sacrificing design to make a (tops) 1 hour chore that you have to do once ever 18-30 months slightly easier is not in my opinion a worthwhile choice.
Well, then you're too much of an aesthete for me, buddy.
No iPod will be dragged kicking and screaming to the brink of kitsch if it is redesigned to overcome the present deficiency. That's merely a canard of your making.
Apple's current iPod iteration, in fact, has already sacrificed form for function. The first generation's face is purer and less cluttered; its beauty is what launched this craze. But nobody is clamoring for a return to vulnerable moving parts.
If Apple's competitors make market gains because of the battery issue, you'll see Ives quickly make the battery replaceable and that will be that.
Allow me to venture something other than the "Lawsuit? Bullshit!" response so prevalent here.
From one point of view, Apple's problem is failing to be forthright about its intention to discourage battery replacement. As the Neistats' film indisputably revealed, only until a few weeks ago Apple tech support actively encouraged owners with dead batteries to buy new iPods rather than replacing the battery in their post-warranty units. Belatedly introducing a new battery replacement policy won't absolve Apple of any prior misleading marketing or other commercial behavior, if such is found by the courts to exist.
More interesting to me is whether legal action -- or just media coverage -- spurs better iPod design. Everyone would benefit if Apple simply put the battery in a better place than under the hdd and made the case easier to open without voiding the warranty. I hear there's this guy named Ives who might be able to finagle that.
The Neistats are Ralph Naders for the 00's: people not content to be fed whatever disappointment corporate America believes is in their (read: its) best interest.
I salute them for calling out Apple on this one. Sure, Apple has subsequently done better, as the Neistats' web page acknowledges. But they should never have had to make this movie in the first place.
The Post's wooly theorizing about disposability didn't do much for me -- the writer is simply observing, lamely, that consumers will keep forking out for the same product (an idea as old as the midcentury, when it was known as planned obsolescence). Pfft. When you have a genius such as Ives working for you, there's no excuse for failing to make changing iPod batteries easy and affordable.
A hopeful upside of such social changes is that individuals too can learn to exploit virtual organization.
Few, if any. That's the same logic that says, in the hands of a George Gilder, We create a handful of millionaires, therefore our society is successful. Will you still feel optimistic if you're not one of the minority who can "exploit virtual organization?" And even if you are, how will you feel about friends and family subjugated by debt, diminished income, and thwarted economic mobility?
The new feudalism -- which isn't necessarily virtual: Wal-Marts, you know, have mass and form -- is easy to discern but incredibly difficult to combat. How does a serf resist without committing economic suicide? That trap is the lever of his obedience, as our feudal lords perfectly understand.
If there's any upside to be located in the short-term, it's actually virtual -- rethinking, attitude shifts. When right wing politics of the Rush Limbaugh/Bill O'Reilly leads to shipping his job overseas, even the most unimaginative IT person starts to get it. Pity that he might be forced to take that Wal-Mart job before he acts politically; once moved down the ladder economically, he'll quickly find his political capital is a meaner coin and his paths for redress all seem to circle back endlessly to the point of his despair...the punch-clock.
until artists start making decent music. the business is going nowhere.
I don't mean to mock (for a change, heh), but there is so much good music being made and already in print that you'd need a second lifetime to hear it all.
A guide, my friend, is what you need. It's called music criticism: go find some at the library, then use a library card to check out some CDs, and soon you'll be sorry you've lost so much time.
I especially appreciated the Times writer's glimpse of the inner Jobs, as peevish as the turtleneck was black. We can read here both the outlines of the legendary mercurial talent as well as the kind of unbearable self-love that, using the Can I Stand Running Into This Guy At The Watercooler Index, would yield a 3-5% market share:
Actually, Jobs seemed a little annoyed. Looking back at my notes, I found it remarkable how many of his answers begin with some variation of ''No,'' as if my questions were out of sync with what he wanted to say. (Before I could finish a question about the significance of Apple's pitching a product to Windows users, for instance, he corrected me: ''We're not pitching the Windows user. We're pitching the music lover.'') After half an hour of this, my inquiries really did start to fall apart, so I didn't expect much when I resorted to asking, in so many words, whether he thinks consciously about innovation.
''No,'' he said, peevishly. ''We consciously think about making great products. We don't think, 'Let's be innovative!''' He waved his hands for effect. '''Let's take a class! Here are the five rules of innovation, let's put them up all over the company!'''
Well, I said defensively, there are people who do just that.
''Of course they do.'' I felt his annoyance shift elsewhere. ''And it's like . . . somebody who's not cool trying to be cool. It's painful to watch. You know what I mean?'' He looked at me for a while, and I started to think he was trying to tell me something. Then he said, ''It's like . . . watching Michael Dell try to dance.'' The P.R. minder guffawed. ''Painful,'' Jobs summarized.
I don't think it's unreasonable for Apple to take some time confirming the exploit, and planning an update. Remember when they released an update that broke things?
I *do* think it's unreasonable for Carrel to demand deadlines to Apple... or anyone, really... to fix their stuff. Especially when Carrel knows it's going to be fixed. Not much better than blackmail, if you ask me.
If we followed that kind of standard, then we would always be waiting for corporations to decide when they're good and ready to fix problems that put the public at risk. That is a curiously supine view of manufacturer responsibility!
And it's precisely what Microsoft says when lobbying for federal punishment for those who reveal its vulnerabilities: only the corporation shall be an arbiter of public safety where its products are concerned. It shouldn't be hard to work out why that is practically an invitation for manufacturer caprice, negligence, and laziness.
Look again at Carrel's timeline. What happened on Oct. 24? What big commercial product unveiling did Apple choose not to interrupt or cloud with acknowledgement of this untimely news about the famously iron-clad OS X?
If we inspect a relevant design problem - user-replaceable batteries in iBooks - we see that Apple previously engineered a nice, effective solution.
Why hasn't it done so with the iPod?
One obvious reason is iPod size. Looking at photos of a battery replacement in action (see http://www.ipodbattery.com/slimipodinstall.htm) it's fairly clear that the nested battery could have had a removable back cover, but for the fact that the hdd is on top of it! What a peculiar arrangement. Presumably common sense didn't dictate this choice, but rather the desire for a slim form factor. Accessibility would have meant a few hateful millimeters more of width...
Another likely reason is profit. Apple doesn't need to charge $99 to replace your battery, or $59 for an extended warranty. It wants to charge you one of those amounts. Battery replacement is part of its revenue stream.
To be charitable to Apple, this may not exactly be defective design so much as design that sacrifices common sense for superficial qualities (although consumers may think differently as their iPods age). It seems to be the product design equivalent of liposuction.;-)
The original poster made valid points about WalMart, an institution that is responsible for widespread labor abuses, social control of its employees, deflating local economies, and spreading the box store culture of underemployment.
A corollary to your point is that Appple is now negating the manner in which you care for your iPod.
Let's say you're super-careful and never allow even a smudge on your iPod. It stops charging. You send it in for battery replacement.
What comes back, while looking similar, has actually been dropped, thrown around, left outside, farted upon through the back trouser pocket of an SCO executive, tightened between Steve Ballmer's thighs while he practices Desk-Jockey Calisthenics, and vanished internally during the making of a Pam and Tommy video only to reemerge, curiously, many months later in a Paris Hilton video through some kind of hitherto unsubstantiated celebrity porn wormhole.
That's not your iPod! Except that - now it is.
Moral compasses and stuff
on
Mafia Tech Support
·
· Score: 5, Insightful
...if you're skilled and determined but have a flexible moral compass, there's a lot of job opportunities out there.
And if you get tired of working for the mob, your moral dereliction will always be welcomed in the energy industry, corporate accounting, cable TV news, and the mutual funds market.
So Microsoft is going to give us the "news," eh? And for free! How generous!
From an early age Americans are taught to consume news from corporations. Too few pause to ask, "What might these giant concerns wish me to learn today? What might they not?" As we see in just the past few years alone, our news industry is as content to serve as a conduit for profitable lies as was the Hearst empire back in its yellowest days. Did you know the sky's the limit for Enron stock, and that the minarets of Baghdad conceal nukes pointing at us?
For the descendents of the people who gave us luminous skeptics of power such as Twain, Bierce and Nast to suck at these monied teats is one thing. For them to suck their fill and think themselves "informed" is risibly quite another.
I liked your analysis of "disposable computing," even if I think the practice is unwise (environmentally and economically). You've nailed some of the key reasons why consumers spring for lousy machines.
If Apple wishes to be a more responsible manufacturer, it should offer a means to reclaim that gorgeous 20" screen at the end of the iMac's useful life (maybe shorter than the 3-4 years you generously give it). All this would require is the selling of a headless iMac pod, upgrades to be performed at the Genius Bars.
I agree with your take on reactions to this classic David v. Goliath dispute.
The desire to side with Goliath is a sign of groupthink. That's all too common today (and maybe not unexpected given the nation's somewhat nervous economic and military position), but it's also ironic, to say the least, in the case of fans of a corporation that trades on idealized images of individuality and self-expression. When Apple puts the squeeze on an employee, hiding behind a legal tradition designed to yoke human ingenuity to the whims of capital, then it's no more individualistic than the Borg in Redmond. Think Different - but all your different thoughts are belong to us.
However, I don't agree with you on never owning a Mac. That's your choice; but ownership isn't a summons to slavish endorsement of company practices. The machine is nice - even if the corporate master isn't.
Tell your representative that we need a bill to keep America Online...American!
Tell him or her that you don't want to see any further loss of American jobs in important sectors of the economy -- like producing endlessly wasteful sign-up CD-ROMs, policing the speech of adults as if they were children, and shoveling load after load of unwanted ads down the throat of miserable subscribers!
(P.S. Dear Germans: would you mind buying Microsoft, too?)
It's a civilized response from a society that still believes there are other centers of authority than merely business.
Changes of that happening here in the US are next to nil, as we cling to the shibboleth of deregulation even when it brings us crisis after crisis in energy, health, stocks, banking, industry, etc. If your Blair keeps studying his lessons well, you can have our troubles, too.
Fair enough, but a little skepticism - and even a cursory knowledge of McDonalds' track record for marketing deals - isn't necessarily FUD.
Wishing for the best of all possible outcomes, as you do, doesn't change the fact that McDonalds isn't exactly in the business of promoting indie culture. In fact, it's somewhat better known for promoting cultural products that are the equivalent of its food.
When individualism runs amok and society screams for mercy, there's a kind of man who knows how to tell society where to stuff it.
The guy in the Andre the Giant-sized car. The guy with the traffic light changer.
And guess what: that's me, pal. Mr. Individualism Man. And I got a lot more individualism where that came from.
For starters, I want a device that will restart the movie in the theater when I arrive fifteen minutes late. You already saw that part? Screw you, I didn't! And if I like it, we're all gonna watch it again.
Then I want a telephone that, when there's a busy signal, dumps the other joker off the line and puts my more important call through with a terrifying ***Sqwonk!*** and the message, "Please hold the line - I'm patching the president through now."
I want my taxes cut, and yours raised! I want my bio-engineered grass to grow roots that sneak across the property line, strangle your grass's roots, and make mine the greenest yard on the block!
If you're a chick, I want to grope your tits, wash your head in a toilet, dangle you out a third story window, and still be the man you call governor in the morning. I want my shit not only not to stink, but to be in demand from florists on holidays and anniversaries.
Got a problem with any of that, you socialist? See how you like sitting at all the red lights I'm gonna throw your way.
Magazines have lead times, so it wouldn't be unusual for PC Mag to have evaluated Panther before the lethal firewire and File Vault munching issues became apparent. Perhaps tellingly, the review has such a generic feel that it's not even apparent that PC Mag tried Panther; the piece reads like a regurgitated press release.
Minus two glaring faults that affect only certain users, Panther looks very good. And Apple will resolve the problems, albeit tardily. But the bottom line is: when you're costing people data loss, do you deserve a 100% rating.
This will erase more than data - good will and credibility have vanished with this blunder, too.
At an Apple store on release day, I nearly went against my better judgment and snapped up the not-ready-for-primetime Panther. I was backed up, after all, to my firewire drive... Then I thought, "Wtf, Zhe, you horn dog, do you want to pay to find bugs for Apple?"
Whew. Saved by a momentary flash of discipline.;-)
What's really cool about this is how it harnesses the power of the eye.
Optical, derived from the ancient Greek word optikos, literally means "the focal power to perceive fair Helena while she is sunbathing nude in yonder olive grove." That's eye power to you and me, dude.
Some critics will say that a major drawback in these new systems is the need for a mechanized eyedropper next to the chip, keeping the core moist and supple at all times. You don't want this chip going red-eye on you during mission critical tasks.
Still, modders are going to go wild. Within minutes, you can change the color of your CPU's iris using the very same dramatic contact lenses worn by today's biggest infomercial stars.
Unfortunately, if you're into porn, excessive downloading can make your computer go blind. That's why I'll be recommending to my porn-intensive clients that they stay on Wintel systems.
Yep. Cocoatech might want to start writing its open letter.
I sympathize with these developers for their interest in writing little (and not so little) utility apps just as in the good old shareware days.
But it does seem increasingly anachronistic. Who, after paying $129/year for OS X, wants to go and plop $15 here and there for tiny enhancements?
The economics of a modern consumer os argues against this practice. When you're paying regularly for an os upgrade, you come to expect Apple will be on top of what's developed independently and - yes - do some Borg-like assimilation for you.
Slashdot Mirror
Well, then you're too much of an aesthete for me, buddy.
No iPod will be dragged kicking and screaming to the brink of kitsch if it is redesigned to overcome the present deficiency. That's merely a canard of your making.
Apple's current iPod iteration, in fact, has already sacrificed form for function. The first generation's face is purer and less cluttered; its beauty is what launched this craze. But nobody is clamoring for a return to vulnerable moving parts.
If Apple's competitors make market gains because of the battery issue, you'll see Ives quickly make the battery replaceable and that will be that.
From one point of view, Apple's problem is failing to be forthright about its intention to discourage battery replacement. As the Neistats' film indisputably revealed, only until a few weeks ago Apple tech support actively encouraged owners with dead batteries to buy new iPods rather than replacing the battery in their post-warranty units. Belatedly introducing a new battery replacement policy won't absolve Apple of any prior misleading marketing or other commercial behavior, if such is found by the courts to exist.
More interesting to me is whether legal action -- or just media coverage -- spurs better iPod design. Everyone would benefit if Apple simply put the battery in a better place than under the hdd and made the case easier to open without voiding the warranty. I hear there's this guy named Ives who might be able to finagle that.
Don't bother suing: the first 11 letters are pure coincidence!
I salute them for calling out Apple on this one. Sure, Apple has subsequently done better, as the Neistats' web page acknowledges. But they should never have had to make this movie in the first place.
The Post's wooly theorizing about disposability didn't do much for me -- the writer is simply observing, lamely, that consumers will keep forking out for the same product (an idea as old as the midcentury, when it was known as planned obsolescence). Pfft. When you have a genius such as Ives working for you, there's no excuse for failing to make changing iPod batteries easy and affordable.
Few, if any. That's the same logic that says, in the hands of a George Gilder, We create a handful of millionaires, therefore our society is successful. Will you still feel optimistic if you're not one of the minority who can "exploit virtual organization?" And even if you are, how will you feel about friends and family subjugated by debt, diminished income, and thwarted economic mobility?
The new feudalism -- which isn't necessarily virtual: Wal-Marts, you know, have mass and form -- is easy to discern but incredibly difficult to combat. How does a serf resist without committing economic suicide? That trap is the lever of his obedience, as our feudal lords perfectly understand.
If there's any upside to be located in the short-term, it's actually virtual -- rethinking, attitude shifts. When right wing politics of the Rush Limbaugh/Bill O'Reilly leads to shipping his job overseas, even the most unimaginative IT person starts to get it. Pity that he might be forced to take that Wal-Mart job before he acts politically; once moved down the ladder economically, he'll quickly find his political capital is a meaner coin and his paths for redress all seem to circle back endlessly to the point of his despair...the punch-clock.
I don't mean to mock (for a change, heh), but there is so much good music being made and already in print that you'd need a second lifetime to hear it all.
A guide, my friend, is what you need. It's called music criticism: go find some at the library, then use a library card to check out some CDs, and soon you'll be sorry you've lost so much time.
Actually, Jobs seemed a little annoyed. Looking back at my notes, I found it remarkable how many of his answers begin with some variation of ''No,'' as if my questions were out of sync with what he wanted to say. (Before I could finish a question about the significance of Apple's pitching a product to Windows users, for instance, he corrected me: ''We're not pitching the Windows user. We're pitching the music lover.'') After half an hour of this, my inquiries really did start to fall apart, so I didn't expect much when I resorted to asking, in so many words, whether he thinks consciously about innovation.
''No,'' he said, peevishly. ''We consciously think about making great products. We don't think, 'Let's be innovative!''' He waved his hands for effect. '''Let's take a class! Here are the five rules of innovation, let's put them up all over the company!'''
Well, I said defensively, there are people who do just that.
''Of course they do.'' I felt his annoyance shift elsewhere. ''And it's like . . . somebody who's not cool trying to be cool. It's painful to watch. You know what I mean?'' He looked at me for a while, and I started to think he was trying to tell me something. Then he said, ''It's like . . . watching Michael Dell try to dance.'' The P.R. minder guffawed. ''Painful,'' Jobs summarized.
If we followed that kind of standard, then we would always be waiting for corporations to decide when they're good and ready to fix problems that put the public at risk. That is a curiously supine view of manufacturer responsibility!
And it's precisely what Microsoft says when lobbying for federal punishment for those who reveal its vulnerabilities: only the corporation shall be an arbiter of public safety where its products are concerned. It shouldn't be hard to work out why that is practically an invitation for manufacturer caprice, negligence, and laziness.
Look again at Carrel's timeline. What happened on Oct. 24? What big commercial product unveiling did Apple choose not to interrupt or cloud with acknowledgement of this untimely news about the famously iron-clad OS X?
If we inspect a relevant design problem - user-replaceable batteries in iBooks - we see that Apple previously engineered a nice, effective solution.
Why hasn't it done so with the iPod?
One obvious reason is iPod size. Looking at photos of a battery replacement in action (see http://www.ipodbattery.com/slimipodinstall.htm) it's fairly clear that the nested battery could have had a removable back cover, but for the fact that the hdd is on top of it! What a peculiar arrangement. Presumably common sense didn't dictate this choice, but rather the desire for a slim form factor. Accessibility would have meant a few hateful millimeters more of width...
Another likely reason is profit. Apple doesn't need to charge $99 to replace your battery, or $59 for an extended warranty. It wants to charge you one of those amounts. Battery replacement is part of its revenue stream.
To be charitable to Apple, this may not exactly be defective design so much as design that sacrifices common sense for superficial qualities (although consumers may think differently as their iPods age). It seems to be the product design equivalent of liposuction. ;-)
The original poster made valid points about WalMart, an institution that is responsible for widespread labor abuses, social control of its employees, deflating local economies, and spreading the box store culture of underemployment.
Let's say you're super-careful and never allow even a smudge on your iPod. It stops charging. You send it in for battery replacement.
What comes back, while looking similar, has actually been dropped, thrown around, left outside, farted upon through the back trouser pocket of an SCO executive, tightened between Steve Ballmer's thighs while he practices Desk-Jockey Calisthenics, and vanished internally during the making of a Pam and Tommy video only to reemerge, curiously, many months later in a Paris Hilton video through some kind of hitherto unsubstantiated celebrity porn wormhole.
That's not your iPod! Except that - now it is.
From an early age Americans are taught to consume news from corporations. Too few pause to ask, "What might these giant concerns wish me to learn today? What might they not?" As we see in just the past few years alone, our news industry is as content to serve as a conduit for profitable lies as was the Hearst empire back in its yellowest days. Did you know the sky's the limit for Enron stock, and that the minarets of Baghdad conceal nukes pointing at us?
For the descendents of the people who gave us luminous skeptics of power such as Twain, Bierce and Nast to suck at these monied teats is one thing. For them to suck their fill and think themselves "informed" is risibly quite another.
If Apple wishes to be a more responsible manufacturer, it should offer a means to reclaim that gorgeous 20" screen at the end of the iMac's useful life (maybe shorter than the 3-4 years you generously give it). All this would require is the selling of a headless iMac pod, upgrades to be performed at the Genius Bars.
The desire to side with Goliath is a sign of groupthink. That's all too common today (and maybe not unexpected given the nation's somewhat nervous economic and military position), but it's also ironic, to say the least, in the case of fans of a corporation that trades on idealized images of individuality and self-expression. When Apple puts the squeeze on an employee, hiding behind a legal tradition designed to yoke human ingenuity to the whims of capital, then it's no more individualistic than the Borg in Redmond. Think Different - but all your different thoughts are belong to us.
However, I don't agree with you on never owning a Mac. That's your choice; but ownership isn't a summons to slavish endorsement of company practices. The machine is nice - even if the corporate master isn't.
Phrases like This new user interface, or 'user experience'... are not...of...this...earth.
Tell him or her that you don't want to see any further loss of American jobs in important sectors of the economy -- like producing endlessly wasteful sign-up CD-ROMs, policing the speech of adults as if they were children, and shoveling load after load of unwanted ads down the throat of miserable subscribers!
(P.S. Dear Germans: would you mind buying Microsoft, too?)
Changes of that happening here in the US are next to nil, as we cling to the shibboleth of deregulation even when it brings us crisis after crisis in energy, health, stocks, banking, industry, etc. If your Blair keeps studying his lessons well, you can have our troubles, too.
Wishing for the best of all possible outcomes, as you do, doesn't change the fact that McDonalds isn't exactly in the business of promoting indie culture. In fact, it's somewhat better known for promoting cultural products that are the equivalent of its food.
The guy in the Andre the Giant-sized car. The guy with the traffic light changer.
And guess what: that's me, pal. Mr. Individualism Man. And I got a lot more individualism where that came from.
For starters, I want a device that will restart the movie in the theater when I arrive fifteen minutes late. You already saw that part? Screw you, I didn't! And if I like it, we're all gonna watch it again.
Then I want a telephone that, when there's a busy signal, dumps the other joker off the line and puts my more important call through with a terrifying ***Sqwonk!*** and the message, "Please hold the line - I'm patching the president through now."
I want my taxes cut, and yours raised! I want my bio-engineered grass to grow roots that sneak across the property line, strangle your grass's roots, and make mine the greenest yard on the block!
If you're a chick, I want to grope your tits, wash your head in a toilet, dangle you out a third story window, and still be the man you call governor in the morning. I want my shit not only not to stink, but to be in demand from florists on holidays and anniversaries.
Got a problem with any of that, you socialist? See how you like sitting at all the red lights I'm gonna throw your way.
Minus two glaring faults that affect only certain users, Panther looks very good. And Apple will resolve the problems, albeit tardily. But the bottom line is: when you're costing people data loss, do you deserve a 100% rating.
At an Apple store on release day, I nearly went against my better judgment and snapped up the not-ready-for-primetime Panther. I was backed up, after all, to my firewire drive... Then I thought, "Wtf, Zhe, you horn dog, do you want to pay to find bugs for Apple?"
Whew. Saved by a momentary flash of discipline. ;-)
Optical, derived from the ancient Greek word optikos, literally means "the focal power to perceive fair Helena while she is sunbathing nude in yonder olive grove." That's eye power to you and me, dude.
Some critics will say that a major drawback in these new systems is the need for a mechanized eyedropper next to the chip, keeping the core moist and supple at all times. You don't want this chip going red-eye on you during mission critical tasks.
Still, modders are going to go wild. Within minutes, you can change the color of your CPU's iris using the very same dramatic contact lenses worn by today's biggest infomercial stars.
Unfortunately, if you're into porn, excessive downloading can make your computer go blind. That's why I'll be recommending to my porn-intensive clients that they stay on Wintel systems.
"I mean, it's not like I'm running Windoze, which is known to crash."
I sympathize with these developers for their interest in writing little (and not so little) utility apps just as in the good old shareware days.
But it does seem increasingly anachronistic. Who, after paying $129/year for OS X, wants to go and plop $15 here and there for tiny enhancements?
The economics of a modern consumer os argues against this practice. When you're paying regularly for an os upgrade, you come to expect Apple will be on top of what's developed independently and - yes - do some Borg-like assimilation for you.