Category Archives: technology

Starting strong…

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If nothing else, I can say that I started the day strong. When others were getting booted and being timed out on the AT&T and Apple websites, I managed to reserve my iPhone 4 for pick up next Thursday. By 5:50 this morning, I had my confirmation email and realized, somewhat disturbingly, that I had reached what was likely to be the high point of the day. Seriously, on a work day, what’s going to be better then the moment you confirm that you’re going to have your hands on this summer’s neatest new toy?

All I need to do now is show up, hand over $199 + tax, sign a new two year contract that I have no intention of staying in longer than a year, and wait in line for the 7 AM opening of the local Apple Store. It’s like any other high holy day, except with bottled water and granola. And it’s possibly the only time of year when I don’t really mind standing in line and being forced to socialize with total strangers. Of course then there’s the inevitable anger when iTunes grinds to a halt under the volume of people trying to activate new phones. That’s part of the price of being a ridiculously early adopter.

Despite what I consider one of the better starts, the day ended, as most days do… with my being annoyed. However, I wasn’t violently annoyed in that wanting to bludgeon someone with a desk chair kind of way, so perhaps I’m making progress and getting through the anger stage into acceptance… or is that indifference? Eh, who can tell the difference anyway. See, I’m growing as a person.

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Analog hell…

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If I had to take a guess, I’d say that they average people who work in the same gilded cage that I do have an average age of somewhere north of 50. That puts the majority of them squarely in the analog world… You know, the one where people wear watches, know how to use typewriters, and complain about people to send text messages. The little corner of this world that where I pretend to have influence has an average age hovering somewhere around 33 or 34 years and… and this is where worlds inevitably collide – the digital versus the analog.

I bring this up because we’re in the midst of ordering a number of things that only make sense if you think in analog… Like wall clocks with our organizational logo on them. That’s nice enough and all, but in looking around just inside the four walls of my cube, I count at least five things that tell me the time that has been synchronized with the network to be reasonably close to the “official” U.S. time as reported from National Institute of Standards and Technology. I’m not exactly sure why we need something that’s going to give a less accurate, battery-powered approximation of the time hanging across the room on the wall, but we’re going to have ‘em, by God. It’s not a big deal, just a nod to doing things the old fashioned way for a less than apparent reason.

That pretty much sets the tone for the next “must have” item in the order… ergonomic, screen printed, mouse pads for everyone! The logic here, of course, is that a branded mouse pad is just the kind of item that will help build unit cohesion and boost morale. Really? A mouse pad? That’ll be a great way to make sure out trackballs don’t… oh, wait… No one has trackballs any more. We have optical mice that bounce a friggin’ laser off your desk… or your leg… or the wall… or your dog’s back in a pinch. Unless your desk is made out of lexan or you have one of those really cool sheet glass covers on your faux-hardwood credenza, it’s pretty much something that’ll be going in a drawer and never seeing the light of day again.

Please, for the love of God, the saints, and all things good and holy, people… stop thinking in analog. The digital camera isn’t going to steal your soul and your laptop, even your crust old Dell 620s, can be used for more than writing email and Word documents. And another thing, stop asking for tethering on your Blackberries and aircards for your laptops. It’s the same interwebs your tying into. We’re not talking about Mission-to-Mars technology here, folks… all I’m asking is that you figure out how to use basic office equipment. Sigh.

Stupid is as stupid does…

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Dear AT&T Mobility,

Wow. This is the third time I have written you in the last year. Our times together just seem to get better and better. You’re doing a real bang up job of rolling out these new devices and making sure the service we receive is top notch. Dropping unlimited data was a real score for you on Monday. And if that weren’t enough goodness for your customers, making 140,000 of your iPad customer’s email addresses and SIM numbers available through your website was a real treat for those of us who spent $700+ for the device and $360 a year for your service.

I did notice that a security consultant rushed to your defense this afternoon and reminded us that “It’s not like peoples’ Social Security or credit card numbers were compromised.” If “it could have been worse” is the best defense you can muster, well I guess I buy that. I mean it was only 140,000 customers for Heaven’s sake. Hard to believe that anyone would want to make a fuss about it, really. And thank you ever so much for not letting anyone know about this officially. It was so refreshing to read this on Google News before getting an email from you explaining what had happened and what you had done to address the problem.

So, AT&T, all I can say is that you’re a real class act. I’m proud to be a long-time customer. Keep up the truly magnificent work.

Your friend,

Jeff

P.S. If you talk to Apple any time soon, let them know that they should be super-proud to be standing right there next to you through all of this.

It’s all about the hype…

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Compared to the iPad announcement back in March, the expected announcement tomorrow the next-generation iPhone is just around the corner seems to be practically drifting gently into that good night. That’s to be expected, I suppose, as most people aren’t all that interested in new tech until they can actually hold it in their hands. That’s well and good. Tomorrow is more of a holiday for the early adopters among us anyway. Of course there are too many rumors to speculate on at the moment, but it would appear to be reasonable to expect a wholly new form factor, a higher resolution display, more powerful processor, two cameras, and, of course OS4. Most everything else seems up for grabs, including the date when it will actually be available for sale. Rumors on that are everything from the day after tomorrow to June 27th. My personal guesstimate is leaning more towards the end of the month. Any earlier than that and we’re almost certainly be hearing rumors circulating about delivery plan or other pre-sale groundwork being put in place. Hopefully mid-afternoon tomorrow, I’ll at least know when I need to schedule leave later in the month.

As a rule, I hate to feel like I’m on the receiving end of a sales pitch, but for me at least, iPhone is a product that has basically sold itself. Given Apple’s iterative method of introducing product improvements, I’m really looking forward to seeing what extras are in store (multitasking, please? Please?). I’ve given the phone a pass on alot of things because what it does, it does so well, but I’m really needing this version to bring most of the loose ends together. Maybe that way I can continue to forgive AT&T’s god-awful service and crippling data limits.

AT&T… You fail. Again.

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Dear AT&T Mobility,

I just want to drop a brief note and let you know I’m thinking about you today. I’d like to thank you for doing your level best to cripple the wonderful new iPad 3G I bought less than a month ago with your new data usage plans. I was ok dealing with the idea that my “unlimited” data plan really meant that I had 5 GB of data available each month. But now, thanks to your apparent inability to expand your cellular network to meet consumer demand, you’ve thoughtfully dropped that limit to 2 GB. But hey, I’ll save $5 a month for getting 3/5 less capacity… unless of course I go over my 2 GB limit, in which case you’ll hit me with another $25 charge, in which case I’ll be paying an additional $20 for 1/5 less capacity. I’m not a fancy big city math major, but it seems to me that what you’re doing is charging almost twice the price, providing only 4/5 the service, and calling it a victory for cellular data users. You’re logical gymnastics are truly the stuff of legend. Very impressive.

Now the reality is that most months I won’t come close to using 5 GB of cellular data since I’m usually running over a wifi network, but during those times when I’m away from a hotspot, it was nice knowing that 3G could fill the gap and I would happily pay my $30 a month for having that capacity in my hip pocket when I needed it. All you’ve done with your new tiered pricing plan is reinforce the image of AT&T mobility as a somewhat fecklessly run operation whose network teeters on the brink of failure under its regular daily load. When you announced the $30 a month unlimited plan for iPad, I really had hoped that you’d finally gotten your act together. Apparently, not so much.

So, yeah, it’s good to know that the $100+ a month I’ve been paying you for more years than I care to remember has been going to do good works like building up network infrastructure and increasing bandwidth availability. You guys are really, really bad at this cellular stuff. The future of wireless is always going to be more data, not less. Trying to artificially hold down demand in the short term by raising rates may work in the short term, but your not going to change the nature of consumption. Each new evolution in technology is going to be more reliant on data, not less, and every month that passes is going to leave your network less able to meet demand.

Today you’re the only game in town, but those days are numbered. You’re on the wrong side of the argument and your customers know it.

Sincerely yours,

Jeff

Correction…

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Not so very long ago I went on at length about the virtue of paper books and why I wouldn’t be in line to buy an e-reader. Funny thing about that pronouncement… I may have gotten it a bit wrong. It’s true that I didn’t get in line for an e-reader, but I did get in line for a device that comes with an e-reader… And I’m finding that I find it a disturbingly easy way to digest my fill of whatever books I happen to be interested in. I’ve been starting off slowly with some of the free public domain titles, but purchased my first $9.99 title last night and so far have enjoyed the flexibility of having a book on my iPad, iPhone or laptop. It’s a convenience at times when a paper book would prove to be inconvenient or simply an added and unnecessary weight.

One thing to understand is that I don’t think ebooks will ever fully replace the printed word for me. I still enjoy the way a book feels in my hands and the way they look on a shelf. It just might replace the collection of books that go on the road with me, though. The way I pack, anything to cut down on what ends up in my carry on is a good thing… And I think the Kindle app might just have won me over as a serious travel partner.

It’s not all sunshine and lollypops, of course. There is the issue of glare and poor visibility in direct sunlight that needs to be accounted for, but on balance I’m finding it to be a reasonable tradeoff between those inconveniences and easy of use/portability. The real test will be how it handles when it’s on the road… So I’ll have my verdict soon enough.

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Not quite a replacement…

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There’s not a lot more I can say about the iPad that I haven’t covered already. I’m still pretty enamored with this little wonder and think it’s probably getting all the good press it deserves. The biggest thing I’ve found missing is connectivity with the cloud. Some of that is a limitation of the wifi model and some of it is built into the way the device works. I’ve got email and contacts syncing OTA, but support for Google Docs would be a big step towards making it my go-to device for most general applications. Still, I suspect that will come in time. The only other element I’ve found lacking so far is Apple’s perennial denial of multitasking. With heavy use of word processing and other productivity apps, that’s going to be a must add in a future OS build. Hopefully we’ll see that sooner rather than later. With Apple set to formally announce iPhone OS 4 tomorrow, it’s possible that some relief is on the way.

The only other thing vie discovered that does’t work as well as I had hoped was navigating some of my particular e-shopping venues. All of my payment and shipping info autofills on my laptop but doesn’t seem to be following suite with iPad. Of course that may just be user error. The learning curve here isn’t as steep as one might imagine, but I know I’m not getting as much out of my new favorite electronic sidekick as I could be. Gutting to the top of that curve remains a work in progress.

24…

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As a techie, I’m not ashamed to admit that there are plenty of toys I’ve purchased on the spur of the moment only to find the buyer’s remorse the next day to be almost overwhelming. Happily, iPad is not one of these. If anything, the more I’ve used it over the last 24 hours, the more I enjoy it and the more things I find to do with it. The biggest challenge so far is remembering not to reach for the mouse when I want to navigate somewhere on the web. That seems to be a muscle memory thing that will “fix” itself in time, however. For all the talk of not supporting flash, I haven’t been overly troubled by it. Of course I tend to value text rather than video for the most part and iPad renders text beautifully, whether your viewing a website or updating a blog. I wanted a device that would replace the folio notebook and yellow pad that I currently carry everywhere, and as I get more adept with the iPad, I think I might just have found it. I’ll be quite interested to see how it handles a day at the office. Now I just need to talk the powers that be into getting the building set up with wifi.

No version 1.0 product is perfect and the expected flaws apply here as well. The first, and perennial issue that plagues mobile Apple products, is the lack of multitasking. Adding that would deliver iPad as a real laptop replacement. I’m also still trying to figure out exactly how/why I’d manage my photos on the iPad. Images I want to share usually go directly to the web, so I don’t see this as a show stopper in that regard. But a better way to sync pictures between your home-based computer, iPhone, and iPad seem like a bit of a no-brainer. Hopefully that will be addressed in future updates. Perhaps the biggest issue that I’ve found isn’t with the device itself, but with the way I’ve learned to think. With the iPhone, the standard response has always been “there’s an app for that,” mainly because the screen size limited the utility of performing some function on the web (ever try using the “regular” Facebook website on a mobile device?) and an app as built to make that function more “do-able.” With iPad, I’m finding less need for specific apps, because standard websites are just more useable. As a result, I’ve dumped many of my old iPhone apps in favor of going direct-to-web. Remembering that I don’t necessarily need an app for everything has been a challenge. As more iPad-specific apps become available, though, I expect that gap will close.

So that’s my 24 hour hands-on review. I’m anticipating that it just gets better from here.

First thoughts…

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Wow. Just wow. “Magical” might be a tough sell, but this is one sweet, sweet piece of technology. It’s responsive and feels very solid in your hand. It’s a lot heavier than you expect when you first see it. The display is crisp and really something you need to see to appreciate. The pictures, even the HD pictures, don’t do it justice. Typing is quite easy, but requires some adaptation, as iPad is too big to follow the tried and true thumb-type formula. Battery life is good so far… Down 10% after an hour of hard use. Setup through iTunes was predictably simple. Looking forward to playing with some new apps this afternoon and really putting it through its paces. If you’re on the fence about the OEM case, it’s working well and adds minimal bulk. Fully folded, it makes typing in landscape a breeze. More reviews to follow, of course.

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