The Apple Phenomenon

Created: 8th June 2010

It seems we've developed a love\hate relationship with Apple lately, much like with Microsoft – except this time, the products actually work. I've always steered clear of Apple, they are just another Microsoft under the disguise of friendliness, coolness and a false sense of being in touch with what twenty-something's want, but all the while secretly telling them what they want. It's all fun and games, until something becomes unsupported.

I'd be lying if I wasn't tempted with the latest Apple fad, an iPad – after all, I was raised with Star Trek. The feeling of tapping away gently on a responsive surface will get any geek excited… even if what you're tapping away at is completely pointless, it reminds me of Star Trek The Next Generation episode, "The Game" (1991), which sees the crew hopelessly using technology that ultimately enslaves them. Look at any communal group of iPad\iPhone users and you'll notice a similarity, especially when you see the tasks usually being performed are nothing short of procrastination.

So I decided early on that these Apple toys aren't for me, unless I want to have expensive fun. To actually get things done however, still requires my PC.

But I didn't want to rule out such a shiny new toy so quickly. After all, most techies would agree that you're not a true techie until you've owned everything. So a quick think of what I would use the iPad for came to three main conclusions:

1. Browsing during Commercial breaks or when there's nothing good on
2. Reading eBooks during long boring events\journeys
3. A comically massive iTunes remote control should I convert in that direction

I wasn't trying to condition myself out of purchasing an iPad, but these were really the only three useful, day to day things I could come up with, and unfortunately point 1 was the only point with any weight behind it. The others just wouldn't work for me, iTunes would be my only bookshelf, and the battery won't last long enough for me to read an entire book.

A similar story occurred with my iPhone decision making, naturally that has far more uses, but again, being locked into iTunes and various other limitations made my mind for me. In the end, I just can't find any Apple product I need. So why do they sell so many?

I think the answer is simple. Apple market products to people who want things that just work, something which they do well. Apple takes care of all the behind the scenes stuff, which end users rarely care about, The modular nature of PC's and Microsoft Windows come with a price of stability and a constant battle called interoperability . Apple doesn't need to worry about this when they control the entire product, and all the applications on top.

So we can love the products, love the simplicity, and not so love the price, but what is there to hate? Well, here at El Serpent – we love our open standards, and accept it isn't the most profitable business model out there. But when companies pretend to be onboard but really aren't – that grinds our gears.

Apple vs Flash vs HTML5 vs H.264

If you've gotta hate something about Apple, hate the fact that they are trying to replace one proprietary video format (Adobe Flash) with another (MPEG LA's H.264), and they are doing it under the name of 'standards'.

The first half of this argument is excusable. Flash is quite bloated, it's a CPU hog and it has a limited future as long as Adobe keep hold of it. H.264 is technically better, and wouldn't require an external installation. There's just one thing they share in common - They aren't royalty-free.

Apple (along with some other big companies such as Microsoft) is a member of the MPEG LA organisation, and is on the receiving end of any royalties paid for the use of this format, so from a business point of view, who can blame them when the choice is either paying Adobe to integrate Flash into Safari, or get paid by Google, Opera, Mozilla and Adobe to use H.264 in their products. This is simply economics, it's better to get paid then to pay.

So where does HTML5 come into it? It just so happens that the W3C is looking for a 'standardized, royalty free' video format to include in their working draft for HTML5 implementations.

Knowing this (and knowing that W3C always give in to majority pressure), they've joined teams with Microsoft to get H.264 as the 'standard', even though it quite clearly doesn't meet the royalty-free criteria. CEO Steve Jobs himself explains that this is still the best thing for the web, and boasts HTML5 as the Flash killer – despite the fact that should the W3C get it their way, no one should financially benefit from HTML5 – as it should be.

So why endorse a working draft markup that isn't complete? Should H.264 become the norm, Apple will no longer have to pay royalties to anyone for video.

Completely in the spirit of business, but not in the spirit of standards.

We'll see what happens with this in the months to come, but for now it's clear each company on the playing field is attempting to secure a royalty-free future, with the W3C in the middle, working to the same goal. Watch this space.

It's increasingly likely I'll own an Apple product sometime in the near future, but if I do – it will be a productive piece of kit, designed to do its tasks and nothing else. With my trusty PC I can compile new software, play the latest games, hack it into MAC OSX, Linux, BSD or a NES, run any browser, music player, word processing software I choose, and best of all – upgrade it freely and easily. But whenever I bring this up to MAC fans, it's always the same reply – I don't want to do any of that!

Well I do :)