The Occasional Blargh

Juxtaposition

I’m going to steal a bit from Raging Thunderbolt’s probably abandoned blog (Ed.: You’re one to talk. Before today, your last post was from over a year ago.) where she or he places two statements together to contrast each other. And I’ll steal a topic which was done on the website last year. Unlike her or him, I will probably F it up. Both statements appeared on Daring Fireball (the longtime obsession of these pages).

Marco Arment [on the release of various Microsoft apps for free on mobile devices]:

It seems that Microsoft is finally accepting the reality of Office’s market position on smartphones and tablets. To some degree, Office needs to compete with the free Google Docs and iWork, but for many customers, it’s also competing with the idea of simply not using office apps (or using them far less often).

John Gruber [on reaction to a developer’s release of an expansion pack for $2]:

Two fucking dollars. I’m going to the App Store to leave a 5-star review; such a beautiful and original work of art, and the App Store rating is being trashed by cheapskate morons.

The thing here is it hasn’t been a new complaint that the Apple App Store has not really fostered a healthy marketplace where developers can make the money needed to invest in applications more substantial that social media front-ends or simple fad-games. There’s folks who feel this has managed to stunt the iPad’s ascent as the PC replacement it was so destined to be. So, doesn’t it seem weird to celebrate as the natural order of things for one company to be pulled toward free by consumers, while lambasting consumers for pulling another app for free?

Android First? Two years later, still waiting for this to happen.

I don’t think he’s looking very hard.

Adobe is…

…obviously never going to get that correction from John Gruber.  Though they probably never asked for one. In fact, it’s doubtful Adobe ever noticed that post where Gruber misreads their press release, and criticizes the company from that misreading.

But I do find it weird how Gruber is praising Apple for mission statements whose only difference from Adobe’s investment statements are the replacement of conditional words with triumphalist hyperbole.

The biggest change, no surprise, is from biz-dev bullshit to plain English, four days before Steve Jobs became CEO in September 1997.

So, once again, Gruber confuses hyperbole with “plain English.” The only reason the statements collected by Alexandre Gollner aren’t bullshit is that none of them are outright dishonest. That includes the pre-September 1997 statements Gruber didn’t like. Those old statements told you far more about what Apple does than today’s puffery. Now everybody knows what Apple does, so they don’t need to say so on its PR. But neither the pre-Jobs statements nor the modern statements are what I would call bullshit.

The last time we left John Gruber with a press release, he confused a forward looking financial statement for a mission statement. But that was back when Gruber was just a lowly blogger. Today, he is not just a simple blogger, but the head of The Daring Fireball Company LLC. With the newfound experience in running a small-business, let’s see if he has improved in his press release interpretation skill set.

One of the things I admire about Apple is their plainspokenness, both in advertising and in press releases.

plain·spo·ken. adjective. \ˈplānˈspō-kən\

Frank; straightforward; blunt; candid.

I don’t think describing Siri as magical or Maps as the most powerful mapping service ever would qualify as being plainspoken, but that’s good. Gruber is beginning to confuse hyperbole as candor. He is becoming fluent in press relation-ese.

At first glance, the headline of the press release announcing Forstall’s departure seemed to go against this: “Apple Announces Changes to Increase Collaboration Across Hardware, Software & Services”. That was followed by a subhead: “Jony Ive, Bob Mansfield, Eddy Cue and Craig Federighi Add Responsibilities to Their Roles”.

Ah, we can see young Gruber struggling. He wants to show evidence of Apple’s candor, but Apple has just spent 25 words without telling you what just happened – they just fired Scott Forstall.

Thinking about it some more, though, and considering what I know about Forstall’s reputation within the company, I think that headline, euphemistic though it is, tells the plain truth:

This is an awesome graf. He’s already resorting to doublespeak, to excuse it. “Euphemistic though it is, [it] tells the plain truth.” Of course, the truth is only revealed if you have prior knowledge of the company.

Forstall was an obstacle to collaboration within the company. Now he’s gone, and his responsibilities are being divided between four men who foster collaboration: Ive, Mansfield, Cue, and Federighi.

So truthful, it takes an outside blog to lay plain the rationale behind the changes. Also note in the actual press release, the announcement of Forstall’s departure is the last sentence of the opening paragraph. And nowhere within the actual press release does it say Forstall was an obstacle.

Of course, it’s rare for a press release to simply say that a senior-executive was fired. People high enough in the hierarchy can afford attorneys to make sure such offensive and harsh words like “fired” and “dismissed” are never uttered. They also exist to ensure that a parachute of appropriate size made of dollar bills is awarded to the ex-executive.

So, yeah, Gruber has gotten much better at reading a press release. Unfortunately, he has much worse at calling out self-serving PRese for what it is.

Above is what Daring Fireball looked like when I visited Saturday night. The only visible content was two ads, navigation, with only the hint of a blog should I choose to scroll down some more. I am the first to admit that the image above is unfair. I lucked into visiting the site at exactly the wrong time, and that the sponsorship testimonial he wrote was unusually long this week. Still, I note this because of his reaction to his discovery that some bundled apps in Windows 8 displayed ads: “Gross”, which is in line with his general distain for advertisements.

Now, I could point out the various promotional interruptions that sometimes greet your Mac or iPad-using day, but I thought it was probably already beside the point when now the major operating systems come with actual stores built into them. Windows 8 has the Store tile which loads what I guess is called “Windows Store” which is the only place to acquire and install the new ‘Metro’-style applications.  Ubuntu has reconfigured its package management application and turned it into a store. (Additionally, Canonical altered its desktop search interface to also search Amazon.com and place products it finds from that store into the search results.) And Apple, which had two stores built in since Snow Leopard, has routed its software update feature through the Mac App Store, as well as selling operating system upgrades solely through the store. Thus, you have to interact with the store to keep on top of system security updates, and to get new OS X releases. Windows system updates still come through a separate applet via the Control Panel, but ‘Metro’-app updates have to be downloaded through the store, too. It remains to be seen, though, if Windows will push new OS versions through its store. It seems a bit late to complain about ads here and there, when the OSes already direct you to exit through the gift shop.

Some weeks ago, Apple released the iPhone 5 and iOS6 to wide-acclaim. Well, except for the Maps applications. Well, I was following reaction, reporting, analysis and opinionizing on the iOS Maps saga, with the intent on writing something. But as posting about Maps now isn’t very timely, I pretty much scrapped that post. However, one particular blogger does merit mention.

OK, a summary. Apple previewed iOS6 and Apple Maps at the WWDC earlier in the summer. People found it to be less than complete, but hoped it would improve; it was an unreleased beta, of course. Unfortunately, the developers saw it was atrocious and it was not improving as release time closed in. Still, the iPhone 5 and iOS6 is released to largely rave reviews. Curiously, many initial reviews do not mention Maps problems. However, these problems prove viral, even inspiring a Tumblr blog. But then, the defenders came out.

A few argued that “well, it worked for me.” Most defended not Maps but Apple’s corporate strategy. Some are consoling us with promises that “Maps has to get better, right?”. But no one is arguing that Apple’s Maps, even as it is now, is better than Google’s.

“Kontra” at CounterNotions:

Q: You’re exaggerating. Google Maps has the best user experience of any company in this business, does it not?

A: Yes it does, if you walk on water, like Google does from Alicante to Valencia in Spain:

Q: C’mon that must be old data.

A: Well, the map says it’s current:

Q: Maybe Google just didn’t get to it yet. Google Maps is in beta anyhow.

A: Yes, it must be:

 

Well, um, wow. And, well, I guess he has a point. If you’re not the Messiah or The Flash or Aquaman you may have trouble making that trek… wait a second, are those dots cities? What’s the scale of that map? Let’s me try to enter that plan.

One hundred sixty kilometers? That’s about one hundred miles! Kontra is actually presenting a 100-mile walking trip as an example to demonstrate Google’s failing. OK, but what of this route where Google suggested you take a detour across the Balearic Sea? That’s the first one (and notice Kontra neglects to mention Google suggested more than one route) and… wait a moment. It’s far longer in distance, but it says it takes less time. What is going on there?

IT’S A FERRY! It’s not “walk on water”, it’s “take a boat and save six hours on a ridiculous trip”. Or as also visible in the last picture, Google suggests you take public transit!

Well, I confronted Kontra on Twitter over this and had a back and forth which lead to him eventually blocking me. It’s probably because I called him a liar. When someone goes out of his way to crop out all exculpatory information, I don’t think questioning his integrity is unwarranted.

Well, this was all two weeks ago. I wouldn’t have even brought this except Kontra recently tweeted this:

More hilarity. Google Maps directions from NY to Paris bit.ly/USkSnl (19,168 mi, 519 hrs) via @theromit

— Kontra (@counternotions) October 11, 2012

Maybe I was too hasty. Maybe Kontra isn’t a liar. Maybe he just doesn’t realize that if you ask Google for “implausible” directions, it will give you humorous results that are coded in. Maybe he isn’t trolling, but is just stupid.

✪ introduces a new standard for judging tech products:

If even the “terrible” reviews declare that the new EarPods are a clear improvement over Apple’s previous earphones, I think that’s pretty good. Are they worth $29 on their own? That’s a good question. . .

…which he had been answering by linking to the good reviews he had been finding. Remind me later to write my post on bias in editorial judgment. Examples of such is through things like the choice of links, choice of text excerpted from each link. All in addition to the actual commentary written under his pen.

★ July 22, 2012

Who gives a shit about Windows apps?

Apparantly, Lytro does. What's Lytro? Oh, it was that camera whose Mac-only support was seen as evidence that Apple was finally winning over Microsoft. Never mind ancient and recent history showed single platform launches that evolve to multiplatform apps. Like the Lytro camera that now supports Windows.

So, should I place a cryptic link here that readers won’t understand unless they hire a private eye to make sense of things? Nah, that’s not me. It’s just that I just read an interesting story on how IBM has blocked Siri because they fear she’ll leak secrets to Apple, and now I have an excuse to post another Zatanna picture. Honestly, I’m surprised that this story is taken as a surprise.

Now, if I’ve somehow gathered new readers they may be wondering what is going on where I’m not writing all that frequently. To those readers, I must confess that sadly, those long sabbaticals between posts are the norm around here. That said, I am in the middle of a move, which may be followed by a second move (because I can’t do anything the easy way). So for this time, I do have a excuse for not posting. I haven’t burnt out yet.

Still, given how I always make the “I can retire” joke when I find any other blog or site that tries to cast a critical eye, I can see how others can be concerned if I will abandon this place, too. I joke about it, but I know the feeling that can come when it feels like the hope of improving the conversation has faded visible and that you’re just snarking into the aether. It does help to step away, not to do this every day. (It’s funny that the point of this blog wasn’t initially to be the tech press critic, but I just stumbled into it.) I guess the above picture fits this statement as well.

Embarassing.

(David Foster Wallace would not be proud.)

Remember again that the fable of “The Boy Who Cried Wolf” ended with all of the sheep being slaughtered by the wolf. Still, the blame was lain at the feet of the boy, so obviously the ones at fault for this are the anti-virus companies who spent years trying to warn people that Macs don’t provide a magic cloak of protection from malware. Please don’t blame the charlitans who sold you on the magic cloak.

It’s telling that ∞ and ✪ has spent more time and words — many more words in ∞’s case — discussing ᔥ & ↬ than reports of the US DOJ looking to take antitrust action against Apple and various book publishers. That said, any discussion of economics, law and business from ∞ & ✪ should only be read for its comedic value.

ᔥ ✪
↬ ∞
↯ ↵

Yeah, that is total bullshit.

I am in a magnanimous mood, and in fairness, when someone does right he should be praised. It wouldn’t be fair to just attack, attack, attack. Siegler, is half-right here, even though he has to sneak in a compliment to Apple, though while Apple was “keeping it real”, they were working with AT&T to make it faux-G.

So, half a cookie for Siegler. It’d have been a whole cookie, but he couldn’t keep it real the whole way.

Today, you can get Microsoft Word 2010 — and just Microsoft Word 2010 — for $120 on Amazon.com. It’s not a great deal. For the same price, you can buy Office Home and Student. However, if you are a stickler for reading and following End User License Agreements to the the letter or the agreement, and you use Word (and just Word) for business or commercial use, this is the version you’d buy. If this is strange, you got to realize this is how Microsoft soaks up from companies their economic surplus. It is near impossible for anybody to buy massive quantities of Home and Student,  whereas enterprises get heavy discounts for buying huge site licenses with things like imaging and license management features. (Universities tend to also buy through site-licenses.) That would still cost them thousands of dollars, but it is still cheaper than retail and they don’t fear a BSA audit for trying to subvert EULA  by buying cheap home edition.  Sadly, for the one-man writing business, you’re stuck with the $120 Word-only edition.

Why did I spend the above paragraph explaining poorly how people buy MS Word or MS Office? Because MG Siegler has praised Amit Runchal at TechCrunch who spent 12 paragraphs telling everyone how Microsoft is doomed because their software is too expensive because people only want Word and Microsoft does not sell just Word. He wrote this without appearing to realize that Microsoft does sell just Word. Or understanding how Microsoft sells Office in general. How Microsoft might have to deal with pricing tablet applications that began from an accurate premise would have been a far more interesting piece to read. Of course, MG Siegler wouldn’t be able to recognise such an article, so he serves you more helpings of “Microsoft is going to die,” empty calories they may be.

This is no way to go through life, son.

AT&T and Verizon Keep Data Plan Pricing the Same for the New iPad

I’m happily surprised by this — I expected them to charge more for LTE than they do for 3G.

John, think about it for a minute. The plans are metered. They’re banking on the faster speed to cause you to use more data. The water company doesn’t worry about adding a surcharge when you buy a washing machine, because they’re sure you’ll end up using more water. Purchasing more water. In fact, charging more would likely cause people to police usage more closely.

“Save” is a relic from a bygone era of computing.
    — ✪'s sentiment from this post on April 5th, 2011. (I will admit, I altered the meaning by clipping the quote as I did.)

I’ve been irritated by the new Duplicate thing, but I can’t tell if it’s because I actually prefer the old Save As workflow or simply that the new Duplicate workflow is going to take some time to get used to.
    — ✪, on November 29, 2011, struggling to let go of a bygone era.

Remind me I have to post my promised thoughts on filing systems and such. Why do I always overpromise and underdeliver?

It’s always good to have a fellow-traveler along on the “Forget Paris” campaign. John Welch catches “The ‘M’ Stands for ‘Mitt’” Siegler once again flip-flopping on a deeply held position:

Yesterday, March 1st, 2012, MG Siegler, on his vomitously titled “Paris LeMON” site wrote, in “Prompts” the following:

The New York Times apparently wants us to have smartphones that prompt you to make sure you want to turn them on, prompt you to make sure you want to open an app, prompt you to make sure you want to send a tweet, prompt you to make sure you want to jump from an app to a web page, prompt you to make sure you want to adjust the brightness (a stranger may be able to read your phone more easily over your shoulder!!).

We’re one step away from a call for apps that prompt you if you’d like a prompt about something. Excuse me while I go hide in a hut in the woods and write a manifesto.

Okay? So we’re clear, just adding prompts is not a solution, but a fucking pain in the ass that makes you hate using your device, right? This is bad, right?

Well, less than a fucking month ago, Siegler wrote, on 8 Feb. 2012, in his “Path, Not Pathological” idiocy:

Yes, it’s weird that Apple, which has the App Store approval process on lock-down and requires prompts for things like accessing location information doesn’t do the same for address book information. My understanding is that Apple has been looking at this issue and it will probably change in a future iOS update.

So prompts were good on February 8th, but twenty-two days later they were bad.

MG doesn’t quite have it down to the point where he can execute the flip in three and a half hours like Romney can, but he has the fundamental understanding that “IOKIYAA”.

It’s OK If You Are Apple. (Or in Siegler’s case, a company he has invested in.)

MG Siegler has half a thought on Windows 8.

Newsflash: “No compromises” is actually a huge compromise.

Actually, to most computer users, having access to the old as well as the new is not a compromise. It’s considered ... well, it’s considered having access to both the old and the new. It’s when one has to give up the old to use the new, that is when compromises have to be made.

For an example, let’s just look at how one computer user is coping with the removal of a command that has been integral to his workflow over the years:

I’ve been irritated by the new Duplicate thing, but I can’t tell if it’s because I actually prefer the old Save As workflow or simply that the new Duplicate workflow is going to take some time to get used to. I suspect it’s the latter, so I’m sticking with it for now.

Another user has to build a hack to comfortably use his computer again. MG Siegler, these are actual compromises. “I want to use the great new features provided by OS X Lion such as automatic versioning, but I have to contort my workflow around the removal of the Save As command — a staple of computer science for decades — or I have to develop a script that brings back said functionality; a script that I must maintain for as long as I am unable to grok the new Duplicate/Save a Version paradigm.”

Links come to me via Stu Parker’s piece on this.

Thunderbolt finds The Mighty Beard playing model number police amusing.

How dare they imitate Apple’s use of Arabic numerals! Even though iPhone 5 hasn’t come out yet, Apple should preemptively sue any other company that uses the number 5 in their product names.

There probably is an argument to be made that ViewSonic is trying to get some competitive notice by calling their phone model the 4S, but it’s no more revolting than a computer company riding the coattails of a popular heavy-duty server operating system by appending the letter associated with that server operating system to their operating system.

However, what I find funny is now the position is to defend the use of cryptic model numbers as the distinguishing name for a product. The Apple punditry usually argue the opposite; model number names are terrible. Here’s December’s entry to that oeuvre from Gene Steinberg, stating how model numbers are confusing and how can we distinguish from the A1297 from the A1286 and such. Although the no-model-numbers edict gave us such entertaining descriptions like “Summer 2001 (Northern Hemisphere)”.

It’s been a while since someone declared as broken a business model he didn’t like. Patrick Rhone uses the clever conceit of using his daughter to illustrate his argument which appears to be there should be an unlimited selection of immediately available entertainment, but that it shouldn’t be paid for through advertisement, nor should anything be advertised before it was immediately available at the moment. Now, his daughter does go about asking good questions, but Rhone does not really bother to answer his daughter’s question in a meaningful way. He’d rather imply that them executives are just being silly.

It’d be interesting to hear his daughter’s questions when there is far less to watch on the iPad from Netflix, and how it could be so even if daddy is paying more to Netflix.