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- Business Uses for the iPad
I put myself squarely in the “Working Mac User” category. My MacBook sees daily use in an Enterprise. I freelance write about the Mac and use mine in school. Outside of web surfing and the occasional game, very little of my time at the keyboard is leisure time. So, when I viewed the live blogs of the iPad event, my thoughts drifted to “How can us this for work?” Rather than deal with hypotheticals, I’ll go into some ways I could use an iPad.
Covering Conventions
I used to cover E3, the gaming industry’s excuse for middle-aged men to ogle booth babes. I’d have to drag my laptop, a camera, notebooks, and whatever crap got handed to me by PR folks. For each appointment my editor sent me to, I was expected to write an article about what I saw. In that situation, when contemplating how much something weighs against its power, weight wins. An iPad that let me write and file a story in from the show floor and weighed under 2 pounds would have be very useful. Add in the optional cellular plan and I’m not fretting too much over an Internet connection — I know, I know, it’s AT&T.
Flying Steerage Class
When I fly, I give up on getting any work done. I’m a large dude — 6′4, well north of 200 lbs. Even my 13″ MacBook is unwieldy in coach. God help me if I get settled in and the Amazon next to me needs to get up. Then I’m balancing a laptop in the aisle while being jostled. If I’m using an iPad I can just hit the home button and slide it into the seat pocket. Watching movies and reading books on this would be awesome and let me save my iPhone batteries for making calls when I land.
This is also true for the train. I spend three bleeping hour a day on the commuter rail. A laptop is tough to manage on a crowded train at times. I also have trouble getting it at a comfortable height to feel comfortable typing.
Presentations and Meetings
I’m lucky. I don’t need to give dog and pony shows a lot. As a sales tool, though, this would be very slick. I’d walk into a client’s office, pull out a very sexy looking device and give a great presentation on it. I have a few concerns: Apple has said it’ll connect to most projectors, but I’ve run into enough flaky issues where getting my laptop hooked to the projector involved ritual chants and waving dead chickens at it. Also, during Phil’s Keynote talk, I didn’t see him mention any sort of a presenter’s view.
The iPad would also be very handy for taking notes on during a meeting, especially if you’ve downloaded the agenda previously. Every now and then I get stuck in an all-day snoozefest meeting, and I think the iPad would be more meeting friendly than a laptop. Often, I feel like I might be making the organizer think I’m not paying attention, and a thin iPad on the table might be less intrusive.
Working Lightly/On The Go
I don’t think I’m unique here: I’ve got a rocking laptop with a 500 gig drive full of documents, music, photos, and movies starring actresses who may, or may not, have been linked to Tiger Woods. Paraphrasing George Carlin, my Macbook Pro is my house; a big pile of stuff with a cover on it. My friend calls me up and wants me to go to Maui for the weekend. Now, it’s never going to happen, but many of us in these situations delude ourselves into thinking we’re actually going to work on a beach in Maui. Or, a family member is in the hospital — or you’re in the hospital. For whatever reason, you need a smaller version of your stuff — just enough to get by for the weekend. For most of us that need to get stuff done, that’s e-mail, Twitter, web surfing, and a lighter version of some productivity tools. The iPad could fill this niche very well for me.
I can think of three times in the last year I’d have been happy to use an iPad instead of my MacBook. My dad was in the hospital for a week and I found my iPhone was a better use for me than the laptop. In October, he and I took a road trip for a week. I hauled the MacBook with me, but in reality I was just going to be playing games, checking e-mail, and doing some light word processing, and the MacBook was overkill. We were at a convention, and I’d have been just as happy sliding the iPad into my carry around bag. The third time was a weekend away with my wife. I brought the lappy but never turned it on. I did everything I wanted on my iPhone, but would have been much happier turning on the iPad to read a book on.
The iWork Suite May Not Be the Killer App
Phil was quite proud of the iWork suite for the iPad, and he should be — it did look amazing. However, I have a lot of concerns about the suite. The biggest one for me is how it handles transfers. For starters, the iWork apps are very closed source. I can’t hand off a Pages document to someone who doesn’t have Pages. On OS X, I can at least make a PDF; I’ve seen no evidence I can do this on the iPad. Also, there’s no Windows version of iWork. If my companion computer isn’t a Mac, how does it handle transfers? Can I even get the documents off it? Will they be in a format I can use on a PC? It’d be handy if seamlessly converted them to .rtf files during the transfer. Steve Jobs reportedly told Walt Mossberg, “Write it in Pages, you could make a Word version and send it to your editors.” We’ll have to wait and see how smooth that is.
For me, rather than iWork, the killer productivity app might be Quickoffice. It already handles .doc and .xls files natively, can access MobileMe and supports Wi-Fi transfers to desktops.
The Printing Dilemma
One of the productivity-related questions I’ve seen going around is the printing issue. I’ve been giving it a lot of thought, though. How often do I, personally, need to print? Not that often. Maybe a page a week on heavy weeks. But being able to save a page to the iPad, or Evernote and have it sync down is what works best. For me, the lack of printing support isn’t a deal breaker: I can always e-mail it.
Will I Be Getting One?
Separating the fact that as a card carrying member of the International Brotherhood of Apple Pundits it’s in our Union Charter to get one, the three times I could clearly go, “yes, I could have used/preferred the iPad” (and those aren’t the only times, just the immediate, big ones that came to mind) convince me I should get one.
I’m not stupid, though.
This is a rev one device. Now, I still have an Edge iPhone, so I’m clearly not in the immediate upgrade class. I’m convinced the iPad 2.0 will have a front-facing camera at the least. Therefore, I’m actually planning on cheaping out and buying the 16GB version with 3G. I think for me, the 3G availability is more important than the extra storage. I can manage my storage very well. I have a 16GB iPhone. There’s 8GB of audio, 3GB of Movies, and 1.3GB of Apps and data. The audio won’t go to the iPad since I’m quite happy with my iPhone as an iPod, so it’s a given the 8GB will get used up by more video. Keeping with the George Carlin theme, will I need my entire 80GB of movies off my MacBook? Heck no. Just the ones I need to get through my weekend in Maui. The Big Lebowski and Star Wars.
How about you business folks? What are you planning on using the iPad for?
Переслать - How-To: Create a Chiptune in GarageBand
Chiptunes are everywhere, and if you’ve been intrigued by them, this article will help you create your very own out of just about any song.
Chiptunes are traditionally created using sound chips from old computer systems and game consoles. Some of the best examples of chip music can be made using Commodore 64s, GameBoys and the original NES. Since these pieces of hardware could only generate sounds and tones over a few channels, there is difficulty in creating complex songs. Along with the fact that this kind of circuit bending is not for a novice like myself and the learning curve tends to be very high. I wanted to find a way to accomplish this without spending days learning and researching software or hardware.
I am not trying to devalue chiptunes in any way, it definitely is an art form. I just want to present an alternative for those that are curious in creating their own masterpiece. So if we’re not going to need hardware and complicated software, what are we going to use? Using GarageBand ‘09, a plugin and a MIDI file, you can convert a song you already know and love into a chiptune.
First thing is to find a MIDI version of a song you want to create. I just went to Google and searched for “Muse midi” and quickly found a Muse song that would work. Save the MIDI file on your computer for later. Now we need to download the Magical 8-bit Plugin from the YMCK website and put the
magical8bitPlug.componentfile in the/Libraries/Audio/Plug-ins/Componentfolder.- Startup GarageBand and start new project by selecting the Piano. This will create a single track project that we can import our MIDI file into.
- Now drag your MIDI file into GarageBand and you will see it create new tracks for each voice in the MIDI file.
- Double-click a track to change the instrument from the Piano to our chiptune instrument.
- Click the Edit tab and then click the drop-down where it says “Piano” and select “Magical8bitPlug”
- Now if you want to tweak that tracks sound, click the Plugin logo and play around with the settings.
- This needs to be setup for every track except the drums. Use your creativity and change the track sounds to match the instrument they’re representing. The drum track needs some special attention and since the plugin won’t work for this, I did the following.
- Change the drum track sound to the Hip Hop drum Kit.
- Add a new effect to this track. Use the Bitcrusher effect and select whatever settings sound good to you. I used Wave Deconstruction.
Now you may have to tweak the volume levels on each track to your liking but for the most part, you are done. Export an MP3 and amaze your friends! Well maybe not if they read this article too, but with this knowledge you could create your own music and use the chiptune sounds as your instruments. I know this is not as hardcore as true circuit bending, so don’t send me angry emails. It’s more of a fun little project to please your creative side. Share your own creations with us through the comments and check out my final results in the audio clip below.
Переслать - Startup GarageBand and start new project by selecting the Piano. This will create a single track project that we can import our MIDI file into.
- The e-Book Wars Rage On
Amazon went on the offensive over the weekend in a brief battle with publisher Macmillan, pulling the publisher’s physical and digital titles on Friday from Amazon.com and the Kindle Store. By late Sunday, Macmillan was back and Amazon was beaten. While this is a victory for Apple and the iPad, it’s a loss for consumers, at least in the short term, and probably forever.
As of today, Amazon’s policy of standard pricing for e-books at $9.99 effectively ended, at least for Macmillan books, but it’s hard to imagine other publishers won’t follow with new pricing from $12.99 to $14.99. While many will blame Apple for this outcome, it’s a little more complicated than that.
Author Charles Stross gives his opinion on the matter, as well as offering a description of the competing business models, which look something like this:
Supply Chain Model: Author -> Publisher -> Wholesaler -> Bookstore -> Consumer
Agency Model: Author -> Publisher -> Fixed-price distributor -> ConsumerIn the supply chain model, Amazon is both the wholesaler and bookstore. Amazon profits by buying in bulk from publishers at a discount and selling for what they can, and in the case of digital books that’s $9.99. It’s a great business model, unless you are a publisher or author. The agency model gives the publishers control over pricing and relegates Amazon to being a book store.
This is a zero-sum game, one which the publishers were losing until Steve Jobs introduced the iPad. Since Apple is interested in selling iPads and wanted to attract publishers, the agency model was adopted for iBooks, even if it meant higher, variable priced e-books.
Macmillan tried to negotiate a new deal with Amazon, or to continue the current deal with changes like delays for publishing cheaper e-books to protect hardcover sales. Amazon refused and Macmillan’s books got pulled. That resulted in a paid advertisement in Publishers Lunch on Saturday from Macmillan CEO John Sargent defending the agency model and saying nice things about Amazon.
On Sunday, Amazon posted a not-so-nice letter in the Kindle Community, saying that “regardless of our viewpoint,” Macmillan wants the agency model. Of course, Amazon expressed that “viewpoint” by “temporarily ceasing the sale of all Macmillan titles,” not nice at all, but in the end was forced to “capitulate.” However, Amazon doesn’t believe all publishers will switch to the agency model. Sure, they won’t.
So, the bad news is we can all expect to pay $12.99 to $14.99 for what used to cost $9.99. The good news is, if there is any, that competition between Amazon and Apple could ultimately force prices lower in the long term. After all, there is no rule that says either company must take a 30 percent cut of each book sold, except the one where it would destroy Amazon’s business not to.
Finally, if this entire saga doesn’t sound familiar, it should. It’s not unlike Apple’s fight with the music industry, with Apple in the position of Amazon and arguing for flat pricing of 99 cents per song. The music industry demurred and went to Amazon with DRM-free songs. They got their variable pricing with Amazon, and Apple ultimately capitulated. We now pretty much pay $1.29 per song at the iTunes Store.
Not to say Steve Jobs is a vengeful iGod or anything, but you can almost see him smirking down from The Campus in Cupertino right now.
Переслать - Apple Makes at Least $200 Per iPad Sold: Report
Maybe it’s a hangover from my days working in electronic retail sales at Best Buy, but I love hearing about the profit margins companies have for their devices. It’s amazing to me that companies like Sony are willing to take a hit and sell devices at a loss in order to sell more software down the road. Apple is clearly no fan of this kind of sales strategy, and the brand new iPad is no exception.
A new report by BroadPoint AmTech analyst Brian Marshall about the cost of production of the iPad based on the going rate for component parts, manufacturing cost and built-in warranty repair costs reveals quite a wide profit margin on a per device basis. The entry-level $499 model apparently generates $208 in profit, while the top of the line $829 model more than doubles that, raking in $446 per unit.
Marshall estimates that the cost of making the 16GB Wi-Fi model of the iPad runs around $270.50, plus $20 for warranty costs for a total of $290.50. Most of that cost accounts for the 9.7-inch touchscreen display, which Marshall guesses costs around $100. Apple sees considerable savings on its own in-house A4 chips, which run around $15 per unit. With a cost of $290.50 and a selling price of $499, Apple stands to see a profit margin of 42.9 percent with each sale.
On other models that margin ranges from 48 to 55.1 percent, giving the iPad line as a whole an overall profit-generating power of about 50 percent, a number which assumes that the Wi-Fi models will sell considerably more than the 3G-capable devices, a reasonable assumption. Computerworld points out that while the number seems fairly high, it is in fact on par with Apple’s other hardware offerings:
High profit margins are standard for Apple, which earlier in the week boasted that its corporate margin for 2009’s final quarter was 40.1%. Some products, in fact, have estimated margins even higher than Marshall’s iPad numbers: The consensus for the iPhone 3GS is above 60%, for example.
iSuppli, a research firm which is well-known for its Apple product tear-downs and component analyses, has refrained from making any estimates about the iPad’s cost to build as of yet, though it does acknowledge that there’s reason to believe many costs will be similar to those found in the manufacture of the iPhone and iPod touch:
We really want to wait until we know a little more about what’s inside. We’d rather not just throw numbers at it yet. It does seem like a gigantic iPod Touch, which means that although some costs would just scale up from the iPod, like the display and the touch screen, a lot won’t.
Considering that the iPad is a brand new product just getting out of the gate, news that it already enjoys such a wide profit margin is a very promising sign of things to come for future Apple customers. Just like it eventually became profitable for Apple to sell the iPhone 3G at a subsidized $99 price point as parts became cheaper and manufacturing costs went down, so too is it conceivable that we will eventually see a significant dip in the price of the iPad. If the 1G iPad sticks around when Apple eventually introduces a 2G camera-equipped model, for instance, 1G pricing could drop to a point where it would decimate netbook sales.
There’s also the possibility that the iPad will eventually get the same subsidy treatment the iPhone currently enjoys, though Apple doesn’t appear to want to go that route with consumers just yet, preferring instead to keep the device unlocked and therefore theoretically available to a broader buyer-base. Subsidies attached to contracts could reduce the initial purchase price considerably, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see $199 as the cost of entry for the 16GB Wi-Fi/3G model.
Переслать - Rumor: Jobs Bashes Google and Adobe, Hints at New Products
Secondhand reports of Steve Jobs at a town hall meeting for Apple employees have the iconic CEO telling it like is about Flash, Google’s “Don’t be Evil” philosophy, and maybe telling us what to expect in 2010.
First, the stuff for your inner rumormonger from MacRumors.
Steve Jobs believes the iPad is as important to Apple as the iPhone and the Mac, and that’s both unsurprising and scary. Let’s hope it doesn’t become a “hobby” like the Apple TV. As for the iPhone, the next model is an “A+ update” that Google/Android won’t be able to match.
Macs are going to “take Apple to the next level” in 2010, unless that level requires Blu-ray. Repeating the tired refrain about software and licensing being a “mess,” Apple is apparently waiting until Blu-ray sales “take off.” Those, like myself, pining for a Mac mini with Blu-ray take a moment to collect yourselves. Finally, about the whole Lala acquisition, Apple wanted to get them on the “iTunes team,” whatever that means.
Regarding Google and Adobe, there’s some dispute over exactly what was said, giving credence to the theory of eyewitness fallibility or the theory of inflammatory reporting. Take your pick.
According to Wired, Jobs had harsh words for Google, asserting that Apple “did not enter the search business,” but that Google “entered the phone business.” If true, that’s a fascinating comment, in that it could be argued their was, at least from Jobs’ point of view, a kind of informal agreement that Apple and Google would not compete in the same space.
More colorfully, Jobs supposedly called Google’s motto “bulls**t,” maybe. John Gruber of Daring Fireball reports a source told him that Wired was paraphrasing, that Jobs said, “Don't be evil is a load of crap.” Scatological nuance noted.
As for Adobe, there’s less to dispute. Steve Jobs hates Flash. According to Wired, Jobs once again criticized Flash, asserting that it is buggy and it crashes Macs, and that “the world is moving to HTML5.” It’s all good, solid boilerplate execuspeak, but it still won’t get me Hulu on my iPad, or will it? As for the company itself, Jobs suggested that while Adobe has great potential, “they are lazy.”
So, cutting through the rumor chaff for the wheat, no Flash for iPad, no Blu-ray for Mac, and just four more months until WWDC and, presumably, the iPhone A+.
Переслать
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