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Google Preparing iPad Rival?

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the here's-hoping dept.

dazedNconfuzed noted an update in the ongoing rumor train about the Google iPad Competitor. It would be based on Android (not ChromeOS) and supposedly Eric Schmidt was telling people about it at a party in LA recently. If any Googlers want to leak me s3cr3t information, I promise anonymity, though without an actual product, price or date it's tough to get really excited. But the iPad clearly has significant limitations that someone else can capitalize on.

6 of 397 comments (clear)

  1. Hopefully true - Closed vs. Open platforms by rjamestaylor · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Really hoping this rumor is true - not that I need to buy another "pad" device (yes, I stood in line for an iPad) - but I'd really like to see how the Closed vs. Open platform models play out. Best case: Apple revises its Closed stance in response to a thriving gPad ecosystem.

    I really like my iProducts, but having been a proponent of open platforms for so long I am uneasy at the tight hold Apple holds over developers and users.

    For example, why hasn't Apple approved the Opera Mini yet? I'd welcome a choice in browsers, personally.

    --
    -- @rjamestaylor on Ello
    1. Re:Hopefully true - Closed vs. Open platforms by StreetStealth · · Score: 5, Interesting

      I don't think either will "win." They are two worlds with two different goals.

      Apple's model will always compromise developer flexibility when user experience is at stake. Google's model will always compromise user experience when developer flexibility is at stake.

      People will choose based on what is important to them.

      --
      Your mind is clear / The things that you fear / Will fade with how much you / Believe what you hear
    2. Re:Hopefully true - Closed vs. Open platforms by uprise78 · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Totally agree. This is totally exemplified by dmesg0's comment above: "By the way, I own nexus one, and with the right firmware (latest cyanogenmod with UV kernel), it's a great phone." Do you really think that Apple would ever let it's users deal with something that nerdy? It's a totally different target audience. The iPhone/iPad is about simplifying things so much that the actual hardare gets out of your way. Android is more about tinkering and spec sheets and more nerdy goods. If you look at the iPad's spec sheet on the Apple webpage it doesn't even show the GPU or RAM! What nerd on earth would ever stand for buying a product with no RAM numbers given? Different strokes for different folks. It is 100% obvious that the iPad was not created for Slashdotters. It was created for Slashdotters parents, grandparents and sisters or anyone else who has come to a Slashdotter wondering why "the internet doesn't work".

  2. Biggest iPad Limitation: No HTML Editing by psydeshow · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I have an iPad. I liked it, until I tried to compose a blog post. Mobile Safari doesn't support content-editable fields.

    Typing HTML code into textareas in order to compose blog posts and web pages is NOT fun. Google Docs doesn't work. and rich HTML in Gmail or other webmail services doesn't work. There are HTML editor apps, but that doesn't mean what I think it means, because they are all code editors not rich text editors.

    The bottom line is that Apple supports rich text output in PDF and proprietary formats, but not HTML. Not even a little bit.

    Everyone has their own priorities, of course, but until Mobile Safari supports tinyMCE and other rich text editors, I have to consider the iPad a toy. Then again, it's perfect for posting on Slashdot! (And it even supports unicode, so why should I complain?)

  3. Re:Teh suXX0rs by Princeofcups · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Pre Soviet Russia was not a backwards agrarian society, any more than other states were.

    I'm afraid that it was. The communist revolution leaders (e.g. Lenin, Trotsky) had to make major philosophical changes to Marx's theories to accommodate the fact that the bulk of the people were "peasants" and not "working class." It was under Stalin that the Soviet Union really industrialized.

    --
    The only thing worse than a Democrat is a Republican.
  4. This is a twisted anti-elitist argument by Geof · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Android is more about tinkering and spec sheets and more nerdy goods. . . . It is 100% obvious that the iPad was not created for Slashdotters. It was created for Slashdotters parents, grandparents and sisters or anyone else who has come to a Slashdotter wondering why "the internet doesn't work"

    It is utterly ironic that the debate about openness has been twisted into one of elites vs honest folk. These anti-elistist sentiments are so powerful they drive much of American politics and scientific backlash (e.g. creationism). Moreover, Apple - long seen as the maker of elitist products for snobbish users - has been recast as the ally of the common man (or grandmother). If I were a PR manager for Apple I could not hope to do better.

    There is definitely a strong strand of elitism among technical folk, from the the old idea that users are losers to the incredible resistance to ease-of-use I remember from the 1990s ("If they can't use a command line I don't want them using my software). A lot of technology really is obtusely designed; the people who get frustrated (which is to say all of us) are not stupid. Tying the open vs closed debate to this experience of disrespect and frustration, and the wider discourse of elite domination by entities from bankers to bureaucrats, is very effective for evoking (legitimate) emotional responses, passing over the need to make thorough arguments.

    Because the linkage is wrong. There is no necessary connection between something being open and it being hard to use. The iPad is easy to use and it is relatively closed. That is correlation, not causation. Apple is simply very good at designing (and marketing) the user experience. This ability seems to be rare among its competitors.

    There is a historical precedent for a more open system that turned out to be easier to use than what it (partly) replaced. You allude to it in your post. The Web was a huge step up in intuitive usability compared to the desktop software that had previously performed many of its functions. It was also a huge step up in terms of capability (compare searching Wikipedia to searching Britannica). And it is open. Too open, in fact, for the iPad and its prohibitions on running interpreted code. Fortunately for today, it is already established and was granted a special exemption. If the iPad lockdown had been the norm 20 years ago, the Web might never have been invented. If lockdown is the norm in the future, the next huge improvement in usability and functionality might not happen.

    I am fully confident that Apple has the talents to develop an easy-to-use and open system. (After all, my computers are Macs.) But the temptation for control is hard to resist. Especially when you can remake yourself as the computer of the people with that wonderful anti-elistism PR.