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Microsoft’s take on Ipad: Another Sour Grape Moment

By thomas | Published January 29, 2010

Microsoft’s iPhone reaction: A retrospect

Remember the introduction of iPhone not so long ago in 2007, and a question was posed to Microsoft’s CEO and the famous response he gave? Below is a clip to help you jog your memory back.

Here are some key things he said back in 2007 and what happen today as of 2010.
In 2007, Steve Ballmer laughed off at the iPhone by saying :-

	“It doesn’t have a keyboard which makes it not a very good email machine”

In 2010, almost all smartphone manufacturers from Nokia’s Symbian, Google’s Android, RIM’s Blackberry to Microsoft’s Windows Mobile are trying to mimic iPhone’s success by having their devices without a keyboard and using Touch Screen technology (only not as smooth as the ones in iPhones) and even up to the point of mimicking the iPhone’s UI .

In 2007, Steve Ballmer put it as if Windows Mobile is the platform of choice for customers by saying :-

	“Right now we are selling millions, and millions of phones every year and they are selling zero”

And three years later this is what happen to the Worldwide market of smartphones according to Gartner :-

Source: Gartner, August 2009 and chart courtesy of Admob

And the iPhone market share keeps growing and growing at a very fast rate, while Windows mobile slowly dwindle into oblivion. And as the saying goes, the rest is history.

Another sour grape moment, and they just don’t learn from history

This time the shot came not from Steve Ballmer (perhap not at the moment of this writing) but from Brandon Watson, Director of Product Management for Microsoft’s developer platform. He was quoted as saying,

	“It is a humorous world in how Microsoft is much more open than Apple.” and he added, “With Microsoft’s platforms, developers can build whatever they want, and target a broad array of devices using the same skill set”

What he is trying to imply here is that somehow Apple with its App Store is a closed system and that developer are being “locked up” into its platform for iPhone, iPod Touch and the new iPad and somehow in the Window’s platform is a more open platform where developers are free to develop anything and can runs in all kinds of devices. How can there be any difference, you tell me? Or perhaps he is referring to Apple’s draconian control over what applications are allow into its platform. While Apple seems to have tight control over this issue and while I may not agree to some of them (ie Google Voice being rejected), I still strongly believe it has more pros than cons by having a centralize repository where we can search for applications.

Windows developers can use the same skill set and develops across all the different Window’s platform (computers and mobile devices) and as if it is not the same when applies to developers who built for the Apple’s platform? Bare in mind, that both applications running for the Mac OS X and iPhone OS (which applied to iPhones, iPod Touch and iPad) are based on Cocoa and Objective-C. So are there any differences? Of course there will be minor differences in API calls due to different sets of Interface and underlying operating system functionality but basically they are still applying the same skill sets. Existing Mac OS X developer will have no difficult time in porting or developing applications for iPhone OS.

Watson said further,

	“Developing applications for the iPhone and iPad is expensive because iPhone OS uses the Objective C language rather than Microsoft’s more pervasive .NET platform”

My Dear Mr. Watson, maybe you have been living in a cage for the past many years but development tools on an Apple platform is FREE and it comes bundle in with every Mac OS X, while development tools for Windows platform, the developers got to pay for it and comes with all sorts of fine print in its EULA. Unless by the word “expensive” you meant something else. And here is an interesting piece of snippets I pulled out from RoughlyDrafted that compares between .NET and Cocoa coming from the mouth of a .NET developer.

	Despite being an expert in .Net but brand new to the Cocoa platform, Hoffman said the time to complete his project was much faster on Cocoa. The same project took only one third the time, despite his having far more experience with Vista’s .Net frameworks than Apple’s Cocoa. He also noted: The user experience developed was better by default on Mac OS X. As a programmer and “not a designer,” Hoffman says he approached user interface development with some trepidation, needing to seek out help from professional designers on the Vista end. Under Cocoa however, Hoffman says he found Apple’s visual development tools very accessible, while Microsoft’s visual interface builder tool in Visual Studio was “so poor I turned it off.”

Two conflicting views of what a Tablet should be, and who will win long term?

When it comes to a Tablet’s form factor, Microsoft and Apple has two different views of the world. Microsoft’s views is that a Tablet must be and must act likes a PC with all the full features of an Operating System cramped in to a Tablet PC which due to its form factor definitely going to have a slower processors, memory and storage capacities. This is where they fail after so many years because a Tablet simply do not have the power to run as good as a full fledged PC and not to mention with all the CPU crunching it will certainly makes the battery life shorter which defeat the purpose of mobility.

As for Apple, they have an entirely different philosophy of being less is more. By making the iPad tablet having reduced functionalities and just focusing on just doing what it can do best that is internet experience, and media experience. David Worthington of Technologizer sums it best in his article by describing the two camp :-

	When Microsoft released its Tablet PC back in 2001, it grafted handwriting recognition onto Windows. That capability extended Windows into new (such as engineering and medical services), but the Tablet PC was still essentially a PC running Windows. Windows 7’s multitouch enhancements create a more natural user interface for PCs, but a PC is still a PC. The iPad isn’t a PC. I’ve gone on trips to Boston and Washington DC over the past several weekends, and spend hours riding Amtrak and on Wi-Fi-enabled busses. I didn’t bring a laptop with me, because I didn’t want to lug one around, and didn’t really need to have a full fledged computer with me. My iPhone provided me with entertainment along the way. Truth be told, I would rather have had an iPad with me to surf the Web, listen to music, watch movies and read.

Time will tell if iPad will be as successful as the iPhone or iPod, but I strongly believe Apple is moving in the right direction with the iPad as a Tablet. For one thing, in my humble opinion is that Apple makes the right choice of not treating the Tablet as a computer but rather a consumer device that delivery rich contents and user experiences to its customers. And with the starting price point of $499, I am beginning to think that it might eventually give netbook a run for its money and many would be buyers of a netbook will opt for an iPad instead. Why? For the simple reasons that a netbook user or would be users is most likely to have a more powerful Desktop or a Laptop system with them to do their daily works and netbook is just a secondary device for them to do simple task like web browsing , email and some minor document editing, which iPad can also do plus much more. Think about it!

Posted in Geek Speak | Tagged apple, ipad, iphone, microsoft, ms, netbook, smartphone, tablet | Leave a comment

My reaction to Apple’s iPad (Part 2)

By thomas | Published January 29, 2010

This is part 2 of the series on my take of the initial reaction to the announcement of Apple’s new creation the iPad. I have talked about the general responses and criticisms from the general view I gathered over the Internet and I will spend some time here to talk about what I think the future iPad will hold.

Some initial unanswered question

Prior to writing this part of the article, I had some unanswered questions as to some of the technical points of the iPad. Firstly is about the applications. How is it that the developer going to maintain two sets of a single application for two screen size of the iPhone/iPod Touch and the iPad not to mention the different UI interfaces such as menus, panes, and windows. I just went through the Apple SDK documentation and it did mentioned a feature call the Universal App where by a developer can maintain one binary for two different set of interfaces. So there you go; problem solved but am sure binary will be bigger from now on having two set of UI instructions.

At the event, Apple review to us the new iWorks for iPad. It looks great and not to mention cheap and at $9.99 it would definitely set a standard of how a software would cost in the future especially for those which are running on a Mac OS X platform. Now the question is since the iPad, like its counterparts (iPhone/iPod Touch) does not has a file folder hierarchy like the Max OS X does, how are the document files going to be stored and shared between a Mac? Would it work like how we sync our songs and videos? After much digging, the answer lies in what they call a Shared Folder.

Courtesy from weblogtip and Apple Inc

Honestly, I would prefer the iPad (even to the extend of iPhone and iPod Touch) to have a common folder system that can be access by all applications. Imagine if applications such as DropBox , iDisk or any other applications can have access to the same folder system, it would be perfect to integrate everything nicely and have files sync across the clouds transparently.

iPad and what the future holds

Content is King

As I have mentioned earlier, there are many strong reactions (positives and negatives) over the announcement of iPad. I am not going to say more about what people’s reactions are as I am sure you can google it. Now, let’s talk about what the future holds for iPad. Remember the reaction when iPhone was launched back in 2007? No multitasking, no apps, no 3G, too expensive , no copy-cut-paste, no MMS, no stylus and blah blah blah, and it will never sell; move back the clock to 2010 (3 years later) and we have over 40 million iPhones sold, over 140,000 applications and over 3 billion of applications downloaded. I am suspecting the same will be apply to iPad and 3 years from now you will see an iPad everywhere you go.

One interesting thing I noted over the Steve’s presentation; He emphasized, “We’re a mobile device company” but I think the subtle hint was “We are a media content delivery company”. Many wanted an iPad as a computer device that can perform like a netbook or a laptop. I think is safe to say Apple strategy since the day of the iPods has always been the contents rather than the hardware. They want to be the King of contents, delivering a full spectrum of media experiences to its customers via its hardware. They started of with Music, then Movies (both rental and non-rental), Applications, Games, and now the “Print” media which are books, newspapers, magazines and comics. There is a reason after all when they changed their name from Apple Computer to Apple Inc; that’s to say we are now no longer just a Computer company, we are a content delivery company. One more thing I wanted to add into this is since now we have iTunes Store, AppStore and the latest iBooks Store, why not merge all this services into one single coherent store for instance an AppleStore? I hope Apple would take note on this.

Apple’s mobile devices roadmap

Let’s move beyond what the iPad can or cannot do for a while here. I think generally many people (unless you are a geek like me) missed something very important over this iPad announcement, and that is the new Apple A4 chip. For those of you who do not yet know, Apple had recently acquired a chip manufacturing company call P.A Semi and iPad is the first product in Apple’s range that uses its own CPU. SOC (Systems-on-a-chip).

Courtesy from  myuibe and Gizmodo

If you have watched the demo, you would have noticed how blazingly fast it was. The demo on the Maps application is super fast. And this A4 Chip, I believe will be the key towards the future road map of all Apple mobile devices maybe including the next generations of MacBooks. There is a good article written on this here by Daring Fireball.

The future of mobile applications

I am sure by now many existing iPhone apps developer will be cranking their thought processes into making use of the screen resolution to come out with some nifty innovations. I am very excited about this. Imagine having the ability to run an iPad version of Photoshop and do a quick editing while having a coffee at Starbuck laying down comfortably on a couch and immediately post the photo online. Ain’t this more true to a sense that a Tablet is more like a “Laptop” than a laptop? I am sure with such a big screen size, couple up with multi-touch and accelerometer, we are going to witness many applications yet to come that will blows your mind away, just like what happen to iPhone with Augmented Reality Apps and many other innovative apps such as those that enable us to search for news, foods or movies based on where we are.

Courtesy from mattbuchanan

My Final Note

The question now is would I buy one? Hell yeah! and I admit I am a sucker for all things Apple. Now, the next question is how and when am I going to use it since I already have a MacBook Pro and an iPhone? The answer is simple really. Doing all my work related stuffs while I am at my desk ie Word Processing, Photo Editing and whatever you can think off, I will stick to my MacBook Pro hooked up to my beautiful 30″ Apple Cinema Display. If I am on the road, walking around, or having a quick lunch I will use my iPhone. How is it I am going to use the iPad then? Say when I decide to laze on the couch or at Starbucks enjoying my coffee and killing time, it will be a good idea to catch up with blogs, perhaps editing one, catching up with my emails, doing some photo editing, reading an e-book, or even perhaps watching a movie with an iPad solely because of its screen size. Not that this cannot be done by a laptop or a netbook, but how many of us can truly lie down on a couch with those hot beast on our laps, right?

For those who were psyched about iPad and got disappointed after that is because they are having a mindset that a tablet is a can-do-all computer, very much what Microsoft is pushing but failed. Sorry folks, I don’t see it that way. If you want a computer go get a computer. iPad will never going to replace a Macbook or a Netbook. It is design for different set of purposes, hence if you have seen Steve Job’s presentation you will noticed he emphasize on one very important issue about iPad being in the third category of device in between a laptop and an iPhone:-

	“If there is going to be a third category device, it has to be better at these kind of tasks (refering to Browsing, Email, Photos, Video, Music, Games and E-books) than a laptop or an iPhone”

So there you have it; my long winded analysis of what I gathered so far and what I think this mobile device will be in the future. And if you are like me, prepare to break your piggy and get swept away by the possibilities of what it can do.

Posted in Geek Speak | Tagged A4, apple, appstore, content, e-books, ipad, itunes, media, mobile, netbook, tablet | Leave a comment

Aside

iPhone – Who needs a netbook?

By thomas | Published June 25, 2009

I admit I am an online junkie who spent most of my awake time being online whether is reading my feeds, searching for information, twittering or haninging out at facebook. I do it while at the comfort of my home, in the office, outside or even when I am driving. I used to carry around my netbook as I feel my Macbook Pro 15″ is kinda heavy and troublesome to be carry around when I am outside. I do carry around my Blackberry but I find it not a good experience when I wanna surf the web or engage in a conversation online.

Ever since I have an iPhone, that changes everything. No longer I need to carry around a netboook with me all the time. The web page rendering is superb for a phone (although I wish it has flash support…come on adobe and apple). I can reply email in an instance and get working done while I am sipping coffee at Starbucks. I can engage in skype conversations, go thru my facebook even doing chat in it, update my twitter plus many more 24×7 without worrying whether I am in a WIFI area or not. Superb thing is now I don’t even have to carry around my camera often as when I see something I like, I just snap it, post process it with either Camerabag or Camerakit and send it off to twitter, facebook or flickr in an instance. Is like a computer only that it is now pocketable. I believe sooner or later many will be dumping their netbook and will be carrying an iPhone or similiar phone like Android.

Best of all is the “Location Service”. Yes, many phones now has GPS built-in but none except maybe Android has use it in a new way. Now I can twit about things that is happening and show the location I am at, Snap a picture of my car and post it to evernote with a linking to the location of my car, check for the nearest movies nearby and see what is playing and many more. This is really powerfully stuff except I do hope Apple would come out with a longer battery life as a fully charge iPhone can’t even last me half day of heavy online usage and I didn’t even make any calls. And when I do need to use a laptop outside I can now do tethering with the 3.0 update when WIFI is not available.

By the way, I am writing this with WordPress app via my iPhone

Posted in Geek Speak | Tagged blackberry, camerabag, camerakit, flickr, iphone, macbookpro, netbook, photos, socialnetworking, web | Leave a comment