http://thestormglass.com/index.htmlPredictions, Prognostication and Opinionenthestormglass@gmail.comCopyright 2007 thestormglass.com2008-09-02T20:41:40+10:00 hourly 1 2000-01-01T12:00+00:00 Tue, 02 Sep 2008 22:27:23 +1000thestormglass@gmail.comApple2008-09-02T20:41:40+10:00http://thestormglass.com/files/the_hype_machine_apple.html#unique-entry-id-28http://thestormglass.com/files/the_hype_machine_apple.html#unique-entry-id-28In case you didn't know, we are in week 3 of Apple's 4 week hype cycle.

Here is how it works (mostly):

Week 1 - Getting close to the 'usual' time of year for a hardware refresh, an outlandish rumor from 'sources familiar with the plans' at Apple appear on the Mac web. This sends people into a flurry of typing and posting on message boards about how awesome rumored things would be or how stupid the idea is. Mostly being dismissed as crazy, within 3 days this is nothing but last weeks news.

Week 2 - Tuesday morning Cupertino time, some more and usually corroborating along with a new but related rumors surface - Kevin Rose for example may come up with some pearl of wisdom based on 'inside' information. Most of the big Apple blogs pick up the news and things start to get crazy. Mockups begin appearing on flickr, spy shots, screen shots even 'leaked' event invites, they all start coming out of the wood work. Mid-week the fire is spreading rapidly and reports wash up daily with little bits of information. Some end up being true, some not. A full week of furious speculation and chatter, but little solid information. It's all hype, but the Mac web is well ablaze with activity.

Week 3 - (This week) By Monday, almost anyone who cares is in a right lather. Then the music stops. Things go deathly quiet on the weekend and Monday is the calm before the storm
(also happens to be a holiday in the US this time around, which fits in nicely). Tuesday morning, usually first thing, before anyone else has a chance to steal the focus the event invites get sent (for the following Tuesday) and the fire gets a big helping of something flammable. A cryptic tag (One more thing..., There's something in the Air, The beat goes on...etc) and a nice looking graphic which is about to spend a week being pulled to pieces by anyone and everyone to find the secret hidden meaning. LOTS of speculation ensues.

Week 4 - It's Showtime! The fire rages over the weekend and into Week 4, right up to the moment the event starts. Usually at Apple's HQ, Steve Jobs takes the stage to show off the expected and sometimes unexpected from the crazy ones at Cupertino.

This is where, of late we have noticed a subtle change, let me explain.

Rewind back to February 2008, the day before Macworld 2008 - Week 4 in the cycle. Apple's stock price was $178. During the keynote, Steve Jobs announced several new hardware devices, one of which was the Macbook Air. In the tech world, some loved it and some hated it but one thing was for sure, it was a product designed to make a splash. On design, on price and on the 'idea'. There is no hiding from the numbers, by the 16th, just two days later the stock price had tumbled to $159. You can see by the graph that the price continued to slide until mid-March, so what gives?

Apple had made one mistake, surprisingly, one they had made many times before - the hype machine got out hyped. The expectation got to such lofty heights that no matter what Apple delivered it wouldn't have been enough.

Move forward to WWDC 2008 and again Steve Jobs took the stage, this time with the launch of the iPhone App Store, iPhone 2.0 OS and introduction of 'Snow Leopard' - the next major version of OS X. Not quite the standard set at Macworld with two new products and a big update to Apple TV, yet the stock remained fairly steady in otherwise shaky economic times.
Less to be excited about but almost no hit to the company? How can that be?

Apple learnt that the hype machine is a valuable weapon but it's also a double-edged sword.
The proof is easy to see, in the lead up to WWDC the expectation was no where in the vicinity of Macworld. People didn't expect much and they got what they expected - At Macworld the expectation was SO huge that even a huge announcement wasn't enough.

Make no mistake, we know exactly what Apple want us to know - they are setting the expectation to a level at or below what they plan to deliver.
When Apple does leak, things get messy...ThinkSecret? Gone. They got in too close and wound up with a Apple Legal roundhouse kick to the face.

People who think that Apple is growing leaky might want to thing again.

Zillatron

]]>thestormglass@gmail.comApple2008-08-17T11:40:39+10:00http://thestormglass.com/files/software_reloaded.html#unique-entry-id-25http://thestormglass.com/files/software_reloaded.html#unique-entry-id-25Way back when we wrote the original Super Software article, we spoke about how providing a way to buy software though the iTunes store was just around the corner. We also talked about how this was a new way of providing users with functionality and Apple a way to maintain control over the platform.

Not only have Apple delivered what we expected, but it has been a gigantic success with Steve Jobs recently stating that in the first month, about $30 million of apps had been sold and many hundreds of thousands of downloads. Only time will tell if that pace will continue, but one thing is for sure - this new platform has created a mechanism for developers unlike anything ever seen in the mobile software space.

The ability to deliver directly the the device isn't exactly new. Many telcos and software houses have been letting people download games directly to users handsets for years. The problem has always been around the quality, price and usability of mobile apps (ever played Tetris on a number pad? hmmm). Apple trashed the existing model and turned buying software into a trivial task - it has it's quirks though, there have been quite a few apps fall though the cracks of the QA testers along with issues of stability on the iPhone OS. These are temporary conditions, it won't be long before the bugs are ironed out, look at the pace of updates already.

I'd say we hit the money here, there really is some super software out there...available right now, in your pocket.

Zillatron



]]>thestormglass@gmail.comHome2008-06-06T18:02:05+10:00http://thestormglass.com/files/multitouch_oops_you_missed_the_point.html#unique-entry-id-21http://thestormglass.com/files/multitouch_oops_you_missed_the_point.html#unique-entry-id-21We don't make a habit of Microsoft bashing, in fact this may be the very first time we have gone down this well worn road - but this is a particularly good example of why Microsoft is struggling in the post-iPhone world.

I'll tackle my two initial questions then move on to three worrying points that I noticed in the highlights reel from All Things Digital.

How high has the bar been set? This point only has one answer, at the moment at least there is nothing that comes close to the interface on the iPhone.
And although the competition is starting to hot up, the Multi-Touch interface of the iPhone is second to none.

Did Microsoft come out punching? They thought they did, but you don't score knockout blows shoehorning touch into MS Paint.

If that thought doesn't scare you then maybe you should to watch the video again, I draw your attention to the 44 second mark.

Not only was that not really an 'evolution' of the Surface computing concept shown last year, it's a cumbersome attempt at playing catch-up and a scary insight into where Windows is headed.

During the demonstration there were another two worrying points when it was indicated that Microsoft were not heading down the path of replacing the mouse and keyboard in Windows 7 - but rather they were 'rethinking' how to integrate touch into an interface that wasn't designed to cope with it.

It would be easy to take this as a one sided argument, if it were Apple delivering this same demo you might say that we'd be singing their praises - wrong. The fact is, Apple DID deliver this demo at Macworld about a year ago with the iPhone. Zero to BOOM in 1 product launch.

But how did they miss the point? I'm glad you asked!
With the iPhone, Apple took the core of an already stable and powerful OS X and designed a whole 'new' interface layer. This enabled them to build a way to interact with a device that was not ever dependant on a mouse, because of this, there is never a cumbersome moment where you aren't quite sure what's going on or what's coming next - 1:43 and again at 3:21 in the video, tap or click and hold?

Some might say that Microsoft are now in the 'lead' to bring touch to the the desktops and laptops of the world, but how can this be any more an advance than the multi-touch interface already built into every Mac portable? Apple have been adding parts of the touch interface into the Mac for quite some time. As we discussed in our article about the MacBook Air - Quick Look and Cover Flow were just the beginning.

Don't get me wrong, I really would like to be excited about Windows 7. Competition breeds the best kind of innovation, the type of innovation that's bought Apple back from the brink. Money can buy a whole lot of stuff and can pay lots of smart people, but if the ideas are bad to start with - all the smart people and all the money in the world can't help you. To fix this kind of problem you need to fall and it needs to hurt. Sorry Microsoft - you missed the point, and when you finally fall its going to hurt like heck.

Zillatron]]>thestormglass@gmail.comApple2008-05-13T23:16:27+10:00http://thestormglass.com/files/iphone_orphan_no_longer.html#unique-entry-id-20http://thestormglass.com/files/iphone_orphan_no_longer.html#unique-entry-id-20Four very interesting things have happened since the release of the iPhone:

1) Apple announce lock-in deal with AT&T
2) Apple announce a web based pretend SDK for iPhone
3) Apple notice that the US mobile phone industry is different from everywhere else and quietly announce they are not 'married' to the one carrier model
4) Apple notice most people noticed that a web SDK just isn't going to cut it and make a real SDK.

The first two are interesting in that most people were surprised by the choices that Apple made - personally I can see the merit in the single carrier model, for the companies, not the consumer. With hindsight, this is really the only way to break in to this market (tick for Apple - clearly a success so far). I can also see the merit in the web SDK model, again with hindsight as my trusty ally it's obvious why they went this way. Zero cost, zero effort, zero exposure. It was a no brainer, but it was still wrong.

If history can teach us anything about how Apple works, it can teach us that no matter what happens - Apple always spin the right way. Case in point is AppleTV Take 2 - They thought they had a winner on their hands and it didn't go to plan, a little 'hobby' here, a pinch of stacking with iPod sales there, add some 'We listened to our customers', BOOM and we have AppleTV Take 2 but Apple come out smelling sweet.

Point 3 and 4 are classic examples of this exact masterful spin that make Apple so interesting to watch.

Once Apple was in shiny-happy-land with the iPhone in the US, they decided it might be time to start addressing the whole '10 million sales', '1% of the market' thing. So they hopped on a plane to Europe and started talking American to Telcos who only spoke 'rest of the world' with limited success. On the plane back to Apple HQ, Steve and Phil were chatting about how marketing phones just isn't the same as iPods and they might have to start to Think Different.

Turns out that some of the telcos played nice but in some countries, there were laws against that kind of crazy long term lock-in business in others - but Apple still found a way to make it work. Casually dismissing the single carrier model was as simple as Tim Cook brushing off a question in a conference call. But that's all it took - it was picked up by everyone that mattered, simple and effective, "scrolls like butter".
In point 1 it was the only way, in point 3 it was just another way.

By the time we got to March 2008, Apple was about to deliver on number 4 in dramatic fashion - delivering the SDK the masses were demanding. When Scott Forstall described the iPhone OS as 'the most advanced platform for mobile devices' the transformation from potential orphan to mobile platform was complete.

Four easy steps to turn mistakes into magic, if you ever needed any proof that Apple was knows exactly what they are doing - this has to be it.

The iPhone was in very real danger of being stuck in a very American problem but Apple not only had the wisdom, they had the guts to make the hard decisions when they needed to be made. The success of the iPhone and the future of their mobile platform depended on it.

With WWDC08 only 3 sleeps away and some large hurdles overcome, we can't wait to see where too next for the iPhone!

Zillatron]]>thestormglass@gmail.comReview2008-04-27T10:02:18+10:00http://thestormglass.com/files/review-meraki-mini-pro.html#unique-entry-id-19http://thestormglass.com/files/review-meraki-mini-pro.html#unique-entry-id-19I ordered the Meraki on Friday afternoon and it arrived 10:30AM the following Monday. Starting with the speedy, albeit expensive shipping - the Mini was sent with UPS and I was able to track the package without any issues. The order confirmation email came from Maraki within 5 minutes of the order and it had a link to the order status page, which was updated with the UPS tracking link as soon as it shipped (on top of the email UPS also sent). So there was no shortage of information, which was fantastic.

The Mini arrived in a small box surrounded with packing material, well protected from any bumps or drops. The Meraki box has nothing on Apple's packaging but it is simple, nothing in excess - great to see they are considering the environment!

Once unpacked, the Mini was an absolute breeze to setup. I plugged a spare network cable from my Time Capsule straight into the Mini and plugged in the power, it came straight up and was ready to go in seconds. After creating a 'Meraki Dashboard' account (<3mins), you are taken to the 'Configure' tab of the Meraki Dashboard where you can set everything from 'basic' Public and Private access to 'Branding', 'Messaging' and there are also 'Advanced' options.

The basic configuration settings let you set the Network Name (SSID) and if you want to use tiered access (Public and Private) or setup specific users (by email address based accounts). In the Public tier you can set up free access, or up to two 'billing plans'. In each of the three available public tiers you are able to set bandwidth settings from 50kbps up to Unlimited. In my particular case, I have set up a free tier and two paid tiers...as you can see here, it is very simple:



Next is branding configuration, in this section you can enable a 'splash page' which users see when they first connect to your network, this can include a custom message (even some basic HTML formatting) and if you would like to display the Meraki logo or your own. You can also turn off the splash page if you choose not to use a billing plan.

The messaging configuration is for setting up the 'Meraki Toolbar', you can enable or disable the toolbar along with setting up custom logos, messages and ad's to be displayed in a (fairly unobtrusive) toolbar that appears at the top of your browser window when connected. This cannot be disabled in the Standard model.

There are a few more things you can setup, like how much network information you would like to share with Meraki (like location information), options for adding more nodes to your network (though MAC and Serial numbers or your Meraki order number) and your billing payout address (which is automatically populated from your order or and can be changed). Lastly there is the advanced configuration settings:



Here you can set some more detailed network settings like Public SSID, allowing wired users to become part of the private tier, restricting outside access to the local LAN (thankfully, OFF by default), Language and time-zone settings along with setting up alerts which can be sent to your registered email account or another that you specify. As you can see in the second screen shot above, there are even settings for redirecting connected users after they see your splash page, allowing others to administer your network and allowing certain users free access to the network.

I thought the last option was cool, you can set your node to 'Run Dark' so there is no visible status indication on the unit. This would be particularly useful on the outdoor units where you didn't want any flashing lights to attract vandals.

You may have noticed at this point that I'm spending a big chunk of this review talking about the Dashboard, the reason for that is simple - the unit is simple, all the brains are in the Dashboard. So once you have un-boxed, mounted and plugged in the unit...that's all you need to do with the hardware. All that said, it might seem like there is a bunch of stuff to setup, in reality though, most of the available settings can be left as default, you only need to change things if you want.

The other major section in the Dashboard is 'Monitor', which as the name suggests, let's you monitor just about everything that is going on with your node and network.


At the highest level there is an Overview which shows recent usage, number of people connected and a map of your nodes location (Google Maps, surprise surprise). The other options like usage data, users and device list let you drill down to the user level and see how much each user is...using and block or white-list particular devices/users.

I briefly tested the range of the Mini using a completely unscientific method, walking around with my iPod Touch. Even though the Mini is sitting on my desk (next to the Time Capsule) on the second story, behind several well insulated walls I can get coverage 'across the street' and about 2-3 houses away in both directions. If it was mounted on or near a window or in a spot where any thought had gone into it at all, I imagine the range would be far better.

The bottom line in all my rambling is, the Meraki unit is a cinch to setup and manage. These devices are built for simple and fast distribution of wifi, with easy to use and easy to understand monitoring and configuration. It's all available, online, from anywhere you can get on the Net. There really is no excuse not to help free the net - it really is super easy.

Hopefully this answers some of the questions you might have had about the Meraki, I'm happy to answer anything else (or provide more screen shots) in the thread...
]]>thestormglass@gmail.comOpinion2008-04-14T22:51:49+10:00http://thestormglass.com/files/ee310e5c08bba72c0fcf6e08cfbd52ad-17.html#unique-entry-id-17http://thestormglass.com/files/ee310e5c08bba72c0fcf6e08cfbd52ad-17.html#unique-entry-id-17I've recently been doing some reading about the 'freethenet' campaign in San Francisco and the Meraki mesh network devices.
Let me say firstly, I'm not assosiated with Meraki in any way - these are my own thoughts.

Usually, I'd find the whole idea of community driven wifi networks...well...scary, but the Meraki 'system' seems to inspire something in people akin to the open source software movements...just look at Firefox. It certainly has inspired me. Although I've often been interested in community projects, none have captured my attention long enough or provided me with the interest needed to devote what little spare time I have. Perhaps this particular project is a little closer to home given the state of the Internet in Australia and being a Mac user...but I'll get to that shortly.

There are groups starting to pop up to help co-ordinate the distribution of the Meraki hardware, Free Australia Wireless as an example. I commend their efforts, although I'm slightly (selfishly) disappointed that there is no Free Melbourne Wireless website as yet, I'm sure in time, that will come - there already is a Facebook group and a Google groups mail list. The great thing about this is the idea that 'you' can help without being a member of any particular group or require any special skills. You are free to add devices, and bandwidth to the mesh as you see fit.

The Sydney arm of Free Australia Wireless got sick of waiting for the government to provide the city-wide wifi they were promised and went about bulk ordering Meraki hardware to do it themselves. Free Canberra Wireless are steaming ahead too, their advantage being the city is much smaller than Sydney or Melbourne so things can happen, and happen fast.

This must be a scary idea for companies like Telstra. In the news again today yet another victory speech from the telco that they have 'successfully enabled ADSL2+ in 900 exchanges'!. That's fantastic news, but 'the mob' is already starting to 'route around' Telstra, their ludicrous pricing and various attitude problems. The balance of power can rapidly tip back in favour to the general public, although it is a way away at this point - the potential is there.

As a Mac user, especially now, wireless just comes with the territory. If you have any modern Mac, you have wifi. If you have an iPod touch or an iPhone wifi is a staple. While cheap wifi may be more common elsewhere, in Australia we are quite undernourished (compared to my perception of the demand) when it comes to free or near-free access to the Net where ever and when ever you need it. This looks as good a way forward as I've seen and the best thing about Meraki is its simplicity. Something that is at the core of the Mac and therefore should be easy for us as Mac users to relate too.

Over at netlife.com.au there is a brilliant blog entry about their personal experience over the first 5 days of contributing to the Meraki mesh. This guy has met his neighbours and already earned $20 to recoup purchase of the hardware. It's not perfect by any stretch, but what is? All you can do is have a go. From the blog: "And to adapt a phrase from the Treasurer of the last Federal Government: "Get a Meraki for yourself, one for your husband and one for the country."

As I said earlier, you don't need to be associated with any group to contribute, but there are some advantages not least of which is bulk buying. Given the friendly and knowledgeable community here at Mactalk I thought it would be interesting to open this up to you and hear your thoughts, comments and ideas on contributing to 'freethenet' with Meraki here in Australia (or wherever else you might be!).

Not only is this a way to contribute to your local community and the wider community but also a way to do something for yourself. I'm sure I'm not the only one that wished my iPod touch wifi worked at 'that cafe at the corner'.

Zillatron
]]>thestormglass@gmail.comApple2008-02-27T18:18:40+11:00http://thestormglass.com/files/8d49da8e3050e2c7df3ee6fae92c3e7e-16.html#unique-entry-id-16http://thestormglass.com/files/8d49da8e3050e2c7df3ee6fae92c3e7e-16.html#unique-entry-id-16Weeks have passed and the dust has settled on the latest bomb dropped by Steve Jobs and Apple, the Macbook Air. This isn't just another ultra-portable laptop. Apple is pursuing yet another interface revolution. If you didn't believe it when the iPhone/iPod touch were released, you should now.

While people were complaining that the solitary USB port stopped them from buying the Air, we looked into what the Air does have, Multi-Touch. Apple left out 'debatable' features like a built in DVD drive, lots of USB ports, firewire and weight but didn't sacrifice on everyday important things like screen real-estate, a real keyboard and now Multi-Touch. The future is available today (ok, 2-3weeks) for those who want it.

After the launch of the iPhone everyone realised that the lack of stylus and hardware keys were a requirement in creating a more adaptive user interface. Apple now appear more than prepared to bring touch to the Mac and the Air is the first step down that path. Although the native OS X interface is built around the more traditional keyboard and mouse, it wont be long before we see Apples team of interface designers bring more of the iPhone to the proverbial big screen.

Coverflow, Quick Look, Stacks and Time Machine all show signs of Apple searching for the right formula to make this the next big 'transition'. Getting Ma and Pa average to feel comfortable with a mouse didn't happen overnight but now you'd wonder where we would be without it. Multi-Touch is starting this all over again, helping the Mac evolve in two ways: 

- Making the human-computer interface less visible by making it more 'natural'.
- Making the computer work more like you think, hiding more of the computer behind a less visible but smarter and more intuitive interface.

The Air is currently the only full size Mac that supports Multi-Touch outside the 'two-finger scrolling' generation of notebooks, this makes it unique and important. Showing OS X is up to the task of driving the latest hardware innovations is only the beginning. It proves Apple know the ideas that made the iPod such a phenomenal success help drive the future of their products, building a base off the original iMac, the iPod was born. Building a base of the iPod, the iPhone was born. The next generation of Mac's will bring this full circle and build off the iPhone and Multi-touch.

We wonder how flexible the hardware and firmware behind the new touchpads are. Can they only report the expanded set of gestures currently supported by Apple apps or can they be used by third party vendors to support an expanded set of gestures?

There is something in the Air...and it's not just a fancy touch pad. 

Zillatron and Broadmier]]>thestormglass@gmail.comOpinion2008-01-12T16:29:00+11:00http://thestormglass.com/files/a7ce30a571f92ee7c253b8b0b78c392e-15.html#unique-entry-id-15http://thestormglass.com/files/a7ce30a571f92ee7c253b8b0b78c392e-15.html#unique-entry-id-15This is the future, like it or not. The reality is, if you fight it - people will steal it anyway. It happened with music and it's already happening with video.

There can be no denying that people will pay for things if they think they are getting value for their hard earned. With MacWorld 2008 only days away I thought it would be interesting to use MacWorld 2007 numbers so there is a direct comparison once Apple announce the 2008 numbers. At MacWorld 2007 Apple had passed 2 billion songs sold. It took 3 years to get to 1 billion songs then just 10 months to get the second billion. That's 5 million a DAY. 
Again, at MacWorld 2007 Apple announced that 50 million TV shows had been sold and in the first 4 months of movie sales, 1.3 million sold. So...it works. But we still can't buy one TV show or Movie in Australia, or a whole heap of other countries. What gives?

The rumour-mill is full of iTunes movie rental whispers...can you imagine what that would do for Movie numbers? Let's have a guess - 1.3 million in 4 months in the US and select European nations, price rentals cheap enough and I'd bet that number would start pressing half the music sales numbers per year. I picked a random movie on the US store and it was USD$14.99, a quick conversion to AUD$16.78. So presumably we'd pay about $19.99. That's still cheaper than buying most new titles in a physical store. TV shows tell the same story, USD$1.99 we'll end up paying about AUD$2.99. 

Is that really that much for the convenience of having the video there, ready to go whenever you feel like watching? No ads. Just press play. I don't know about you, but I don't really have time to be screwed around by TV stations that start shows late, randomly play repeats mid-season, cut the end of sentences so they can trim 30 seconds off the running time of the show to squash in another ad and then cancel the show or move it to 11:30pm Monday night because it doesn't rate. Then when we do eventually get the show on DVD, it's priced so high that it's not affordable - unless you wait another 3-6 months for it to become 'cheap'.

The beauty of this model is that consumers get to buy what they want and the show gets supported. I understand that in Australia (and elsewhere) the complexity of buying shows made in the US or UK adds significantly to our 'buy price' but that doesn't mean we need to get ripped off, or worse still, not have it as an option at all.

Every time I read 'reports' about how much piracy is costing the studios and how much it drives the cost of producing the content I can't help but laugh. They don't make the content available, then complain when people steal it. Blame the pirates! Arrr! iTunes hasn't removed piracy from the music industry, but it sure hasn't made it worse. The current business models were developed a long time before the Internet and digital distribution was viable. For some reason there seems to be this notion that if you cant fit the square peg in the round hole, you just need to get a bigger hammer. Pushing high margin models doesn't work anymore, high volume is the only way to stay relevant. Just look at how many online music stores have come and gone before and more so after iTunes, the story is almost always the same, to expensive, bogus rentals or limited support.

I read the other day that in this new digital age that 'Lo-fi is the new Hi-fi', how true! People download lower than broadcast quality TV shows every day from BitTorrent and watch, with no ad's, whenever they feel like it.  HD-TV is great, no argument - the bottom line is that when it comes to day-to-day TV, I'd gladly trade HD for SD if it meant I could watch at my convenience. 

Production studios seem to be on an agonisingly slow ride to understand this simple point - Give them what THEY want and they'll buy it. Give them what YOU want and they'll steal it.
The sooner they understand this, the sooner I can start paying them for my fiance's favorite nightly soap opera...*sigh*

Zillatron]]>thestormglass@gmail.comApple2007-12-27T22:54:06+11:00http://thestormglass.com/files/453f62e0d989e403e7703ada7d812219-14.html#unique-entry-id-14http://thestormglass.com/files/453f62e0d989e403e7703ada7d812219-14.html#unique-entry-id-14It's an unusual beast Apple TV. Most people think it's missing a TV-tuner, some say it should have a DVD drive. Then there are lots of people that say it's missing lots of different abilities.

In some ways, they all have a point. Sure, a TV-tuner would make it a more 'normal' set-top-box and a DVD drive would make it more attractive to Ma and Pa Average. And yes, we agree that the ability to play a boatload of video formats would make it more attractive to the 'tech-savvy pro-sumer'. But...That's not what Apple TV is about.

There has been dozens of attempts at media PC's and set-top-boxes in the past (and even now), but all suffer from similar problems:
- Feature bloat
- Clunky Interface
- Compulsory Technical Know-how

Apple TV is tightly integrated with iTunes, just like your iPod. In fact, it IS an iPod...for your TV.
The TV-tuner issue is a moot point, watching and recording live broadcast TV is the past. Apple know this, they have the means to distribute content on a large scale and now they have the device to bring it straight to your lounge room. It appears that it's never been Apple's intent to give people an easy way to do what they do already TV - this is a 'mind-set' changing device.

Change the way people get their entertainment by providing a simple, easy to use device and 'normal' TV seems like it's from the stone age.

The DVD drive is also a non-issue. You don't put music onto your iPod with a CD, why should you be able to put movies on Apple TV with a DVD? More to the point, why provide something that you already have? Apple want you to BUY movies and TV shows though iTunes. Having said that, Apple make no effort to help you put movies from a DVD into iTunes directly - but they don't stop you either.

Apple TV is a stealth bomber in every sense - It's flying under the radar as people continue to ignore it yet, it carries a motherload of potential as it has executed a single handed removal of the big issues that plague other set-top boxes:

- Straight forward feature-set with fully upgradeable software platform to allow more features to be added later.
- Simple, elegant interface that even my mother can use.
- Anyone that has setup a TV before will more than manage plugging in one HDMI cable, not to mention the already familiar (iPod-like) way Apple TV integrates into iTunes.

Of course, in a perfect world were everything you want is on the iTunes Store, Apple TV is an invaluable device. But...Apple don't have everything they need on the iTunes store (look at Australia for example). So if my mum wants to put her favorite show on to Apple TV, or in iTunes...well...I do it for her. But for the more technically proficient of us, it's far from a big effort. I'd be more than happy to pay for the convince of being able to download and watch TV shows and movies at my leisure - but that's another post entirely.

We agree, Apple TV has a way to go before it has as tightly integrated experience as the iPod. But the device is very well executed for what it's supposed to be, and iPod for your TV.

Zillatron & Broadmier]]>thestormglass@gmail.comHome2007-10-27T12:53:00+10:00http://thestormglass.com/files/04431e4542f04ba05e5f482b7738580c-10.html#unique-entry-id-10http://thestormglass.com/files/04431e4542f04ba05e5f482b7738580c-10.html#unique-entry-id-10This really is the underlying reason why the iPhone is such a revolutionary device. "Multi-Touch has been around for ages!", we hear you say.
It sure has, we were just as blown away as you the first time we saw video of multi-point touch input - no pun intended, but the 'point' really is
that it took Apple to make it useful. 

We've said before that Apple seem to have a knack for solving problems with technology and not creating technology then trying to find a problem to solve with it. In this case they took all the technology, mixed it all together, added a pinch of awesome design, baked for 2 years and out came the iPhone.

We've also said before that this is a similar story to the original Mac's bitmap interface and mouse and the iPod's clickwheel - as if creating one revolutionary human-computer interface wasn't enough, Apple have now dropped this scale of change on market, staggeringly, THREE times.
Not only that, but this time they have taken one of their two previous interfaces and almost obsoleted them both in one hit. In the last article we talked about how Quick Look changes the way you view your files on the move on this new mobile platform. But it extends even further than that into Leopard where, Quick Look currently lives.

Frankly, we couldn't really see the point of Cover Flow on a screen that you cant touch. Sure it's pretty and convenient if you have a side scrolling mouse (ahem, Mighty Mouse) - but that's it?

This system is made for the touch screen, you don't ever select an action (verb) to do anything. You simply 'tell' the software what you want - a flick, a pinch, a tap. And although it's simple, it totally turns on it's head how we use computers, especially mobile ones. By sweeping this convention aside Apple not only leave behind the 'typical' human-computer interface but more importantly, they make the interface work like you THINK.

Believe it or not, Microsoft tried this long ago in Windows XP with 'tasks' in the Control Panel...today I don't know of many XP machines that have left it on, most people prefer the 'Classic' view simply because it makes more sense. The idea wasn't new then and it's not new now, but the point again is that nobody has really made it really useful until now. 

Take the iPod Touch - the home screen has 'Music', 'Videos', 'Photos' and 'iTunes' as the four primary tasks Apple expect you to use the Touch for. It then takes other common activities using YouTube and not just made it a default bookmark in Safari - but made it into its own 'task'. More like you think, less like a computer does. You think you want to look at YouTube and you tap the icon to tell the computer you want 'that'. 

If I tell my 49 year old mother to goto YouTube on her PC she, stubbornly, fumbles around with Firefox refusing help and totally unaware it's in her bookmarks already. Hand her the Touch, not only did she get from 'sleep' to YouTube in under 5 seconds from (with NO help), but she made the comment that she wished she could 'do other things on the computer as easy as this' and then she said 'This is easy' - at which point I realised I wasn't going to see my Touch for the next little while. It was this combined with Steve Jobs saying they removed the verbs from the iPhone interface that made us really understand that in this case, less is clearly more.

It's not so much what Apple put in to Multi-Touch, but what they left out.

Zillatron and Broadmier]]>thestormglass@gmail.comApple2007-10-24T20:56:13+10:00http://thestormglass.com/files/4df604dfafb416069e7e5f0ea0c22d7b-9.html#unique-entry-id-9http://thestormglass.com/files/4df604dfafb416069e7e5f0ea0c22d7b-9.html#unique-entry-id-9
We've already made the connection between having a hard drive in a tablet and 
a bad user experience. We believe that a proper tablet computing experience can't 
be created by simply 'adding' a touch or handwriting recognition layer to an existing 
desktop operating system. 

Software for a tablet computer requires a different interface to software for a desktop or laptop. 
The tablet software can't rely on accurate position inputs, it typically runs on a smaller display
and access to a keyboard is such a problem that it should be used only for text entry and even 
then only if it is absolutely necessary. 

The concept of a file browser (like Finder) as we understand it simply doesn't work on a small display. 
A file browser running on a tablet computer can't rely on the user being able to read a long list of filenames 
or accurately select a filename from that list. What is needed is a way for the user to select a document 
based on its content, without reading a filename.

What is needed is a graphical representation of the contents and a way to select a document using broad, 
simple gestures.

What you need is Cover Flow. It's perfect for the job, it already exists and if you have an iPhone or iPod Touch 
you're already using it on a tablet computer. 

What you need is a way to display the contents of a variety of file types, that's fast, simple and built right into
the OS - Movies, photos and music are already handled on iPods. A tablet needs to be able to show the contents
of word processor documents, spreadsheets and things we haven't thought of yet. 
It needs a way for developers to tell Cover Flow how to display a preview of a document. 

What you need is Quick Look. It's perfect for the job, it already exists and you're going to be using it on a tablet computer. 

Quick Look allows you to view the content of files without loading the editor application. The editor application may 
not even be installed, you won't have a hard drive so you'll have to pick what you need. Quick Look enables application
developers to provide plug-ins to represent their documents on the tablet. 

Overkill technology for Finder on traditional OS X, perfectly suited for a tablet computer. 
Quick Look is small, it can fit into flash memory and leave plenty to spare for your content. 
It is fast because it doesn't need to load an application to display a document, so it doesn't need a power hungry processor. 
And because of this it even saves on power, it allows the tablet to run for longer on a cheaper, smaller battery.

Quick Look and Cover Flow will replace Finder and provide 90% of the functionality users need from a full-size OS X installation, 
right in your pocket. 

Cover Flow and Quick Look will work together with Multi-Touch in Apple's next generation of mobile computers to provide the user 
with the perfect interface - and in two years time, you'll wonder how it could have been any other way.

Broadmier and Zillatron

edit: Thanks to one of our readers for pointing out that its Quick LOOK not VIEW. We'll try not to rush so much next time!!
Thanks. :D
Z]]>thestormglass@gmail.comApple2007-10-22T20:42:01+10:00http://thestormglass.com/files/538f3f60529252f2411fb6b6406bee18-8.html#unique-entry-id-8http://thestormglass.com/files/538f3f60529252f2411fb6b6406bee18-8.html#unique-entry-id-8If there is one thing mobile carries and Apple have in common it is that they both are good at control and making profits. What happens when two companies that excel in these areas clash on terms for a product release? 
We don't know the full story, but what we do know paints a picture that isn't as pretty as you would expect for what is a enormous product for Apple.

Originally, we speculated that carriers would clamour to be the 'one' in each respective country that Apple was to sell iPhone. However, it appears that even stellar sales in the USA can't give Apple the edge they need to muscle in on the carriers.

But why? Presumably these companies WANT to sell the iPhone, surely they want in on the huge sales that will come from it. Apple know this. Apple know that where ever they make the device available, there will be hordes waiting to hand over their money.

The iPod business model is fantastic, but the carriers do NOT have the same problems the music and film industry has. Apple can muscle them around because there is simply no other way to compete on all the levels iPod/iTunes forces you too. Yes, iPhone is going to be big. But me, as a carrier, I already have 5 other phone manufactures that are happy to play ball the way I want. Why do I need Apple? Sure they are a cool brand and I'm going to get millions of new customers from this one device. Why do I need to bend and stretch for them and then have them take a big chunk of my 'safe' monthly subscription revenue? I already control this arena, the profits are mine.

Verizon weren't game enough, AT&T saw the light. But by all reports they have taken a big hit on contract profits to accommodate Apple's demands. It's paid off for them in a huge way with people switching to AT&T just to get iPhone, as expected. Although we didn't see it early on, this has always been a gamble for Apple. About 6 months before the iPhone was launched, we guess that it became obvious that deployment was going to be a difficult, uphill battle. By this time though, they had past the point of no return. 

Keeping in mind the relatively slow uptake of the iPhone by new carriers (take France and now Canada as examples) and the limits placed on iPhone sales by the telcos that have already signed up, the number of iPhones Apple COULD sell if the device was carrier independent and the virtual guarantee of stellar sales on the iPod Touch - the future is getting pulled in every direction except the right one. 

Apple created a baseline when they signed on with AT&T, this committed them to creating similar lock-in deals in the global market. It's impossible to sell an unlocked phone in other countries while locking contracts still exist in others, this is far from ideal. The danger in this situation is the iPhone could become increasingly isolated as a product compared to similar technology in like the iPod touch and our predicted Multi-Touch Mac which can be sold, unlimited by third parties. 

We hope it isn't, but it just might be - the most successful orphan, ever.

Zillatron and Broadmier

]]>thestormglass@gmail.comApple2007-10-19T20:08:09+10:00http://thestormglass.com/files/91a043785caf1c292d4370e6a38930da-7.html#unique-entry-id-7http://thestormglass.com/files/91a043785caf1c292d4370e6a38930da-7.html#unique-entry-id-7
It's been a few years now since the release of the first iPods
without a hard drive.  When the iPod mini was first released we
thought of them as a nice option for those that needed something
really small and didn't mind sacrificing some functionality.  If you
were serious about your music you wouldn't want to be caught without
all of it on you, would you?

Somewhere along the way that perception changed, now the only iPod
that sports a hard drive is called the 'classic', a nice way of
saying it's considered outdated, on the way out.

Part of the reason we changed the way we view the flash iPods is
their increase in storage capacity, those gigabytes make a difference.
Some may argue that 16Gb doesn't compare to a 160Gb hard disk, but
that's not the whole story.

We believe there's something else, in the last few years we've been
educated to trust in the technologies that select and manage the media on our
portable devices. We have smart playlists, iTunes manages our pod-casts and our content
is synchronised automatically.  It just works, we can trust it.

The difference between all of your data and what you need to take with
you is becoming more obvious.  The USB key has shown us how little we
really need  with us.  The few documents you're working on, some reference 
materials, that's all we need to continue our projects.  The rest we fill up 
with photos and old files that we haven't got around to deleting.

So how does this fit in with the Multi-Touch Mac?  It shows that it
doesn't need a hard drive.

The Multi-Touch Mac will be a bridging device, it won't carry everything
you have, just what you need.  It will let you be productive when you're
between bases.  On the train, waiting for the kids, in a meeting.  As
soon as you get back home you will plug it in and it will recharge
and update its content. The last twenty documents you've worked on, and those
you've marked as favourites, will be synchronised automatically.  You won't have to
think about it. It will just work, you'll trust it.

The hard drive is not needed, in fact, we believe the hard drive is
one of the main reasons previous attempts at a tablet computer have
failed.

A hard drive makes the computer larger. Hard drives are small but the
extra battery power required to run them means an increase in the size
of the battery, accompanied by a significant increase in price.  A
hard drive makes power management more challenging, keep it running
all the time and power is wasted, shut it down often and spinning it up
when needed will use up even more power and make the computer seem
slow.  It makes the computer fragile and it adds weight.

When a tablet has a hard drive it's tempting to put a full operating
system on it, after all, if a tablet can run a desktop operating
system then it can run all the desktop software a user needs.  All
you need is to emulate the mouse with a touch screen add some
handwriting recognition and that's the end of it!
Right? Wrong. Now you have two problems.  You've got an oversized,
fragile computer with a short battery life and you have software that
doesn't fit they way people want to use a tablet.

Hard drives and tablet computing don't mix.  The Multi-Touch Mac
won't have a hard drive and in two years time you'll wonder how it
could have been any other way.

Broadmier and Zillatron
]]>thestormglass@gmail.comApple2007-10-11T19:34:24+10:00http://thestormglass.com/files/8acdbd050aa0aa9efc37014539e62d6a-6.html#unique-entry-id-6http://thestormglass.com/files/8acdbd050aa0aa9efc37014539e62d6a-6.html#unique-entry-id-6This is another one of those things that Apple has snuck in and done before anyone knew what was going on.

When the iPhone was released with Wi-Fi, Apple touted its speed and power efficiency over 3G as its choice for high speed network connectivity when the EDGE network was not available.

What this does for the iPhone is great, it allows you high speed access to mail and web browsing, at home or whenever you are in range of a hot-spot.

When the iPod touch was announced, it also came with Wi-Fi, but what for? Its an iPod, right? Yep. But then there is always 'One more thing...'!
Apple again flexes it muscles and pushes the envelope on content delivery. The idea is simple, walk into your nearest Starbucks and hear a song you like...as Steve Jobs would say - 'BOOM' , you can download that song right from your iPod/iPhone. Along with that, the Wi-Fi iTunes store now gives you access to the 'normal' iTunes store, right from your iPod.

But why is this so important?
As usual, it right under our noses. You can already download games for your iPod from the iTunes store, along with music, podcasts and all sorts of video, the next step is software.

A large part of the appeal of the iTunes store is its simple purchase mechanism. Now that it has been simplified for use on the Multi-Touch platform, it's perfect for buying and installing applications for your iPhone/iPod to compliment the standard applications you get out of the box.

Take the YouTube application for the current iPhone/iPod, Apple has taken something that people do a LOT and created a very simple interface. Why not a Facebook or MySpace application? It may not be important to us, it may not be big enough for Apple to include out of the box, but it would be great if you really wanted that functionality. If for a few dollars you could buy that application from iTunes and expand your device? BOOM.

Not only does it create the basis of a 3rd party development ecosystem (not the stop-gap Web 2.0 we have now), but it also allows Apple to control what is made available though the delivery system, THEIR delivery system. So the developers are mostly happy because they can develop Applications for the new platform. Apple is happy because they get control over the delivery and quality of the applications and functionality available to the users. The users are happy because they get extra functionality and extra applications.

With the iPhone and iPod touch Apple are introducing people to a new way of people-machine interaction and a new way of buying content, software and functionality.

Zillatron & Broadmier]]>thestormglass@gmail.comApple2007-10-08T21:19:07+10:00http://thestormglass.com/files/b52cad1e5c4e50f471f80228e299df99-5.html#unique-entry-id-5http://thestormglass.com/files/b52cad1e5c4e50f471f80228e299df99-5.html#unique-entry-id-5
The iPhone and iPod Touch hold all your favourite photos, their dock
guarantees that they will be sitting on your desk, facing you most of
the day.

They have nice, big color screens and are idle the majority of the time.

Doesn't it make sense to everyone but Apple, that they NEED to show
you those photos after they've been idle for a few minutes?  They
should automatically start a slideshow of the photos stored in an
album called 'Favourites' or 'Docked' when they have been on the dock
for a few minutes.

In an ideal world the user could define their own 'Ken Burns' effects
like they can with iMovie.

What we've described isn't a huge change, its not going to sell
millions of multi-touch devices, but we think it would be a valuable
and interesting feature.

If there was a software ecosystem supporting multi-touch, these
'computer-putty' devices could reach their full potential.

Broadmier and Zillatron]]>thestormglass@gmail.comApple2007-10-05T21:49:19+10:00http://thestormglass.com/files/8b6b797882331525d2a5749db9757410-4.html#unique-entry-id-4http://thestormglass.com/files/8b6b797882331525d2a5749db9757410-4.html#unique-entry-id-4
Since the iPhone was released, there has been talk that Apple may be in the market to revive the Newton. As
recently as last week, Appleinsider have been pedaling the most recent incarnation of the rumor. A week prior to that we
had discussed this very thing - but you'll just have to take our word for it :)

This is one of those 'Where to next?' conversations where everything starts to make sense. You can see the whole picture,
not just pieces of the puzzle. When AppleTV was announced, Steve Jobs explained the direction Apple was heading with media
in the home and in your pocket.

- iMac in your office.
- iPod in your pocket and car
- AppleTV in your living room

It paints a very simple picture of how Apple is aiming squarely at content distribution. You can retrieve your content, anywhere you want.
Now with the iPod touch and iPhone, you can buy content on the move, not just from your desk. This move further extends the reach of the iTunes store, making it not only a music and video platform but by stealth (through iPod games) a software purchase platform aswell.

This push to morph iTunes from a simple jukebox application to a integrated content distribution system should be scaring traditional software houses, they are already getting left behind. Just like the music and movie industry. Most people didn't understand the plan with iPod (arguably, neither did Apple), but these are now roads well travelled - the iPod business model works and the iPhone is doing it all over again.

iTunes is only one piece of the puzzle.

We think there is one product missing from Apple's current line-up, one that fits perfectly between the iPhone and Macbook.
That product is a multi-touch Mac.

'No!' I hear you say, 'Microsoft have been pedalling tablet PC's for years and they never got anywhere!' - we agree!
Not because we think they are a bad idea, they aren't. The single biggest hindrance to the tablet PC form factor has always been the interface and the hardware that its based on.

The Multi-Touch interface provides a method of interaction unrivaled in mobile electronics, the genius of Multi-Touch is not so much the hardware (although impressive) but the way you can interact directly with the software. Making the interaction so basic (by NOT using a keyboard and mouse) brings the device to the masses on a scale not seen since the iPod (click-wheel) and the original Mac (bitmap display/mouse).

Apple have a knack for solving problems with technology and not creating technology then trying to find a problem to solve with it - Multi-Touch epitomises this by providing a solution to a problem that most people take for granted. It's so simple, that it prompts cries of 'why didn't I think of that?' when you see it and draws 'ooh's' and 'ahh's' when you use it.

They cracked the code that was holding back the tablet PC, a Multi-Touch based Mac for the masses is coming. It's just a matter of time.

With the iPhone, we see a device that has converged some functions from a laptop, a phone and ipod. This is a major milestone in the world of portable electronic devices. Like the iPod, iPhone paves the way for 'smart' devices. The iPod's mass production has allowed Apple to push the envelope on price and on technology for years. Driving the price of memory, cpu's and LCD's down though sheer volume and allowing them the flexibly to create breakthrough devices like iPhone - now you know it's possible, I bet you wouldn't have believed how far ahead the iPhone technology was to be if someone told you 12 months before it was announced.

So Apple have the hardware and the software to make it happen, they have shown they can deliver content directly to your device though the Wi-Fi iTunes store. The board is set and the pieces are moving.

Zillatron and Brodmier









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