Apple kicks butt, but WHY? Ping!
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Posted on 04/11/2010 2:38:33 AM PDT by Swordmaker
What does Apple get that Sony, HP, Microsoft, Dell, Samsung, and LG don’t?…. Usability in software. All these other geeks out there making hardware love packing on “specs”, stuffing big numbers like RAM, gigahertz, and hard drive space into small or cool looking gadgets. It all looks good on paper, but after you use one of their gadgets for more than a few weeks, you just want to throw it out a window. Thousands of new gadgets released every year all using the same-old crappy unfriendly, unintuitive, unattractive software. It’s no wonder so many are flocking to Apple when we can just pickup one of their simplistic products, start taping and swiping our fingers, and lo and behold… it just does what we want it to do. Of course, it isn’t easy, or cheap, to make software this user friendly, which is why everyone is having such a hard time keeping up.
As a software developer, I hear the phrase “I just want it to…”. Which, as any experienced software developer knows, is the most expensive phrase we ever hear. People have software needs all the time, which may require vast complicated effort to achieve, but they want it to hide all that complication behind a simple and user-friendly interface. What most people don’t know is that making software do just about anything doesn’t cost nearly as much as making it easy and intuitive for them to use. This lack of cost awareness is what ruins so many “brilliant” product ideas.
Sony is, in my opinion, the worst offender. In the past decade, I have seen Sony release cutting-edge gadgets to the market before anyone else. The PSP was an amazing gadget when it came out, in theory. It played music, videos, viewed photos, surfed the web, and of course, played games. The problem was that, excluding the last feature, it didn’t do any of them well. In fact, all the claimed features were so hard to use that almost no one could figure it out. Then, even more idiotically, Sony received reports that users were not using the extra features and stopped improving them! Sony could have been the what the iPod Touch is today, but lost the chance with bad software.
But I don’t just write this to rant, I write this as a warning to other business owners and entrepreneurs out there. Developing software and technology is one thing, but making it user friendly is another. In fact, usability can consume up to 80% of a project’s time and resources. That is, if your actually going to make something people will want to use. You have to build it, review it, fix it, test it, fix it, beta release, fix it, get feedback, fix it, get more feedback, fix it… and maybe… just maybe… people will be able to actually use it.
This is why the only mobile platform even close to keeping up with Apple is Google’s Android. Google is the only one in the fight with the know-how and resources to keep up. Even RIM, makers if the Blackberry, can’t keep their mobile software up to par, they have to invest in starting from scratch or spending huge resources in fixing what they have.
If you or your company has a “great idea” for an application or gadget, just remember, once you price the development… multiply it a couple times for usability.
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Well, I did note that the Pink Phone event by Microsoft this week just highlighted the PUG UGLY design that MSFT chose was cringe worthy.
Microsoft is bucks up. Why can’t they hire an industrial designer? Unless they are committed to pug-ugliness.
Apple is like Obama. It has a bunch of highly loyal fans who are blinded to reality. Loyalty to Obama or Apple requires a hge dose of cognitive dissonance.
I loaded OSX on a generic PC and was very unimpressed by its clunky, boxy, Linux like look. With red,green, yellow stoplight buttons on the windows? lol/ Windows 7 is a lot prettier. I used it for an hour then realized, that for all the Apple propaganda on Free Republic, “There is no there, there”
Maybe the iphone is way ahead of the pack but the latest grooviest OSX is a big yawn for this Windows7 user and early adopter (Betas)
As a former Windows user I can honestly say that my MacBook Pro and iPhone 3GS are the two of the best investments I've ever made.
Apple delivers.
The only things that Obama provides is sh*tty legislation and contempt for our allies.
Roger that!!
Apple’s only marketing ploy seems to be insulting Microsoft. Not that they can stand on their own, or solve business problems. Just that they aren’t microsoft.
But if you want to talk phones lets talk the droid which is kicking everyones butt.
You need to work on your trolling skills.
Widescreen... The iPad plays widescreen movies fine...Except for FLASH, the iPad has capability for all these things and the watermelon/rock has none of them.Multitasking... The iPad, like the iPhone, multitasks native Apps fine, currently multitask some third party apps such as Yahoo Messenger's notification and MDN notification just fine, and with the release of iPhone OS4 this fall, will multitask many other third party apps just fine.
Flash Support... It will not support Flash, and probably never will, because Flash is a 32 bit application and iPad and iPhone are 64 bit Operating Systems... and Flash is a resource hog that eats CPU cycles.
Camera/Webcam... With a 99¢ app, available now, the iPad will allow an iPhone 3Gs camera to be controlled and shoot pictures for the iPad and display them on the iPad... in real time. Other apps are on the way that will do the same thing with ANY bluetooth capable camera.
phone/video call... The WIFI capable iPads work just fine with the iPhone version of SKYPE... and will make phone calls to any phone in the world using the built in microphone and speakers.... or to a Bluetooth headset.
Removable battery... First of all, the battery in the iPad is dangerous to handle, secondly, the addition of a battery access port would add weight and complexity and cost to the iPad, and thirdly who needs a replacement battery when the iPad has a measured 11.8 hour life between charges, and a 30 day standby time?
Memory Card Slot... The iPad was designed to be a Cloud based computing device with storage on the cloud. Which memory card of the 14 current standards would Apple have decided to include? Someone would have been excluded no matter which Apple chose. Most people have no need for one, why make them pay the cost for something they will have no need for?
USB Port... The iPad has a USB port as part of the charging access port on the unit... and a accessory USB port is available for purchase for those who feel compelled to have one. However, the purpose of a USB card is rapidly being replaced by Bluetooth enabled devices. For example, Bluetooth printers are becoming standard.
HDMI or VGA... Again, for the vast majority of iPad users, this is totally unnecessary, so why force users to pay for something they would never use. An accessory port with a video out port is available for those small percentage of users who feel the need for a small price.
TV or FM Receiver... Apps are available for both of these to receive streaming music and TV feeds over the internet. Why have heavy hardware add ons to do something that can be done in software?
CD/DVD or Bluray... These are now antique standards... If you want a movie ... download it from the cloud or from your computer. If you have it already on a DVD, use one of the available utilities to rip it to a file and import it to your iPad.
OS X... iPhoneOS is a subset of OSX. However, apps are available that allow an iPad user to access both an OS X Mac or a Windows computer over the internet and fully use either of those computers.
Text Editor... Pages is a full fledged word processor app, with the full ability to create content in either Rich Text Format, text ASCII, or in Microsoft Word format.
So, so much for the smarmy iPad to Watermelon/rock comparisons... they are so much ignorance about the actual capabilities of the iPad... written by people who have not bothered to do even a smidgen of research.
Yeah, true but thats because I’m not a troll. Just a person who doesn’t believe the hype. Put down the cool aid.
Dennis, you would say that about Jesus Christ if he were born of Apple...
There’s PLENTY of research by knowledgeable people who consider the ipad very short of functionality.
I’ve never owned an Apple device, save an Nano, which is eh, OK.
I buy PC’s like candy bars. They are disposable tools.
Apple buyers remind me of the trade carpenter that shows up with only German power tools that he is too afraid to use, get wet, lend out. He’s usually the guy that has to take twenty minutes to rip a sheet of plywood.
Lame.
You might want to do a little research on the relative incomes of Mac owners compared to PC owners. You might be shocked... Mac's wad of cash would be larger than PCs in the YouTube video... :^)>
I think one of the reasons lefties like Apple is that it hasn’t paid anyone back in ten years. Not one single dividend. Lefties love great, interesting, leg tingling people that borrow money and don’t pay back.
Is that why NetApplications latest report shows that iPhone/iPod touch has .614% of all net traffic and 66.61% of all mobile net traffic, while the Android OS has a whopping .07% of all net traffic, and 6.15% of mobile net traffice, behind Windows Mobile? That's really kicking butt... Not.
Actually, this chart looks like an old video game with the IPhone EATING every one else up PacMan...... doit doit doit doit.
There's plenty of research by people who consider the ipad very short of functionality who have NEVER TOUCHED an iPad... just like the people who produced the iPad is to Rock and Watermelon charts. Ignorant. Many of these same people were saying the exact same things about the shortcomings of the iPhone two years ago... and were predicting it would never amount to anything and would be a flop. It's FUD, driftdiver.
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