Hvorfor avisers iPad-udgaver flopper og altid vil floppe

Som Felix Salmon skriver på Reuters.com i anledning af Murdoch-imperiets store iPad-satsning The Daily og dens tidlige død:

When the iPad was first announced, there were lots of dreams about what it could achieve, and how rich its content could be. But in hindsight, it’s notable how many of the dreamers came from the world of print. Web people tended to be much less excited about the iPad than print people were, maybe because they knew they already had something better. The web, for instance, doesn’t need to traffic in discrete “issues” — if you subscribe to the New York Times, you can read any story you like, going back decades. Whereas if you subscribe to a publication on a tablet, you can read only one issue at a time.

When the iPad launched, it allowed people to do things they could never do with a print publication: watch videos, say. But at the same time the experience was still inferior to what you could get on the web, which iterates and improves incrementally every day. The iPad then stayed still — the technology behind iPad publications is basically the same as it was two years ago — even as the web, in its manner, predictably got better and better.

One of the things that confused me, when The Daily launched, was the way in which it failed to leverage the wealth of rich and valuable content available within News Corp. You couldn’t watch episodes of The Simpsons, you couldn’t get access to amazing footage from Avatar, you couldn’t read exclusive extracts from HarperCollins books. Murdoch was happy to spend a large eight-figure sum on building custom-made content for the new publication; he even shelled out for a Superbowl ad. But he never managed to use The Daily as a means of bringing his company’s already-existing content to life in new ways for a new platform, and I suspect that iPad constraints are part of the reason.

Fordi en låst, “kureret” platform i sidste ende aldrig vil kunne konkurrere med et helt åbent system, hvor  alle kan lave mere eller mindre, hvad de har lyst til. Folk har ingen grund til at vælge den lukkede og begrænsede iPad-avis, når avisernes almindelige hjemmesider allerede har langt bedre tilbud.

Via Boing Boing.

R.I.P. Steve Jobs, grundlægger af Pixar og Apple

Jeg har aldrig været en stor fan af Apple-produkter; jeg kom for sent i gang med computere til at stifte bekendtskab med de første Macs, og iPods og iAltmuligandet har altid virket lidt for poleret, smart og hypet men ikke særlig robust, for det skal jo alligevel kun holde til næste generation kommer om et par minutter. Der er dog ingen tvivl om, at Apple har været med til at skubbe grænserne for, hvad man kan med computere og anden elektronik, kontrolfreaks eller ej. Og hovedæren for dette tilfalder uden tvivl Steve Jobs.

På denne video forklarer Steve Jobs, hvorfor han blev hvad han blev, fordi han droppede ud af college og gjorde de ting, der interesserede ham, i stedet for at passe sine studier; og hvorfor du ikke kan lade dig nøje med det næstbedste job, men skal holde dig til det, du selv vil og kan stå 100% inde for, uanset hvad andre måtte forvente af dig. Hvorfor du skal følge dit hjerte og gøre de ting, der interesserer dig, i stedet for at følge den slagne vej:

Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma – which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of other’s opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.

Hvad man end måtte mene om Apple og deres umiskendeligt totalitære tendenser i retning af censur mod og overvågning af deres egne kunder, er det tankevækkende ord fra en mand, hvis tekniske vision forandrede verden.

Wikileaks: Boykot Apple

Det opfordrer Mark LeVine til – han skriver på Aljazeera.net:

On December 21, Apple pulled a WikiLeaks application from its iTunes store, banning it forever. When reporters queried the company about why it did so, the response was: “We removed WikiLeaks because it violated developer guidelines. An app must comply with all local laws. It may not put an individual or target group in harm’s way.”

And so Apple has joined capital’s war on WikiLeaks; adding its power to that of the credit card company’s online retailers and even Swiss banks who refuse to do any business with the grassroots whistleblowing organisation that has done more to bring the malfeasance of governments and corporations to the light of public scrutiny than any other organisation in at least two generations.

And because of that, I will never buy another Apple product again. You’ve made your choice, Mr. Jobs, and now so have I.

LeVine skriver mere, og det er alt sammen værd at læse. Men egentlig er der ikke mere at sige. At mene, at Apple-produkter er cool er det samme som at mene, at politisk censur er cool – for Apple praktiserer politisk censur og er stolt af det.

Læs det hele.