When I talk about or teach people iOS development often we start to talk about Android and I always say one thing - I use iOS myself, I make apps for that system but I don't want it to be the only mobile OS out there. I want systems like Android to succeed - even if I won't use it myself there's always something good for me from that - competition will force Apple to make iOS even better, to treat developers better and to try harder in general. That's why I'm often sad that Google made tons of stupid mistakes when they made decisions about Android and its future.

And right now we have 10000 devices, every one of them has different hardware, different screens, different versions of Android. Some get updates, some of them don't and never will (the great pre-iOS  approach to clients - you want new system, buy our new phone). It's a mess and there's not much Google can do about it, at least for now.

Then Amazon came out with their Appstore and I had high hopes. And it turns out - I was right. They made difficult decision of starting their own store but that decision was a good one. Distimo analyzed the situation and - big shocker - for many developers Amazon's small store gives more profit than Google's huge marketplace.

Wow - so people prefer to buy apps from good sources and like to be sure that it will run on their device instead of just hoping that "available for Android" means that their device is on the list of supported devices.. And even developers prefer to feel comfortable and know on which devices and OSes the app will run. If only Google would be smart enough from the beginning instead of just force mass production of Android powered devices - maybe I would be Android developer now (or at least iOS/Android).

It's just a first step, but a really good one. One that is a light at the end of the tunnel. Maybe Google will learn something, maybe Amazon will get more popular and somehow replace Android Marketplace. Maybe in some time there will be good reason to make Android apps. I really hope so.

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I was driving in a car with a friend of mine back from Gdansk where I tought some cool people about iOS development and there was this story on the radio about chat bots. We were talking a bit about them and I remembered that there was this one called CleverBot which got pretty high score on Turing Test not so long time ago. I decided to talk to him/her today myself.

Now I'm convinced that we should start to make Turing Tests for people now, to get the new scale because if that one scored 42% then I'm curious how stupid those in "human" part of the test were to make CleverBot sound smart/human enough to get such a high score.

Seriously - I really, really tried to act like it was normal conversation but >90% didn't make sense. Gramatically and in any way at all. Except for places where basically any answer would be correct and places where CleverBot asked questions the conversation was similar to one you could have with a retarded, blind, eating-its-own-poo monkey with ADHD. Don't get me wrong - it's a smart monkey in a sense that it knows how to bang the keyboard with it's own head to make words sound English - that part is amazing (for a monkey). But the rest? Pretty much random selection of sentences from database would make pretty much as much sense as our conversation. I had conversations that were better and made more sense with some chat bot from a small Polish company 10 years ago than with this state of the art "computer".

I'm sure there's a great technology behind CleverBot, huge datacenters, advanced algorithms etc. but before you spread the world that computers/bots are getting smarter please check if it's not the case of just people getting dumber..

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Niedawno ruszyła tzw. duża e-księgarnia "spod pióra" Helion'a ebookpoint.pl i od razu poszła dobrą drogą - zdecydowała się zrezygnować z DRMów, a co jeszcze lepsze - postanowiła się tego nie wstydzić i pokazywać, że to dobra droga.

Kolejnym krokiem aby osiągnąć ten cel stał się mały konkurs-pytanie do tych najbardziej zainteresowanych - czytelników i potencjalnych klientów - dlaczego DRM jest kiepskie (bo że jest rozumie się samo przez sie). Jako osoba, która stara się to mówić od lat postanowiłem niejako powtórzyć to i tutaj.

DRM w przypadku naszej księgarni możnaby przeparafrazować jako "Do not Read Me". Zabezpieczenia DRM jako zabezpieczenia antypirackie występują w różnych formach, rozmiarach i kształtach, ale zawsze można je porównać do świnek morskich. Tak samo jak taka świnka wcale świnką nie jest, do tego z samym morzem nie ma nic wspólnego, to jeszcze dodatkowo jej skuteczność antypiracka list podobna co DRM'ów. DRM'y z zasady, w 99.(9)% działają tylko na tych, który dany produkt z tym zabezpieczeniem kupili - piraci w większości, zarówno Ci aktywni (udostępniający) jak i pasywni (pobierający) dysponują i cieszą się wersją tych "zabezpieczeń" pozbawiona lub wręcz wypadałoby powiedzieć - uwolnioną. DRM to takie kajdany dla uczciwych nabywców dóbr cyfrowych, nałożone przez jedną lub więcej osób z procesu sprzedaży, która z jakichś to powodów stwierdziła, że jej czytelnik, fan, klient (niepotrzebne skreślić) to zapewne złodziej i lepiej mu te łańcuchy założyć, żeby nie korciło go aby kupiony utwór udostępnić komukolwiek. W imie pokrętnej "logiki" i chęci maksymalizacji wyimaginowanych zysków, ktoś z tej ścieżki produkcyjnej zapomniał, że ma do czynienia z fanem, klientem, drugą uczciwą, myślącą osobą. Osobą która często (co może jest jeszcze bardziej przykre) nie poszła najprostrzą drogą próbując ściągnąć plik z torrent'a, rapidshare'a czy chomika dostaje prezent w postaci "zabezpieczen". Zarejestrowała się w serwisie, wypełniła kilkanaście formularzy, wpłaciła lżej lub ciężej zarobione pieniądze na konto sprzedawcy, przeszła proces weryfikacji oprócz potwierdzenia w oczach "sprzedawcy" (któregokolwiek na liście) uczciwości.

I ten brak zaufania możnaby było przeboleć, gdyby tylko na tym to się skończyło. Niestety najczęściej to tylko początek problemów - bo a to połączenia z internetem potrzeba, a to nie działa z naszym ulubionym urządzeniem, a to nie w tym formacie (a przekonwertować sie nie da, bo zabezpieczone). I tak siedzimy sobie przed monitorem, patrzymy na nasz najnowszy, wcale nie tani zakup, ściągamy kolejną aplikacje, bo ta której używaliśmy nie obsługuje XXX DRM i gdzieś w głębi naszego umysłu pojawia się pytanie - po cholere ja to w ogóle zrobiłem, a można było prościej, szybciej i korzystać gdzie i kiedy się chce.

Drodzy sprzedawcy - jeżeli chcecie konkurować z piratami (którzy paradoksalnie wychodzą tutaj na tych dobrych) - skoro już ceną nie możecie, to konkurujcie szybkością, prostotą i zadowoleniem. DRM'y tego wszystkiego nie dodają. A klienci się znajdą.

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Few years ago I bought my first and only Windows Mobile device because I wanted to write some apps on it. Mostly for my personal use but since I was also working in a company in which we were specializing in .NET applications maybe something for business too.

It was way before any normal, real touch devices like the iPhone was introduced. I didn’t like the experience of poking some small x’es with a stylus and the way that the phone worked and was organized. I never wrote any real app on that thing.

Now, after few years of iPhone Microsoft is introducing their new platform - Windows Phone 7.

First of all - the name is stupid - is it a windows phone or a windows operating system for phones? Windows Mobile was at least closer. But that’s not the stupidiest thing when it comes to Windows Phone 7- there’re ads.

WTF? Am I retarded or something or they say that we love our new phones too much so they created one that suck and you will never want to use it after you buy it? Well - if that’s true - at least they would be pretty consistent when it comes to Windows mobile platform..

Good tip for you Microsoft - keep those ads - change the final message so that people would at least hope that your system doesn’t suck. Say something like “the phone so cool that you will not be able to take your eyes of yours”, but not THAT!

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Kilka godzin temu wróciłem z przedpremierowego pokazu filmu “The Social Network” David’a Fincher’a - filmu, który ponoć ma spróbować przedstawić historię powstania Facebook’a. Spróbować, ponieważ powstał na podstawie książki “The Accidental Billionaries” Ben’a Mezrich’a (autora, który zaczyna lubować się w historiach wybitnych studentów - inna jego książka została zekranizowania pt. “21”) - a jak się robi np. film na podstawie książki na podstawie życia, to można już tylko próbować. No a ponoć, ponieważ jak się człowiek zastanowi, to tak naprawdę film wcale nie opowiada historii powstania Facebook’a, a bardziej historię grupy znajomych/przyjaciół, którzy - tak się złożyło - stworzyli Facebook’a.

Muszę przyznać, że po wiadomości o powstawaniu filmu nie byłem specjalnie pozytywnie nastawiony. Nie pomógł specjalnie trailer - ot - na fali popularności serwisu ktoś postanowił nakręcić o nim film. Innymi słowy - nie spodziewałem się zbyt wiele po tym filmie.

I tu człowiek musi przyznać się do błędu. Możliwe, że przyznałbym się wcześniej, gdybym sprawdził kto ów film będzie robił, niemniej jednak nie zwykłem robić rozpoznania (jak np. sprawdzania reżyserów) filmów, które mnie nie interesują. I był to błąd, duży błąd Panie i Panowie. Bo Panu David’owi Fincher’owi wyszedł (z resztą nie pierwszy raz) naprawdę dobry film! Film - jeszcze raz to podkreślę - nie o Facebook’u, film który mógłby być równie dobrze filmem o serwisie dupamaryni.pl i nadal byłby interesujący, ciekawy i dobrze nakręcony, a co najważniejsze - który naprawdę dobrze by się oglądało.

W świecie, gdzie hity kinowe operują na najprymitywniejszych emocjach i pragnieniach, ktoś stworzył film, który prezentuje 2 godziny dialogów, bez efektów specjalnych, bez eksplozji, bez grania na emocjach i sztucznym budowaniu napięcia. Naprawdę - ten film to 2 godziny gadania pomiędzy kilkoma aktorami, z których tak naprawdę interesuje nas może 3-4 z nich - niemalże recepta na niewypał (zwłaszcza biorąc pod uwagę temat Facebook’a) czy co najwyżej rzewną historyjkę, którą można obejrzeć co najwyżej w telewizji, jeżeli nie ma nic ciekawszego do roboty. A jednak - 2h oglądania mijają jak z bicza strzelił, a sam film staje się naprawdę dobrym obrazem. Z premedytacją unikam tutaj słowa “hit”, ponieważ (przynajmniej dla mnie) oznaczałoby to coś modnego chwilowo, bez głębi, do obejrzenia raz, po byciu skuszonym reklamą w telewizji lub przed innym filmem. Ten film to hit w zupełnie innej kategorii, niż filmy jak Avatar, Alicja czy Transformersy - bo ogląda się go nie dla samego oglądania, a dla obejrzenia historii przez niego opowiedzianej. Film porównywalny jedynie z innymi filmami reżysera, jak chociażby “Siedem” czy “Gra”, którego mogę oglądać wielokrotnie i znajomość historii wcale nie sprawia, że z filmu czerpie się mniejszą przyjemność.

Na koniec, obawiam się dwóch rzeczy. Po pierwsze - że ludzie mogą iść lub nie iść na film ze względu na temat. Myślę, że pewna cześć osób pójdzie na film tylko dlatego, że jest on o Facebook’u - będą to Ci, którzy wrzucają “śmieszne” fotki na Facebook’a, mają 7 miliardów znajomych i piszą zajefajne komcie. Z drugiej strony z tego samego powodu ominą go osoby, które wolą obejrzeć film ciekawy, inteligentny, a darować sobie wszystkie eksplozje, Piły i filmy, których 90% budżetu stanowi dola dla studia od efektów specjalnych. Uważam bowiem, że powinno stać się zupełnie odwrotnie i film ten skierowany jest (wbrew pozorom) do innej publiczności, niż początkowo (zważając na temat) jest kierowany.

Drugą rzeczą jest historia w filmie pokazana. Nie ma co ukrywać i nie będzie to specjalny spoiler, jeżeli powiem, że film nie pokazuje Zuckerberg’a w specjalnie pozytywnym świetle (chociaż przy odrobinie wyczucia - myślę że mogłoby być znacznie gorzej). Niestety - większość osób uzna historię przedstawioną w filmie jako prawdę objawioną i w 100% precyzyjną historię powstania popularnego serwisu. Myślę, że warto jednak pamiętać, że film jest adaptacją (niestety nie wiem jak luźną) książki, w której pisaniu pomagał Eduardo Saverin, więc delikatnie powiedziawszy - może być “nieco” stronnicza.

Namawiam Was do obejrzenia The Social Network - to naprawdę dobry, solidny film, z rewelacyjną ścieżką dźwiękową, bardzo dobrą grą aktorską (szykują się oskary) i historią oraz formą prezentacji, która potrafi naprawdę wciągnąć.

PS. Jeżeli odrzuca Was fakt, że jedną z głównych ról gra Justin Timberlake - nie martwcie się - jest kiepski, ale z drugiej strony sama jego gra jest marginalna i bardziej się o nim mówi i jest się świadomym jego postaci, niż się ją ogląda.

PPS. Fun fact - w filmie wykorzystano efekty specjalne, ponieważ role braci Winkelvoss gra.. jeden aktor!

PPPS. Chciałem podziękować firmie Brand New Media oraz Pawłowi Opydo za możliwość zdobycia wejściówki na film.

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I know, I know - it’s just a prototype, but it leaked and that’s also something which would probably be a final product if HP would buy Palm. The HP Slate prototype video leaked - running Windows 7 and everything and I have to say - if that’s your killer than we have nothing to worry about.

First of all - after months of having iPad and watching this video I think everyone (sane) will agree - tablets has to run their own OSes - there’s no chance for good, useful tablet running Windows. It’s just stupid - from OS point of view (maybe bigger icons and on screen keyboard doesn’t make Windows a touch-friendly device), from developers point of view (what’s the point of making tablet apps for Windows when you can just make Windows apps for much bigger market) and at last - from user point of view (what’s the point of having the most popular OS on the board if 99.9% of apps aren’t and never will be “universal” and work/look/feel well for both - mouse and touch). When iPad was introduced most people said Steve Jobs was insane when decided to put iOS instead of OS X on the device - now we can see that he was right - iPad (or any tablet device) couldn’t and wouldn’t replace normal laptop - it’s a new category a computer for something else and the device wouldn’t be any better just by having OS X on it instead of iOS/it’s own OS. Also - it’s would be terribly slow! Netbooks was introduced so that people would have cheap device to surf the web and write documents. If a tablet sucks at this first one - what’s the point then?

But ok - it’s a prototype, it won’t be available with Windows 7, HP will make Palm OS run on it - you say. Ok - so it might work faster, it might be more touch friendly, it might have it’s own community of developers with apps written just for the tablet Palm OS. But there are things in this device that makes me to believe that (if the same team will be responsible for making the HP Slate with Palm OS) it will also suck. There are subtle things from the design point of view which shows that this team clearly doesn’t have a clue or a vision of a decent tablet device.

How the hell someone thought that it would be a swell idea to put a keyboard button on the side of the device - which you have to press every time you want to show or hide onscreen keyboard? Seriously?! There was no other solution? If so than you have failed and you should get back to the drawing board. It’s a tablet device - the least it should do is to provide you a decent (not good - decent would be enough) way to read and write stuff using year fingers. If one of those basic functions require you to press a button ON A SIDE of the device than it fails at provide that most basic functionality. It like making a universal car that runs on both - diesel and gas - but when you want to change a gear you have to pop the hood and change it manually with a screwdriver mounted under it. Or even a Kindle (or any hand held device) to which you would have to connect USB keyboard if you would like to write/change something.

Second insane idea - HP Slate has a dedicated CTRL+ALT+DELETE button! Well - there’s nothing more that client wants to hear than that in the research and development they decided to put a special, dedicated button to show you a task manager so you would be able to kill frozen apps. That’s a sign of good quality, trustworthy, stable device.

Those are some of the reasons which makes me to believe that with or without custom/Palm OS - HP just won’t be able to ship a good HP Slate device. In my head they are acting and designing like a company which makes stylus operated devices in a world of multitouch. And that’s sad - there’s nothing good when there’s no good competition in any area. 

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Many companies has R&D departments that makes really interesting stuff. Microsoft has their own labs. Part of those labs decided that people don’t like to just sit in front of their TVs (or at least have that option) - instead they have huge apartments and would love to jump like retards in front of their console. They created a problem (in their heads - people don’t like controllers) and solved it.. kind of.

Other part of research team at Microsoft found another problem - when you use Google Street View there’s nothing more annoying than not being able to see 10GPix, crisp pictures. And I have to admit - if you have good internet connection - there’s no such thing as too good picture quality. Solution - Microsoft Research Street Slide View. At first I thought that they will use one of their older technologies (Photosynth) which creates 3d environments using and connecting many pictures - I have to admit - that would be cool and interesting (at least if they would use their own pictures - and not pictures taken by users on flickr or any other photo sharing site). But that would be too cool and too simple for Microsoft. So as a solution to crappy picture quality while zooming in Microsoft will give you an option to zoom out - giving you super small (but crisp) pictures of one side of the street. Oh - and since it leaves a lot of browser space on upper and lower part of this panorama - they will also give you ads. No more this fancy 3d panoramas, no more problems of low quality pictures while zoomed in - instead you can watch one side of the street and some really cool ads - problem solved!

Seriously Microsoft? You worked for months and came up with a step back idea and more advertising? I would more likely prefer to jump in front of my TV - at least I see potential (not for gaming of course) in that technology. 

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There’s more and more buzz about iPhone 4 “death-grip” and how it should be “fixed” with 4.0.1 software update (based on 4.1 beta). And the buzz is mostly negative - and by negative I mean that iPhone users are playing CSI, squeezing their iPhones and showing on youtube that it still looses reception. Well - no shit Sherlock! That’s what phones do when you try to fuck with the antenna. When most amateur video authors see “no fix” I actually see a fix. I really try to ignore people squeezing their phones like crazy, trying to “change the grip” cause it’s not working or “let me go to the basement, because I’m upstairs and it could be a factor since I can’t perform the death-grip” - I really really really do. What I really see from those videos - I haven’t seen a user with reasonable reception to fully loose the service (actually with any reception but I guess you can loose it if you can have like 1 bar normally). I see people loosing reception to 1 bar but that’s it. Guys from Pocket-lint was kind enough to not just “perform death-grip” (where most ends) but also check if reception loss has actual impact on making a call.

I wrote this in few places before - I think that the problem was the reception algorithm which was showing more reception than the phone actually had. Second of all - I have this feeling that this algorithm also caused iOS to drop service and search for one when it actually had like 1 or 2 bars of reception. There’s no confirmation on about that one but those early videos seems to prove that that might be actually what was happening.

If you want “final death-grip solution” - ask Apple to make static icon of full reception. I have a feeling that that’s what most of those iPhone 4 users wanted.

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My last post about iPad simulator bug turned out to be an iPad bug - well - webkit/safari bug on the iPad. You see - when I use this kind of CSS:

-webkit-border-radius: 8px 0 0 8px;

I will get upper left and lower right corners rounded on all webkit browsers (safari, mobile safari on iPhone etc.) but not on the iPad. On the iPad I will get no rounded corners. To get ones - I need to set the same radius for all.

-webkit-border-radius: 8px;

And it works fine but isn’t what you neeed.

Now - to test if it’s just a simulator bug or iPad bug I used page that changes the radius dynamically on the iPad’s Safari browser and it worked fine - so I decided that it’s just a bug on iPad Simulator. But that’s not the case - the bug is an iPad bug in general (Safari on iPad to be exact). So why the page worked fine? Well - because there is a workaround. You can set corner values individually for more than one corner:

-webkit-border-radius: 8px;

-webkit-border-bottom-right-radius: 0;

-webkit-border-top-left-radius: 0;

And you get the same result as you get on webkit browsers without the bug.

Also - this bug aside - think of how awesome tools Apple creates that you can actually replicate a bug from the device on a simulator! They could choose the easy road and just use webkit installed on the system or use the same webkit for every simulator they ship with XCode. But no - to give you the fullest experience before testing your software before the actual device - they make it with the same software (if it’s possible of course) they use on the device itself. Pretty awesome for a software you basically get for free..

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Just discovered a bug in Apple’s iOS SDK.

You use UIWebView and load a simple HTML file. One element has -webkit-border-radius CSS property set with few values (the one from screenshot has: -webkit-border-radius: 8px 0 8px 0). Everything displays well on both iPhone simulators but on the iPad simulator - there’s no radius. For the iPad simulator to “work” there can only one value - for all corners. What’s more interesting - it works well on the iPad itself.

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Apple and bad engineering? I don’t think so.. If you like to fly in space and listen to your favorite music all the time. If nothing pisses you more than your music to stop playing when you’re dying by being shot with a Death Ray - well look no further - the iPhone 3GCO (Crappy Old) is here.

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Maybe that’s just me but I get a feeling that we don’t get more iPhone killers anymore. That war is lost and Apple competitors decided that maybe it’s better to advertise your products as a product rather than just another iPhone killer. Which is a good thing - for both - Apple fans and people that doesn’t like Apple brand - plus customers which can concentrate on what does the phone really offers rather than just what it has bigger or better than the iPhone.

But it doesn’t stop people from trying to compare new products to Apple’s i-stuff and put things just because Apple doesn’t have those.

Cisco decided to hit the market with their new tablet device called Cius (which BTW we should pronounce “see us”, but this “i” in between makes it really difficult to do so - at least for me). And it’s great - in a free market there’s no better thing than a good competition. The problem which I have is with few small things that makes me think that Cisco decided to wink at us and market their product (at least a little bit) as an iPad competitor.

First of all - I think we all expected iPad to have a front facing camera so that we could use this device to talk to friends, chat (and of course - sex chat :P). Why it doesn’t have one - well - I have few theories. Because I could write a whole new post just about why Apple decided to not build iPad with camera - I try to say it quick and simple. First - that’s a feature for iPad 2G. Second - Apple wanted the iPhone (the device which started this whole Apple mobile market thing) to start that whole FaceTime revolution and I think Apple will try to keep it that way - so that the core features will be announced on the iPhone platform first and than adapted to other iOS devices (exception - iBooks - but only because it is a core functionality for iPad and maybe some extra one for the smaller devices) - so be prepared to have iPad to iPhone FaceTime calls with iPad 2G (and maybe even Macs - which will be announced as a revolution - when you don’t have to have a phone to call somebody - mark my words). And third of all - Apple just didn’t know if iPad would sell well enough - so they decided to concentrate on things like iBooks and mobile web than on other features.

That’s how Apple works and that’s what gives Apple constant flow of money - introducing few new features every few months instead of making devices pre-packed with all of them out of the box. If you don’t like it - don’t buy Apple products because that’s just what they do and they will not change.

But back to Cisco’s Cius - what’s the number one features presented on pictures and videos about the device? Front and back facing cameras (5 MPix, 720p HD). I wonder why they emphasis on that feature.. And don’t get me wrong - it’s great that you have front facing camera - it’s that one feature that’s missing from the iPad but really? Front facing HD camera on 7” display? 720p chat on any display? Back facing camera on a 7” device? That’s one huge camera which I can take to wherever I want and make 5Mpix pictures with it.. “Wait a sec, I will just take my huge tablet device and make you a picture - who really needs those small compact cameras or cameras in phones when you can make a picture or video with this huge screen”. Maybe I don’t get it - maybe it’s really important for business solutions so that when I talk to someone in HD to switch to a camera on the back of the device so that he or she can see my crotch. In HD!

Second thing - 8-hour battery that is detachable and serviceable. I get that it’s hard to replace a battery on the iPad and you want to show that with your Cius I can replace it myself, but why would I? If it would work on AAA batteries than great but it’s not like I will carry few batteries with me - just in case I will feel the urge to replace them. And after some time - when I will have to replace battery on my device because it will suck - I’ll just go and replace it. I cherish few more hours of battery life much more than the chance to replace it every few years. And guess what - it’s not like it’s impossible to replace it on the iPad and even when I have - it’s not like I will have to wait for weeks so that Apple will replace it in my device. It might even be quicker (for a customer) to replace a battery on the iPad with Apple battery replacement program than to replace it in your Cius.

What’s more? A bunch of stuff but I won’t get into details. Just thought that those two - which Cisco obviously thinks that makes their product so much better than the iPad - is enough. Why I wrote about them? Because just like with all those iPhone killers - I think they’re just missing the point - concentrating on megapixels and not on things that really matters. It’s like with those compact cameras and megapixel race - in a long run - it’s just not good for anyone.

What’s Cisco missing? First and most important - the apps and experience. You can’t build a 7” device and say you will have the mobility AND the full experience of your desktop. Steve Jobs said that they think there’s something missing between the iPhone/smartphone and Macbook/notebook. He didn’t say that it will replace any of those - that we will stop using desktop or mobile computers, that you will have the same experience like on a laptop or desktop - he said that maybe for some of tasks - like reading or browsing the web it’s better to have a smaller, more mobile device with which you can have more direct interaction with - thanks to the bigger mobility and touch screen features. You can’t say that only Cisco can give the best solutions and products and than say that you also have a access to Android Marketplace and that you will give Android developers the ability to use some of your APIs to use in their apps. And don’t know about you - but if a company would say that they are the best and only they can provide good quality apps and then wink at me and ask me to develop some (so logically - inferior to their) apps for their device I wouldn’t be that interested. Especially if you make it sound that it you do it because it’s a great deal for me - not for you.

I know that Cisco Cius is more business solution and i direct competitor for the iPad which doesn’t directly targets business right now, but you can’t help it that you are and will be compared to the iPad, especially if you clearly concentrate on features lacking from the iPad (if business would give a fuck - I’m sure we would here that it supports Flash).

I don’t write all this to show that iPad or any Apple product is superior to other solutions. I find them cool and useful - you don’t have to and that’s fine. I’m also aware that they don’t have all the features, hardware and functionalities that it could have. But also because of that I feel that it’s important to show you my point of view so you could compete better with products which I currently use. I might never buy your products but if you compete well enough - Apple will have to try that much harder when they will produce and release their products - which in the end - is good for you, me and everybody.

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I finally found the time to write few words about the whole Android thing.

Over two weeks ago NPD made a research which shown that Android-based phones outsold iPhones in U.S. in the last quarter - with 28% of smartphone sales, while iPhone was sold in only 21% of the cases. For many people - that was a pretty big deal. For me - not so much. It was pretty impressive when Apple took a huge chunk of smartphone pie - not because it’s Apple but because they did it with just one phone and now the reason of me being not impressed is pretty much the same. The thing is that for me it was just a matter of time - since Apple have pretty much only one/two phones out there and Android was thrown in about 40 phones already. It doesn’t even matter that the Android sales were boosted by Verizon’s “buy one get one free” deals. It was just a matter of time when Google’s free system would be in more phones (or even devices maybe) than Apple’s.

But since that’s not so much important - let me tell you what is.

I think that Google made and is making a big mistake with their mobile system. Actually - two mistakes which causes me to think that more means less.

You know why iPhone and Android are so popular? Because companies that made those realized that more and more people (especially with smartphones) want good operating system on their devices. The way the devices is designed is important but it’s the software part which will be used for hours per day and has to be useful, powerful, well thought and friendly. Without that even Apple wouldn’t do much with their great design and marketing. And Apple and Google was pretty much the only ones which got that and are successful because of that. All the other guys from the phones market didn’t and still don’t get that it was the software part that made iPhone so successful and you won’t make an iPhone killer without a killer OS on your device. And that’s the problem of Android. You can like it, you can even love Android and think that it’s so much better than iPhone OS and I can think it’s the other way around but I’m pretty sure we can both agree that it pretty much looses it’s coolness when it’s not updated.

Apple made something simple, relatively cheap and brilliant - they started to update the software of their device. Before that - you pretty much stuck with what you got then you bought the phone. If you bought smartphone with some Windows Mobile system you used the same system for years without the option to update your device and add some new features. Apple pretty much changed that in a large scale. They introduced small and large updates. iPhone OS 2, iPhone OS 3 and now iPhone OS 4. And if you bought an iPhone (even the original one) you could go from OS 1.0 all the way to iPhone OS 3.x. And Android is also constantly updated - it started with 1.5 and few days ago version 2.2 was released. The problem is that when it comes to Android - pretty much only Google gets that it’s really important to update - all those phone producers still lives in a world where you have to buy a new device to get the newest software/firmware.

And I think it’s Google’s fault. When Google released their system they should have said - here - you can have and use our system for free, you don’t have to worry about making it better, fixing bugs, adding new features - we will handle that. But if you decide to use it on your device - you have to agree to do two things: first - you have to send us every device on which you use our system, so we would have hardware to test it on. And second - every time we release new version of our system, you will recieve an email from us if the system is compatible and ready for your device. And if it is - you have 2 month to release it for you users (2 months is enough time for apply and make any changes you want to make in your version of Android - like some changes in UI etc.).

Google didn’t do it and now you have devices bought few weeks ago which can be outdated and have old version of the OS, without all those cool new features. And I think that’s Google’s first big mistake and that it damages the image of Android system itself.

As it turned out - I wrote more than I though I would so let’s say that that’s it for now - more - including the second mistake - maybe tomorrow.

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Ok - haha - who hacked into my inbox again?!

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I love to support indie developers - especially if they have good products and they’re actually trying rather than just expecting that people will buy their products.

This time it’s Humble Indie Bundle which contains 5 games from Indie developers - World of Goo, Aquaria, Gish, Lugaru HD and Penumbra Overture. All the games are DRM free, available for Mac, PC and Linux and part of what you pay goes to charity.

If that’s not enough - it’s one of those “pay what you want”, where.. you pay how much you want.

I have to admit - I have some of those games from other purchases (some of them I didn’t even finish yet) but I still bought the package to support the developers and I ask you at least should consider doing the same.

Plus - I’m really interested in indie development and I’m planning to interview John from Wolfire after the bundle madness will end.

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I read an interesting story this weekend. I like Apple for those little things that usually you don’t even see or realize that they exist. This little story is about one of those.

There’s a very (the most) popular instant messenger in Poland called Gadu-Gadu. It’s not in any way a great application or network - just the first and only for a quite long time which made it difficult to compete with it. They want to be up to date so they released apps for mobile devices - including for both - iPhone OS and Android.

For some dumb reason they also decided to charge people to use mobile versions of their apps. The apps are free but you have to pay subscription to use it on your mobile devices. As far as I know - it’s true for both - iPhone and Android. You get a free app which is a trial version and for which you have to pay subscription. But there’s an interesting difference between those too.

You see - to buy a subscription you have to use Premium SMS, which is a normal SMS message sent to a special number and for which you’re charged between from ~2 times to ~100 times as much as you’re charged for a normal SMS message. I don’t really like that kind of payment - first of all - the provision is like 50% and second of all - somehow I don’t like to pay big mobile phone bills. But that’s really not the point of this story. Normally if you would like to pay with Premium SMS you have to send some message like “GG.YOURGGNUMBER” to some 7xxx number. On iPhone you have to do it manually. On Android on the other hand you have one button you have to touch. Which one is better?

Well - you might say - Android is clearly better. On iPhone you have to get out of the app, open SMS app, dial a number, write a message and send it. On Android you just have to tap a button that is your subscription of choice. Well - you might say that - if the app is well written and thought. You would change your mind if the subscription window would pop up again and again - every time you tap on the button. Normal person would think - there’s clearly some problem with connection or something or it’s a bug and would tap on one or more of those buttons several times before they would quit the application. And that’s what the author of the story did. Little did he know, the Android app sent those Premium SMS’ each time he tapped on the button, without any confirmation or any sign at all. As a result - he was charged for a 90 days subscription (each time 9 PLN without 22% tax, which is >30 times more then for a normal SMS message) multiple times.

He wrote to the company which made this app but they didn’t care. They said that the app did what he wanted - sent messages and it’s not their fault that he tapped the button every time it popped up. Luckily for him - he’s a lawyer and is willing to sue them not for the money (which would be nothing compared to what he could get if we would live in US) but just to show them they can’t treat their clients like that. In the comments there’s a similar story from Symbian user.

So if you ask me - I would prefer the iPhone way. Yes it take a little longer but I’d rather spend a minute every 90 days and send a message manually than to loose some relatively large sums of money because there’s some communication underneath I don’t know about.

So if you complaint about lack of some super time saving feature on the iPhone or long and picky approval process for the AppStore - think again. It might save you few bucks (per app).

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So HP and Palm announced today that HP will buy Palm for $1.2 billion. That’s twice as much as the company was worth on the stock market after almost 1/3 collapse on 19th. There were speculations that companies like HTC or Google might buy Palm but I think that not many out there thought about HP.

I have to admit - I really don’t like HP. Before Macbook I had their premium class notebook. It was pretty good at the moment, had pretty good design - the difference between it and other “normal”, ugly laptops was visible. Very soon it became crap. First the hard drive, than the battery, than the wifi card, touchpad. After few months of using it it stayed more time at HP support than on my laps. I also have HP printer which is also crap. Recently I’ve had to replace one of the cartridges (black) and ended up printing gazillion test pages - every time I turned it on. It was aligning the cartridges every time. After printing the test page and hitting Cancel like a million times it was printing fine, but for some reason - HP engineers decided that it would be swell idea to force this alignment procedure every time you change the cartridge - without showing any message of course, so that the customer could use some of paper and their overpriced ink basically for nothing. Oh - did I mentioned that you have to have both cartridges (black and color) to print this damn test page - even if you just print in black? Yeah - for me - that’s the quality of HP. That and crappy quality of any software they release for their products.

Now - HP wants to buy (and probably will) Palm. For me and for many people interested in mobile market - that’s a very sad news. Why? Well - HP can’t offer anything more than money. Sure - that money will save Palm from bankruptcy but in the long run nothing good will come out of this. HP will use Palm in three ways - first, the patents, but that’s not really important, second - the webOS, but that’s not that simple and third - the brand.

When it comes to webOS, HP is a partner of Microsoft for their Windows Phone 7 and they agreed to continue working on that. That puts them and Microsoft in pretty awkward situation when it comes to continuing development of webOS. It could work out with other companies/partners but with MS - it’ll be tough. I kind of hoped that Palm would be bought by a company like HTC. They have experience in developing phones with Windows and Android and it worked pretty well. You wanted a standard smartphone - you’ve had their Windows phones, you wanted something more fresh - you’ve had Android phones. The next OS would be something nice to choose from. And what’s even more important - they have experience in this mobile smartphone market. HP on the other hand have almost zero experience. One of the reasons why HP is buying Palm is that HP wants to get to this more and more interesting market of mobile phones and mobile devices and Palm is already in it and it’s known. Unfortunately - that might be only good deal for HP but not for current and future customers of Palm. Many people now say that that’s the chance to see webOS in tablet devices. There was a chance for that - but now - when we know that HP will buy Palm I doubt we’ll see this anytime soon. HP is practically only company that wasn’t interested in using mobile OS like Android in their tablet - HP Slate. When every other player makes tablets with mobile systems like Android or iPhone OS, HP will release theirs with Windows 7. For me that’s a sign that HP wants to see tablets as normal computers but without keyboards and with touch screens. That means no to webOS.

The last reason why HP is buying Palm is for the brand. As I said - Palm is known for their work on mobile market. They were pretty much the first to announce the iPhone killer. The mobile market is now really interesting place to be and HP want some of that cake. It would be really hard and uncertain for them to start from the beginning with their or some new brand. Instead - they’ll use Palm as a backdoor to get to the mobile market. And once again - I think that might be a good deal for them but a terrible thing for the customers and the brand itself. Palm was pretty much one of the stronger competitors of Apple and the iPhone. Palm was meant to give something fresh. Now, I’m afraid that HP will kill that freshness. They will become just another mobile phones manufactures and with every product released the Palm brand will mean less and less. It will become just another brand of phones - like Sony Ericsson, Siemens or Samsung. Just like HP is just another brand of computers next to Lenovo, Dell or Asus. They will not create nor become the new iPhone. HP at the end will kill what made Palm so different and unique.

So - HP came to save Palm like a good, wealthy knight on a white horse. And it might look great and romantic at the beginning. But at the end of the day - the knight will take the princess to his castle and make some nasty things to her, because she owes him. And than she will have to take care of the children, wash the dishes, clean the house and do some more of that nasty stuff while that not so good anymore knight will sit on the couch, drink some beer and watch TV in his underwear. The prose of life no one is talking about.

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Gizmodo made a stupid mistake by saying to the public that they bought the iPhone prototype. If they wouldn’t they could just say that they are journalists and they can’t reveal their sources. Instead - they wanted to brag how much they paid and now they’ll most likely be found guilty committing a felony. Such a rookie mistake..

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Few days ago someone uploaded a video showing Android working on the original iPhone a.k.a. iPhone 2G. I wouldn’t say it was a good experience - mainly because Android phones was different approach in usability and usually have more buttons than the iPhone has. Now Android A Lot uploads a full video tutorial on how to do this on your own phone.

I wouldn’t do it for few reasons. First of all - I don’t have iPhone 2G. Second of all - I enjoy hacking devices (would love to see Android on my Nokia N700 which is useless since Nokia screwed first users and didn’t update the system of their “original” internet tablet), but it seems as suck a dirty hack. More proof of concept from some Android geeks than something which would be actually useful in everyday life. Third of all - I don’t think that there’s a reason to install other system than iPhone OS on that device - I’m more interested if there will be a way to hack the updater and install iPhone OS 4 on the 2G.

But there’s something which I would do - if I were Google that is. I would prepare an “official” Android release for the iPhone 2G. With easy installer, customized to work with only one Home button etc. It would be a good demonstration how fast and well you can customize Android to work on a certain phone, it could be actually something useful - more useful than working with Adobe to make their crappy technology working on the Android and the timing is perfect since Apple is dropping support of the 2G with the release of the new OS.

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mnmal:

A little humor with the Woz.
Original on the iPad Report

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