On Wed, Jan 27, 2010 at 22:37, Mo McRoberts <m...@nevali.net> wrote: > So, what does everyone think? >
I quoted it earlier on my blog - Alex Payne (@al3x) states succintly what the problem is with closed platforms like the iPad: "The thing that bothers me most about the iPad is this: if I had an iPad rather than a real computer as a kid, I’d never be a programmer today. I’d never have had the ability to run whatever stupid, potentially harmful, hugely educational programs I could download or write." - <http://al3x.net/2010/01/28/ipad.html> I'm preaching to the choir here - the first computers I used were both open and booted straight to a BASIC prompt (BBC B booted straight to BBC BASIC, and the Amstrad CPC 6128 booted to AMSBASIC). Back then, games and accessories were pretty expensive - £25-£30 (£30 in 1990 money is £45 in 2009 money, remember), and no Internet, meant the only thing to do was to play around and write code. Now, to programme on my Mac, I have to install a special developer kit from the DVD. On Windows, you can hack, but it's not at all clear how to unless you really rummage around a bit. Okay, so Apple have made a closed platform. Big deal. What concerns me more about the iPad and the rise of proprietary App Stores (there are people saying that there ought to be app stores for Windows and Mac OS X!) is the reaction of the geeks is "don't worry, web apps will save us". I've seen so many people say this - Joe Hewitt, Chris Messina and many others. Except web apps won't save us. Web apps will always be a second class citizen. How about any software that requires a bit of oomph? I bring up three examples always: Final Cut Pro, Eclipse, Crysis. Last time I checked, browsers weren't much good at chucking polygons around compared to the cheap and widespread graphics cards in everybody's computers (don't let the length of the spec fool you: HTML5 does not contain OpenGL hidden inside!). And they will never have full platform access. On the iPhone, how do you get access to the Notifications API from a web app? (Best I can think of is e-mail or Twitter.) And what if there's data that's supposed to be a little bit more private? And, it doesn't solve Alex Payne's issue: it basically splits the world into two - the haves and the have-nots. The haves live in a world of computers, compilers and servers. The have-nots, even if they have great ideas, don't get to play in that world. They don't even get to play at the shallow end and build webpages or write JavaScript hacks (sorry, no Firebug for you, no text editor, no filesystem even!). -- Tom Morris <http://tommorris.org/> - Sent via the backstage.bbc.co.uk discussion group. To unsubscribe, please visit http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list.html. Unofficial list archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk/
