, Eric. My wife uses a Mac, and frequently requires technical assistance. I think she is representative of most Mac users in that she has little idea of where documents or images are stored. As opposed to the iPad, at least on the Mac there is an option to get at the filing system.
My theory is that there is a psychoactive drug impregnated into the Mac keyboards. With continued use, people absorb the hypnotic drug and get convinced that Mac, and only Mac, products are good.
This is just interesting and Pope Steve Jobs [peace be upon him] that’s a first one in its class except am not the guys at apple would be pleased with you if you wrote this review where they sell their products that adherents queue at midnight on the release dates to buy!
Ever try to find the date and time you took a picture on your iPhone? You can’t unless you download the pics to your PC first so you can view the date/time stamp. Brilliant!
Here is Steve Job in 1983, and why he was (back then) a light in a world of dark.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=lSiQA6KKyJo
I used older-generation Mac computers in 1992-1995 for serious office work, and then got involuntarily drawn into the WinTel PC world, where I have been ever since. With each successive “improvement” in the Windows operating system, and now especially with System 7, the amount of control that I have over file management has perceptibly decreased, to the point that now . . . .
(1) There are all sorts of locations on my C: drive that I cannot access at all;
(2) I cannot download and install a simple update to Acrobat or whatever without bothering an IT person with administrator credentials and a password to step in and do it for me;
(3) The high-end document management software that my large law firm uses (as an add-on to MS Outlook) is complete garbage in its System 7 version;
(4) Simple keyboard macros that I have been using in all of my forms and templates for 18+ years now cause huge headaches because of the interaction / incompatibilities between Win System 7 and the 2007-10 Windows version of Office (It is apparently impossible to give your own self-authored macros “trusted” credentials via the “Trust Center,” even if one goes out and buys credentials); and
(5) Windows System 7 continues to be so full of holes exposed to viruses and malware that the only solution that the Redmond engineers can think of is to pile on various safeguards that make the application software harder to use. The best analogy I can think of is that I am sold a house with an attached garage whose door is stuck permanently open, and the builder’s solution for the burglary risk is to erect internal barricades to prevent me from moving from room to room in the house.
I have a number of partners and colleagues who have acquired iPads and who seem to use them without complaint at meetings and to manage e-mail; I don’t intend to get one anytime soon. But I wonder whether doing serious writing, editing and spreadsheet work in the Mac OS environment these days is as bad as it is in the current Windows environment. Some of my partners have taken the drastic step of buying Mac computers for use at home. I am tempted . . . .
Well, you were all warned. Original Sin (TM) started with an Apple and a Worm. Well, sort of.
I still run WinXP. The OS that suits dinosaurs best. Wormproof
(www.mobilemac.nl/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/mm/2009/11/apple_worm.jpg)
I would dispute the Catholicism connection. What with the photo of the mosque in Cupertino and the mindless kowtowing to Jobs, iPadism seems more akin to Islam, making your remarks more akin to blasphemy! But aren’t people being herded onto platforms of that sort generally? How much less dependent upon Google are the users of Android?
Eric, your entry today made me laugh out loud. Excellent blog! I did empathize with you, having had my own battles with an iPad. (I have a friend who has iEverything – and Apple can do no wrong. Yes, there are those who are more comfortable having everything done for them, and never having to think about the technology at all. The shiny buttons and cute tricks are fun to use, and as long as you stick to the Apple-sanctioned behaviours, Apple products are exceptionally consumer friendly.)
I am an old lady, recently transformed into a computer geek. All this new technology (including the various iThings, Android devices and genuinely portable laptops) has been grist for my learning mill and great fun to mess about with.
I now have a laptop that runs both Windows 7 (for testing websites in Internet Exploder) and Debian Linux (for doing actual work). My desktop PC also runs a version of Debian Linux. (I must admit to being a control freak – I must know where my files are, what is going on inside the machine, and be able to communicate via the command line interface.)
I also have had the loan of an iPa(i)d for several weeks, in order to test my website features in Apple’s mobile operating system environment.
Your analysis is spot on, in every detail. I have found rather too many things that it will not let me do, so shall have to jailbreak it in order to put some useful (to me, not Apple) software on it and have proper access to all my files.
My two cents: If you like having a real keyboard to type on, get something with a real keyboard. There are many choices; the best one for you is the one that has the features you actually want to use, not the features ‘they’ think you ought to want to use. (Email me if you’d like more information on various machines.)
(I highly recommend an old, somewhat disgusting, episode of ‘South Park’, called ‘The Centipad’, for a brilliant account of Apple’s hubris.)
Couldn’t agree more = I do not see how Apple can be so successful with products that restrict the user so much.
It’s a very simple procedure to delete something from the iPad.
Click on the item until the circle appears above it and to the left.
Click on the circle.
Delete.
It’s in the help files.
And Android is the turbocharged Maserati which is rapidly getting larger in your rear-view mirror. But where does that leave Linux?
My main concern with Apple is price. After years of experience I know damn well that any device I use a lot will eventually be dropped, stolen, sat upon, forgotten, or go through the wash cycle. I’d rather not be out a week’s salary when that happens. So I buy Chinese Android tablets from eBay — now starting around $50 for a 7″ tablet with Android 4. I have had four of them, and although the first two were, let’s say, alpha versions, the manufacturers have now got their act together and they can do some amazing things. I’ve commented about them on Teleread recently, if you’re interested — search for Jon Jermey.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HhsWzJo2sN4
I think some diversity in the topics you post about is great, especially if it is as refreshingly curmudgeonly as this.
“We won’t let you anywhere close to the file system lest you cause some problems that you won’t be able to solve on your own, and we have a program that does it all for you,”
As Jeff D points out, lamentably they all seem to move into that direction, not only Apple. Treat all customers as complete morons, and write the software so that it tries to think for itself.
I am a bit of a Luddite – for example, instead of a smartphone I am still using one of those tiny Nokia cell phones that has no functionality beyond, well, that of a phone plus alarm clock, and I am not missing a thing.
It astonishes me how many colleagues use tablets; I recently had a conversion with one who brought his to our journal club. Asked how much they cost these days, he replied I could get one for $400-600 (Australia). I had just bought a netbook (tiny, tiny laptop) for $300, and I find it really useful for working during travels, e.g. conference, field work and holiday trips. So what I learned is that I could pay one and a half to twice that money, plus more money for an extra keypad, and then I would maybe have the same functionality from a tablet? Count me out for the moment.
I bought a Mac a few years ago, and a key selling point was that it runs a flavor of Unix under the hood. If I can’t figure out how to do something using the graphical interface, I have the option of manipulating the file system from the console command line.
You spent several hundred dollars on a device that you knew almost nothing about and then found that it didn’t do what you wanted. Everyone who researched the product, weighed the trade-offs, determined that it would work well for them, bought it, and now love it are, you conclude, the fools.
Honestly, did anybody who knows anything about iPads tell you it would replace your laptop? I ditched both my phone and my laptop after I got my iPad, but I never recommend that to anybody because there are serious trade-offs that few people are willing to make. I want something small and light that just works; I got it. If you want something else, get something else. Know what you want and what you are getting.
While initially hostile to my wife’s iPad, I now quite like it for quick internet surfing and fact finding (this morning I quickly found the local library’s phone number in it, when I couldn’t find it at all in the phone book) as it’s much faster than turning Windows XP on and waiting for it to surrender control to me after all the drivers and mysterious auto-start programs have loaded and the anti-virus program has updated itself.
But writing and editing more than one sentence, downloading stuff, or working with multiple programmes on the iPad will drive you crazy.
A useful but expensive and inessential luxury.
@ Alex SL #15
I have much the same, and only this morning while watching an advert for the latest phone, I told Mrs Brains, “I don’t want a phone that’s more intelligent than I am”, to which she replied, “I think you’ve already got one” – ouch!
Gavin said, very earnestly:
I’ll just say two things in response. First, the post was meant to be as much a criticism of myself as of Apple. No, I didn’t know anything about the iPad, though, as a tablet “computer”, I expected it would have features that I expect computers to have, such as access to file systems, even if it was restricted to mounting as a hard drive when plugged into a computer. This would allow me to load things that I wanted, and erase (important consideration when what is there is personal) files I no longer want stored there. Just deleting things is not enough, as anyone knows. Computers’ memories are long, and I don’t want personal photos, passwords, etc. accessible should I lose it, sell it, give it away, or what not. So I did expect that it would be more accessible than an iPod, for instance, which I can, with special software, mount as a drive on my computer. I find iTunes completely counterintuitive, and thought that an iPad would offer more of the capability of a computer. It doesn’t. I should have found out, but I guess it was just the media blitz that convinced me that it was better than most. So, I was fooled by oversell. My bad.
Secondly, however, the experience was a truly emotionally taxing. I found it beyond frustrating. I read the owner’s manual, and still didn’t find solutions for the problems I had. They’re just not there. Sure, you can delete things, but I expect more control than that, expecially when it comes to loading things. I have a little Blackberry Playbook, and it’s so far ahead in this kind of control that it leaves iPad in its dust. I guess I just like to be in control, and not having it was exasperating.
However, I do not say that people who like Apple are fools. Did I say that? In fact, if you search, you’ll find that the word only occurs (until this response) in your comment. I have no comment to make on Apple lovers, who are a considerable number, and quite a force, obviously. I found the experience an unhappy one, but I also recognise that others find Apple devices the cat’s meow. Different strokes as they say. But the post was meant to be as much a joke on me as on anyone else.
As to Alexander and his recommendation. As I returned the iPad, the Asus Transformer was the one the salesperson at the store recommended to me as the best choice, but I’ll wait a bit before I jump this time, and take Gavin’s advice. I thought, benighted me, that I had looked into it, but obviously my research (such as it was) was a bit to cursory.
Ive been feeling guilty about not using linux for years. I got dobbed into the computer world at age 50 when my friendly electrician (sic) had a meltdown while writing some business software for me. I then spent a few months hurriedly teaching myself VB (actually very enjoyable) and have been stuck with Gatesy ever since. Mind you I was using W2000 until 4 months ago.
No doubt one of the estimable correspondents to this site will tell me that I can migrate everything to linux and if so, don`t be shy about coming forward….
LOL,
Eric, I recognize your state of mind there. I have to deal with lots of computer software myself (I’m not a “computer guy,” but I work using various software programs). I would have written exactly the same type of rant if I’d hit the computer in the heat of my frustration. But usually after a bit longer, what seemed insane at first starts making sense.
And what I see in your rant is mostly frustration; vs actually thinking things through clearly.
First, let’s address your issues with the iPad, and then on to your questions about “why do people like buying apple stuff?”
iPad: You are using it wrong.
As you recognize, it wasn’t designed to do the things you want it to do. Hence YOUR expectations were wrong, and that is not Apple’s fault.
I have to ask: what in the world were you going to use it for? Yes it’s centered around apps. You didn’t know that going in? The iPad is well lauded for the fact it is more intuitive and easier to use than any computer – to the degree that is simply amazing in the history of computing. And clearly it’s apps-driven system meets a lot of people’s desires and needs.
But all things involve real world compromise, right? The more they made it like a regular file-system computer as you seemed to want, the less it would have actually succeeded in what it has done.
That said, the problems you mentioned appear to indicate you didn’t learn how to use some functions, which are extremely easy to find out how to use.
ERIC: The only way — aside from a few pieces of software that promise much more ease of use — to get something on to your iPad is to go through iTunes, and that loads everything you ever had on your iPod (which I had given up trying to understand years ago), plus the few things that you really want to add to it,
If you don’t understand iTunes (or the App store), then of course you aren’t going to be able to manage your files properly. My kids understand how to use iTunes. It’s not that hard, honest. iTunes will only sync every music (and other) file you have with your new iPad if you have it on “auto sync.” As soon as you sync your device to iTunes right there on the first page (every time) you have an option to “manually” manage your music etc. Just click that box and that’s it. Every time you attach to iTunes you are now in control of what goes on or off your iPad/iPhone/iPod. Select only the content (music, videos, apps, pictures, files) you want on your iPad and there you go.
ERIC: “and then there is no simple way to get it off again,”
Sure there is. One way is to connect with iTunes and, if you had simply chosen “manually” manage your stuff that one early time, you could select anything you want to remove.
Or, without even syncing to iTunes, right from your iPad: if you want to remove any Applications, just press and hold on an App. All the apps will start wiggling and have an “X in the corner. You can either re-arrange your apps on your display, or delete any of them by tapping the X …just pop along deleting any Apps you want while it is in this mode.
Press the home button when finished and you are out of this management mode.
Want to delete a song? Swipe left and you can choose “delete.” Pretty damned easy stuff.
You can delete whole libraries of music from your iPad as well. As well, any notes are easily deleted – there’s a trash can icon immediately available. Photos are similarly VERY easy to delete quickly from the iPad or iPhone itself. There is virtually nothing in any App I can think of on my iPad/iPhone that I can’t easily delete. And, of course, just syncing to iTunes again will allow you to further micro-manage if need be.
As far as you wanting to create and manage your own file system; ok, that may be your desire, but iPads/iPhones have another way that makes things a lot more simple and appealing and easier to use for a great many people. It’s app-centered, not file centered.
I want to see a note I took? It’s in the Notes app – the list of notes right there. A photo I took? It’s in the photo app. Music? In the music app. Sound recording? The list is in my sound recording app. Daily Reminders? Reminders app. Schedule? Calender app. Etc.
I use my iPhone for everything under the sun. But also on a daily basis I work on my Mac with file-ordering systems (working in post production sound, I have to be very organized as I have many thousands of files I’m dealing with at any point in time).
For me it’s a damned relief sometimes to move to using my iPad or iPhone.
I don’t have to remember “now what kind of folder did I make and where did I put that folder?” for my files. On my i-device it’s always obvious where they are and easy to access. And on those rare occasions I’m wondering where anything is on my iPad/iPhone, there is a spotlight “search” function and I ALWAYS find it immediately.
My wife, who calls me for help fairly often when on her computer, can do all this on her iPhone or iPad without calling me. She is instantly functional on the thing, and that is amazing.
So your rant seems to me a combination (as far as I can infer) of your not really learning how to use your device and jumping the gun too fast, and/or blaming Apple for your having come to the device with the wrong expectations. It’s one thing to find the iPad isn’t a fit with your needs (and part of it seems to be a lack of learning about the device on your part thus far), it’s another not to recognize the merit of these devices.
Cheers,
RH
Eric, one last thing, I recognize your post was a classic “rant” and not always serious.
But given you wrote this:
“There must be some explanation for all the excitement that people display every time Apple comes up with something new. And, possibly, just possibly, all this is reasonable to some people. But I like to have control over what I do, and dislike intensely being led around by the nose by some engineer dreaming up the best new way of keeping the faithful in leading strings, waking up every morning with “Lux Aeterna” on one’s lips, and paying one’s due thanks and praise to the silicon gods of 1 Infinite Loop (a company whose head office is a perfect circle has more than ordinary hubris!). Is it just the cachet that keeps people loyal to Apple and all its latest gadgets, or do some people simply like this kind of torture? “
This is a sentiment that one often encounters from the Apple-Bashing side (even if you are being less than serious here, it’s still the type of Apple-bashing one sees often). The idea is people who buy Apple products are cult-like or “sheep” simply led mindlessly around by Apple – duped by Apple.
No. The fact is many of us look at what the competition does, look at the options out there, and simply like what Apple offers. A lot of us truly appreciate the way Apple began sweating the “little details” along with the big. Just yesterday I was again wrestling to open another consumer electronics device – it’s packaging being an utter contempt for the human who actually has to deal with it. Difficult, unintuitive – I even as I sometimes do, sliced open my thumb on the damned hard plastic that required a tool kit to friggin’ open up.
Contrast that with unboxing any Apple device, like an iPhone. It is such an “aaahhh” moment: the elegance and ease – it turns what is normally an egregious task into an ergonomic and aesthetic pleasure – the way each piece is presented and wrapped in a way that is as intuitive and simple to undo as possible. Every time I experience the difference I am thankful there’s a company like Apple who “get’s it,” that I appreciate such touches.
Then there is the industrial design. I find nothing competes with Apple in terms of the look, feel and precision of the devices. My original iPhone 4 had me marveling at it’s quality month after month and any other phone I picked up afterward felt and looked like a cheap toy or knock off. The same goes for my new iPhone 5. This is a device I handle every day and so the sense of build quality is truly enriching. I don’t get it from competing products.
As for what the iPhone can do for me: This first reminds me of a conversation I had with a woman, an interior designer, after we both had an iPhone 4 for a month. I was amazed with it; when asked she said “Eh…it’s just a phone…I don’t see what all the excitement is about.”
My jaw dropped, but when I asked her how she used it, she said “You know, email. Making phone calls…it’s just a phone.” Well, that explained it. It’s like using the internet, or a computer, only to take notes or send emails and concluding there isn’t much to be excited about. Of course there isn’t, if you aren’t actually interested in discovering all the other amazing things that can be done on a computer/the internet.
Same with devices like an iPad or iPhone. I am staggered that anyone can be blase about these devices (or other good competing devices). I went from a flip phone that could just make calls and text. Now I have an iPhone 5 and I use it to:
- Access the Internet at any time. Just having the “internet in my pocket” is a massive thing!
- Email. Text.
- Take photos – the quality is amazing and I have a camera with me at all times now – no need for point-and-shoot.
- Shoot videos – this tiny little slim camera does 1080p HI-DEFINITION video recording. Our family vacation videos look absolutely incredible you-are-there, whether on my big Mac monitor or even on our big Home Theater projection screen. The fact I have this in my pocket available any time is mind-boggling to me.
- Take notes.
- Do sound recordings. I have a professional sound recording app on the iPhone and it has allowed me to always have a recorder on me. Hence I’ve capture MANY sounds that have been useful in my sound editing work.
- Music – I have my music everywhere with me now, not just when I remember the iPod.
- Weight Loss. I have some weight loss apps that are remarkably helpful and easy to use. They help me keep track of calories taken in and calories burned, and can even recognize by bar code the nutritional content of anything in the grocery store. I have lost over 50 pounds using these apps to help me. A profound change in my life.
- My iPhone remotely controls music, videos, movies on my music and home theater system.
- I have a sleeping app/alarm that measures the quality of my sleep for me and, in monitoring my sleep phases, wakes me up at a time I’ll feel the least groggy.
- A flashlight app that turns my camera’s flash into a flashlight at the touch of a button. I can not tell you how often this has come in useful. I use it constantly.
- I can now stream internet radio in my car via my iPhone. This has replaced the horror of listening to commercials-strewn radio, and now I hear exactly the music I want. Total in-car life changer for a music lover like me.
- The music recognizing programs like “Shazam” and “SoundHound,” in being able to tell me whatever song it is I may be hearing on a radio or in a public place, has hugely increased my ability to discover and download new music that I love.
- GPS and maps functions on my iPhone have been invaluable, ESPECIALLY as a parent who is always chauffeuring my kids to unknown destinations (e.g. other kids houses for parties, various sports arenas, all their programs in various locations). A life saver!
Those are only a few of the apps I use constantly.
That’s not to even mention the “Siri” voice recognition function on my iPhone 5. While some have disparaged siri, I’m finding it to be remarkable. I simply talk to my phone and it does what I want. In the car I say “Where’s a Subway Sub for lunch” and it immediately shows me on a map my location and where Subway subs are. I say “I want to go to the King’s Hotel” and Siri finds it on the map, maps a route, and then automatically starts guiding me by voice (and map) turn-by-turn to get there! It’s incredible how many things I can simply ask it to do at the push of a button and it does it for me. Reminders has become invaluable. If I need to remember anything I just raise my phone to my ear, I hear a beep, and I say “Remind me tomorrow, 4:30 in the afternoon, to pick up John’s uniform from his school.” The phone confirms it will remind me and it DOES remind me, with an alarm and with the text of my message the next day at that time. For someone with a crap memory this has been a Godsend for me. I use it every day.
I could go on about other ways I use this device, but I would not hesitate to use the word “profound” to describe it’s impact and integration into my daily life. Of course you can get many similar features in other smart phones. But I like the package Apple delivers best.
I hope that helps explain why some of us are thrilled with our Apple devices.
I’m 48 years old and so remember when this stuff was science-fiction fantasy. I often feel like I’ve been given a slice of advanced Alien technology to put in my pocket, and frankly I have little patience for people who yawn in the face of such things. It reminds me of the saying (to paraphrase) “He who is bored of London is bored of life.” I just can not become bored or indifferent, as some can, to the amazing advances in technology we can now hold in our hand.
RH
Well, all that may be, RH, and it’s not so much that I can’t use iTunes, but that I do not like that approach. I find the Playbook’s app system combined as it is with what is to me a much more intuitive file system much more to my taste. And I think it is a matter of taste. Instead of just copying and pasting files, I have to go through another program, and I simply do not find that an intuitive way of working. I simply didn’t realise that the iPad — as I say, my Bad — was like the iPod in this respect, and had I known I wouldn’t have bothered. I simply find Apple ways of working unintuitive. I’ve been using Windows since 1989, so it’s second nature to me now, that’s all. I really think it does have to do with taste, more than anything else. Now, when I want to put something on my iPod — and I haven’t bothered for some time — I use a third party file managing program, and it works just fine. But my rant was a result of finding out that the iPad worked like an iPod, when I thought it would be very different. I found it frustrating, and while I see how iTunes works, and can even make it work, it simply seems to be a lot of bother. I can work faster the way I do things now. Besides, I like being able to fiddle with things, and work around things, and tweak things. Didn’t like not being able to access things where I simply take access for granted. As you say, if I don’t like working the Apple way, when lots of people find this way of working helpful and productive, I shouldn’t have bought an Apple product. Now I know. Won’t make that mistake again!
I should add that I find it interesting how much fire this has generated! Much more emotional investment here than in most moral issues! Even as contentious an issue as atheism scarcely holds a candle to it. And — just to anticipate your next comment — I’m not really Apple-bashing, as such. I’m just recording a frustrating day trying to fit my normal way of working into someone else’s paradigm. Most of it was my fault to begin with, not having done enough research before I tried to make the leap. Simply found it hard making it across the abyss. But I will agree, there is something very cool about the Apple design, very sleek and functional. And, since I grew up without either radio or TV, I am still simply blown away by the changes that have taken place in my lifetime, and do appreciate the astonishing advances in technology. Love my techie toys, just didn’t enjoy the Apple experience.
I didn’t mean my first post to sound harsh – sorry if it did.
I think this subject does generate some heat because we are talking about devices that many of us use every day, all day. They are intimately integrated into our lives (and as explained in my last post, can have quite an impact on our life).
I have never got involved in these types of apple-product discussions (which often start with someone speaking derisively of an apple product). Except for just recently when the apple-bashing became too irritating. It’s one thing to discuss how a product isn’t what an individual is looking for. But more often, particularly with Apple-bashers, it is accompanied by a move from “Since I don’t like it..the only reason Apple can possibly be successful in selling so many is because people buying their products are just sheep, unthinkingly buying into a company cult.”
It’s THAT move that I personally am just sick of seeing. It’s more overt in many posts and blogs on the internet, though there was a certain tone in that direction also in your post, at points (“keeping the faithful in leading strings,” kind of stuff).
I think PCs are great and I think Android and Windows phones etc are great too. I completely understand someone choosing them over a Mac or iPhone. I can like my iPhone and not hate Android phones and not think disparagingly of Android people simply because they buy Android phones. It seems hard to find the same sort of respect coming from people who buy PCs or especially Android products, where apple-bashing, including bashing of apple customers, seems to come with the territory.
Cheers,
RH
This reminds me of the American presidential election, where the illusion of choice is offered.
My son accuses me of going with Mac because it’s fashionable. Uh, no. I used Microsoft Works (my favorite oxymoron) at work so when it came time to get a computer for home I bought a Mac without doing any research at all.
It just couldn’t be worse than the bleeding from the eyeballs frustration that I got from the Windows to the seventh circle of Hell.
Fascinating discussion! I never thought it would produce this! It was just a personal rant, and certainly was not intended to reflect negatively on anyone’s choices.
After twenty-five years in the IT game, including working on many of the pieces that make up today’s tablet scene, I am still incredibly frustrated by the iPad offering. I’ve had a couple of iterations of iPhone and still find myself fighting with the device, with iTunes and Apple’s general philosophy all the time.
As much as Apple often gets fine details right, it can get the big stuff very wrong and while others will polish their fine details, the Apple philosophy is less amenable to improvement. People refuse to give credit to Microsoft and others for sweating even more details in getting a vast array of computer equipment working and talking to each other, where Apple will largely only work with its own equipment and with recent versions of its software. I have a friend who has to maintain two versions of Apple iOS to run both his music software and his printer, despite there only being a subpoint version difference between iOS. To print his music, he has to print to a PDF and then transfer the file for print output.
It seems every time I interact with iTunes to do the simplest thing, it has higher priority objectives so it will not let me get through with what I want before letting it do its thing in the background. I was actually reminded of this post when I was just trying to synch photos with my iPhone this afternoon. It’s wiped all the current photos and put half of them back and then failed with a cryptic “see iTunes for explanation” message. iTunes has issued a ” no comment”.
Since I have done a lot of design-work, I watch what friends and colleagues do with their devices, and probe them (gently) on their interactions. I’m frequently amazed at what they will tolerate with Mac devices that would have a Windows user on their knees pleading for relief. I also spend an inordinate amount of time supporting Mac users who will swear blindly that their devices are flawless and intuitive, and yet have to turn to non-Mac users to figure out the frequent problems they experience. The best analogy I can think of are those with a faith-bent who believe that God has all the answers except when they need anything other than mundane reassurances.
I’ve lived on three continents now and I notice that continental Europe is less subject to the infamous reality-distortion field. Why? Perhaps because the value for money of Apple products is much less – there are certainly a lot of problems dealing with language and locale issues that don’t exist on Windows, or alternate mobile phone platforms. iTunes is also less compelling because Apple effectively taxes everyone living outside the US with higher prices per track, and rather patchy music catalogues.
I am hoping that because Rich H understands iTunes so well that he can explain why it continually wants to wipe my iPhone clear because it thinks it has been associated with another computer (when my iPhone and PC have had a monogamous relationship for 2 years). I have worked on mobile device synchronisation software, and must say that the iTunes method is painful in every way: speed, complexity and requirements for user involvement. (Don’t you just love waiting to have to manually OK every update to every adult-rated app?)
I’ve spent a lot of time on Apple forums, with thousands of others who are dealing with bugs that have lived for version after version. Apple is no better than Microsoft or Google here, except in their magical ability to be excused for such omissions.
I think that more fire should be generated by the effects of Apple on the web. Because of Apple’s rather quaint rules on what is permitted in its app stores, particularly in terms of adult or political content. Apple judges any app that allows you to view such content online as an adult app and may throw the app from the store if user-generated content breaches their guidelines. Since many such apps are slightly optimised versions of mobile web apps, it means that site owners have to force the same restrictions on all users of their web portals, irrespective of whether they use an Apple device or not. Thus Apple extends its walled garden.