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Interactive TV is here at last

Remember all the hype in the 90s about the idea of interactive TV? Well, check out the baseball-watching app that was demoed an hour or so into the iPad launch. Looks like interactive TV to me!

The iPad is an Information Appliance

I rarely write an actual essay on this blog, because whatever I want to say, I usually find that someone has already written and published it, and done a far better job than I could. But here’s something I haven’t read yet, in all the many things I have read about the iPad.

The iPad is the information Appliance that Jef Raskin was talking about back in 1979

Jef Raskin was Apple employee number 31, and one of the brains behind the original Mac. It is true that the Mac as it was released is very different to how he first envisaged it, and he left Apple two years before the Mac was launched, but his work was nonetheless a big part of it. From that time and for the rest of his life, Mr Raskin envisaged something called an “Information Appliance” – something both as ubiquitous and simple to use as a toaster.

Although in many ways the Amazon Kindle is much closer to an example of what he described because it is a single-function device, it is my opinion that the iPad is the first real multi-function device that would fit his vision.

Consider, it is a device that:

1. ‘Just works.’ A very large number of people will be able to be actually doing something with it within about 5 seconds of getting it out of the box. 10 seconds if you have to type in a wi-fi password.
2. Takes care of internal details for you. Yes, there is a file system inside this thing. No, you don’t ever really have to care about it.
3. Is where you want it, when you want it. As portable as a book, you can have it in the kitchen, on the bus, or next to your favourite chair (yes, even that one). Plus, with a claimed 10-hour battery life (that’s use time; a month of sleep time), chances are it will be charged. Plus, according to Steve Jobs it ‘boots in seconds’. Excellent.
4. Does what it does really, really well. Reports are that the email app is excellent, and fast, and just works. Reports are that the web browser is excellent, and fast, and just works. Reports are that the word processor is excellent, and fast, and just works. I’m sure we can all see the pattern forming here – reports I’ve read from the few people in the world who have actually touched one of these things all agree on this point.

Let’s get personal now and think about the computer users in my family, because we cover a pretty good range of computing needs:

There’s me. To briefly set the scene, I am a computer programmer. I like to tinker with the way programs actually work, and invent new things – something that can’t be done on the iPad by itself. I also like to read books, gather information on the web, and email. I can do any or all of these things on my daily commute on the bus with devices ranging from actual ink on paper to a powerful laptop. We’ll get back to the iPad’s applicability to me later.

There’s my dad. He’s the one who’s interest in gadgets sparked me off on my whole career, actually – thanks Dad! – when he bought a Dick Smith Cat computer in about 1982. (Ironically, the Dick Smith Cat was an “Apple IIe compatible” computer, something that Apple really didn’t like people to make.) Dad is also a tinkerer, and told me yesterday that he has no interest in the iPad. To him, it just looks like a bigger iPod touch, and not a lot of actual use. Well, I love to be challenged to think, and the result is this essay :)

There’s my Mum. She is an artist, and she runs a network business. (Fellow geeks: I mean people network, not computers.) Her computing activities consist of, to my knowledge, email, web communication and other web tasks, word processing, and I suspect managing digital photos. She has no interest whatsoever in the inner workings of a computer – and by inner workings, I don’t mean bits and bytes, I mean the filesystem and operating system. Fortunately, she has someone handy (see Dad, above) who does like that stuff!

Note that everything Mum does with the computer, she could also do with the iPad (she also has an iPhone; I assume they’ll sync nicely). Additionally, she may well find the Canvas application that was demoed at the launch interesting. I imagine she could well theoretically be an iPad customer. On the other hand, it is highly unlikely that she will buy one for the foreseeable future, for two reasons: first, she already has a quite decent laptop. Second, she has my dad to look after any maintenance issues she may encounter.

Then there’s my father-in-law. He has an eMac that is about 8 years old, which has served him well all this time. Just last year, he upgraded to broadband from dialup internet connection, and at the same time, got more RAM, an upgraded OS, and wireless networking in his home. He is very proud of the fact that he managed to execute these upgrades himself, achieving a level of mastery over the technology of personal computing, a field that he, himself, is half again older than.

His uses of the computer are exactly 3-fold: email, web surfing, and typing. (Not word processing, really – as long as he can get his words printed out in a font large enough to read easily for public speaking, he has what he needs.) Could he do all of this on an iPad? You bet he could, and without any messing around at all. I believe he would be an ideal potential iPad buyer.

My mother-in-law, I recently taught how to turn on a laptop, and in a separate lesson, how to open a browser, go to a specified site, and fill in a form. She is a bit curious about what the internet can do for her, but quite rightly not interested at all in all the hoops required to get there. If father-in-law gets an iPad, I can actually imagine her finding it useful too, assuming she can pry it from his hands. Eventually, I suppose, she’d have to buy her own :)

And now to my nuclear family. We are all heavy computer users, in our own ways.

My wife does LOTS of email and internet research, forums, and word processing. She will also be studying again soon. Potential iPadder? Yes.

Eldest daughter: email, facebook, digital photographs, and school assignments. Definite potential iPadder.

Son: Gamer. He has a pretty good laptop already. A lot of games he likes online are Flash, which, as we all know will never come to the iPad any more than it will to the iPod touch / iPhone. On the other hand, Flash doesn’t run on his PS3 or PSP either, and that lack doesn’t seem to stop them being used… and games for them are a lot more expensive than anything on the App store so far! He would also use an iPad, if he had one, for word processing, study, email, and surfing the web. Potential iPadder, but we’ll probably get another few years from the laptop first.

Youngest daughter, although she is only 9, also enjoys using the web. She likes the social and fun aspects of Club Penguin, for example. She has no need of her very own computer yet, but it will be interesting to see what is around when she does. I’m betting the users won’t be worrying about operating or file systems.

And so we are back to me. You might think I am a gadget freak, always wanting the latest. Not true; I don’t even own an iPhone or iPod touch yet, despite cursing daily at the inadequacy of the UI on my very basic handset. Also, I like to gainfully use my time on the bus sometimes with some programming; something better suited to a laptop or even (shudder) a netbook than an iPad.

So, would I buy one?

Yes.

First, I already mentioned that I like to read. iBooks on a book-sized device? Yes please! Cheap as a Kindle and does other stuff too? Nice!

Ability to use the web and mail on the bus (even if only offline with the wi-fi model)? Yes please!

Ability to have email and the web handy wherever I choose to sit at home, or at a McDonalds, or wherever? Yes please!

Of course, it all falls down if I want to do some programming on the bus. That’s really a quite specialized use that the average user just won’t want. Let me tell you how that could happen: I’ll bet that if I got the 3G version, (possible, assuming the data plan is good and cheap like Apple seems to have negotiated  in the US), I could remotely connect to a home computer.

Sound a bit too tricky? Well, luckily there’s an app for that.

- Mark Whybird