I never actually thought I would end up buying an iPad or for that matter really liking one if i did. However, sat at 32,000ft typing this review out on an iPad this thing makes absolute sense, and is just about the best gadget I have purchased to date.
For the vegetarians amongst you, there is a very easy analogy the iPhone is a quorn burger, where as the iPad is a full blown New York strip steak with steak sauce, fries and whatever else you care to have on, or with your steak. Yes it doesn't multi-task, and yes you are limited to the apps that apple approve - but what you do get is a fantastic piece of hardware with some fantastic apps.
The ultimate role of the iPad is neither to be a laptop nor a giant iPhone, it is to be the device you goto on a morning to get your news fix, or when you are sat down and having an argument over who made the engines for the Blackbird. It's instantly on and instantly there, unlike any device I have ever used you click it happens.
The keyboard is surprisingly good and like the iPhone, it will learn your common mistakes and correct them. Unlike the iPhone however there is built in spell checker, which seems to be apart of the OS so is available to any application that supports it; it's the simple touches that make life easier.
As far as battery life goes I expect it to easily last the 6hour flight to San Francisco that I am on now, which will involve watching at least 3 episode of FlashForward, and multiple tweets.
All in all I think it may well turn out to be a good buy.
In my continuing saga to be as lazy as possible, I have brought back my Apple Remote into use. It has practically no use except when away from the computer you can change the iTunes track. So been as I use Spotify almost as much as I use iTunes why can't I do the same.
Turns out you can with a little SIMBL plugin, http://themacbox.co.uk/smr/
Update Available: http://www.jacktams.co.uk/2009/10/09/spotify-applescripts-updated/
I have almost solely being listen to music through spotify for the last couple of weeks, sure it doesn't replace iTunes but its damn good at what it does, all you can eat music for free. http://www.spotify.com/
The Problem:
Spotify can use the built in shortcuts for play/pause, forward and reverse, but if like me you use a different keyboard and effectively 'dock' you Macbook its not much use. Enter Quicksilver, the perennial quick-launch and whiz-kid short-cutter for mac. http://bit.ly/yrlr7
I already have a load of triggers set up within quicksilver for everything from make an event in iCal to post a tweet or send email.
So getting Spotify in there, it turns out Applescript is here to help, using the System Events helper you can select a menu item without actually clicking it. Below is the code for the main actions you would want in Spotify. Simply save the apple script, then attach it to a trigger in Quicksilver. Hey Presto, magic! For more details on setting up triggers check the Quicksilver wiki, it explains it alot better than I ever could. http://bit.ly/134dnL
Play Next
tell application "Spotify" to activate
tell application "System Events"
tell process "Spotify"
click menu item 3 of menu 1 of menu bar item 5 of menu bar 1
end tell
end tell
Play Previous
tell application "Spotify" to activate
tell application "System Events"
tell process "Spotify"
click menu item 4 of menu 1 of menu bar item 5 of menu bar 1
end tell
end tell
Play/Pause
tell application "Spotify" to activate
tell application "System Events"
tell process "Spotify"
click menu item 1 of menu 1 of menu bar item 5 of menu bar 1
end tell
end tell
Notes:
Don't forget to activate assitive device support see http://www.macspeech.com/extensions/faq/kb.php?article=48
Being the heavy user of Last.fm I was a little concerned when techcrunch broke the story that supposably, last.fm had given the RIAA, information pertaining to users who had scrobbled any tracks from the Upcoming and undrealeased U2 album. The fact I can't stand the rose tinted glasses wearing, Irish Hypocrite is beside the point.
Firstly, what got me there was no mention of the Data Protection act fair enough last.fm is a CBS company, but its still based in the UK (for the most part) and that would mean the passing of this data would be illegal. You cannot pass data to a third party without consent from the data subject.
Also it seems like there are alot of people and blogs posting unsubstantiated rumours to get traffic and therefore ad revenue etc. I know its always been there but it seems like everybody is at it even big news companies, what little credibilty these sites have is been quickly ruined by hastly researched stories and a all too trigger happy publish finger.
Last.fm - Keep up the good work.
TechCrunch Article
Last.fm - "TechCrunch is full of shit"
The dust is still settling from Jerry Yang's announcement that he is to step down as Yahoos' CEO. I wonder if Yahoo! has any idea what it wants to be. Search, Advertising or Neither.
There is still talk of Microsoft buying Yahoo! Search, which is fair enough take the least toxic bit of Yahoo! But what are you then left with. Yahoo! Mail, Delicious & Flickr they are the only remaining big properties that Yahoo have on the books.
Delicious & Flickr have yet to be monetized and the user base on both platforms would kill the person responsible for upsetting the status quo. That leaves Yahoo! Mail, which has some ads but the willingness of Yahoo! to go with the Google advertising deal means they are likely making no money on that either.
So how is Yahoo making money?
Sure its got deals with BT in the UK providing the homepage and mail service to all BT Broadband customers, and it has some News properties which are well trafficed. User growth is going to be negligible anybody who would want to sign up for a Yahoo! Account probably have, its a problem many big companies face and sure there have been attempts to get the workforce re-invigorated but so far nothing new and astounding has made it through the door, and what has been something a bit different had to be bought in.
I have said many times before that Yahoo! doesn't have a clear sense of what it wants to be; Search, Advertising, Content or Video, it just doesn't sit nicely anywhere and it can't be the agregator for all because Google has sewn that one up however, thats not to say Yahoo! couldn't compete - they could if they become a strong leader in the tech sector again.
If I where Yahoo! I would invest heavily in cloud computing services, rather than following try and jump ahead. Just like Apple did in 1997.
