Apple January 26th Event 'Confirmed' by Internal Source? Focus on 'Mobility Space'?

[KnightWRX]

I can't understand those here that think that just because they have no use for a new device, no one should. Why are you even reading iSlate-related threads in the first place?

Obviously you aren't understanding the conversation that was taking place. Someone claimed the tablet would replace the Macbook Air, the guy you responded to told him why it wouldn't.

But to answer your question, a lot of nay-sayers (I am one) understand very well that because the tablet wouldn't answer our needs, it doesn't mean someone doesn't need it.

What we are saying, based on observation of the market, is that tablets in general, be them general purpose tablets or laptops with swivel screens, just aren't making inroads on the market. They are a small niche. The fact is, they have all the cons of both the PDA and the laptop, and don't have too many pros to outweight them and consumers are voting with their wallet on this one.

Tablets fit in between a laptop on a PDA. However, they aren't more portable than a laptop really. While they are smaller, they still require a bag of some sort you'll have to drag around, risk losing, getting stolen, or simply forgetting somewhere. They still require 2 hands to handle.

On the other side, they have mostly PDA like functionality (unless you count the WinXP tablets) like a rumored iPhone OS based tablet would have. Quick apps that can do quick things like listening to music, viewing a video or previewing a document, but not full content creation/editing capabilities and limited input like a full laptop offers.

And that's why they aren't catching on, the market isn't very big for laptop portability problems with PDA power.

E-readers on the other hand seem to be a good revenue maker. However, they have a low cost associated with their single use capabilities. If Apple does do a e-reader only tablet, on the cheap, this might be a good competitor to the Nook or Kindle and tied with the iTunes Book Store, this could be a worthwhile product. But a general purpose tablet like the Nokia N810 or the Samsung Q1 ? Not seeing it being more popular than the Apple TV was after the initial hype has died down.

 

[str1f3]

Wow, just now in 2009 you tell us this ? Seriously, where were you in the last 40 years ? We now have to rewrite every OS out there to support downloading files, instead of leaving that up to applications. What a bummer, so much work.

OSes should provide hardware and network layer communication services and that's about it. The OS gives you sockets, and an Application uses that socket interface to download and upload information. The OS should provide a filesystem, and Applications use that filesystem interface to write out files.

This is proper OS design. Good seperation of kernel space and user space is important.

Heh, the problem with that idea under the iPhone OS is it's locked into the app. That's why it's a terrible idea. Apple's hard rule for all iPhone apps is that they are sandboxed. Given Apple's long time distaste for 3rd party devs, I doubt you will be seeing them open up anytime soon unless you see them opening up for the same devs whose apps they are quick to reject for the most inane reasons. If you want to question proper OS design, you should be asking this question of Apple, not me.

Now you can say that Apple may open it up in the future but you're going on nothing but your gut. The only thing that Apple has been opening up with recently has been with certain API calls that were going to be open not much later anyway.

 

[KnightWRX]

If that happens under the iPhone OS it is locked into the app. Apple's hard rule for all iPhone apps is that they are sandboxed. Given Apple's long time distaste for 3rd party devs, I doubt you will be seeing them open up anytime soon.

That's because the iPhone OS isn't file based and doesn't expose the filesystem to the user. This would be trivial to add as the kernel already has a filesystem driver (or you wouldn't have any files). All Apple needs to do is make a finder and expose things like NSFileHandle to applications so they can do IO on the filesystem level. Of course, that would break the sandboxing, unless you were very strict about how applications can share files they write out.

Putting all of this in kernel space is just ridiculous and bad design in general. It would mean a theoritical NSDownload class would need to support about every protocol out there, and adding in new ones would require Apple's intervention.

Seriously, everything you propose is a very big mistake in OS design.

 

[cmaier]

That's because the iPhone OS isn't file based and doesn't expose the filesystem to the user. This would be trivial to add as the kernel already has a filesystem driver (or you wouldn't have any files). All Apple needs to do is make a finder and expose things like NSFileHandle to applications so they can do IO on the filesystem level. Of course, that would break the sandboxing, unless you were very strict about how applications can share files they write out.

Putting all of this in kernel space is just ridiculous and bad design in general. It would mean a theoritical NSDownload class would need to support about every protocol out there, and adding in new ones would require Apple's intervention.

Seriously, everything you propose is a very big mistake in OS design.

Huh? The iPhone is filebased. Apps can write to the file system. They just can't write to files outside their sandbox. NSFileHandle is already available to iPhone programmers.

 

[colinmack]

What we are saying, based on observation of the market, is that tablets in general, be them general purpose tablets or laptops with swivel screens, just aren't making inroads on the market. They are a small niche. The fact is, they have all the cons of both the PDA and the laptop, and don't have too many pros to outweight them and consumers are voting with their wallet on this one.

My impression of your argument is that it's similar to discussions before the iPod came out - an argument based on yesterday's (or at best today's) version of a market/device, not tomorrow's. Yesterday's tablet devices may have failed for a variety of reasons, or had limited consumer appeal/benefit. That doesn't mean a company like Apple can't get it right (after all, they tend to have a decent track record at looking at a failed or niche market, figuring out why everyone else screwed up, and 'reinventing' it into a broad consumer success).

Don't forget - a good part of why the iPod completely wiped the floor of that entire industry (and literally redefined the way music is purchased/consumed by the average Joe), is that they figured out how to deliver a complete and seamless ecosystem, and not just a device - a tablet looks to be a similar reinvention just waiting to happen (print, newspaper, magazines, textbooks, portable TV/video, etc.)...

 

[KnightWRX]

Huh? The iPhone is filebased. Apps can write to the file system. They just can't write to files outside their sandbox. NSFileHandle is already available to iPhone programmers.

Users can't directly manipulate files besides syncing. I explained that as what I meant by "isn't filebased". All it exposes as a user interface is app launchers.

I'm pretty sure after jailbreaking, everything is there to manipulate, the iPhone OS as sold doesn't let you though.

And you're just saying the same thing, only adding that NSFileHandle already exists, but like I said, it doesn't allow you to read/write to the filesystem outside your own little sandbox.

 

[str1f3]

That's because the iPhone OS isn't file based and doesn't expose the filesystem to the user. This would be trivial to add as the kernel already has a filesystem driver (or you wouldn't have any files). All Apple needs to do is make a finder and expose things like NSFileHandle to applications so they can do IO on the filesystem level. Of course, that would break the sandboxing, unless you were very strict about how applications can share files they write out.

Putting all of this in kernel space is just ridiculous and bad design in general. It would mean a theoritical NSDownload class would need to support about every protocol out there, and adding in new ones would require Apple's intervention.

Seriously, everything you propose is a very big mistake in OS design.

I'm not weighing the choice between OS handling this or the app. I'm looking at Apple and the options available as of right now. Could I see Apple doing something like this because they refuse to give any measure of the power to devs? Yes. As of today, Apple hasn't shown the slightest interest in this.

Even if you look at multitasking, for example, Apple has made sure only their apps run in the background. Apple cited battery life at the 3.0 press conference but I think it had more to do with them not trusting devs to have their "poorly written apps" running in the background and consuming to much memory and battery life. This goes back to the reason why the App Store exists to begin with. Apple didn't even wan 3rd party apps on their device, only web apps.

 

[KnightWRX]

My impression of your argument is that it's similar to discussions before the iPod came out - an argument based on yesterday's (or at best today's) version of a market/device, not tomorrow's. Yesterday's tablet devices may have failed for a variety of reasons, or had limited consumer appeal/benefit. That doesn't mean a company like Apple can't get it right (after all, they tend to have a decent track record at looking at a failed or niche market, figuring out why everyone else screwed up, and 'reinventing' it into a broad consumer success).

Don't forget - a good part of why the iPod completely wiped the floor of that entire industry (and literally redefined the way music is purchased/consumed by the average Joe), is that they figured out how to deliver a complete and seamless ecosystem, and not just a device - a tablet looks to be a similar reinvention just waiting to happen (print, newspaper, magazines, textbooks, portable TV/video, etc.)...

MP3 players, the flash based devices with 128 MB flash memory, were booming when the iPod came out. Heck, hard drive based players existed, in the form of the Creative Nomad. Also, portable music had been big since the 80s and the Walkman by Sony. Also, the iPod didn't have a complete ecosystem at first and what really made it popular was the bigger drive. This was a big market, with big possibilities and the MP3 portion was growing and growing.

The iPod became a hit not thanks to the iTMS, but thanks to Windows support. That's when it started to sell. This shows Apple had a hit from day one with it, they limited themselves by introducing it only for Macs.

If you don't believe me, relisten to the iPod introduction, Steve covers all of this :

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kN0SVBCJqLs.

Unlike the MP3 players and cellphones however, tablets aren't fairing so well. That is my point. Rewriting history in an attempt to make it seem Apple turned such niches into booming markets before doesn't make it true either.

 

[DELLsFan]

Foxnews.com is part of the Murdoch empire. As such they could tell me the sky is blue and I'd feel the need to go outside and check.

Yup. As I suspected. Only a handful of posts before the anti-FoxNews rhetoric began. Seriously, some people really DO need to get out more. I hope you do.

 

[KnightWRX]

Yup. As I suspected. Only a handful of posts before the anti-FoxNews rhetoric began. Seriously, some people really DO need to get out more. I hope you do.

anti-Foxnews rhetoric ? He's just stating facts :

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Akre

FoxNews sued for and won the Right to Lie.

 

[*LTD*]

Yup. As I suspected. Only a handful of posts before the anti-FoxNews rhetoric began. Seriously, some people really DO need to get out more. I hope you do.

I heartily support an anti-FOX news stance, even if it just takes the form of a passing remark.

 

[jjd]

Awsome - Fox News is A+ #1 when it comes to the news, so if they say it's January, then bank on it.

This is without doubt the funniest thing I have ever read on Macrumors. Hilarious. Bravo sir!

 

[eRondeau]

It's magazines.

Steve's right, nobody reads books anymore, but everybody reads magazines. My money says this is the "killer app" for the tablet -- online interactive magazines. It's green because there is no paper used, and subscriptions will be inexpensive and handled online just like podcasts are now. Let Amazon have their books, with the right device Apple could put the entire magazine printing industry out of business overnight.

 

[cmaier]

Steve's right, nobody reads books anymore, but everybody reads magazines. My money says this is the "killer app" for the tablet -- online interactive magazines. It's green because there is no paper used, and subscriptions will be inexpensive and handled online just like podcasts are now. Let Amazon have their books, with the right device Apple could put the entire magazine publishing industry out of business overnight.

I read books (sometimes) but magazines never (unless sitting in an airport terminal where there is no wi-fi.) Anything in a magazine will also be available on a website (usually). Not so with books.

 

[Peace]

Steve's right, nobody reads books anymore, but everybody reads magazines. My money says this is the "killer app" for the tablet -- online interactive magazines. It's green because there is no paper used, and subscriptions will be inexpensive and handled online just like podcasts are now. Let Amazon have their books, with the right device Apple could put the entire magazine publishing industry out of business overnight.

Wouldn't that make the magazine industry not want to participate ?

 

[str1f3]

Great post on Daring Fireball:

http://daringfireball.net/2009/12/the_tablet

I'm not alone in thinking that this is potentially a replacement for a MacBook and that an e-reading media player alone is not good enough. He likens it to the change from the Apple II to the Mac. He also says that it is now like what it was before the iPhone was introduced at Macworld. All the people who work on Safari, iCal, etc. have gone into hiding. No one even knows what the tablet looks like.

Heh, this philosophy reminds me of a terrorist cell.

 

[uraniumwilly]

Great post on Daring Fireball:

http://daringfireball.net/2009/12/the_tablet

I'm not alone in thinking that this is potentially a replacement for a MacBook and that an e-reading media player alone is not good enough.

It seems people just need to print word processor documents and internet access. All the rest: music, movies, games, misc. apps are add-ons for replacement of a macbook.

 

[eRondeau]

Wouldn't that make the magazine industry not want to participate ?

I'm no expert, but I've been led to believe that the actual "printing" of magazines and periodicals is a break-even proposition at best. The real $$$ is in the advertising. Think of the expense and complexity of physically printing millions of magazines weekly or monthly, shipping them around the world to national distributors, and then further shipping them to a million corner stores. Or even worse, printing mailing labels and actually mailing them out. Either way they're soon discarded, losing all information contained within. In 2010 the whole publishing concept is inane.

If Apple does this right the magazine publishers will be lining-up to get onboard. Same ads (only interactive, click on the Rolex ad to jump to the Rolex website), same ad rates, more subscribers, and a distribution cost of near zero. Everybody wins. Plus it will win huge bonus points with the greenies who forever criticize print media for wasting resources. And of course, Apple takes a percentage of all click-throughs for their trouble. I'm telling you, this is The Next Big Thing.

Sure at first the concept will scare some publishers, just as it took a few years for the music industry to take the iTunes Music Store as a serious retail competitor. Now its the #1 music seller in the world.

As history has shown, if any company can revolutionize a hundred-year-old industry overnight, it is Apple. And this tablet may well facilitate that revolution.

 

[Peace]

I'm no expert, but I've been led to believe that the actual "printing" of magazines and periodicals is a break-even proposition at best. The real $$$ is in the advertising. Think of the expense and complexity of physically printing millions of magazines weekly or monthly, shipping them around the world to national distributors, and then further shipping them to a million corner stores. Or even worse, printing mailing labels and actually mailing them out. In 2010 the whole publishing concept is inane.

If Apple does this right the magazine publishers will be lining-up to get onboard. Same ads (only interactive, click on the Rolex ad to jump to the Rolex website), same ad rates, more subscribers, and a distribution cost of near zero. Everybody wins. Plus it will win huge bonus points with the greenies who forever criticize print media for wasting resources. And of course, Apple takes a percentage of all click-throughs for their trouble. I'm telling you, this is The Next Big Thing.

Sure at first the concept will scare some publishers, just as it took a few years for the music industry to take the iTunes Music Store as a serious retail competitor. Now its the #1 music seller in the world.

As history has shown, if any company can revolutionize a hundred-year-old industry overnight, it is Apple. And this tablet may well facilitate that revolution.

Sorry. I was responding to this :

"with the right device Apple could put the entire magazine publishing industry out of business overnight."

 

[KnightWRX]

I'm no expert, but I've been led to believe that the actual "printing" of magazines and periodicals is a break-even proposition at best. The real $$$ is in the advertising. Think of the expense and complexity of physically printing millions of magazines weekly or monthly, shipping them around the world to national distributors, and then further shipping them to a million corner stores. Or even worse, printing mailing labels and actually mailing them out. Either way they're soon discarded, losing all information contained within. In 2010 the whole publishing concept is inane.

If Apple does this right the magazine publishers will be lining-up to get onboard. Same ads (only interactive, click on the Rolex ad to jump to the Rolex website), same ad rates, more subscribers, and a distribution cost of near zero. Everybody wins. Plus it will win huge bonus points with the greenies who forever criticize print media for wasting resources. And of course, Apple takes a percentage of all click-throughs for their trouble. I'm telling you, this is The Next Big Thing.

Sure at first the concept will scare some publishers, just as it took a few years for the music industry to take the iTunes Music Store as a serious retail competitor. Now its the #1 music seller in the world.

As history has shown, if any company can revolutionize a hundred-year-old industry overnight, it is Apple. And this tablet may well facilitate that revolution.

Hey, that sounds like a Website. Interactive magazines is a good way to lock yourself to a single platform. You can make "Interactive magazines" in the form of a website, then everybody has access to it, not just buyers of a particular device.

Seriously, the Web is already here, it's already ubiquitous and has all the same articles, ads, features a magazine has and could have in a digital format. It makes no sense.

 

[*LTD*]

Steve's right, nobody reads books anymore, but everybody reads magazines. My money says this is the "killer app" for the tablet -- online interactive magazines. It's green because there is no paper used, and subscriptions will be inexpensive and handled online just like podcasts are now. Let Amazon have their books, with the right device Apple could put the entire magazine printing industry out of business overnight.

I'm in the minority.

Half my house is a library. Then again, I'm an academic, so books are part of my job. Nothing like a nice old book with beautiful typography. In any case, I do like to acquire material in pdf format.

 

[eRondeau]

Seriously, the Web is already here, it's already ubiquitous and has all the same articles, ads, features a magazine has and could have in a digital format. It makes no sense.

Ahhh, but with the greatest respect sir -- there were lots of ways to buy and play music before the iPod came along. The iPod did the same thing much better than any competitor and the market responded in kind. There were lots of cell phones on the market before the iPhone came along. The iPhone did the same thing much better than any competitor and the market responded. I'm just saying that I believe that if Apple chooses to enter the e-reader market they will do it better than any competitor and the market will respond with success. (And BTW I'm not saying magazines is ALL the tablet will do, it will be just one of many applications -- but I believe it will get the entire industry to sit up and take notice -- it will immediately be the tablet's Killer App.)

There will always be an internet, but the internet is rigid & clunky. Everything Apple does is smooth & beautiful. Call me shallow, but I'll buy smoothness & beauty over slowness & clunky every time.

 

[KnightWRX]

Ahhh, but with the greatest respect sir -- there were lots of ways to buy and play music before the iPod came along. The iPod did the same thing much better than any competitor and the market responded in kind. There were lots of cell phones on the market before the iPhone came along. The iPhone did the same thing much better than any competitor and the market responded. I'm just saying that I believe that if Apple chooses to enter the e-reader market they will do it better than any competitor and the market will respond with success. (And BTW I'm not saying magazines is ALL the tablet will do, it will be just one of many applications -- but I believe it will get the entire industry to sit up and take notice -- it will immediately be the tablet's Killer App.)

eBooks make sense. MP3s made sense (they were already highly popular before the iTMS sold digital music). The iPhone is not content, so I don't get what you're trying to say by comparing it to interactive magazines.

Digital magazines... well, we already have them. They're called websites. They are updated constantly, are interactive, have articles, features, videos, sound...

The revolution you're thinking of already happened 10 years ago. eBooks is another matter, and Amazon and Barnes and Noble are already doing that. Apple will probably get in on it, but a magazine revolution will never happen. The current shift from paper to online media is not about being green or paper at all, it's about convenience. The web provided fast updates (no more waiting for a periodical), interactivity and multi-media content (sound, video). It was also much more accessible (don't have to subscribe or go buy a copy) which in turn granted a wider audience.

This is why the Web took off and hurt the press industry, because it is an Interactive Magazine like you say.

There will always be an internet, but the internet is rigid & clunky. Everything Apple does is smooth & beautiful. Call me shallow, but I'll buy smoothness & beauty over slowness & clunky every time.

The Internet is rigid and clunky ? The Internet as sold by mega corporations maybe. The Internet is open and vast. You can easily invent a completely new protocol, spread and if people adopt it, it will become the next big thing. Tim Berners-Lee did in 1991, using NeXT computers of all things. The Internet is always moving forward.

Rigid ? Really ? Just today, you can get information over the Internet by : Visiting a website using HTTP, subscribing to mailing lists using SMTP/POP3/IMAP, consulting a relevent discussion group over NNTP, chatting online with informed people over IRC/XMPP/any other instant messenger or chat. You can use applications over any number of protocol, be it thin client or fat client protocols.

How is this rigid ? And seeing how Apple is very dependant on the Internet, I don't see what smoothness they bring over slowness and clunky Internet ? You're not even making sense.

 

[farmboy]

Facist b/c he doesn't like Obama or Dems? That statement has a "facist" flare to me -- if you use a proper definition, i.e. a governmental system led by a dictator having complete power, forcibly suppressing opposition and criticism, regimenting all industry, commerce, etc., and emphasizing an aggressive nationalism (from Dictionary.com).

Facist is such a loaded word the way you use it, as-if anyone who doesn't support Obama or Dems is evil. This isn't a political thread, but I can tell you Obama and the Dems don't have a lot of friends these days, especially the way they rammed healthcare down. Their favorability is way below 50%.

CRIPES! IT'S F-A-S-C-I-S-T, not facist. Kind of detracts from your political intellect when you repeatedly misspell an important word, especially when you're purporting to understand its meaning. You ever notice those little red ----- under the words you type?

 

[RevK]

Apple will get it right

I have a MacBook Pro which I use for email, for work, for photos, for writing checks, etc. I now read the Denver Post every day online which requires me to get the laptop from the office room upstairs, take it downstairs with me, and set it on the kitchen table, where it remains until it's out of battery and I go and plug it in again.

I also have an iPod touch, which does what it does perfectly, but it's too small to really want to READ on it.

I imagine an Apple slate with ME in mind. I don't expect it to be used to write documents or write checks or manipulate photos. But it will be my window to the world of reading and entertainment. A NEW way to connect with a home in my living space, not my office. I'll bet money on Apple getting THAT new device right.