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This guy is a complete tool

[Galen Gruman of Infoworld:](http://www.macworld.com/article/147073/2010/03/ipad_preorder.html?lsrc=rss_main)> Sure, we can expect Apple to make future innovations in the iPhone OS (which the iPad uses) available to the first generation of iPad devices through OS upgrades—as Apple has nicely done for iPhone and iPod touch owners. But the iPad’s hardware isn’t upgradable, so you’ll be stuck with the iPad’s relatively low amounts of memory and its lack of connectors such as USB that I would expect Apple to remedy inthe future. And you’ll be stuck with whatever iTunes-based content locks Apple decides to place on media content and e-books.
via [macworld.com](http://www.macworld.com/article/147073/2010/03/ipad_preorder.html?lsrc=rss_main)
He expects Apple to add USB in the future? That’s all you need to read to know this guy is a complete moron.

Every time any new gadget gets announced in the tech world, the same crowd never fails to try to tell me to “wait until the second generation.” As if the fourteenth generation won’t still have bugs in it.

Do me a favor. If you’re too cheap or chicken to live on the bleeding edge of technology, do us all a favor and admit that to yourself and move on. Leave the rest of us, who LIKE living on the edge alone. We enjoy taking a risk every once in a while in order to try something exciting. And we have no use for your condescension.

And Mr. Gruman, if you want anyone to respect what you have to write, you have to be less intellectually dishonest with your audience. I refuse to believe that you are stupid enough to have thought that people would wait in line on March 12th for something that will go on sale April 3rd. The preorder happened online, not at Apple Stores. If your local news station didn’t know that, you certainly should have. So don’t try to paint the lack of a line as anything other than a misunderstanding.

Why the iPad line won't be like the iPhone lines of last year

I have a few theories about how April 3rd will go at Apple Stores across America.

  1. iPad will be a roaring success, and Apple will sell even more than most people expect on day one.
  2. Despite that success, there will be lines, but not crazy long lines that form two days before and leave people not able to get their iPads until days or even weeks after the launch date, as was the case with the last two iPhones.
  3. Some in the tech media will try to spin the shorter lines as doom and gloom for Apple.

Here’s why I think iPad will have a great first day of sales:

  • There are simply more Apple users out there than there were two years ago. The iPod and iPhone halo effect has grown the Apple customer base in a very big way. So even though I think a phone has a much larger market to grab than a tablet device, Apple has gained a much larger audience to sell to than it had back in 2007. Even if one in twenty iPhone or iPod customers go for the iPad, that’s still a big number.
  • The App Store. iPhone didn’t have an app store when it debuted. iPad is compatible with existing iPhone apps, and already there are 16,000+ announced apps that are revamped or designed specifically for the iPad. I’m not sure, but I think that’s more apps than the Palm WebOS has, and the iPad isn’t even for sale yet. And, all of your existing apps can simply sync over to the iPad, so there’s no loss in investment, or worrying about compatibility issues. That’s not even guaranteed between two different Android phones.

But here’s why the line won’t be crazy:

  • AT&T is not involved in the transaction. When I waited for the original iPhone in 2007, most of the waiting was before the store opened. Once they started selling the iPhone, I was in and out of the store in less than an hour. Why? Because Apple was letting users handle the activation on their own, at home. So the transaction was a simple matter of choosing a model and ringing it up. The iPhone 3G and 3Gs were a different story. Because of subsidized pricing, you had to activate the phone in the store. In other words, you can sell an iPad in a minute or two; it takes at least 20 minutes to sell one iPhone 3Gs. That’s why, even a few weeks after the 3GS debuted, there were still lines at most stores, and you still had to wait over an hour to get one. iPad won’t have that problem. If you’re patient enough to wait until Sunday the 4th, even, I’m guessing you will be able to walk right in and buy an iPad with no waiting at all, given that they don’t run out.
  • WiFi only vs. 3G. The 3G versions of the iPad will be less popular, to be sure. But the fact that the 3G won’t be available on day one will keep some customers from standing in line on day one.
  • The iPad is not a revolution, at least not to the media. When the original iPhone came out, it was a true event. It was a revolutionary new device, the likes of which had never been seen before. The iPad is, arguably, an even more important device, as far as the history of computing goes, but it won’t have the same impact in the short term. At least I don’t think so. So, plenty of customers, yes, but not so many that it will get out of hand on day one.
  • Everyone “needs” a phone. People don’t think they “need” an iPad—yet.
  • Preorders. Apple is offering free delivery, guaranteed on the 3rd, for people who are too lazy to drive to the store. Many will go this route, just for the sake of convenience. Personally, I’d rather head over to a store, where I can get my iPad at 9 or 10 in the morning, rather than wait all day for the FedEx truck to show up. But that’s me. For the people who drive hours to get to their nearest Apple Store, especially, the free home delivery will look pretty appealing.
  • Reserve for pickup. You can actually reserve an iPad for pickup at an Apple Store on the 3rd. Come in any time between 9 a.m. and 3 p.m. and go home with an iPad. This will help curb the temptation to camp out the night before. After all, who cares what place you are in line, if the line is sure to move fast, and you have a reserved iPad with your name on it waiting for you? This will also help Apple make sure they have enough iPads to meet demand on that first day. Each store will know exactly how many and which flavors of iPad it needs.
  • There are more Apple Stores now than two years ago. Just within easy driving distance from where I live, there are over 10 Apple stores. Three more than there were when the original iPhone debuted. If I were willing to drive an hour or more, there would be several others. More stores equals fewer people per store.
  • The big day is a Saturday, not a Friday. The first iPhone went on sale on a Friday evening for a reason. Make the sale on a weekday, and you can cut back on some of the craziness with people who can’t get out of work, at least. The fact that Apple is launching iPad on a Saturday indicates to me that Apple itself doesn’t expect the lines to be crazy. So they launch on a Saturday to make the lines a bit bigger, in order to avoid media backlash from lines that appear too short. Which leads me to my final theory.

Here’s why the tech media will spin shorter lines as a bad thing:

Well, do I really have to explain this? Bottom line, the “iPad lines indicate poor sales” stories will be short-lived. Apple will announce staggering sales figures a few days or weeks later, and the media will have to shut up. Okay, maybe they won’t. At least not the Paul Thurrotts and John Dvoraks. But three years from now, when everyone’s grandmother has an iPad in the living room…

In some ways, it’s a shame that the iPad launch event won’t necessarily be the big deal that the iPhone debut was. People still think I was crazy to wait all day in that giant line in Palo Alto. But I got to hang out with old friends, meet some new people, eat plenty of free food, water, and pizza. There was a guy letting people ride around on his Segway. It was like a giant street fair. And it was a blast. Plus, it gave me a sense of community; I wasn’t just buying a new device. I was buying into a cultural phenomenon.

For a minute this morning, I thought about making the 40-minute trip down to Palo Alto again for my in-store pickup of the iPad, just for old-times’ sake. But then I thought about the fact that this one wasn’t going to be such a big party, and I decided to make the much easier ten-minute drive to one of the three San Francisco stores, so I could get home and start playing with the iPad that much faster. I have a feeling I wasn’t the only one.

Pink Floyd showing their age

> Indeed, as EMI has discovered, that still appears to be the case, at least when it comes to Pink Floyd. The High Court ordered EMI to pay £40,000 in court costs with the possibility of future damages and EMI may have to pull Pink Floyd’s individual offerings from places like the iTunes Store and Amazon MP3. (As of this writing, the albums with per-track purchases were still available. Get ’em while they’re hot.) In addition, EMI must pay Pink Floyd an undisclosed amount in royalty payments. > > This doesn’t mean they wouldn’t become available again as full-album purchases, though—iTunes, for example, regularly offers albums that have one or two tracks that only come with a full album purchase. We wouldn’t be surprised to see *Dark Side of the Moon* come back to iTunes with every track marked “Album only.”
via [arstechnica.com](http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2010/03/court-nixes-individual-track-downloads-of-pink-floyd-albums.ars?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=rss)
Hey, I love Pink Floyd as much as the next guy, and I can’t fathom why anyone would want to buy just one of their songs, rather than listening to the whole album in context. But sorry, guys. This is going to end up being a poor business choice.

I almost always buy full albums on the iTunes Store. But I know I’m in the minority on that. The vast minority.

It just seems like a stupid move, to deny people the chance to own just that one song they like. But maybe there is something noble in the way they are standing on principle.

It’s important to consider WHY the album has died a slow death over the past decade or two. It has little to do with services like iTunes and Amazon MP3 selling individual tracks. That was a necessary REACTION to the death of the Album as a format.

No, the real reason the Album died is that record companies started pushing out albums full of junk from bands that only had one or two good songs to offer. They searched for the lowest common denominator in the pursuit of profits, as always. And people got fed up with it.

Pink Floyd, of course, can’t be accused of contributing to that phenomenon; they certainly didn’t write a bunch of “filler songs” to surround the one hit. But despite being the victims here, they are, nevertheless, selling music in the reality of that new market. Fighting this is just going to make it easier for haters to call them greedy.

Wil Shipley's Open Letter to Steve Jobs Concerning the HTC Lawsuits.

> I always thought of you as a guy who’d say, “Well, copy me if you can, because you’re copying what I did years ago, and what I’m working on now is EVEN cooler!” I like it when competitors copy me because it means they aren’t about to leapfrog me: they’ll always be playing catch-up. > > If Apple becomes a company that uses its might to quash competition instead of using its brains, it’s going to find the brainiest people will slowly stop working there. You know this, you watched it happen at Microsoft. Enforcing patents isn’t a good long-term play: it’s the beginning of the end of the creative Apple we both love.
via [wilshipley.com](http://wilshipley.com/blog/2010/03/open-letter-to-steve-jobs-concerning.html)
This is all nice, Hippy sentiment. But Apple lives in the real world, with lawyers and stockholders.

I’m not a fan of Apple stifling competition via litigation, either. But I’m not naive enough to think that these things are never necessary. And I don’t presume to understand all the legal implications. Apple needed to go down this route at this particular time for some reason. Otherwise, it wouldn’t risk the obvious negative PR.

Our patent system is definitely broken. But that doesn’t mean that Apple should have to play with one arm tied behind its back while everyone else stomps all over them.

AppleInsider | Apple to build 5 million iPads during first half of 2010 - report

> We believe various news articles and competitor notes calling for a build delay were just false alarms and note Apple has already announced that Wi-Fi iPad models will be available in the U.S. on April 3 and models with Wi-Fi and 3G will be available in late April,” he wrote. “While we do not yet have visibility into the specific chip suppliers, we think that many of the iPhone chip suppliers will also sell into the [iPad].
via [appleinsider.com](http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/10/03/09/apple_to_build_5_million_ipads_during_first_half_of_2010_report.html)
False alarm? Get out of town. Really?

This sort of article is why, six months from now, when Apple announces that it sold 4.5 million iPads, I’ll be reading that “Apple missed its target goal of 5 million iPads.”

More analysts pulling numbers out of their arses.