Apple sells 2 million iPads in under 2 months - Page 7

Originally Posted by melgross

It was pointing out, and pretty well, seeing as how upset you are over it, that I don't need to look to another company, despite your lame remark about my needing to.

And it's your poor writing that responsible for misunderstandings.

Originally Posted by melgross

I give them credit for what they're designing. They make the decisions. I don't agree that all their decisions are for the best though. Sometimes their vision is what's best for Apple, not us. Like not giving us Blu-Ray, even as an option.

The point is that with some things, they can make an exception, or even change their minds, when it suits them for their own purposes. Another example is not giving FM tuners on iPods. I know that very few people really care about that, but when they found a way where they could make money off adding it, they did. So their vision isn't always guided by what's best for us as consumers of their products, but what's best for Apple, the company. Now, as a stockholder, I appreciate that, but not always as a customer.

Originally Posted by Dr Millmoss

I take this also from Steve Jobs' comment that he was as proud of what they left out as what they included.

Originally Posted by jragosta

How do you know that?

iTunes and Mail work fine in the background on iPhone OS 3.2. It's at least theoretically possible that Apple could have printing work in the background.

It's simply THIRD PARTY apps that don't background.

Originally Posted by melgross

If we need a dongle, it's safer to have one with a cord. A solid one like these is easy to damage a port with, as the leverage from it can pop the post socket right off the board, if pressed down by mistake. but a cord doesn't have that problem. The connector hardly extends from the socket, and if it's pulled out, it's less likely to damage anything. Even if it's dangling straight down, the cord is so close to the socket that leverage is slight.

Originally Posted by melgross

Printing with the Mac or PC is the way printing apps for the iPad/phone work now, so that would be nothing new. I hope it's direct. I can print images or text, or combinations. These programs are pretty sophisticated. Check out PrintBureau.

But I mostly just want to print with a print button. I see no problem with including the USB port. It's up to Apple to decide how much support they will give it. There's no reason why they couldn't give full USB support, if they wanted to. They just don't want to, so far.

As for drivers, they could allow the downloading of any drivers the customer wanted. They have them all, and the ability to allow that. This is nothing too difficult from a technical standpoint. It's just a matter of will.

Originally Posted by solipsism

I don't get this. The 30-pin connector already does USB signaling so why does it have to be replaced by Micro-USB or Mini-USB (the only two that would fit) just so some people can have printing while completely hurting the entire iDevice line of accessories and Apple's ability to push the use of the connector by limiting it to just USB signaling?


I don't get this either. Some of those print drivers are huge. I can't imagine anyone DLing hundreds of MBs for a print driver to use once when it's faster to send to a PC to print.

Apple clearly has positioned these devices to be portable, auxiliary computing devices, so unless there is a method that doesn't require a lengthy and archaic driver DL for each new printer I don't see this happening without the use of a 3rd-party app.

Originally Posted by newbee

Again, it's always the "poor writing" that's responsible for your "misunderstanding". Do you ever accept responsibility for anything you read and fail to understand, ever, hmm, ever? If it only happened once it "could" be the writer's fault but when it continues to happen with various writers, you have to look elsewhere.

Please show me where I asked you to look to another company, other than the one you "say" you owned. I'm betting you'll come up with a "lame" excuse to explain why you can't/won't.

And as for "seeing how upset I am" .... your mind reading "abilities" have again failed you. If I ever do get upset it sure as heck won't be over the postings of a "Global Moderator".

Originally Posted by Dr Millmoss

I find this argument to be highly abstract. For the most part I think people understand what they are buying and make choices accordingly, based on personal preferences. All products involve compromises and tradeoffs. If you like what a product does, you buy it. If you don't like the compromises and tradeoffs, you don't. I don't assume that Apple or anyone else has failed because their products don't precisely express my preferences.

Apple is just like any other corporation. What suits them is making money. First, last, always. We make our purchase choices based on our preferences, not on some abstract notion of what some company thinks is best.

Originally Posted by Dick Applebaum

What you say has logical merit:

But my experience with destroying the micro USB port on 3 Mophie JuicePack Airs tells a different story...

Maybe, just different strokes...

.

Originally Posted by Dick Applebaum

I tend to agree with Sol on this, though, personally, I'd like the added capability MG describes.

I think I understand Apple's reasoning, though!

Consider these points:

--The drivers that Apple has don't exist for the ARM platform-- they would need to be converted and maintained separately.

-- As part of the forecast/pricing for every device they make, Apple includes the cost of support. Adding, somewhat-specialized features or function comes with a resource and support burden. To cover this Apple would need to raise the price or remove other function.

-- Finally, what sets many Apple devices, apart, from the competition is: that they choose not to do some things, badly; and choose to do a few things really well!

Will you, Sol or I ever get an Apple device that meets all our requirements? I suspect the answer is no! The real question becomes: can they get close enough to satisfy most people while meeting Apple's objectives...

The answer is a resounding YES!

.

Originally Posted by melgross

It's not always a matter of buying or not buying. We're not talking about major tradeoffs, but ones that are annoying. Annoying I can live with, though not quite as happily as I would otherwise.

Originally Posted by Dr Millmoss

I can hardly think of a major product I've owned that hasn't featured some tradeoffs, including ones I had a hard time understanding or found to be annoying. It's just a fact of life. If a product has too many tradeoffs, we should not buy it. That's the bargain we make with manufacturers. I don't think it's a matter of the manufacturers thinking they know best for us. They make their decisions based on cost of production, technical issues, design issues, and marketing. The rationales may not always be clear to us, but I think it's fair to say that they exist nonetheless.

In the case of a omitting a USB port, I can make a pretty good guess for Apple's rationale. You or I might not necessarily like it, but the alternative explanation doesn't have to be a cynical one.

Originally Posted by melgross

I don't think it's a cynical one. It's one that's good for whatever they're trying to push as a usage pattern, as well as their own technologies. They're giving up a lot of potential users though with some of these restrictions. With the iPhone, and even the Touch, I'm willing to accept much more in the line of restrictions, because the small size of the devices themselves restricts what can be reasonably be done. But some of the software restrictions are too limiting in a device like this. The photo industry has been very excited about the iPad, but some of that is dying. This is one reason:

http://www.robgalbraith.com/bins/con...=7-10052-10708

This is sad, because there are several hundred thousand users of their product. John Nack from Adobe is now moving into a mobile products area in the company, and has recently asked if people want a Psd viewer for the iPad. When looked at last, there were several hundred posts saying that they would want a simpler version of Lightroom, or at worst, Elements instead. But that may be impossible. Apple could be losing millions of sales over this in the coming years. It's not a small number. Most users would be using this in complement to their MBPs and Macs, not instead. This is why some of this is frustrating. I refuse to support every single decision that Apple makes, when some of them are just obstinate about doing things their way.

At the All Things Digital conference, Jobs said that iPads and other tablets were going to eventually replace the pc based computing environment for most people, but in order to do so, they must replace the functionality as well.

Originally Posted by Dr Millmoss

I think this is actually a perfect example of what I have been saying. You assume that Apple is "just obstinate" about how this works, or doesn't. That is cynical explanation IMO since it attributes it to insincere motivations. I think they have other reasons which although they may be less than fully apparent from the outside, exist just the same. Additionally, I don't see obstinacy as a business plan, and I believe Apple is actually pretty good at business plans. Perhaps we differ on that point.

And FWIW, others are meeting much the same need within the restrictions. So while perhaps this company can't squeeze their pro photo editing app into the iPad, at least not in the way they's like, others have. So naturally they complain about it. Perhaps future iterations of the iPad will have a hardware profile that will make their app possible on the iPad. Maybe not. Perhaps the iPad's software model will never allow them to port this particular app. Perhaps others will do what they cannot.

So the iPad is not an open-ended wish fulfillment machine. I'm not shocked. It was designed to do the things it can do very well, instead of everything anyone could imagine, poorly. It seems to me this was Apple's decision from the start, the way they decided the iPad had the best chance to establish a beachhead in a market where others have failed.

This doesn't translate into Apple being obstinate. It translates into them knowing what that intended to do, and doing it.

Originally Posted by melgross

I'm not going to bother responding to you here, so if you want to keep blathering on, feel free to do so.

Originally Posted by newbee

Congratulations on knowing how to" quit while you're behind."

Originally Posted by solipsism

You really are acting like an ass here.

Originally Posted by newbee

Read post #115 and you'll see who is acting like an ass.... and an arrogant one at that.

Read post #121 and it starts to look like a trend has started here. Melgross gets all uppity with someone for no reason and when he is found to be wrong he transfers all blame to anybody but himself. When he no longer can shift blame .... you come riding in on a white horse to try to save him by using tag team methods. That's fine ... but my advice to both of you is simply this: If you can't take it .... don't dish it out.

Originally Posted by solipsism

I chose not to follow that sub-thread, but I did see one person end it and another try to draw that back in by putting them on the defensive. You get to a point where you realize either party will not see the other's PoV, if one ends it then the other should too. Feel free to get the last word in, but if your last post looks like a blatant attempt at baiting then I can't help but that party an ass.

Originally Posted by newbee

Congratulations on knowing how to "quit while you're behind."

Originally Posted by melgross

If you had something worth responding to, I would have.

Originally Posted by newbee

You're a real riot. It would appear that your ego is so huge (or your self esteem is so small) that you waited a full week to post a reply that says nothing just so you could have the last say on this matter ..... unbelievable. .... I'll tell you what .... this is my last post on this thread, so go ahead .... knock yourself out ... trash talk me to death. What a pathetic attitude. I can hardly wait for your "explanation" .... but I will.

Originally Posted by melgross

Wow! You really think that making those statements changes anything?

Originally Posted by newbee

No .. I've still got the same opinion of you that I've always had.

Originally Posted by melgross

Wonderful. At least you're consistent.