Freyburg

I have a new article on Mac | Life, this time about GPS on the iPhone and how it can be unreliable in a variety of circumstances.

It would appear that Apple is in fact looking to expand the iPhone OS past the iPod and iPad. To what purpose? Well, Steve Jobs did refer to the iPad as a “magical platform”, and maybe there’s more to that statement than just the iPad’s seemingly limited abilities. Maybe Apple is working on ways to convert their entire line of laptops to some hybrid of the iPhone OS, giving even professionals a new way to express themselves.

Or maybe not. After all, the iPhone OS is (at least at present) somewhat limited, and an application like Final Cut Pro would need a radical revamp in order to work in an “iPhone OS-ish” setting. But I’ve always said Steve Jobs is a lot smarter than I am, so we’ll have to see what Apple has in mind with this latest mysterious move.

Vancouver Sun tech reporter Gillian Shaw interviewed myself and several other technology enthusiasts on the day of the Apple iPad announcement, and you can check out my thoughts online on her blog (as well as in yesterday’s dead tree version of the Vancouver Sun.) Techvibes.com also reposted “The iPad cometh“. Neat!

After years of waiting, rumours and nonsense, the Apple iPad is finally upon us. Am I impressed? Am I blown away? Kinda.

Clearly it makes sense to move media from the somewhat clunky interface of keyboard and screen to a touchpad, and Apple is the company to move the computer industry kicking and screaming into a new paradigm. And what the iPad does, it does very, very well, from we surfing to reading books and newspapers. And yet….there’s something missing. Maybe it’s the fact that there’s no camera, no multi-tasking and the fact that the iPad seems geared more to content consumption than content creation.

As someone who creates content for a living, that leaves me high and dry. I can’t use the iPad for quick and dirty vlogging or podcasting and I definitely won’t be editing video on it anytime soon. I have a Macbook Pro and an iPhone, and between the two of them I get everything I need without a third device.

But on the other hand it’s a new platform, so as a content creator that makes me happy. In theory, the iPad form factor makes it an ideal platform for video and for print, both fields I happen to work in. It even opens up the possibility of new forms of magazine, hybrids of video, audio, game content and print articles, distributable by small publishers consisting of a writer, developer and designer. In a way it could be the rebirth of the zine.

In fact, the potential of the iPad is almost limitless. But right now, that’s just what it is…potential. And that’s why i won’t be getting one just yet.

All indications point to “maybe.” But The Beast from Cupertino recently purchased a huge data center, and the possibility of Apple moving into the streaming video space would be a perfect fit for not only their rumored tablet device but also for the TV in your living room. Everyone hates the cable companies, and if Apple could do an end run around them, they could repeat their successful reshaping of the music industry Throw in saving print through the tablet and the ability for anyone to broadcast from anywhere and you’ve got a media revolution. Maybe.

Yes, an infomercial for a Mac Performa. With 8 (count ‘em!) megs of RAM! Scary that my iPhone is a quantum leap in capability compared to this brick. And in actual fact, an iPhone is also many times more powerful than a Cray supercomputer of yesteryear.

Apple updated the iPhone system software to 2.2 late this week, and so far I’m impressed. New features include street views (for some cities) in Google Maps, a redesigned Safari, and the absolutely welcomed ability to download podcasts directly into the iPhone from the iTunes store. Never mind that the process is a little clunky, just the fact that I can do it is pretty impressive. Equally cool, bit not as glitzy, is the fact that you can now hit “update all” to update your apps, and they’ll update all at once. More importantly, the icons now stay just where you left them, rather than you having to move them around every time a feature gets changed. Other than that…it’s the same iPhone as always. Apparently Apple has added a bunch of “emoji” icons, which is important to the Japanese market, but doesn’t do much for me.

Just doing a test of blogging from my Iphone. Which, until Apple allows me to cut and paste and include links, is of limited use.

Yep, the other side of the coin has dropped and I’ve got another article up about Flash on the iPhone up at Mac | Life, this time accentuating the positives of Adobe’s graphical powerhouse on Apple’s iconic mobile device.

…is the title of my latest article over at Mac | Life. It’s already getting some vigorous debate from Flash defenders and detractors, so join in with your two cents, wouldya?.