Sunday, June 29, 2003
Mac mischief from the fast lane
It's been a good week since Steve Jobs last opened his mouth, so perhaps the changes in the Mac universe have stabilized to the point that I can actually write a column without every bit of it being outdated information before anyone reads it. As such, here's what's been on my mind this week:
- Watching Steve's Keynote in the Apple Store at The Falls (Miami) was an elightening experience. I did two headcounts and came up with 80 and 90 people in the store, almost all of whom were watching the keynote. This included nearly every employee, some of whom seemed to be even more elated about the G5's than the customers were. The most interesting thing was seeing who in the store applauded the most for which announcements. It was easy to pick out who the publishers were (FontBook), who the consumers were (iChat AV), who the developers were (XCode), and so on. Although many viewers were behind me and my eyes were rather glued to the screen, I didn't notice many attendees getting up and leaving at any point. So even those who wandered into the store during the Keynote by sheer coincidence seemed to be sticking around. The only thing that seemed odd was the total lack of fanfare or acknowledgement on the part of the store itself. I imagine some of the browsing customers had no idea that this was even a live speech, let alone the fact that the guy doing the talking was the CEO of the company that runs the store. I mean, would you ever expect to walk into WalMart and see a live speech by its CEO being broadcast right there in the customer area of the store? Would anyone, and I mean anyone, stop to watch it while buying their diapers and cat food? It's just further proof that Apple has something going on here that goes far beyond any other company on earth. Perhaps in the future, the Stores will be a bit more willing to point this out to those who happen to wander in during a Keynote. Or maybe it all goes back to the whole thing of not wanting to overhype the various Keynote addresses, for fear that the least spectacular ones will come off as let-downs.
- If anything, Apple is getting bolder with its retail gambit. While the new Apple Store opening near me in Boca Raton is of the petite variety, the one that just opened in Chicago is certainly not. The new shrine up there has four floors, a theater that puts my local multiplex to shame, and from the pictures, it even appears to have a conference room. With a decent bit of imagination, that conference room has nearly limitless possibilities: seminars for local Mac-using (or potentially Mac-using) businesses, user group meetings, and who knows what else? Clearly, this isn't just about getting Joe six-pack to switch to the Mac anymore -- although the coffee bar suggests that the focus on the consumer is being taken to a whole new level as well.
- I'm not sure whether the PC crowd's skeptical reaction to the G5's speed should be looked upon with humor or pity. It's not as if the real-world performance tests are open to debate. Take Adobe, who just a few months ago placed a page on its own website telling its pro customers that Adobe products ran faster on the PC. Now, an Adobe VP is on stage telling the world that the G5 runs Adobe products up to twice as fast as the fastest PC. Are these PC users implying that not only is Steve Jobs lying about the G5's speed, but Adobe and an independent research firm are all in on the conspiracy? Maybe IBM is lying as well. Nevermind the fact that an IBM VP just told the world that G5-based Macs are significantly faster than IBM's own Intel-based line of PC's. If Andy Grove gave a speech tomorrow and acknowledged that the G5 blows away his own company's offerings, would the conspiracy theorists then claim that Intel was in on the plot as well? At some point, you've got to give up the ghost and admit that your platform is, for the time being, not the fastest. The kicker is that most of these complaints are probably coming from PC users who aren't using anything even close the fastest PC anyway. Beyond pride, what should they care? The existence of the G5 doesn't make their current PC run slower. For that matter, the G5's birth doesn't make the iBook I'm typing this on run any faster. Are some PC users just smarting from the fact that not only does the Mac have the vastly superior operating system and the vastly superior vital applications, now the top Macs are faster, too. Now, there's nothing left in the world that PC users can use in defense of their platform choce...except for video games. I suppose next they'll be claiming that it wasn't really gaming legend John Carmack on stage at Mac World Expo praising the Mac, and that skating game mastermind Tony Hawk doesn't really use a Mac.
- The iSight is somehow much larger than I was expecting. It appeared to be the size of a camera battery when I was watching the Keynote, but it turns out to be a good four inches long and one inch wide. This appears to be a good thing, considering the image quality it produces. I'm sure Apple made it as small as possible, so if it were any smaller, the quality would probably not be nearly as good. Suffice it to say that I'm extremely impressed, and look forward to a time when I can put it to good use, either personally, professionally, or both. For the time being, like the G5, it's just something for Mac users like me to brag about.
- Based on my own experiments with two G4-based Macs and two camcorders, iChat AV really does work as advertised. But the 600 Mhz minimum requirement for video chat seems a bit steep. I wouldn't expect video chat to be supported on my mother's ancient 233 Mhz iMac, but the fact that my sister's somewhat new 500 Mhz iMac misses the cut just doesn't seem right. Here's a call for Apple to get those requirements down a bit by the time iChat AV becomes a final product. If users of slightly slower Macs have to live with small video windows or a bit of choppiness, let that be the choice of the user. Don't automatically disable the functionality entirely. That having been said, the audio chat is a great thing...and as long as your Mac has a microphone, there's no hardware cost involved. There's no per-minute cost, and there's nothing to hold up to your ear, so I can envision voice chats that go on for hours, with long gaps of silence in between. Why go through the hassle of hanging up? Now, for a wireless headset that will permit voice chats to continue as you run to the kitchen for a soda, etc. The "V" in iChat AV will get the most attention, but the "A" will get the most use and in the end, probably change more lives. And to think that there were those who dismissed the original iChat as "just another AIM client" and a "waste of time"...as if Apple would go to all the trouble to create it without having years worth of future plans for the product.
- Now that the iPod has proven the viability of a handheld device that can charge its batteries directly from the computer over 6-pin FireWire, wouldn't you just love to go back in time and choke the life out of the digital camcorder company execs who decided that 6-pin FireWire was just too large of a port for their devices, and instead opted to go with powerless 4-pin ports across the board? We could all be charging our digital camcorders automatically while we import video into iMovie. But then that's the problem: too many head-honcho technology geeks lack imagination. That's why it's often so easy for Apple to embarrass the others so thoroughly, simply by trying to imagine what would make the end users' lives easier. The iSight is about to prove the viability of a device that can pull all its power from the computer over 6-pin FireWire while it's performing a task, as well. Will other tech manufacturers ever get it?
- Rumors of laptops powered by fuel cells make me think that everything could change, again, with respect to how laptops are used. Wireless networking finally fulfilled the promise of a laptop, allowing users to get full usage out of their laptops (including Internet) for hours at a time with nothing at all plugged into them, but fuel cells could change that to weeks or even months at a time. If battery life on my iBook suddenly became a non-issue, using it would become an even more integral part of my day. Yours too, I'd imagine.
- I got to spend a good thirty seconds with Exposé, and already I know for sure that it will change the way I work. I will no longer feel compelled to hide applications or dock windows for any reason. Every window on my screen will be as accessible as the one in the front. The ability to clear your desktop instantly might be the most valuable of all. Never again will I have to perform the desktop equivalent of stage-diving just to get to that document I want to drag into an email, or that file that I want to launch. I tend to have so many apps running at once and so many clutter-causing windows open, that I often access my desktop items via a folder in my dock because it's quicker than digging for the desktop, but this will alleviate that need entirely.
- The new Finder makes a LOT of sense, and should allow non-computer people (the vast majority of users) to take advantage of features that had always remained out of their reach. Of course you shouldn't have to go to a menu to bring up the Get Info panel, but for nineteen years, Mac users did. Those longtime Mac users who still claim that the MacOS X interface is more difficult to use and navigate than the traditional Macintosh OS are simply crying sour grapes, in my opinion.
- Should Panther cost money? I don't know. I've been disturbed to come across so many Mac users happily plodding along with 10.1, either refusing to pay for Jaguar, or somehow unaware of its existence. Since these people didn't pay for Jaguar, they either haven't spent money on OS X since 10.0, or their Mac came with 10.1 and they never have paid for OS X. Why not charge them? Just because Microsoft "innovates" so much more slowly, only being able to release an OS they can charge for every 2-3 years, should Apple slow down to the same level? Apple is innovating the hell out of OS X, but that doesn't mean that users must keep up with the newest version. Those who don't want to pay for OS X upgrades and are content to stick with whatever version came with their Mac until they buy a new one, are welcome to do so. Apple has so spoiled us with free software such as iTunes, iMovie, iPhoto, iCal, iSync, Sherlock, and Safari, that some users have the gall to cry foul when the newest versions of the free apps require a version of the operating system that they have to pay for. Guys and gals, that's called a business plan. Or should Apple just give every bit of its software arsenal away for free until the company goes out of business? People seem to forget that just because the actual software box they buy might have cost fifty cents to manufacture, it doesn't mean that thousands of developer-hours weren't spent on it. Those developers usually ask for a paycheck at the end of the week, just like you and I do.
- If you don't believe that Apple Education is doing anything to get stakeholders to realize that schools MUST have Macs, go here and take a look at what all is being done with Macs in schools, and take note of how Apple is subtly building an infrastructure by which teachers around the world can share iLife-based ideas and even lesson plans. Most educators are all too happy to share what has worked for them with other educators. Unlike the corporate world, in which the Burger King and the Mc Donald's down the street from each other would sooner shut down than ask each other for help, schools can share their ideas and resources quite freely, knowing that in the end it's all about educating kids -- whether they go to your school or another one. This is something that Apple obviously gets, and something that I doubt any of the PC companies have any clue about. Providing "solutions" for schools about allowing teachers to share inspiring technology lesson plans, not about conning schools into upgrading to a system that runs the same crap ten percent faster.
- In some ways, the Mac platform has made more progress in 2003 than it did in the five years prior. That's not bad, considering that the year is only half over. Do you start to get the feeling that Steve might announce next week that he and the team are kind of tired, and that they'll be taking the rest of the year off? There's so much new stuff coming out so fast that most of the people with whom I regularly share this stuff can barely even keep the names of all the new products straight. For that matter, I can barely keep them straight sometimes. As my dock steadily grows with more and more vital apps, all I can think is that it's a good thing that they can all be learned (and taught) so quickly. This was never more apparent than when I sat down to write the curriculum for my elementary technology classes for next year. We did a decent job last year of keeping the kids current, but then Apple goes and invents stuff like Keynote that's so good that is simply must be put to use. Every one of my older students will need to become proficient with Keynote, iPhoto 2 and the digital camera, Sherlock Dictionary, and then grasp how to use such tools in conjunction as part of their regular classroom curriculum...and that's just in the first nine weeks of the year! It's a good thing kids that age can pick up intuitive software so quickly, and it's a good thing that Apple's software titles are so intuitive.
Anyone else thinking along similar lines, or thinking different(ly)? Give me a shout.
It's been a good week since Steve Jobs last opened his mouth, so perhaps the changes in the Mac universe have stabilized to the point that I can actually write a column without every bit of it being outdated information before anyone reads it. As such, here's what's been on my mind this week:
- Watching Steve's Keynote in the Apple Store at The Falls (Miami) was an elightening experience. I did two headcounts and came up with 80 and 90 people in the store, almost all of whom were watching the keynote. This included nearly every employee, some of whom seemed to be even more elated about the G5's than the customers were. The most interesting thing was seeing who in the store applauded the most for which announcements. It was easy to pick out who the publishers were (FontBook), who the consumers were (iChat AV), who the developers were (XCode), and so on. Although many viewers were behind me and my eyes were rather glued to the screen, I didn't notice many attendees getting up and leaving at any point. So even those who wandered into the store during the Keynote by sheer coincidence seemed to be sticking around. The only thing that seemed odd was the total lack of fanfare or acknowledgement on the part of the store itself. I imagine some of the browsing customers had no idea that this was even a live speech, let alone the fact that the guy doing the talking was the CEO of the company that runs the store. I mean, would you ever expect to walk into WalMart and see a live speech by its CEO being broadcast right there in the customer area of the store? Would anyone, and I mean anyone, stop to watch it while buying their diapers and cat food? It's just further proof that Apple has something going on here that goes far beyond any other company on earth. Perhaps in the future, the Stores will be a bit more willing to point this out to those who happen to wander in during a Keynote. Or maybe it all goes back to the whole thing of not wanting to overhype the various Keynote addresses, for fear that the least spectacular ones will come off as let-downs.
- If anything, Apple is getting bolder with its retail gambit. While the new Apple Store opening near me in Boca Raton is of the petite variety, the one that just opened in Chicago is certainly not. The new shrine up there has four floors, a theater that puts my local multiplex to shame, and from the pictures, it even appears to have a conference room. With a decent bit of imagination, that conference room has nearly limitless possibilities: seminars for local Mac-using (or potentially Mac-using) businesses, user group meetings, and who knows what else? Clearly, this isn't just about getting Joe six-pack to switch to the Mac anymore -- although the coffee bar suggests that the focus on the consumer is being taken to a whole new level as well.
- I'm not sure whether the PC crowd's skeptical reaction to the G5's speed should be looked upon with humor or pity. It's not as if the real-world performance tests are open to debate. Take Adobe, who just a few months ago placed a page on its own website telling its pro customers that Adobe products ran faster on the PC. Now, an Adobe VP is on stage telling the world that the G5 runs Adobe products up to twice as fast as the fastest PC. Are these PC users implying that not only is Steve Jobs lying about the G5's speed, but Adobe and an independent research firm are all in on the conspiracy? Maybe IBM is lying as well. Nevermind the fact that an IBM VP just told the world that G5-based Macs are significantly faster than IBM's own Intel-based line of PC's. If Andy Grove gave a speech tomorrow and acknowledged that the G5 blows away his own company's offerings, would the conspiracy theorists then claim that Intel was in on the plot as well? At some point, you've got to give up the ghost and admit that your platform is, for the time being, not the fastest. The kicker is that most of these complaints are probably coming from PC users who aren't using anything even close the fastest PC anyway. Beyond pride, what should they care? The existence of the G5 doesn't make their current PC run slower. For that matter, the G5's birth doesn't make the iBook I'm typing this on run any faster. Are some PC users just smarting from the fact that not only does the Mac have the vastly superior operating system and the vastly superior vital applications, now the top Macs are faster, too. Now, there's nothing left in the world that PC users can use in defense of their platform choce...except for video games. I suppose next they'll be claiming that it wasn't really gaming legend John Carmack on stage at Mac World Expo praising the Mac, and that skating game mastermind Tony Hawk doesn't really use a Mac.
- The iSight is somehow much larger than I was expecting. It appeared to be the size of a camera battery when I was watching the Keynote, but it turns out to be a good four inches long and one inch wide. This appears to be a good thing, considering the image quality it produces. I'm sure Apple made it as small as possible, so if it were any smaller, the quality would probably not be nearly as good. Suffice it to say that I'm extremely impressed, and look forward to a time when I can put it to good use, either personally, professionally, or both. For the time being, like the G5, it's just something for Mac users like me to brag about.
- Based on my own experiments with two G4-based Macs and two camcorders, iChat AV really does work as advertised. But the 600 Mhz minimum requirement for video chat seems a bit steep. I wouldn't expect video chat to be supported on my mother's ancient 233 Mhz iMac, but the fact that my sister's somewhat new 500 Mhz iMac misses the cut just doesn't seem right. Here's a call for Apple to get those requirements down a bit by the time iChat AV becomes a final product. If users of slightly slower Macs have to live with small video windows or a bit of choppiness, let that be the choice of the user. Don't automatically disable the functionality entirely. That having been said, the audio chat is a great thing...and as long as your Mac has a microphone, there's no hardware cost involved. There's no per-minute cost, and there's nothing to hold up to your ear, so I can envision voice chats that go on for hours, with long gaps of silence in between. Why go through the hassle of hanging up? Now, for a wireless headset that will permit voice chats to continue as you run to the kitchen for a soda, etc. The "V" in iChat AV will get the most attention, but the "A" will get the most use and in the end, probably change more lives. And to think that there were those who dismissed the original iChat as "just another AIM client" and a "waste of time"...as if Apple would go to all the trouble to create it without having years worth of future plans for the product.
- Now that the iPod has proven the viability of a handheld device that can charge its batteries directly from the computer over 6-pin FireWire, wouldn't you just love to go back in time and choke the life out of the digital camcorder company execs who decided that 6-pin FireWire was just too large of a port for their devices, and instead opted to go with powerless 4-pin ports across the board? We could all be charging our digital camcorders automatically while we import video into iMovie. But then that's the problem: too many head-honcho technology geeks lack imagination. That's why it's often so easy for Apple to embarrass the others so thoroughly, simply by trying to imagine what would make the end users' lives easier. The iSight is about to prove the viability of a device that can pull all its power from the computer over 6-pin FireWire while it's performing a task, as well. Will other tech manufacturers ever get it?
- Rumors of laptops powered by fuel cells make me think that everything could change, again, with respect to how laptops are used. Wireless networking finally fulfilled the promise of a laptop, allowing users to get full usage out of their laptops (including Internet) for hours at a time with nothing at all plugged into them, but fuel cells could change that to weeks or even months at a time. If battery life on my iBook suddenly became a non-issue, using it would become an even more integral part of my day. Yours too, I'd imagine.
- I got to spend a good thirty seconds with Exposé, and already I know for sure that it will change the way I work. I will no longer feel compelled to hide applications or dock windows for any reason. Every window on my screen will be as accessible as the one in the front. The ability to clear your desktop instantly might be the most valuable of all. Never again will I have to perform the desktop equivalent of stage-diving just to get to that document I want to drag into an email, or that file that I want to launch. I tend to have so many apps running at once and so many clutter-causing windows open, that I often access my desktop items via a folder in my dock because it's quicker than digging for the desktop, but this will alleviate that need entirely.
- The new Finder makes a LOT of sense, and should allow non-computer people (the vast majority of users) to take advantage of features that had always remained out of their reach. Of course you shouldn't have to go to a menu to bring up the Get Info panel, but for nineteen years, Mac users did. Those longtime Mac users who still claim that the MacOS X interface is more difficult to use and navigate than the traditional Macintosh OS are simply crying sour grapes, in my opinion.
- Should Panther cost money? I don't know. I've been disturbed to come across so many Mac users happily plodding along with 10.1, either refusing to pay for Jaguar, or somehow unaware of its existence. Since these people didn't pay for Jaguar, they either haven't spent money on OS X since 10.0, or their Mac came with 10.1 and they never have paid for OS X. Why not charge them? Just because Microsoft "innovates" so much more slowly, only being able to release an OS they can charge for every 2-3 years, should Apple slow down to the same level? Apple is innovating the hell out of OS X, but that doesn't mean that users must keep up with the newest version. Those who don't want to pay for OS X upgrades and are content to stick with whatever version came with their Mac until they buy a new one, are welcome to do so. Apple has so spoiled us with free software such as iTunes, iMovie, iPhoto, iCal, iSync, Sherlock, and Safari, that some users have the gall to cry foul when the newest versions of the free apps require a version of the operating system that they have to pay for. Guys and gals, that's called a business plan. Or should Apple just give every bit of its software arsenal away for free until the company goes out of business? People seem to forget that just because the actual software box they buy might have cost fifty cents to manufacture, it doesn't mean that thousands of developer-hours weren't spent on it. Those developers usually ask for a paycheck at the end of the week, just like you and I do.
- If you don't believe that Apple Education is doing anything to get stakeholders to realize that schools MUST have Macs, go here and take a look at what all is being done with Macs in schools, and take note of how Apple is subtly building an infrastructure by which teachers around the world can share iLife-based ideas and even lesson plans. Most educators are all too happy to share what has worked for them with other educators. Unlike the corporate world, in which the Burger King and the Mc Donald's down the street from each other would sooner shut down than ask each other for help, schools can share their ideas and resources quite freely, knowing that in the end it's all about educating kids -- whether they go to your school or another one. This is something that Apple obviously gets, and something that I doubt any of the PC companies have any clue about. Providing "solutions" for schools about allowing teachers to share inspiring technology lesson plans, not about conning schools into upgrading to a system that runs the same crap ten percent faster.
- In some ways, the Mac platform has made more progress in 2003 than it did in the five years prior. That's not bad, considering that the year is only half over. Do you start to get the feeling that Steve might announce next week that he and the team are kind of tired, and that they'll be taking the rest of the year off? There's so much new stuff coming out so fast that most of the people with whom I regularly share this stuff can barely even keep the names of all the new products straight. For that matter, I can barely keep them straight sometimes. As my dock steadily grows with more and more vital apps, all I can think is that it's a good thing that they can all be learned (and taught) so quickly. This was never more apparent than when I sat down to write the curriculum for my elementary technology classes for next year. We did a decent job last year of keeping the kids current, but then Apple goes and invents stuff like Keynote that's so good that is simply must be put to use. Every one of my older students will need to become proficient with Keynote, iPhoto 2 and the digital camera, Sherlock Dictionary, and then grasp how to use such tools in conjunction as part of their regular classroom curriculum...and that's just in the first nine weeks of the year! It's a good thing kids that age can pick up intuitive software so quickly, and it's a good thing that Apple's software titles are so intuitive.
Anyone else thinking along similar lines, or thinking different(ly)? Give me a shout.
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