Un commento da leggere.
The Future of Web Content – HTML5, Flash & Mobile Apps: “The recent introduction of the new Apple iPad has stirred the discussion over the future of web content and application runtime formats, and shone light onto the political and business battles emerging between Apple, Adobe and Google. These discussion are often highly polarized and irrational. My hope in this post is to help provide some balance and clarity onto this discussion.”
Tutte le persone che provano ad usare il Kindle DX che ho comprato, siano colleghi universitari o mia moglie che non ha un background informatico/tecnologico, hanno una reazione immediata: cercano di usare il dito per sfogliare il testo o per richiedere una qualche funzione. E rimangono abbastanza perplessi quando dico loro che devono usare il joystick.
Sarà certamente un campione piccolo, ma è il segno che certi tipi di user experience ormai sono entrati nel vissuto di tante persone. Questo è uno dei motivi per cui aspetto di vedere la reazione all’iPad da parte di questi utenti.
Questo conferma quanto da più parti si ripete: il punto non è solo far leggere qualcosa in elettronico. L’utente vuole anche cambiare ed estendere l’esperienza d’uso. Altrimenti, tanto vale tenersi la carta.
Study finds people want more from their Kindles, less from their newspapers — Engadget: “This may come as a surprise to you (although probably not, you smart devil), but it turns out that plenty of people are dissatisfied with their current e-reader options — according to a recent study conducted at the University of Georgia. The study was conducted over a six-month period where participants read the Atlanta Journal-Constitution on a Kindle, then provided feedback. The results were, well — not entirely shocking. Younger adults found the Kindle to be lacking because it had no touchscreen or other applications (though to be fair, neither does the print version of the paper), while older adults seemed more satisfied, but also reported missing the crossword puzzles and comics of a real, live newspaper. Pretty much everyone agreed that the screen was nice and comfortable to read on, but almost no one was a fan of the price. All in all, there’s not terribly much here that we think is overly telling — besides (of course) the fact that paper rules.”
The iPad And Chrome OS Netbooks Are On A Collision Course: “‘We don’t know how to build a $500 computer that’s not a piece of junk.’
‘Netbooks aren’t better at anything.’
Those two quotes are both from Apple CEO Steve Jobs. The first was during an earnings call in late 2008 when Jobs fielded a question about why Apple wasn’t cutting prices amid the rising success of netbooks. The second came on Wednesday as Jobs was unveiling the iPad.
Apple has made it clear all along that they had no plans to build a netbook. And true to their word, they haven’t. But that doesn’t mean that Apple didn’t feel there was a need for a device that resided in between a full laptop and a mobile phone — in fact, that’s squarely where Apple is positioning the iPad. With it, they feel that they’ve created a $500 (for the baseline version) device that is superior to every netbook out there.
Meanwhile, Google has decided to target the market in between the laptop and the mobile phone as well. But whereas Apple is anti-netbook, Google is very pro-netbook — they just want to make them better. That’s the reason behind Google’s Chrome OS, as Google clearly laid out during its unveiling event late last year.
And so yes, we once again have Google and Apple on a collision course.”
Top 10 Reasons The Apple iPad Will Put Amazon’s Kindle Out of Business:
1) The multi-functional capability. Buy a Kindle and you get… a reader. Another dedicated device to carry. Buy an iPad, and you get a whole new companion that can do pretty much anything. Games, movies, browsing, documents, and more—all in one. And zillions of iPhone apps. It’s sooooo much more than a reader, it’s a whole-life device.
2) The screen. Full color, multi-touch screen, gestures, and more. It’s a pleasure to look at it – and we all can rely on Steve Jobs’ aesthetics to know that it’s a pleasure to hold as well.
3) The compatibility. iPad supports ePub out of the box, overcoming publishers’ resistance to having to support a proprietary format such as Kindle’s; and creating compatibility with books sold through a leading standard format through any channel. (Something tells me Amazon will be making an announcement about ePub support real soon…)
4) The iBooks store. Apple has captured the magic of shopping. Once again, whereas Amazon does great with the functional needs of buying a book, Apple goes beyond to create an experience.
5) The experience. The Kindle provides a good functional experience for readers—in a very Bezosian way, it meets all our needs. But Apple’s creation goes beyond, to make the experience fun and cool. You can swipe through pages on an iPad. On the Kindle, you have to dutifully click a button.
6) The economics. Publishers have been deeply concerned about price erosion with Amazon’s $9.99 pricing—and have been up in arms over Amazon’s 70% revenue share take. Though Amazon has reversed the revenue share (to match Apple’s reported offer at 30%), it would require publishers to cut prices and offer deep discounts. Considering the threat the publishing industry is under, the last thing that publishers want in a time of transition is to have their revenues crammed down further by Jeff Bezos.
7) The apps. In a digital age, a book is (finally!) becoming more than just words on a page. But the Kindle has been slow to recognize this. With the iPad, out of the gate publishers can create whole experiences. Want to create something unique in the market to draw consumers? Publishers can go beyond e-books, and create an app using one of the world’s most popular SDK platforms.
The marketplace. Apple’s iBook and App Store marketplaces will instantly be a must-attend venue for publishers. The anticipated sales of the iPad will mean exposure to so many more consumers than Kindle; and Apple already has 125 million consumer store accounts with 12 billion products already downloaded. Amazon won’t even release the number of Kindles sold, because the number of consumers buying its device pales next to Apple’s reach.
9) The price. For $10 more than a Kindle DX, consumers get an incredible ebook reader, and so much more: a device that they can use for, well, pretty much anything. The options, consumer experience, and flexibility for that $10 are a no-brainer.
10) The Apple factor (a.k.a. ‘sexy’). Let’s face it, Apple is a brand people want to be affiliated with. It has a cool factor. Even those of us who are smart enough to know better still fall in love with Apple products, and carry them with pride. Amazon just doesn’t have that. As Jason Kottke says, ‘the iPad makes the Kindle look like it’s from the 1980’s’.
Apple has upped the game for Amazon. Jeff Bezos and his team better start a clean sheet of design if they want Kindle to catch up again and play as a leader with consumers.
It’s clear that Amazon is already scared: witness their recent moves in the last few days running up to Apple’s announcement. Just this month, they’ve announced an app framework and a new royalty structure to be more attractive to publishers – and both moves are clearly defensive catch-up plays to respond to the threat of the iPad. Amazon is even trying to win love by giving away free Kindles to their best customers.
But the best plan for Amazon isn’t to try to buy customers or try to match Apple’s approach. Rather, they’ll need to re-think their consumer experience from start to finish. They’ve done a great job so far of digitizing books, but now if they want to compete with Steve Jobs’ inventiveness, they’ll have to step up to be a must-have device in consumers’ digital lives. Of course, they can also just surrender and continue to sell books through their existing iPhone app, which should be compatible with the iPad like all the other apps in the App Store.”
Devo dire che sono sempre più sorpreso da certi commenti che leggo sull’iPad.
Chiarisco subito un punto. Non voglio dire che sia una meraviglia “blind sight” solo perché sono un utente Apple. Semplicemente capisco poco QUELLE critiche.
E uno dice che non ha lo schermo HD e quell’altro che non ha lo spinotto USB nativo e quindi devi usare l’adattatore. E un altro dice che ha uno schermo che fa schifo. E altri che dicono che non ha tutto ciò che deve avere un netbook. E uno dice che non puoi togliere la batteria e quell’altro che ha “solo” qualche decina di gigabyte a stato solido. Uno lo vuole quadrato, quell’altro lo vuole rotondo. E uno dice che non fa le tagliatelle e quell’altro che il caffè è troppo lungo.
A me pare che molti stanno a discutere di dettagli o fuori piastrella (vedi commenti sul netbook) e perdono di vista il punto: questo è un device che costa come uno dei tanti ereader sul mercato, più o meno come uno smartphone, fa molto di più e soprattutto ha quello che gli ereader non hanno: il colore e un apps store + ambiente di sviluppo, cioè SOFTWARE. E oggi ci sono già le apps iPhone e a breve presumibilmente inizieranno ad uscire le applicazioni iPad che sfruttano il 10″.
Dopodiché magari quando lo provo e lo vedo mi delude. Ma non certo perché devo usare il cavetto per l’USB. Magari perché non ha l’integrazione con Exchange o non usa bene un disco su cloud per condividere docs.
Mi sa che molti non hanno ancora capito la lezione dell’iPhone: non frega niente se hai la telecamera da 5 MPixel o da 3 o se hai lo schermo da 2000 pollici o di un pollice in meno. Alla fine conta quello che riesci a fare, cioè le applicazioni e i contenuti che puoi utilizzare. Poi qualcuno dirà che in Italia alcuni contenuti non ci sono (vedi video) ma questo c’entra poco con il prodotto in sè essendo una questione di politiche commerciali.
P.S.: Oggi ho iniziato ad usare il Kindle su iPhone. Beh, è più comodo del Kindle vero e proprio. Non oso pensare cosa sarà sull’iPad con schermo da 10″ a colori. Poi tutti mi diranno che l’eink è più leggibile? Boh, questione di feeling direbbe Cocciante.
Una opinione credo simile alla mia.
What We Learned About Apple Yesterday: “The way I see it, the iPad is not about creating; it’s all about consuming content. It shouldn’t be sold in Apple stores, it should be sold on newsstands (together with a 24-month subscription to some newspaper), in video clubs, in libraries. I honestly expected a lot of subsidized options for the device if you agree to buy some content with it, but Apple hasn’t really delivered that – yet. If I’m right, and if Apple starts doing that, most of iPad’s shortcomings won’t matter.”
Leggo commenti di persone che criticano l’iPad in tutti i modi e su tutto. Ovviamente, ogni opinione è legittima. Ed è altrettanto ovvio che bisognerà provarlo per capire veramente come funziona.
Ma avrei qualche commento. Primo, ascolterei il keynote. Jobs spiega bene il posizionamento del nuovo dispositivo. Secondo, senza dubbio l’iPad dovrà crescere come è successo per l’iPhone. Leggo per esempio che non avrebbe il supporto per Exchange e spero che lo aggiungano subito.
Ma il vero punto è che iPad NON è un notebook. È inutile confrontarlo con le prestazione di un notebook. Ma è anche meglio per quello che deve fare di un netbook. Il vero punto è che definisce un profilo di uso diverso e il vero competitor è Kindle. Io già oggi ho in borsa il MacBook e Kindle. Sono oggetti diversi per usi diversi. Ma se confronto prezzo, prestazioni, esperienza d’uso e flessibilità, il Kindle non mi pare abbia speranze. Per di più Apple ha scelto EPUB come formato.
È su questo che si gioca la battaglia, non sul fatto che l’iPad sia o meno equivalente ad un notebook.
