iPad observation #10: Is the iPad an unforced error? I say Google and MicroSoft can’t even copy genius.
By: Greg Swann,
Phoenix Real Estate,
Post Archive,
RSS FeedPosted: Thursday, April 15th, 2010, 8:55 pm MST
Category: Flourishing,Innovation,Technology
Busy as anything, ever, as I’m sure you can guess from my absence hereabouts. How busy am I? I still have not lain my own hands on an iPad. Tried to make time a couple-three times, but I couldn’t squeeze out the seconds.
But I have been paying attention to the aghastrointestinal noises made by the sputtering pundidiot class about the iPad, to some amusement. Translated into a language ordinary people can understand, the main objection runs like this: “These beach socks will look terrible with my tuxedo!” Could not agree more. But if you’re clamming or gigging frogs, you might-could find them a good fit.
Whatever. The iPad’s day is but barely begun, and one of the revolutionary things it will do is wash away this entire cadre of washed-up technology “experts.” Here’s hoping they can find a job worth doing.
Meanwhile, Richard Riccelli passed along this catalog of Grave Portents published by that citadel of techspertise, Slate magazine. Richard’s question is this: With the iPad and its closed software universe, has Steve Jobs committed an unforced error — unnecessarily created an obvious opening for Google and MicroSoft to compete?
My answer is no to everything.
Every kvetch about the iPad comes from people who will not be its audience.
1. It’s not a laptop. Duh.
2. It’s a closed hardware/software universe. Thus does Apple piss off 40% of the INTJs — 2.8% of the buying public.
3. It fosters a market opening for losers who could have beaten Apple ten years ago — except they’re losers.
We’ll have to wait to see it — Alice in Wonderland is an early mover (that munches up all of Brad Inman’s stale Vookies) — but the software built to take advantage of the unique iPad hardware will be killingthing.
Jobs is not wrong. Jobs is early. As always. Why? Because the future doesn’t exist until he invents it. Not hero worship, just an awareness of the amazing things the man causes to be done.
The two big iPad stories, going forward: How cool this tool is, and how lame are the clones.
Don’t believe me? Go buy an Android. Go buy a Zune. Google and MicroSoft can’t even copy genius.
My early posts on the iPad:
- Apple tablet computer announcement liveblogging now…
- The Apple iPad is a category-cataclysm and no one knows it yet: Double-thinking Steve Jobs and his double-suss of the hi-tech marketplace
- iPad observation #1: The iPad is the computer for the rest of us
- iPad observation #2: Find a bigger dead-pool: The iPad eats everything.
- iPad observation #3: If your baby — or a caveman — can figure out how to use the iPad, the user-interface works
- iPad observation #4: Looking for a smart way to connect with your clients in a pull-based marketing world? Update your iPhone/iPad app.
- iPad observation #5: Linking frees slaves, sometimes, but the future of mobile real estate is unknown to attorneys from New York City.
- iPad observation #6: “We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.”
- iPad observation #7: When you’ve built a product that turns whole worlds upside down — what happens next?
- iPad observation #8: The death of mediocrity and, along with it, the death of contempt for the consumer
- iPad observation #9: I went digging through the heap of festering garbage that is the Vook and came home with an education.
- iPad observation #10: Is the iPad an unforced error? I say Google and MicroSoft can’t even copy genius.
6 comments
6 Comments so far
Love reading your blogs on the Ipad and competition. Let me know when you actually get one! Then tell me all about it. Keep up the good (and amusing) blogs!
Yes, yes, yes! I’m glad to see there are others out there with my viewpoint. I’m a big fan of Google – they’re ahead of the game in many areas – but when it comes to Android vs. iPhone (or iPad for the sake of this article), they won’t even be able to come close. I think Steve Jobs is probably years ahead of MSFT and Google when it comes to this particular technology, and as soon as they come out with an “alternative” to the iPad, he’ll pull another trick out of his sleeve. One keen insight that I think has really helped Steve, is that he doesn’t really put customer feedback to use. This sounds stupid, but when you think about the fact that God made humans, and has put specific creative talents in each of us, we might be missing out on some of the most brilliant ideas if we put a ceiling on our creativity and look to man vs. God or our God-given talents for the next best idea. God is so faithful, and I don’t know that Steve Jobs is a “spiritual man”, but at least he’s probably utilizing his God-given talents better than the avg. Joe.
Thanks for this blog!
As a recreational user, the iPad is an amazing toy.
As a Realtor, the iPad is a useless tool for me. There are only two things that I need the capability to do remotely and on the run: 1) Look up listings when I’m with clients 2) Write Contracts without running everyone back to the office. Everything else, I can already do comfortably and efficiently on pc’s or mac’s at my office.
The iPad works fine with my local MLS and I give them an A in this category.
However, the iPad is incompatible with Instanet Forms (the company that provides the contracts that I use) and therefore of no use to me.
I run a real estate business, not an amusement park, and have no use for technology that doesn’t improve my bottom line.
I’m consistently amazed at the number of Realtor reviews that rave about the iPad. What does it really do that you can’t already accomplish with existing technology?
> I’m consistently amazed at the number of Realtor reviews that rave about the iPad. What does it really do that you can’t already accomplish with existing technology?
Seems to be excellent at inciting your ire.
I won’t even bother to buy an iPad until iPhone 4.x is released, but I know that it will be a good friend to my lap, once I get one. My iPhone is already filling that role. YMMV, of course, but I’m always grailing for the world I want to live in, rather than reconciling myself to pain and misery in the world I live in now.
I have an ipad with wifi on order. I just think it will be easier to look up houses and such easier on an ipad than a laptop. I have an iphone and a laptop but using the mls on my iphone is virtually impossible bc the screen is so small.
I agree: “Jobs is not wrong – Jobs is early.” We may not fully understand how we will utilize the iPad, but I don’t mind being on the front of the emerging trend to find out.
I have a 64GB Wifi iPad (coupled with a Sprint Mifi card), and I’m already setting up listing presentations, builder presentations & short sale presentations in Keynote. I can set the iPad up on a table using the kickstand on my case and control the presentation remotely using an application on my iPhone. I can check the MLS much more quickly on it than on my iPhone or in the time it takes me to pull out my laptop wake it from its sleep. For all of the time I might spend waiting I can read a book on refining my business when I might have otherwise played a mindless game.
The iPhone was a great leap in business productivity for me, and I have the same ambitions for my iPad.