Tech Thoughts
There has been so much going on in tech the last couple weeks, that I feel I would be a bit remiss in blogging if I didn’t at least mention it. So, here are a few thoughts I have about the mobile, gaming, desktop, and search spaces (as these are were the majority of announcements have come).
Mobile—The last week has been all about the pre and iPhone. The pre looks like to be a truly awesome platform. I love the idea of cards as a way to switch between apps. Like windows revolutionized the desktop space, I think cards will do the same for the mobile space. I think multi-tasking is core to the future of mobile OS. My e71 has multi-tasking (albeit in a totally less attrative form) and I could not imagine having a phone without it. If you watch McNamee’s pitch on the pre he sells the device as essentially a phone for power users. He says that its main competitive advantages are the immediacy of information, multi-tasking, and a nice keyboard. For me, these all ring true. Honestly, these are the same reasons I went with the e71 over other devices. The phone seems to do everything that my e71 does, but with an iPhone-like interface.
With that mention, lets transition to a quick discussion on the new iPhone. Like its predecessor, the 3GS features the same killer interface and design. And lets be honest, it is because Apple did very little in its 3.0 update to change how the device works. Honestly, I can’t really fault them for that. At this point, they have the best phone in the segment. It is easy to use and has great app support. And, the $99 price point is extremely interesting. I think that is going to pull a lot of late adopters out of hiding. It will be interesting to see if the low price point on the phone will make up for the high contract costs, because I know a lot of current dumb phone users still look at the reoccuring costs (or total cost of ownership) as a main reason not to get into the segment. Overall though, the iPhone launch was a little lackluster. I thought we were going to see the true third generation of the phone with a killer OLED screen and a smaller footprint. I guess we will have to wait another 6mos to a year to see what they have in store for the next generation. With that said, I think the 3GS will more than keep the iPhone faithful happy.
So, which would I chose? If I was buying today, I would get the pre. After watching the videos on the engadget review, I was astounded by how the interface works. My first impression was that this was how a phone should work. But, I am not going to go out and buy one today. I just got my e71 and it still does 95% of what I want. And, buying first gen hardware is always a crap shoot. Regardless of my opinion, the space is getting interesting. It is the first time in 2 years that a strong argument can be made for a competitor having not just a competitive (ahem, Android and Blackberry) OS, but a truly better OS than the iPhone. And, I think the next couple months will be crazy for mobile as the rush of Android and Windows Mobile devices start flooding in.
Gaming—Honestly, I haven’t picked up a controller in a long time on either my Wii or 360. I kind of feel bad, but that is not where my interest lies currently. What I am excited about is the future of the Xbox 360. To say they were the best of show at E3 was an understatement. With Natal, Zune support, Twitter, Facebook, and (what I am really looking forward to) Last.FM support, the system has moved out of the realm of game console to entertainment console. I hope they take all this a step further and begin to offer an open marketplace for apps (ala the iphone). As far as the other two big players go, I was completely disappointed with their E3 performance. Sony had a couple cool games but nothing compelling enough to make me want to buy their console. And, Nintendo really is starting to get old fast. Yes, the motion controllers are fun, but there are not a lot of compelling uses for the console outside of parties. I am glad I own one, but I would like to see something a little new and exciting from the company. Because as it stands right now, if Natal can do half of what is advertised, I will not being buying a Wii HD (or whatever comes next).
Desktop—At the WWDC, we finally got to finally see the details of Snow Leopard. And man, I wish I wouldn’t have sat through the announcement. It looks to be an extremely boring release for the company. The performance tweaks are nice, but it looks like the company is content to put OSX in its current form up against Windows 7. And, I think that is a losing proposition. But hey, for $29, I am more than willing to upgrade my Macbook. On the flip side, Windows 7 is looking better-and-better. If they hit the rumoured $49 upgrade, it will be a good fall for Microsoft. I just hope that they have a family pack or allow users of the RC to upgrade to 7 for the same cost. I really do not want to shell out $99-150 to put Windows 7 on my Macbook.
Search—I am currently testing Bing out and I kind of dig it. I really agree with a lot of people that search has become a commodity. You get pretty much the same results out of the three major services. What I like about Bing is that I can filter down ambiguous searches and also get a quick preview with the little ajaxy thing they have to the right of the results. Also, it looks way better than Google. And, I do put some value into that. The problem with both Bing and Google is that I don’t think that either of them are as good as Twitter Search for a lot of my searches. So, I am still divided. For opinions I go to Twitter, for questions I go to Bing, for programming queries I go to Stack Overflow, and on my mobile I use Google. And, maybe that is a good thing. But, honestly both Google and Bing really should get on the Twitter band wagon. Because, a real-time search inclusion on either of their sites would be a killer feature.
So, there you have it—my insights on mobile, gaming, desktop, and search. I know a lot of you will not agree. So, feel free to express your opinion below.
