Steve Job’s mission to change the world
Things are getting a little tense when it comes to computer platform and operating system preferences and loyalties these days. This is especially true along the Mac / Non-mac (read windows, but also marginally Linux). Mac users have always had a fanatical side to them, which is appropriate for a small group defending a way of computing that has, for decades, been scraping along strong, but small. Now, however, Apple is pushing hard in many directions (mobile, tablet, desktop and laptop) and it is the Non-Mac people who are starting to match the partisan fervor.
As a rare cross-user, I'm caught in the middle. Not so much the middle between people moralizing about why Apple is a cult that is evil for going against the sainted precepts of open software (which I believe in) or why 'those people' can deal with lousy interfaces and crashing computers if they want (those mac users obviously haven't spent much time on Win7.) I enjoy those conversations. I generally stay out of those that remain at the surface level, because I frankly don't care about those criticisms. I've used both platforms now professionally for a year. Sure, I like win7 over osx, but I enjoy the experience of my mac book pro more than any other mobile computer I've ever owned. Sure this and that about one system is dumb, so's the other in a thousand ways. But there are a number of interesting angles:
Flash not allowed on Apple Mobile devices
It's hard to weigh on this one fully without being a fly on the wall between the colorful conversations between Apple and Adobe. Sure, Flash is the most popular rich media plugin on the web. Sure, Adobe (the winner of the creative software wars) has done well in developing it into an extremely powerful platform for designers and programmers alike. And, sure, by blocking it on its mobile devices Apple has devalued the work of thousands of Flash developers.
On the other hand, Flash programs can easily require more bandwidth, processor power and ram than the iPhone and iPad have to offer. Further, there's no way to throttle these apps, which means that browsing the web on these devices would turn into walking a minefield, which could bring your device's battery (or at least it's browser app) down at any minute. Can't blame Steve on this one for preserving the experience over the flexibility.
Also, it's important to note that Adobe is by no means an open company. Their Flash standard is as proprietary as anything Apple does. Flash has, in fact, quietly stifled HTML5 and other open projects, such as many in javascript. This, to my knowledge, was not done overtly but the effect is the same: give people a good proprietary solution and it will take longer for the open community to develop. Apple's add network, to be released with the iPad OS4, is heavily HTML5 dependent. This will do wonders for interactive web design, and help out those who don't want to shell out hundreds of dollars every 18 months for the latest Flash upgrade.
Steve Jobs vs Programmer Freedom
Subtitle: should we reserve the programmer's 'right' to push around any bit on a system or should we allow people with a vision for their platform to enforce standards of their choosing?
Before using the iPhone, I would have been squarely in the programmer's rights camp. I come from the gnu world, grew up on linux and gcc via emacs and got old and lazy in the php mysql open source web world. I love how there's a million scripts and modules up there for me to get to do just about anything I want. Server space is cheap and the software running on it is free. Sweet. And I had the potential to be a part of it to the core. I could contribute to the php project (but didn't) or the apache project (but didn't again.) I could, just maybe, tweak the fate of the industry of which I was a part (probably didn't, but who knows with that whole butterfly effect principal.)
The iPhone quickly and seamlessly integrated into my lifestyle. This was a big deal for me, as, suddenly, I was carrying around this device that did really cool tech stuff but also never forced me to jump through hoops to do simple things in the moment or read endless documents to add a new feature. It, in a very real way, delivered the promise of technology, which for me was always to enhance life. It delivered the communication, information and media without getting in the way of the moments of my life that I was using them in. Ok, sure, I did go a bit over the deepend and get sucked into using it more... but that's my choice. My lifestyle is constantly adjusting to include more communication, information and media. It's not my choice to hunt through a half dozen menus to find an obscure option (read: doesn't work for me).
So I developed a great respect for the iPhone. I got a mac book pro, and found, unfortunately that OSX didn't hold the same magic for me. The hardware, however, and some of the packaged software did.
As the Apple mobile OS (iPhone, iPad) matures, Apple is adding more and more features for programmers to use in their SDK. At the same time, they are taking steps to limit developers to using their SDK for programming apps. They are also making judgment calls to allow or ban apps from their app store, the only way to get apps onto the devices of course. There's no doubt that there's business motives at the heart of the Apple / Adobe divide, and cutting off their CS5 iPhone authoring tool was probably as aggressive as it was practical. But, at the same time, the biggest bone of contention is Flash, which is a plugin that allows programmers to easily use up far more resources than the iPhone and iPad have to offer.
Ultimately, again, I can't blame Apple for holding the keys to their kingdom in the name of preserving the experience on their devices. If there were no competition, I would get nervous, but there is much competition. For now, I'm happy to go along on the iPhone ride because beyond simply being best one out there, it is intensely interesting in many ways.
When it comes to seating sensors to deny apps, I get a little weirded out. They do occasionally cross the line of making anti-competitive choices, but I don't believe these are status quo. The web lets some really disgusting stuff slide around in digital form and I don't want it showing up on my, my (if I'm lucky) kid's or anyone else around me's phone. If that's censorship, call me an advocate of censorship. But, again, there are other open devices and a hundred ways to get any media you want on the iPhone as well.
What do you think?