Living Life by Design

I’m a tech at one of the largest entertainment companies in the industry

shitpeoplesaytowomendirectors:

Just recently, I was called in to repair something and the (male) director sort of laughed and went, “No really. Where’s my tech?”

I laughed back and said, “I’m the only one you get. You don’t like, I don’t fix.”

He blushed and stepped aside.

• 8 years ago
• 690 notes

An Ode to Apple - What Gives?

Let me preface this by saying that I own an iPhone 4S. I chose it for its compact size, it being the only smartphone available at the time through Verizon that fit in my tiny girl-pockets. It was also chosen because I was so used to my iPod as a means of listening to music and became quite accustomed to the iOS. It was the first iPhone I ever owned, and became my constant companion over the past two years. But that in no way suggests any sort of brand loyalty. My contract gets renewed soon, so who knows what brand my next smartphone will be. After using a touchscreen Windows 8 desktop for a few months, I certainly love it and might just have to try out a smart phone with the same OS. But I digress…

——————————————————

Recently, Apple released the 5th generation of the iPad, as well as an updated iPad mini. A friend of mine happened to post an article about it on their social media site, and so of course I was curious to see how exactly Apple updated their tablet line. I was not surprised to find that the only way Apple truly updated their tablet line was by changing the dimensions, rather than making some major change to the hardware like most other companies do.

Which brings me to the main point of this “rant”, as you could call it: has anyone noticed that Apple really only sells two products? Or rather, they sell two operating systems on a variety of different sizes of the same two devices. On one hand, there’s their desktop systems and OS. I can’t really complain about those, since those seem to get newer models at a much lower frequency than the other half of their business, which is comprised of their mobile technologies. But let’s face it: the iPad and iPad mini lines of tablets are simply larger iPhones, while all three of the aforementioned devices are just smarter and/or larger versions of the iPod. They all run the same iOS, and the smaller devices are all around the same size with the same look and all lines have very similar features. Sure, some have retina or larger memory systems or run a bit smoother or faster than previous generations. But these changes do not illicit a need for a new generation every year. Take the iPad, for example. How much different is the brand new 5th generation from the original first generation? Aside from a few hardware upgrades, the main selling point of this generation is the fact that its thinner and lighter than before. That’s it. Because the iPad wasn’t thin enough to begin with. The Apple website even goes further, talking about how the iPad Air, as this new model is called, is 20% thinner and lighter than the previous version. Which, in all honesty, isn’t that much when you realize that 20% corresponds to only .33 lbs (.44 at most, depending on which previous generation they are comparing the weight to). That’s less than half a pound -how many people are really going to notice that much of a difference? To put that into perspective, an actual apple (the fruit) weighs, on average, .4lbs, depending on its size.

Apple goes on to say that the iPad Air has an “all new design” (and yes that’s straight from Apple.com), when in all reality, the new iPad just looks like a combination of the iPad mini and the iPad with Retina Display (aka the fourth generation). Based alone on the image displayed on Apple.com, the new iPad looks exactly like the iPad mini. Show me an image of the iPad mini next to an image of the new iPad Air, and I probably couldn’t tell the difference. Apple then tries to use the app store as a selling point for the iPad Air (as though this new iPad came with a completely different app store than the one I can access from my mothers older iPad 2), as the the smart case/cover, even though those have already been around for at least a year.

Is anyone else starting to see how ridiculous this is?

At this point, one has to stop and ask: why is Apple doing this? Why release a new generation every year when you really aren’t updating much? Why go through all that trouble? The answer to that is one word:

Profit.

Why else would Apple plan their releases just before the holiday rush? And then there’s the extravagant cost that is required to purchase an Apple product, moreso attributed to buying into a brand rather than paying for a superior device - because, let’s face it: Apple products aren’t any more superior than their Android and Windows brethren. For around the same price as an iPad (and even less if you know where to look and find good Black Friday sales - another thing Apple doesn’t allow), I was able to purchase a Toshiba Thrive tablet, which has a similar amount of screen real estate, and while being bulkier than any iPad, comes with USB/HDMI/micro USB Ports, expandable memory via an SD card slot, and a removable and replaceable back panel, allowing one access to the battery, should it ever need replacing. It also runs on an Android OS, which comes with nifty features such as Swype (which is allowing me to write this whole article from my tablet while on the go, and is adjusting to my typing with autocorrect faster than my iPhone ever did). I’m not saying that I find Android better than iOS, but I enjoy my choice of various options in terms of what tablet I purchase to run said OS.

But let’s get back to the point.

I can’t see why people get all excited about new Apple products like this one. They wait around all year, just waiting for Apples next announcement, knowing its going to come inevitably (as it does every year… Damn, way to take the surprise out of everything Apple), just to find they made minor changes? And then, going on to spend hundreds on that new device, just to keep up with the trend, even though their iPad with Retina is still running perfectly fine. I will honestly never understand the brand loyalty that people seem to have with Apple. What’s the big deal?

Back to the article that started all these thoughts: it went on to say that Apple is probably not going to hold is place at the top for much longer, as more people opt for older iPads rather than the newer models (and yet Apple keeps releasing more generations…), and because of the growing popularity of Android devices. As soon as next year, Android could have a strong market lead on Apple. Only time can tell.

But I know one thing for (almost) certain:
After writing this, my next phone its probably not going to be iOS.

We’ll see.

Link to the Apple iPad Air Product Site:

http://www.apple.com/ipad-air/

The Link that started this long thought process:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-24629711

*This article was written entirely on the Toshiba tablet mentioned above. This is the third iteration of the rant, the first having not been intelligent enough, and the second having been lost in the Uploading Error of 2013, due to lack of a proper writing app.

• 9 years ago
• 0 notes