Slashdot Mirror
Apple's 'What's a Computer?' Ad is Annoying People: Business Insider (businessinsider.com)
Can an iPad replace your computer? It has been the topic of debate for years, with plenty of people advising against it. Apple sure begs to differ. It has been running a commercial in which it predicts a world where a computer is extinct and a child with an iPad doesn't even know what the word "computer" means. Business Insider reports that plenty of people are finding that commercial annoying. From the report: "Does this commercial tick anybody else off?" writes one commenter on a snippet of the commercial that was posted to Facebook. "I want to smack this kid. What's a computer? You know what a computer is you disrespectful smarta--!!" Plenty of other social media posts, some with thousands of retweets, have made the same observation.
An iPad can replace a computer when they can actually write all the code for iOS on an iPad. Until then, people will need real computers.
This ad even annoyed my teenage daughter. We are a very pro-Apple family, so itâ(TM)s not because we dislike Apple. But she feels that of course the kid knows what a computer is, and that the ad makes kids look stupid or oblivious to the world around them and she doesnâ(TM)t like that stereotype. Even if you donâ(TM)t use a âoecomputerâ - you certainly can know what one is. A better response would have been something witty about progress, maybe like âoeThis is more than a computerâ or âoewho uses computers anymore?â or something. This is all even before we get into the fact that from a technological standpoint, an iPad *is* a computer...
...how Apple had to cancel the "I'm a Mac. I'm a PC" ads because everyone thought Mac guy was an insufferable douche and liked PC guy better.
Like Apple or hate it. Apple (and Jobs in particular) has worked for the last 20+ years trying to remove the "computer" from people who had to work with it.
Did you ever get to work with an original Mac? The one that had a training cassette that was to be played with the original tutorial programs? The entire purpose of that machine was to make working with it so simply anyone could do it. (Even my mom...god rest her soui...as mathematically incompetent as she was had no problem using it.)
Now compare that with trying to get a C64 to read from a floppy drive.
Is the ad annoying? Sure. Apple haters are really going to hate it.
But they should be running chrome books by now, anyway. :-)
A hundred years ago, authors wrote books/manuscripts with pen/pencil and paper. Neither pen, nor pencil, nor paper requires a desk. An author can easily operate a pen, and write a book from a park bench, or lying on the floor. Police detectives can write in their paper notebook while walking the streets of any city on-foot.
And yet, with the mobility of pens and paper, authors still had writing desks, and police still did written reports from a desk.
The keyword in "desktop computer" isn't "computer", it's "desk".
A desk is a marvelous thing. It's an organizational structure. It's a focus. It's big. It's dedicated. It's productive.
If you can do anything from an ipad, then you can do six anythings concurrently on a desktop with one large screen. You can do 18 anythings concurrently on a desktop with three large screens. And if one of your "anythings" involves another something -- like an object, or another person, or a product sample, then your desk supports that kind of additional item.
And if one of your "anythings" involves real collaboration with three other humans, in one place, as most creative tasks do, then a big desk in a big room with a big screen allow three humans to function in parallel (as opposed to series).
If you can accomplish your task in a 12" screen, then enjoy your flattened 1980s original imac. 12" doesn't get much accomplished these days. It does, however, do the same thing that it always did.
Your ipad is harder to read than an old newspaper, more awkward than an old book, bigger than a walkman, has worse sound than a record player, and is more delicate anything that's ever been handheld before. It's wonderful and amazing for all sorts of other reasons, especially for varied functions, but it is absolutely worse at each individual effort.
Jack of all trades, master of none. If you don't plan on excelling at anything, the ipad is the perfect device for you.
Some advice: when you hire a contractor to build your house, don't hire one who comes with a swiss army knife. You want the guy with the big rusty hammer, and the big box of screw drivers.
What is a slide rule?
What is a log table?
The tech changes and the terminology changes with it. The ad is (apparently) a prediction and it is pretty certain that at some point in the future the word "computer" will be just as obsolete as the other terms. Who in the real world actually "computes" anything, anyway?
However, it is questionable if, in the world where the word "computer" has slid into obscurity, whether Apple will still be around to say "We told you so!"
politicians are like babies' nappies: they should both be changed regularly and for the same reasons
With the iPad Pro...it IS pretty powerful and I'd dare say it beats some laptops out there for power, and certainly for screen quality.
I've been playing with one, doing Affinity Photo and doing some pretty heavy computational stuff, like focus merging about 22 RAW images. It is cranking through that faster than some older desktops or laptops I've seen.
Is it a replacement, no...BUT....I likely may more often leave my laptop behind and just carry the iPad Pro while out and still do some high end image manipulation on it...till I get back home to the desk workstation set up.
I"m currently using an older MBP, but it is on a stand and wired up to wacom tablet, usb and thunderbolt drives and devices, 27" monitor and good old fashioned buckling keyboard. It is NOT a portable computer. I'll soon be swapping it out for an iMac pro....., but even freeing it up from main use...I will be traveling with my iPad Pro more than the laptop. I need to do work, but usually, I do not need full blown desktop needs while on the road.
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........