Slashdot Mirror
The 'Post-PC Era' Never Really Happened... and Likely Won't (techpinions.com)
Mark Lowenstein, writing for Techpinions: As we head toward Apple's annual device announcement-palooza, it's an interesting exercise to consider where we are in Steve Jobs' vaunted, much quoted 'Post-PC Era.' The fact of the matter is, that era never fully arrived, and it doesn't look like it will, in the near- to medium- term future. [...] Tablets have had a good run, but sales have tailed off of late. I'd say they've had greater influence on the evolution of the smartphone and the PC, rather than leading to a significantly different nomenclature for what most of us carry around today. My Techpinions colleague Ben Bajarin says that Creative Strategies surveys indicate that only about 10% of tablet users have 'replaced their PC' -- a number that has held steady for several years. And that 10% is concentrated in a handful of industries, such as real estate and construction. PC sales aren't exactly surging, but they're steady. Your average white collar professional today still carries around a smartphone and a laptop, with the tablet being an ancillary device, used primarily for media/content consumption.
Tablets have had a significant influence on the design of smartphones and PCs. They ushered in an era of smartphone screen upsizing, led primarily by Samsung, and now reinforced by the iPhone X and the expected announcement next week of a 6.5 inch iPhone model. For those who don't want to swing both a smartphone and tablet, we have 'Phablets,' most personified in the successful Galaxy Note series, and alternative-to-keyboard input devices such as the S Pen and the Apple Pencil. We've also seen the development of some hybrid tablet/PC devices, the most innovative and successful of which is Microsoft's Surface line. But that product is competing more in the tablet category than in the PC category, with the exception of a few market segments.
Tablets have had a significant influence on the design of smartphones and PCs. They ushered in an era of smartphone screen upsizing, led primarily by Samsung, and now reinforced by the iPhone X and the expected announcement next week of a 6.5 inch iPhone model. For those who don't want to swing both a smartphone and tablet, we have 'Phablets,' most personified in the successful Galaxy Note series, and alternative-to-keyboard input devices such as the S Pen and the Apple Pencil. We've also seen the development of some hybrid tablet/PC devices, the most innovative and successful of which is Microsoft's Surface line. But that product is competing more in the tablet category than in the PC category, with the exception of a few market segments.
Tablets do not replace PCs and laptops. They just aren't as functional. Tablets are nice for reading and doing light work but for anything that requires real heavy-weight work, the PC reigns king.
The big difference is the OS. Mobile devices have those neutered OSes that only let you install approved software and don't give you full control over your own property. There have been attempts to do this with PCs, but so far they are still general purpose computers.
... the big sucking sound for software is coming to close down PC's. We've seen huge gains by Vavle and the game industry to lock down PC's, couple that with smart phone games and emulators like nox and then top it off with windows 10. There is huge pressure to keep taking away control of the machine from end users largely because customers can't reach these companies to punch them in the nads for their theiverous practices. The internet has allowed companies to force policies on populations that don't want them through attrition (aka, are you not going to buy videogames forever if devs choose to release drm infested games?). The market is over and we're finally seeing our society enter a feudal like faze where capitalism is transforming itself into a new feudalism of serfs who have no rights to own the things they buy and lords you extract tribute through simply not being able to be reached by the peasants.
imagine how much stupider it would look to be taking the picture with the camera on a laptop.
If only there were a small device that only took pictures and could then transfer them to the laptop.
If the universe is someone's simulation -- does that mean the stars are just stuck pixels?
Anyone who watches TV knows that a computer is a large mysterious machine that occupies a large room. It communicates via many blinking lights which is how the genius computer operators understand what the machine is directing them to do. Mere mortals are separated from computers by a large glass windows. The computer operators wear white lab coats. There is no readily apparent mechanism by which the humans communicate to the machine; but it doesn't seem to need their useless opinions.
The computer's mystery is exceeded only by its power.
I'll see your senator, and I'll raise you two judges.
Fool. The user is always supposed to have ultimate control over the device. Fuck off with your scare-mongering as an excuse for sloth and apathy. If a user refuses to learn, they deserve what they get. Dont bust out the golden shackles and try to tell me its jewelry.
Good-bye
I always saw tablets as expensive toys with limited uses, and to be fair they have legitimate uses, but as a replacement for a full-blown desktop computer or laptop? No. Too limited, too specialized. It's always been marketing hype like with anything else, trying to convince people their lives aren't complete unless they have such-and-such thing. Just like smartphones; you don't actually need it, a plain old phone would be just as good, but you want it, mainly because they convinced you you need it.
when you're on /. it's easy to live in the tech bubble, but fact is most people just want tech to work. They're a means to an end not an end themselves. If they pay a little (some cases a lot) extra to have it work that's well worth it. And so it giving up the control of an old school PC experience.
Also, there's a huge difference between somebody who likes gadgets and a technophile. We often conflate the two and think there's more technophiles than there really are.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
Tablets have had a good run, but sales have tailed off of late.
That's because they ceased making them better. Almost every tablet I've seen is nothing more than a supersized smartphone and it runs more or less the exact same software. I haven't bought an iPad because it really does nothing for me that my iPhone doesn't do competently and if I need more computing power my PC will run rings around any tablet on the market. Tablet's exist in the space between smartphones and laptops which constrains them on both sides. They aren't as portable as smartphones and they aren't as powerful as PCs. To grow further they need to do offer something which neither smartphones or PCs can easily match.
What seems to be happening is that tablets are slowly becoming low end laptops rather than their own distinct type of device. It's not clear if this is a good thing or a bad thing but it does explain why they've plateaued.
Other problems include that the accessories for tablets tend to be complete afterthoughts. The keyboards, and covers and other periferals are not well integrated. Apple introduced the Apple Pencil which functions fine but lacks software support and has no physical integration with the device. You have to carry it separately rather than sliding it into a convenient holder where it gets charged when not in use.
To use a car analogy, it is similar to why we have sedans, SUV / minivans, and trucks.
Back in the '90s, the proverbial "killer app" to get everyone to buy a personal computer was The Internet. You needed your email and web surfing and the only way to do that was with a personal computer--despite some attempts to make it otherwise.
Which was great for companies that made personal computers. Because while you had competition, "a rising tide lifts all boats." Whether I buy a Dell, HP, Asus, or Toshiba, I'm still essentially buying the same thing. One might be "better" than the other, but these companies compete against each other for essentially the same thing.
The problem is that the tide is starting to go out. People aren't buying as many traditional personal computers. Phones are now personal computers--while it can only do about 50% of what a personal computer can do, it can do 100% of what most people want to do with their personal computer. The economies of scale that made the generic personal computer so successful are now threatened--the personal computer my Mom bought to surf the web is a 3 year-old version of the top-of-the-line computer that I bought to develop software when it first came out. But this time she bought a tablet--something different. The company that made that high-end computer can't move their costs down after a year or two for a wider audience because that market is fragmented.
In some ways, that means higher prices up front for the latest and greatest because they'll have a harder time selling last year's model. My Mom is no longer subsidizing my cheap hardware by buying the three year-old model of what I bought.
People aren't buying as many traditional personal computers.
While there is some truth to the idea that some activities are more convenient on a phone or tablet, I think the larger culprit in declining PC sales is their increased longevity. We are long past the point where the computational power of a PC has exceeded the needs of many users, where a new computer has no perceptible performance increase over a three year old computer for many users. Now granted I installed ample RAM in my 8 year old PC when I built it but it is still a useful machine, even for many video games with a video card upgrade every 2-3 years.
Phones are now personal computers--while it can only do about 50% of what a personal computer can do, it can do 100% of what most people want to do with their personal computer.
Perhaps "many" not "most". For longer endurance activities, outside of gaming, larger screens and real keyboards are more necessary. Phones and PCs will likely remain complementary devices, in the developed world people will likely continue to have both. Tablets and PCs, there we may have convergence, a "laptop" becoming a "dock" and a detachable "screen".
My Mom is no longer subsidizing my cheap hardware by buying the three year-old model of what I bought.
Similar story in my family. The "retired" folks who just wants email, Skype, web browsing and online shopping in moderate proportions is finding a tablet quite satisfactory. And this includes people who had used computers for many years at work.
But for people in school or still working, I think PCs will be hard to replace with tablets.
Fool. The user is always supposed to have ultimate control over the device. Fuck off with your scare-mongering as an excuse for sloth and apathy. If a user refuses to learn, they deserve what they get. Dont bust out the golden shackles and try to tell me its jewelry.
There are a LOT more users that don't give a shit about having "ultimate control" than you assume. What you call golden shackles the average user calls blissful ignorance; and they're quite happy not knowing or being responsible for their hardware.
In fact, most of the shit you own and operate today you don't have "ultimate control" over, so I'm not really sure where your delusional demands are stemming from here.