Why Were the Experts so Wrong about the iPad 2?

Right before the iPad 2 hit the stores March 11th most pundits said it was no big deal - a minor upgrade - and thought the demand would not rival the first version that came out eleven months earlier. They could not have been more wrong. Not only did the first shipments sell out within hours but there have been lines of people every morning at every Apple store waiting with baited breath for the next truck. How could the experts have been so wrong?

They tend to overestimate the interest and knowledge of the general public. They believe everyone has the time and inclination to hang on every tweet from every tech vendor and writer. Surprise, surprise most people have real jobs and a variety of interests besides computers. In spite of all the hype about the first iPad a year ago, few people really knew much about it on day one - from the basics of how would it actually work to the more important "is it really suitable for business?" Questions like these prevented the vast majority of people from purchasing the first iPad early in the cycle.

Along the way, three things happened. First, the positive reviews came in and the early adopters showed theirs off to anyone they could corner - friends and coworkers alike. This created the buzz and the associated "cool factor." Next, businesses began to experiment and found that it really was appropriate for many tasks involving their mobile workforce - storage of sales and technical documents for example. Finally, at the end of 2010 many people who decided to buy were advised to wait because the next version would have a camera - or maybe two cameras.

Consequently, when the iPad 2 became available there was a huge demand in spite of the experts suggestion that it was not a major improvement over the original. When you think about it, what would the "experts" have required for a major improvement? It is unlikely in my opinion that any new tablet from any vendor will be considered a major advance over the preceding tablet. Just like the succession of PCs over the last thirty years, each one will be a little faster or have a slightly better screen or camera. The fact that tablets are primarily touch screens with a processor and solid state storage makes improvements primarily a matter of new and upgraded apps. There's not much you can do with the basic tablet slab except speed it up and add a new I/O port or button. I certainly am not saying there will not be better tablets in the future; I'm just suggesting that few new versions will be considered major leaps forward.

Cool Camera Apps - Part 1

No subject gets more attention in my newsletter than the apps I review. (Note: in case you haven't heard - "app" is just another name for a program. The term evolved along with mobile technology but is now being used for full fledged PC/Mac software as well.)

I've been pleasantly surprised by how much I use my iPhone camera. It's certainly not a great camera but for many purposes it's "good enough" and, most important, I always have it with me. I divide camera apps into two categories
1) apps that are primarily associated with taking pictures (photography)
2) those that are mostly used for editing pictures (editing)
This distinction is not precise since many apps do a combination of the two. I base the distinction on the primary attributes of the app and what I generally use it for. Some apps modify still and/or video images as they are being taken; others operate on images from the library and some can do both. The following two apps cost 99 cents each.

For the photography apps, you can't beat QuickCam - often described as the camera app that should have come with the iPhone. For general purpose iPhone pictures, I've switched completely to Quickcam. It's easy to use and will start up and take pictures much faster than the standard Apple app. It has a rapid fire mode where you can touch and hold the camera button and take two pictures per second. While you are taking video, you can touch the camera button and take a still picture.

ToonCamera is another favorite. It works on both live and stored still and video images to create a cartoon effect by limiting the number of colors used. This picture of a fox taken in our back yard

Cartoon Fox - original shown in inset

shows the results. If you are familiar with the GIF image format, you get the same effect. GIF works great on art and drawings with a limited number of colors but produces the cartoon effect when used with photographs - like coloring with eight crayons!

Here's a quick list of other favorites in this category (many have free and paid versions)

Timelapse - Set your camera in a window and it can take pictures at regular intervals for a specified time. Then save the results and play them back as a movie - watch a flower grow!

ExternalCamera - Monitor the iPhone camera on your iPad - watch and listen to a sleeping baby or keep an eye on your front door.

CameraFun - Variety of special effects.

SneakyPix - Set the camera to take a series of pictures while you appear to be reading email or talking on the phone - that's sneaky.
CanScan - Use this camera app to snap a picture of a document and automatically rotate, crop and adjust the lighting for a perfect "scanned" document.

Tablet Typing can be Improved

Portable devices all suffer from inadequate keyboards - inadequate in that they do not allow rapid touch typing like the "real" keyboards we're all accustomed to. There are ways to speed things up including -

1. Autocorrect features are generally quite accurate and should be allowed to work. Backspacing and correcting errors is such a natural action we waste time making corrections that are already suggested by the software.
2. Apple iPad and iPhone users should use the special key actions such as swiping the period key to enter a quotation mark. Because space is limited, some keys are relegated to secondary keyboards so these special actions eliminate the need to switch keyboards. For more info on this subject including easy ways to enter special characters see this article.
3. Android users who master the Swype app can significantly speed up their routine typing by sliding a finger from character to character and allowing the software make corrections as they go. This brief description will show you how it works.

Luxury Hotels Go Paperless and Mobile

Starting in January, the iPad tablet replaced touch panels in every guest room at The Plaza Hotel in New York City, where it provides guest services and room controls. 

Guests of the Plaza can use the touch screen to order room service, contact the concierge (or make their own dinner reservations), and control their room’s lighting and climate, plus general web browsing. Another benefit is moving away from having a guest directory in the room. 

The paperless benefit of the iPad is also being pushed by The Forty 1 North Hotel Marina Resortin Newport, Rhode Island, which puts in-room iPads on its list of eco-conscious measures. 

Directories, menus, maps, and daily newspapers are all delivered paperlessly to guests using the iPad.
(from CNBC)

Comparing Apple and Android App Review Process

There are going to be hundreds of articles comparing Apple (iPad and iPhone) with the numerous Google Android tablets and phones. Two facts may be more important than any others

• Fact 1 - At the present, there are thousands of apps available for both the iPhone and Android phones. Right now there only a couple of Android tablets that run the version of the Operating System designed for tablets and there are about twenty apps available. There are 65 thousand iPad apps available.
• Fact 2 - Apple monitors all apps to make sure they are not harmful while Google does not. In fact the entire process of updating the Android OS is handled by the carriers - the phone companies. This would be like Microsoft having WalMart responsible for updating its software.

Read this excellent article to understand the ramifications of the second fact.

iPad monthly data plans compared

The roll out of the iPad 2 brings additional monthly data plans - that is if you're willing to change cell phone providers. The follow chart summarizes the various plans available. 

Chart from All Things Digital

The issue of monthly fees and long term contracts will become increasingly important and increasingly complicated as more mobile devices become available. I've mentioned before about the inevitability of "tiered pricing" - different rates for different types and quantities of data.

Purchase price will be less important as vendors attempt to lock users into long term, complicated, expensive contracts.

iPad 2 - first look

There were no big surprises today when Steve Jobs introduced the latest iPad - except for the fact that Steve Jobs was on hand for the introduction. The iPad 2 is a solid but unremarkable upgrade to the best selling first iPad. I for one look forward to the faster processor - particularly when showing presentations with Keynote - the Apple version of PowerPoint. The Motorola Xoom - the current contender for the tablet throne - compares favorably on a feature by feature basis.

The big advantage the iPad has, and it is a big advantage right now, is the huge app collection. Developers have written over 50 thousand apps specifically for the iPad in addition to over 300 thousand iPhone apps that run on the iPad. Because the Honeycomb version of the Android OS is brand new, there are only a few dozen apps written for the Xoom.

Many people thought that competitors would need to be lower priced than the iPad to get in the game but if anything the Xoom is slightly more expensive than the iPad. The low price point set by the first iPad was a real shock last year and it put to rest the idea that Apple products were expensive.

The tablet market is just getting off the ground; Apple has a commanding lead right now. The fun is just starting! Stay tuned.

NFC - Will this be your next "credit card"

We can now add NFC to the numerous methods of wireless communication. Wireless connections - whether Wi-Fi, Bluetooth or cell phones - are all based on radio signals transmitted through the air. They differ only in frequency (pitch) and amplitude (strength). The amplitude determines how far the signals can be detected - cell phones a few miles from the tower and Wi-Fi a couple of hundred feet from a home router.

Devices are tuned to certain frequencies so a radio will receive a specific station and not broadcast the microwave signals from the kitchen, the x-rays from the hospital down the street or the cosmic rays created during the big bang 15 billion years ago. I'm not making this up.

NFC stands for Near Field Communication. These are very weak (low amplitude) signals that will be used to communicate between your cell phone and billing devices that will replace credit card scanners. The NFC standard dictates the range of transmission to be four centimeters. When NFC enabled phones come out this year, they will replace credit cards in locations that can pick up the signals. Wave your cell phone near a reader and a charge will be recorded. The short transmission distance means you will not likely buy a shiny new BMW just by walking by the dealership.

Three Tablet Contenders Compared

There will be dozens of companies and hundreds of products involved in the Tablet competition ahead; just like there were when PCs were introduced in the 1980's. The difference now is that there are some powerful, big name, experienced companies involved. In the 80's they were mostly companies you'd never heard of making products they'd never made before.

Click here for an early look at three contenders - Apple iPad, Motorola Xoom and HP TouchPad. The Xoom is coming this summer; the Touchpad is due this month and a second version of the iPad should be out within two months.

Mobile Operating Systems Galore

First a little history - Some of us are old enough to remember what life was like before Microsoft Windows dominated the world of desktop computing starting in the late 1980s. For the previous ten years there were a dozen or more hardware designs and operating systems including Radio Shack (Trash 80), Commodore (Pet), Sinclair, Franklin, Timex, Altair, Atari, Heathkit, Ohio Scientific and of course the venerable Apple II. None of these survived or thrived for more than a few years. Even Apple faded into the background for a long dark night.

We are today in the middle of a similar struggle involving mobile operating systems. Early leaders included Palm and Blackberry. Now the question is: How many products can survive in the long run. In particular which operating system(s) will dominate. Once that is decided, phone and tablet makers as well as carriers will fight to differentiate their devices - all based on one of the dominate operating systems. The OS competition today involves Google Android, Google Chrome, Apple iOS, HP WebOS, MS Windows Phone 7, MS Windows Mobile, MS Windows 8 (possibly) and RIM Blackberry OS. And you thought it was a two way race.

How did this turn out in the PC world when (almost) everyone used Windows and also used basically the same hardware? It turned into a price war and there were many casualties. Hundreds of small and large companies went into and out of the PC business in the last twenty years. Technology was a minor consideration - shelf space and advertising budgets were what mattered most. PCs became commodities which meant the death of companies and the death of innovation.

There is every reason to believe this will happen in the mobile field as well. It's an issue of software developers, shelf space and mindshare. Companies can only develop apps for a limited number of operating systems; retailers have room for only a few products in their stores; and consumers and companies cannot spend countless hours choosing between dozens of platforms.

Watch this space (and every other space) for ongoing discussion of this exciting topic as the Mobile Internet unfolds before us.