While Apple itself has done a lot to piss me off nothing compares to how much the fanboys have done it. Apple does a lot of illogical things which the fanboys always defend, no matter how bad it is. The absence of a camera on the iPad caused fanboys to scream and yell how cameras are useless, yet at the same time Apple was working of FaceTime with the ability to have a video conference between multiple devices. But this post isn’t about FaceTime (again) instead I chose to write about some of the arrogant things fanboys have said in a while.

No maximize button

If you’re a Mac user you know that OS X does not have a maximize button anywhere on the operating system. The trade-off here is that instead of a “full screen” maximize Apple has implemented a stretch-to-content like feature. It’s a decent feature, but I don’t think it’s very necessary. If you need to resize a window to content, you could do it manually, quite easily. Maximizing takes a whole lot more work because you have to stretch the window so all corners in the window hit the corners of screen.

The feature is not the problem though, it’s the fanboy response to that.

“It’s because the Mac is all about multitasking, full screen does not allow multitasking”

I’m sorry, what? That sounds like you’re implying that we’re forced to run it full screen. Quite the opposite, we have the option of maximizing. I can have multiple Explorer windows open transferring files between different folders, I could be chatting on Messenger, and any other crap you might throw at it.

I do agree that maximized windows are against multitasking, but it’s far from being anti-productive. If you’re working in Photoshop, or editing a video in Final Cut, are you going to run it in a small 800×600 window or are you going to run it in full screen? In reality, having multiple windows open leads to distractions. Though the computer might be able to “multitask,” the human mind can only process certain things at once.

I’m going to go as far and say Windows 7 is better than Mac OS X at multitasking. The classic taskbar is faster at switching between open applications than the OS X dock, and ALT+TAB displays all open windows while Command+TAB displays one instance of the application. So if you have multiple Terminal windows open then it would only display the one.

I’m just confused why these fanboys are anti-feature. What’s wrong with having both a maximize button, and a scale button. A fair compromise would be hold shift and press the scale to fit to maximize. There, everyone wins.

The iPad 2 resolution

Recently there was a rumour going around that Apple would double the resolution of the current iPad in the iPad 2. While this rumour was based on the packaged files in the new version of iBooks, Apple fanboys jumped to conclusion and assumed everything was going to be new and different. To explain, when the iPhone 4 came out with its doubled resolution Apple added a naming scheme “x2” so that the appropriate resolution was chosen for the correct generation of iPhones. Well apparently someone found a file called “iPadx2” somewhere in the package.

The file was a background graphic (wood tile) and the original resolution was 768×400, where the x2 graphic was 1536×800. Mind you that the original iPad resolution was only 1024×768. Wouldn’t it be more possible that Apple just doubled the size of the graphic so that there would just be a large graphic, instead of a small tile?

What is the rumoured resolution of the new iPad? It’s a highly impressive 2048×1536. But the question is would Apple include such an impressive DPI/resolution on the iPad before including it in a Macbook Pro?

Another issue that affects this whole thing is price point. I don’t think Apple is the kind of company that would offer such an impressive resolution, with IPS at that very appealing $499 price point. Take into account that a large resolution like this would need a beast of a processor to render everything. Games at that resolution would demand an insane amount of processing power that I don’t think we’re able to achieve yet with mobile processors. With stronger processors, the battery life would be compromised and what would be very disappointing.

Verizon iPhone

In Canada this is totally unnecessary. Our CDMA carriers have switched to HSPA networks, and thus all carriers are able to carry the iPhones (well, all carriers that matter anyways.) However in the States this is some new dawn of time. I guess it makes sense since it used to be exclusive to a single carrier and now it’s available on two. This is not a significant jump at all.

The rest of the world is allowed to enjoy the iPhone on any carrier they wish, because there is no technology war between different technologies. While in concept CDMA is superior to standard GSM phones as it allows more simultaneous connections (and other technical reasons.) Modern GSM phones use wCDMA for the 3G.

Anyways, the fanboys are treating this like it’s the end of Android. Though the iPhone is technically available to more people, it seems like a pretty niche market. Most people who wanted an iPhone already had an iPhone. The whole Verizon deal opens the door to people who were never thinking of getting an iPhone before. Also with it being so close to the release of the iPhone 5, I see no point in investing in a Verizon iPhone, yet.

But by far the worst thing I’ve heard was:

“This is going to be awesome for developers.”

Yeah, how might that be? It’s still the same phone, it doesn’t offer anything new to developers. If Apple announced the iPhone 5 for Verizon then it would mean a lot. For now it’s just slightly larger sales numbers for developers and the same old for everyone else.

While I’m on the topic of the iPhone 4, where the hell is the white iPhone, Steve?

So yet again we have an Apple press conference. I have talked about Apple press conferences before: here, here, and here. Now the media has a thing for blowing this shit out of proportion, making a big deal about every minor thing that Apple releases. I guess I do too.

First came the iPod Shuffle. After the last shuffle which was the size of a quarter. It seemed Apple did some market research and learned that people actually want buttons on the device. What a shocker! So the current Shuffle is practically the same as the one we had 2 years ago. Great! It’s a nice device for anyone who just wants a cheap device to load up with songs. It does not need a screen, it does not need wifi. It’s just a simple-ass music player. Along with adding the controls, Apple also added an additional 5 hours of battery life. Fuck yeah.

Following that we had a dramatic change to the iPod Nano. While the Shuffle got controls, the Nano lost them. The Nano is now an 1.5 inch square screen that plays music. Not the change I hoped for but at least they got rid of that pointless camera on the back of it. Apple boasts to have multitouch on the device which leads me to my next question. Why the hell is multitouch important on a 1.5 inch screen? I don’t think that an 1.5 inch canvas is enough to do any gestures. Another thing that pisses me off is the clip. It’s basically an iPod Shuffle, with a screen.

Next comes a device that I actually want: the iPod Touch. Take the iPhone 4 and take out the phone (and LED flash) and you’re left with the iPod Touch. It’s fairly impressive: you have the retina display, you have the 1ghz processor, and you have the dual cameras capable of recording 720p. All is good, but the price of it sheds some light on how over priced the iPhone 4 is.

The 32GB iPod Touch is 320CND.
The 32GB iPhone 4 is 780CND.

That’s a difference of 460CND.

The 32GB iPad is 650CND.
While the 3G version is 780CND.

That’s a difference of 130CND.

So what’s the deal with the other 330 dollars? Okay, so add in the cost of the GSM antenna and LED flash. That’s nowhere near 330 dollars.

Apple also announced some bullshit social networking service aimed at music loves. Totally ignoring the fact that Myspace exists, Apple decided to show their spin on it. I guess it’s kind of a neat idea, if it wasn’t run by Apple. This whole service is just a way they can push you to download more music. Joe Biden likes “Love Game” by Lady Gaga, WOULD YOU LIKE TO BUY IT RIGHT NOW FOR 99 cents? A friend of mine mentioned a great idea: what if you could share your music with a friend kind of like what the Zune had? You can share the song with a friend and he can listen to it a limited amount of times before the song expires. Brilliant! But instead you are force to buy it.

But the worst of the worst has to be the new Apple TV. They took the current device, and just gutted it. They removed the ability to watch 1080p, they removed the hard drive, they removed all the syncing and other “complicated” bullshit. You are left with a device that can only steam movies and TV shows. You no longer “own” any content. Watched a good episode of Glee and want to show it to your friends? Well, you’re going to have to re-buy it. Sounds great no? They did drop the price of it to 120CND, but that makes me wonder, what made the old one ~$250 anyways?

Also, Apple showed no love for the iPod Classic and continues to sell it for $270. That’s an incredible price point by today’s standards. If they dropped the price of it to 199 that would be great! Hard drives aren’t that expensive anymore, are they?

“Why do other companies bother making phones, the iPhone is the easiest one to use.”

That’s something I heard the other day, and I did not take too kindly to it. It came from some person who probably never used any other phone for an extended period of time. Agreed, the iPhone is pretty easy to use. All I do is go to the app store, download an app, it shows up on my home screen and tap it to open it. But last time I checked, I can do the same thing on my Windows Mobile, or Android. Making phone calls and changing settings are all pretty much similar as well. So what does it make this guy think that the iPhone so superior?

To answer that question let me quote Microsoft “the computer that’s easiest to use is typically the one you already know how to use.” Which is totally true: If you use an iPhone all your life then using some other phone will be some strange and unfamiliar experience. There are some differences between the phones, but by no means does it make the phone confusing and stupid. Whenever you move from one thing you’re accustomed to, to another things might be a little off, but better. Say you’re moving up from a Honda Civic to some Ford Mustang, you’re going to have to get used to the changes, but once you do you can enjoy the full benefits the other product offers.

Even if you love your iPhone, you have to admire other companies. Competition drives innovation and helps advance technology. Do you really think that the iPhone would have copy and paste, MMS, LED flash, and a high resolution screen if it wasn’t for other phones? No competition also means that companies can charge whatever the hell they want. This makes it worse for the consumer, why the hell would you want a monopoly? It’s bad for everyone except the company itself.

So go ahead, love your iPhone. But don’t hate competition, they’re your best friend.

So… iPhone 4 hit up Canada. Yeah, I picked one up. It’s a nice little device  and I’m having a blast with it but there is just one problem… Getting it was a pain in the fucking ass. I have waited in lines before and quite frequently they are painless. In fact, most lines are better than they actually appear to be. “Your wait time from this point is 60 minutes” says the sign at Canada’s Wonderland, yet 20 minutes later we are somehow on the ride. On hold for the credit card company and it says estimated wait time if 45 minutes, and eight minutes later I’m on the phone with someone I can hardly understand bitching about my statement. It’s beautiful because you are getting more than what you expected, you are actually pleased…

But what about the Apple line. Showing up early as fuck in the morning to get the jump on the line was apparently an idea shared by many. Estimates put about anywhere from 400 to 500 people in front of us at the most. You figure you have most of the store trying to sell this product, you could easily move through this line in a couple of hours. Oh, but this is using common sense. What ended up happening was a horror story.

Before the mall opened, the line was humming along at a snails pace. Slow, but we were making progress. Everyone started making introducing ourselves. Laptops were in abundance and Youtube’s data traffic was never higher. It was the greatest part of any line. Eventually the line stopped. It stopped period. It was not moving at all.

I went to see what was up, and asked the Apple rep what was going on. The Rogers servers were down, which is understandable due to the nature of the day. “But Nick, why was the line not moving if Bell and Telus were still able to activate phones?” Great fucking question, and it is one I asked. I was told that it was unfair to the Rogers customers if anyone else could get a phone while they were waiting, so in the spirit of fairness  we must all wait for our turn. It was at this time everyone was pissed, so free water was given out.

At this point of the line, most peoples laptops had already died out, so human interaction was necessary to fight off insanity. Problem is a bunch of fat Apple loving nerds arn’t the best company to keep for long durations, so people started taking breaks away from the line. Going off at 30 minutes or so at a time to get food. I heard a group of guys actually went off and saw a movie while a friend held their spots. How this sort of thing could happen, well, when a line doesn’t move for two and a half hours at a time people can go dick around forever and come back like nothing happened.

Rogers would constantly go down throughout the day, and line’s would stop. People would crowd around the front of the store, yelling for a solution. The most common, and sensible solution, was to give out a voucher to the Rogers people, guaranteeing them a phone but telling them to come the fuck back when the servers arn’t corked. An Apple employee actually said this was “illegal” due to “copyright law” and that if we were unhappy with it we should “contact our MP.” People were pretty pissed off.

Now, about 15 hours in we were told the store was closing, and they were handing out vouchers for people to come back the next day. What the FUCK?! We were not just told that it was illegal to do this, and in fact this solution would have solved all the problems. We went back the next day and walked out with a phone in ten minutes. Why? People could come at their leisure instead of waiting the hell in line to get their phone, thus no need to line up to guarantee themselves a fucking phone.

The whole experience sucked fucking dick. 15 hours for a piece of paper telling us to dick off cause the management couldn’t handle basic human beings properly. In my picture I show a picture of the line breaking off in weird, convoluted ways. That is exactly what the fuck happened. At one point we were standing IN FRONT of the Apple store walking AWAY from it to get closer to our phones. Then we stopped for three hours cause Rogers shat the bed. Why the fuck are activations, a process which takes significantly longer than buying a piece of hardware, in the same line as anyone else. Could you imagine going to fill up your tank of gas, and having to wait while people get their engines services? It would be complete horseshit. Yet 30 minute credit check and activations are piled in with hardware sales because they perceived it to be the same. It’s not the fucking same, it’s a piece of technology compared to negotiating a contract. A FUCKING CONTRACT.

What sucks is while we were all waiting in line for the iPhone and getting fucked over, normal customers were going in and walking out with Mac’s and iPods. Apparently, when the store “opened” they only had three people dealing with phones and the rest of the Macsperts were standing around looking important or helping give tutorials on how to Google on Safari.

I don’t know what blows more, the fact that a high tech, top end consumer and business electronics company can’t simply manage a line of people on their fourth iteration of the product, or that I was in line and wasted a fucking day of my life being angry with other angry people. Sure, it was nice to get off my fat ass and feel like I belong to some sort of community, but lets be honest, it was a waste of everyones time. I’m just shocked at the whole event.

Seriously, how do you fuck up a line?

There seems to be a lot of magic in the air. By which I mean the Apple Magic Trackpad that has been released recently. Apple is no stranger in the touch interface world: the iPhone and iPad has made them millions!

But it seems that Apple has been whoring out the technology. Last year we saw the release of the Magic Mouse, being both a mouse and a miniature trackpad. Now Apple has made a giant laptop trackpad calling it “the first one ever for OSX” even though Wacom has been making the Bamboo tablets for a while now.

Regardless of whatever Apple releases you have thousands of fanboys run out and buy everything that’s made by Apple. There’s no exception this time, these Macfags boast how much better than a mouse it is. Newsflash Macfags, there’s a reason why most people plug a mouse into their laptop instead of using the track pad. The mouse is faster, has more precision, and has more freedom – your canvas is as big as your desk – so why would anyone use a trackpad. In all honesty, it’s fun. Zooming in with your fingers can be quite nice, you can slide a window by sliding your finger, but god knows it can’t replace everything.

I’m really surprised Apple hasn’t released a touchscreen version of the iMac or Macbook yet. That way you can directly touch the screen instead of moving a cursor.

Also, learn to embrace pen input.