My Virtual Dave

So yeah… I’ve been following the rumors that abound regarding the anticipated announcement of Apple’s new tablet device.  It seems a bit dim by comparison to the anticipation of the iPhone’s initial release, but who knows… maybe in the upcoming days/weeks/months it takes Apple to actually polish their announcement the excitement will grow.

Do I sound skeptical?  Yup!  And you may ask why…  You see, one of the biggest reasons for the success of the iPhone was a combination of its revolutionary user interface in the form of capacitive touch, combined with the power of a real computer which when applied to the phone industry (an industry in which Apple had never participated before), it was groundbreaking technology.  The thought of taking such powerful computing to an industry that had been locked up by mega-telco’s putting out 23% of what an end user really wanted (yes that is a made up statistic, but my feeling of what I felt I got out of cell phones prior to the iPhone).

So why the skepticism…  It is because most of the rumors seem to indicate that Apple is taking the iPhone/iTouch to a bigger format.  Wait a minute… Isn’t that the wrong direction?  Maybe and most likely yes.  Not because people don’t want or need bigger; its because the industry gets excited about smaller, faster, cheaper.  However, there would be a reason that Apple is going bigger and that hypothetical reason could be in keeping with the Apple tradition of breaking down market barriers and bringing the unconventional to new markets thereby making it the new convention.

What could the reason be?

How about the re-invention of paper.

Over the last two decades, we have seen the march of time and advancements in technology bring an almost certain death to the Newspaper industry.  Even the surviving newspapers are experiencing subscription/readership rates that are so low, its a wonder that any of them can support the infrastructure costs for the needed physical distribution of their product.  Print advertising has been all but replaced by internet advertising.  Print news in general has been replaced by “read what you are interested when you are interested in reading it” internet media sources.

So what bright new technology could topple such an industry?  Well, if we all think green, take the Kindle as a sign that electronic books are here to stay, combine it with a 4g mobile device for on demand download, and provide a device that can truly mimic the written page; you could not only crush what is remaining in the newsprint industry, but serve up a truly new ability to not only read content, but store it, save it, index it, read it in a familiar form, with full size text, and fonts we have grown accustomed to, while also combining the powerful computing tools needed to manipulate, edit, save, share and publish new media.

Where’s the catch?  Why do I remain skeptical?

Its the rumor of the name  the “iSlate”.  Slates, tablet, touch PCs have always met with limited success.  They are rigid and weighty.  They are not convenient to hold and read on a subway as you are commuting to work.  They are cumbersome and stand out when you use them in public – think of sitting getting your favorite latte at Starbucks and whipping out your iSlate to read a few headlines before heading back from your break.  Even with an iPhone like interface… Even with a larger screen… Even with it being as thin as an iPhone… its not the same.  Just the word slate brings on images of hard, heavy and rigid.

But!  an iSlate using Electronic Paper?  That would be the balls.  Think of a screen that is flexible yet can display vibrant images.  Think of a lightweight, paperthin device that could be held like a sheet of paper, or a newspaper for that matter.  That would be cool!

And I know what you are going to say… A flexible screen like that would not have the same tactile response as an iphone like device.  It could not hold the computing power of a device like that.  It would be limited in its use.

Not necessarily though!  What if Apple made an iSlate which acted as a frame for electronic paper?  the slate portion of the device held all that you would expect from the powerful devices that Apple has historically produced.  Imagine a slot at the top of the device that would allow you to reach in and yank out your electronic paper and the paper itself has enough storage to display for you the content that was downloaded to it that you are interested in reading.

Now THATS a device I would ogle over.  The slate having a glass like rigid pane similar to a picture frame on your wall that gives you that rigid yet smooth surface for the capacitive touch interface.  The images being displayed on the other side of the transparent glass by your flexible Electronic Paper.  The paper acting as the display portion of the screen with perhaps a couple of independant touch sensors that upone removing it from the iSlate would then allow you to flip through your digital content.

Think of a true converged media device.  Your TV, combined with your PC, combined with your Phone, combined with your magazines and newspapers, with an interface that is suitable in all those uses.  Internet everywhere, media at your fingertips, communication friendly, and powerful enough to handle all your computing needs.

Now that would be killer.  If the iSlate is anywhere close to what I described, I would tell everyone to call Rupert Murdoch and tell him to hang up his hat.  But something tells me that if Apple is truly going to take over this industry.  Steve is smart enough to line up his ducks before pulling the trigger, so maybe he has struck a deal with a few magazine publishers and newspaper outlets.  He already has the developers, the music, and the video content.  And to put the final nail in the coffin… how about throwing in a couple of book publishers as a way of dousing the Kindle?

I guess we will have to wait and see.

As you all know I have been an avid fan of the iPhone since its initial release.  I had the pleasure of having my oldest son present me with one as a gift.  His gift wasn’t that he was buying one for me, it was that he got in line at 7 am on the day of its first release and waited in line all day to ensure I would get one of the first out the door.  Well he was second in line, and since I had already been an AT&T customer, a mere few minutes later I was the first person leaving the store with an iPhone in my hand.

I was very engrossed in this wonderful ground breaking technology.  Being a techie from way back I researched and studied the phone in great depth.  I even participated on the iPhone hack team by performing tests on my phone and sharing the results with the coders that were furiously working to unlock its hidden secrets.

I bought a MAC and downloaded the tools I needed to start coding in XCode and Cocoa as soon as the SDK was available.  I cranked out enough apps to test the iPhones useability and was pleased with the results.

I doubt I could ever claim to have coined the term as it seems so obvious, but I have always believed in the existence of “technocrud”  I have written about it in the past, and Im sure you can find my blog posting about it in my indexes of entries.   It seemed that technocrud was being developed at such a rate that it was mind boggling.

Then the wind began to change… DROID was coming… Or more specifically the promise of a trully open OS for a phone such that the artificial barries that Apple was imposing would no longer exist.  Skeptics claimed that Apple’s foothold would prevent its adoption.  They were down right wrong.

So here I was sitting there in my living room and all of a sudden my son came screaming to me in a fit of excitement… “DAD DROID IS COMING!”

I had seen some of the early Android phones.  I had several opportunities to play with them and I had been watching the myriad of apps that the developers had been releasing.  Yet up until now, none of the phone had ever struck me as being true iPhone like predators.  The screens didn’t work anywhere as nice.  Getstures were clunky, keyboard typing not as intuitive.

So I skeptically went down to the Verizon store, perhaps in hopes of maybe seeing something that really would impress me.  You see… as much as I loved the iPhone, my passion has always been cooled due to the requirement to be on AT&T’s network.  As much as there have been arguments regarding their coverage areas being comparable to Verizon’s, they simply did not stack up compared to what Verizon offered in the areas I frequented.  So me with my skepticism ventured forth.

Upon my arrival, I went to the pod that had this large Droid banner hanging from it and I was immediately faced with two phone options.  One was teh Moto Droid.  Having been a fan of Motorola, I picked that up first.  It was nice.  Very….. well… um…. Wait… Kind of a cross between a Q, Blackberry and Treo.   Ummmm…  Isn’t this kind of bulky?  Did their engineers design this to target people who like the button feel of a keyboard?  Moving parts on the phone?  Sliding screen?  I don’t get it… did any of them ever look at an iPhone?

But I looked over next to it, and my eyes immediately were drawn to this sleek, little, sexy number.  It had this little roller ball that was intermittenly glowing white as if it were calling out “touch me”.  I put the Moto down and lifted this matte finished,  black beauty and it immediately felt at home in my hand.  I pressed the phone button almost instinctively and the screen came to life.  Slide down to unlock…  Here was the test.  Was this going to feel like yet another faker attempting to lure me away from the graceful feel of the iPhone interface?  My thumb traveled down and with a swipe the home screen came to life.

OMG!  The weight, the design, the look, the vibrant display, the smooth touch and glassy feel of the phone made me instantly realize I had my hands on what was soon to be (at least for me) the death of my iPhone.

I must have spent two hours probing the applications and interfaces, email, calendars, contacts, phone, video, internet speeds.  All to which I was looking for that one flaw… NOTHING.  I could not find it.  A quirky smile came across my face and I reached out with my hand in the air, the phone being restricted only by that simple littel security wire and I gestured to the sales clerk… I want this one.

HTC had done it.  I don’t know where they found their engineers, but they were ultimately successful in creating what to me seemed like the very next step BEYOND what Apple had accomplished.

Well to say the least, my sons were happy as when I got home, they were the proud recipients of my two iPhones I had been using.  They dont use them as phones, they merely use them as if they were iTouches.

But me… Everyday I use my wonderful new communication companion, I grow further in love with it.

I tip my hat to both Google and HTC, and hope they can surpass this wonderful device so I may remain loyal as a new follower, adopter and fan.  And I appologize to AT&T.  As much as I like to be loyal… you do need to catch up.  Verizon is a better phone network, especially now since they have drunk the coolade and really know that there are people like me that need and want phones that are open to do with what we please.

Oh… and as a note to HTC… I am always open to having you send me pre-release phones, I would more than enjoy giving you my feedback. (hint hint hint)

This evening I had the pleasure of being invited to attend a seminar that was given by my Friend and colleague, the brand samurai Kevin Skarritt. He is in my blog roll, so please go check out his blog.

Anyway… the topic of his presentation was to discuss the effective use of LinkedIn and are you maximizing it to help drive business for your company. Even though I feel I am fairly knowledgeable about LinkedIn, I attended in order to show my support for my friend. Maybe one reason was that when I spoke to him earlier this week, he had said that only a handful of people had registered. I figured why not attend, after all, I would be networking with people, and I may just learn something new from Sensi Kevin.

LinkedIn is not Facebook, and I remember that over the last couple of years, that its growth (at least within my network of people) was slowish. However, over the last several months, I have noted a significant increase in my network of peers filling in on the site. I actually use my contact manager to compare my contacts there to what I have on linked in, to determine saturation rate.

What I am finding now is that of my active contacts, saturation is very high right now. Somewhere in the 60-70% range based on my recent contacts in my contact manager. My older or less accessed contacts I can see a much smaller percentage of saturation. Last I checked it was in the 20 to 25% range.

So leave it to say, that LinkedIn has now become a valued tool in my daily arsenal. And lo and behold, when I showed up at the seminar. It seems Sensi Kevin had nothing to worry about. We were both pleasantly surprised to see an overflow crowd of people at least 5 times what he had told me had registered.

Congrats Kevin, and yes… I will be more than glad to go to your next event in a month.

Although some wine and beer might be a pleasant addition to the evening.

Oh! and by the way… Read more…

When I first started programming, I remember carrying a long cardboard box around.  I would walk into the computer lab, find the nearest workstation, sit down and start typing away.   Each time I felt I had that next line of code perfect, I would hit a key and the din of a series of mechanical arms would fill the air as they punched a card and spit it out to then be added to the collection of cards that resided in my box.  Once I felt my perfect program was done, I would take my box to the window on the other side of the lab, and I would hand my neatly stacked and labeled cards to the seedy looking guy on the other side of the window.  I would fill out a form and that was then wrapped around the cards and held with an elastic band and I was off to my class.  I would then ponder for a period of time what fabulous results would spring forth from my masterpiece. Read more…

When I was in high school I took a photography class.  I was pretty good at it.  The teacher said I had the ‘photographer’s eye.’  Perhaps I inherited the trait.  My father was a photographer in the Air Force during the Korean War.  I still even have several of his cameras from that era.

Over the years, my skills and love for photography advanced.  I upgraded from one camera to the next and went SLR.  I bought lenses, set up my own dark room and processed my own prints.  Then came digital. Read more…

My friend Carl Ford called me last week.  He is writing an article on iPhone application download statistics and the phenomena surrounding the hype of Apple’s success around the iPhone App Store.

His question was quite simple, and I wish I could have answered it better.  You see Carl has this thought that I may be some mindful guru around what is happening in the iPhone community.  Perhaps that is because he knows I participated as a contributor to the original iPhone hack team that worked to unlock the first gen phones.  That was the effort that many people think acted as a catalyst to get Apple to open up the interfaces and platform and pushed them to release the SDK for the iPhone. Read more…

Most open source turned into TechnoCrud. Code that is barely functional hard to support and has no developer following. Its amazing how much of it is out there. The only redeeming quality about it is that it acted as a learning tool. A very expensive one mind you.  Don’t get me wrong there are many valuable, robust, open source applications on the market.  I use it myself.  However what I am referring to are the projects that lost developer support, or never got the following and eventually the contributor community shriveled up and died. Read more…