Not just that

Mozilla aren't promising improvements, they're promising to match Chrome.

"We're hoping to be as good as the competition in the future, in the areas we're willing to talk about" isn't much of a sales pitch.

Agreed

Fragmentation basically isn't an issue here. I'll bet that if Apple do anything then they'll increase the pixel count by an integer multiple, just as on the iPhone. So you don't even get scaling artefacts on software that was hand designed to the pixel on a lower resolution device.

This being the Internet and all

There's probably a whole bunch of people that feel very strongly about apostrophes ready to point out that "Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds Murder Ballads" (reading the cover exactly as printed) is a statement, not a title.

But not me, because I'm a fan.

That camera was just one day away from retirement!

Etc.

@Cliff

No, they're not cancelling it. One of Boris' first moves was to cancel the existing contracts, but TfL have subsequently put new agreements in place at least up until 2013. It's all a Blairite public private partnership, so the messages about lifespan and cancellation tend to be a bit confused and never completely definite.

@James Butler

It wasn't pre-release hype. Apple continued to follow the line that the web browser is how people deliver applications for the iPhone for the first full year of sales. The jailbreaking community and various aggressive blogs forced their hand, and I assume that App Store revenues have cemented their change in direction. However, it's a sign of their attitude in general that I almost feel I have to say that they're dedicated to keeping the browser completely open.

See my post history on other threads for my willingness to jump in when people are making unsupported claims or overreaching on an issue, but on this issue I think the analysis is correct: here Apple are damaging their consumers, damaging their own reputation and damaging the marketplace. Their controlling tendency is going to cost them, even if it takes death by a thousand cuts rather than a single, watershed moment. If I were a serious content producer I would continue to pursue an iPad distribution channel for the simple reason of market share; I would nevertheless ensure that everything I produce is easily portable elsewhere. Pragmatically I'd want to fully embrace the iPad to maximise profits right now, but I'd certainly have an exit strategy in place.

Leave Nixon out of this

He may have conspired to pervert the course of justice (and quite probably wasn't entirely mentally sound) but he ended the war in Vietnam and began normalisation of relations with China. It's unlikely that anybody even slightly more liberal would have been able to retain any sort of political power even just for visiting a communist country. Even pre-Republican wave Clinton gave him a decent eulogy.

@thecakeis(not)alie

On the contrary, the original post opens "Honestly, with growing examples of this, it's a wonder any developer wants to take the risk on the platform." — it therefore takes one factor in the decision process and proceeds to a conclusion with no further evidence. The post alone doesn't make a complete argument and I guess that somebody (not me, by the way) didn't like that.

If I were to suggest that because Oracle are suing Google over Java, it's a wonder any developer wants to take a risk on the platform then I would much more obviously be talking biased rubbish but would have stated exactly as much of an argument.

One question that we do know the answer to

"Can a 1.5Ghz Atom run Windows 7 acceptably?"

As above

Reread the article. Bids on the intimate notes went significantly higher than those on the electronic tinkering.

Is anybody talking about Apple?

I really don't see how Apple are at all relevant to this discussion. I can also think of other major OS owners that admit defects, making this not refreshing or different at all. Microsoft are one such.

It didn't go for more than the Turing papers

Highest bid on the Turing papers: £240,000

Highest bid on the Apple 1: £133,250

The Turing papers had a higher than £240,000 reserve, so weren't sold. The Apple did sell.

I can't comment on scarcity, but I'd also imagine that an Engima machine that's "has had some restoration" is worth less than one that was still all original. Especially as there seem to be surprisingly many of the things about — at least in comparison to Apple 1s.

Personally, I'd still pay more for the Enigma.

Ummm...

... at £850, the cheapest MacBook Air is only £10 less than double the price of the cheapest iPad.

You're out of date

Apple did charge for iPod updates in the past on the cited grounds of accounting regulations. They've subsequently said that they've found an accounting way to avoid having to do that. iPod owners have received recent major version upgrades for free, just like iPad owners.

On the other hand...

Apple's multitasking tablet is still on the market before most of the big name competitors and they've managed to grab a 95% market share from their eight months on the market so far.

But I'm sure things would have been better if they'd done them your way around.

Apple always support at least the current and previous generation device

So I'd suggest your definition of a legacy device is someone excessive. At any point that you buy an iOS device, you're guaranteed at least a year of software support from Apple — which is a year more than 99% of other phone manufacturers. Though it's difficult to guess what the other tablet manufacturers will do.

Absolutely

I'd guess that this is the same as all the operators that'll give a free XBox, PS3, television or whatever. The calculation is that they'll still make a profit (probably on an individual basis, definitely over the whole group) even if you cancel in very short order.

*cough*

It was Toki! Also pretty much the only decent platform game for the Atari Lynx.

Its not exactly the game

But it sounds like it may have been the inspiration for Acornsoft's Alien Dropout (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-kdKw4q2YQY) — not sure if that's a helpful clue?

Nope, sorry

The simulator can't download applications.

I know people that want an Android phone

I mean normal, non-technical people. Reasons tend to be that they're cheap, have a pretty good browser and can run Angry Birds.

The article doesn't seem to discuss the way that this market differs from that of the 80s: the increasing delivery of functionality through browsers. If you bought an MSX then you were in an entirely different ecosystem to someone with a Commodore 64. But if you buy an Android phone then you're probably going to use it to interact with 80% of the same material as someone with an iPhone. Ditto a bada, webOS or Windows 7 phone.

Both copied Delicious Library

Or possibly a real bookshelf.

And they don't even have to try

In this case all they did was replace the front page on their website for 24 hours. That's what really galls.

Similarly relevant possible announcements

Apple to buy a newspaper! And to set up a phone number you can call to get cinema listings! They're putting a 6502 coprocessor in every Mac! They're adding Snake as a built-in app to the iPhone! iWork is finally going to be able to open WordStar documents, with most formatting correct!

You fell for semantics

All Jobs has ever said is that Macs don't have any viruses since OS X. And he hasn't said that in a while. It's the people with vested interests who have extrapolated this to argue that the OS has no security holes.

Apple last released a security update on the 12th, admitting to the need for 100+ security patches. That was the seventh security update this year.

Generally the argument tends to be one side claiming the OS is uncrackable, the other arguing that it's just that nobody can be bothered cracking it. The reality is probably in between. See the fantastic run of 64bit Windows for evidence that mere market share does not determine the number of successful attacks, see the existence of a few bits of known Mac malware, all of them based on social engineering, for evidence that the OS at least isn't a Windows 95 knockover.

@Geoff Campbell

That's really odd. Though maybe Dixons are like the phone shop you attempted, and have come to the conclusion that they need to drop the price because sales are lower than expected — never mind that it's only because every time someone tries to buy one some sales idiot obstructs them. Which obviously isn't the case on Amazon.

This is the real reason for Internet shopping?

At least for electricals. It's absurd that someone can walk into a phone shop and ask for a product that is available subsidised on mobile phone networks, then be unable to obtain that product rather than a similar one they don't want that isn't available subsidised.

Still, the £999.99 possibly saved you an error?

So the rule is...

... if you can download it from the Apple App Store, you can definitely run it. I don't see how that's a bad thing. In fact, I think it's probably the only rational way to run a consumer facing store.

This story clearly states: "Now it turns out Java developers are invited to the Mac Apps Store party, after all." and mentions that Java will remain in OS X for the next few years. Lots of time for someone to create a packager that bundles a JVM with an app.

@Trevor Pott

Your argument doesn't support your conclusion. One company — Oracle — now controls the progress and ongoing availability of Java across Windows, OS X and Linux.

The only flaw in Apple's transition from supplying Java as part of the OS to the Oracle version being supplied has been a few weeks of uncertainty. Conversely, Microsoft's (with Sun) involved a protracted court battle and a pitched war for hearts and minds.

Supposing you don't trust Oracle, all non-Oracle Java implementations share the distinction of originating from the UNIX-associated world. Of Windows, OS X and Linux, only one is notably not even attempting to be a UNIX. Conversely, only OS X is a fully certified UNIX.

Since you don't claim any unique feelings about any of the big commercial companies, we can rule out any distinction in your judgment between how Microsoft and Apple will act in the future.

Therefore, the conclusion that you need to warn your customers off Apple only is untenable if the rest of your arguments are taken at face value.

Probably shows either...

... that OS X is now sufficiently established that Apple are confident that Java will be delivered without them having to do it themselves, or that OS X is now sufficiently minor in their product line up that they're not that bothered if entrusting someone else to deliver Java backfires. Or, I guess, that the c.2000 guess that Java was going to be big on the desktop as soon as it was done well enough didn't pan out.

In any case, I think perhaps you've misunderstood the motivation of many of the posters, here on the Internet. They made up their mind about companies like Apple, Google and Microsoft long ago and the actual content of the stories doesn't really have a bearing on what they post.

Except that seeing the Geniuses is free

And, where possible, the fixes they perform are free. They're one of the reasons that Apple always tops customer service satisfaction polls.

Not sure how likely they are to play the "it's third party software, you deal with it" card though.

My understanding is that...

... ENIAC was Turing complete, whereas Collosus wasn't. Though that would make it "the world's first Turing complete electronic computer", both electronic and Turing complete having already been done elsewhere.

@Alternatives

Expecting to incur the wrath of the rabid gang, I think an issue may be that Apple, Microsoft and Palm all have tight control over software updates in the sense that they can publish an update and be confident it'll be available to all users almost immediately. Google are in the unfortunate position that they don't control software updates further down the channel. So the position is, for many Android phones, that the source code is available allowing people an extra means to find one or more of the many faults that are all but unavoidable in a project of that size, but that pushing fixes is extraordinarily difficult. Look at the number of handsets for which manufacturers have so far failed to supply 2.2. Even high profile devices like the Galaxy S have yet to receive it (next week, apparently), though it hit the Nexus One in June.

Being extremely generous,

I've decided that the author just thinks that, being a report about physical products sold, manufacturers are more interesting than software stacks.

What effect Android is having on smartphones versus feature phones would be interesting. Forget the high end stuff where Android also plays and iOS plays exclusively, to what extent has Android put smartphones into the same price categories and so into the hands of the same consumers as feature phones?

@Tony Chandler

Shush! You're ruining their straw men.

Yes, you can

But if you're not willing to accept remote content kill switches then you'd also better avoid Android and iOS phones.

In the 1984 case, Amazon had supplied content they didn't have a licence to supply — a free edition had been uploaded in a country where it is out of copyright (Australia, I think?) and then offered for download in a country where it remains in copyright (the US). That's unlikely to occur with newspaper content.

And in real space, too

NASA sent a Mac Portable into space for one of their missions - check YouTube for the video evidence. Since it has a mechanical eject floppy mechanism like all Macs of the era, they seem to be having some fun with it in zero gravity.

It's strongly implied in this case...

... that the periodic alarm sounds at 24 hour intervals irrespective of the length of the day in between or whether the time it is now sounding at matches the time it represents itself as sounding at. So I'd imagine that setting the clock within the double hour or missing hour wouldn't be that interesting.

Still though, this is really basic stuff. I don't see how it can be portrayed as anything other than extremely embarrassing for Apple.

Don't worry, they paid for them

"iPad’s honeymoon will be shorter than iPhone’s."

The current exchange rate is one buzzword for two definite articles. By sticking with the amateurish prose of an American blogger elsewhere, lots of extra buzzwords became within budget.

It would be interesting to know...

... whether Angry Birds produces more average revenue per user on Android (where it's free but includes adverts, albeit very unobtrusively) or iOS (59p, no adverts).

On reflection

Since relevance correlates with newsworthiness, I think there's good evidence to raise a presumption that Apple are relevant on the desktop.

It'd be extraordinarily difficult to argue that they're relevant in the server space. Given the number of iPod socks they've sold, they're probably more relevant in clothing.