Archives For mobile

1.7 Million iPhone 4 Sold in 3 Days

Dwayne Harapnuik —  June 29, 2010 — Leave a comment
http://gizmodo.com/5574299/apple-sold-17-million-iphone-4s-in-three-days

Apple Sold 1.7 Million iPhone 4s In Three Days via kwout

This is quite the number to sell considering the pre-order problems AT&T had and the fact that Apple is still using AT& T exclusively. Furthermore, the iPhone 4 was just released in 5 countries and won’t be released to an additional 18 nations until the end of July.
Read the full Gizmodo article…

Just less than two years ago back in Canada I recall arguing with many people about the impact of the iPhone and my categorization of it as a disruptive technology. This really is a “I told you so moment”. The following is an excerpt from a post I made in a Lethbridge College Educational Technology blog back on November 24, 2008.

The Blackberry Storm is supposed to be RIM’s answer to the iPhone but after watching and reading several reviews of the device I think RIM has not only missed the mark but they are a classic example of how a market leader’s success prevents them from seeing the next “big” opportunity. Christensen the author of the Innovator’s Dilemma points out that serving their best clients and focusing on what has brought them success in the past is the same thing that will prevent a market leader from taking advantage of the latest disruptive innovation.

The Blackberry Storm has a large touch screen and has all the best of RIM’s latest features so it is a the ultimate business enterprise device for keeping up with email and calendaring on the road but it lacks WIFI. In addition, Jason Hiner points out in his TechRepublic video review of the Storm it doesn’t come close to matching the iPhone’s usability and web browsing capability.

There is no denying the Storm or any other Blackberry for that matter are much superior devices than the iPhone for a business user whose priorities are email and calendering but no Wifi, poor usability and poor web browsing are huge issues to a Net Gen user or anyone else uses the web to its fullest potential (Web 2.0 & the Cloud). If you aren’t paying attention to were the Net Gen user is going and what they really want then you are missing “the next big thing”. It will be interesting to see if RIM will join the ranks of so many other companies who’s success prevents them from seeing where the market is going.

This is a “told you so moment” if there ever was one.

This is a classic example of disruptive innovation–we are still just in the early stages of this disruption and only time will tell just how significant this latest release will be. To be fair to RIM, Nokia is the market leader whose overall market share is being eroded by the iPhone, Blackberry and Android.

In iPhone , ,
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ACU Connected Year Two: Faculty Perspectives

Dwayne Harapnuik —  June 14, 2010 — Leave a comment
http://blogs.acu.edu/connected/

ACU Connected Blog via kwout

In mLearning ,
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Apple – The Mobility Company

Dwayne Harapnuik —  May 4, 2010 — Leave a comment

AppleInsider reveals:

Apple jumps past Motorola to become biggest US phone maker

Motorola announced sales of 8.5 million phones in its spring quarter, dropping it below Apple’s record sales of 8.8 million iPhones and vaulting the Mac maker into position as America’s top phone manufacturer.

Apple announces iPad sales top 1 million in less than a month

“One million iPads in 28 days — that’s less than half of the 74 days it took to achieve this milestone with iPhone,” said Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO, in a statement released Monday. “Demand continues to exceed supply and we’re working hard to get this magical product into the hands of even more customers.”

In several group discussions at the Educause 2009 conference in Denver last November there were still many who questioned the wisdom of choosing the iPhone as the platform for a mobile learning initiative. Perhaps now with Apple taking the lead in smartphone sales and the recent success of the iPad these questions will not be as significant and we can focus more time in your discussion on how we can use mobile devices to enhance learning.

In 21st century learning, iPad, iPhone , , ,
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Thoughts on Flash – Steve Jobs Open Letter

Dwayne Harapnuik —  May 3, 2010 — Leave a comment

In his recent letter Thoughts on Flash Steve Jobs attempts to explain why Apple does not and will not allow Flash on iPhones, iPods and iPads. Jobs provides the following six reasons:

  1. Openness – Flash is proprietary; web standards such as HTML5, CSS and JavaScript which the iPhones, iPods and iPads use are open.
  2. ‘Full Web’ myth – The Flash that is primarily used on the Web is also available in a more current H.264 format that does play IPhones, iPods and iPads. Furthermore with Youtube, Neflix, ABC, NBC, CNN, Fox and many other media publishers iPhone, iPod and iPad users aren’t missing out.
  3. Reliability, security and performance –  Jobs states: “Symantec recently highlighted Flash for having one of the worst security records in 2009. We also know first hand that Flash is the number one reason Macs crash..”
  4. Battery life –  Twice the life with H.264 videos which play for up to 10 hours, while videos decoded in software play for less than 5 hours.
  5. Touch format – Flash is made for a mouse-driven PC, and not Apple’s touch-based interface.
  6. Substandard development – Third-party developers are primarily interested in their own needs and not the needs the entire platform. Jobs states: “For example, although Mac OS X has been shipping for almost 10 years now, Adobe just adopted it fully (Cocoa) two weeks ago when they shipped CS5. Adobe was the last major third party developer to fully adopt Mac OS X.”

Perhaps Jobs’ concluding statement sums up his argument best:

Flash was created during the PC era – for PCs and mice. Flash is a successful business for Adobe, and we can understand why they want to push it beyond PCs. But the mobile era is about low power devices, touch interfaces and open web standards – all areas where Flash falls short.

Apple can never be accused of falling short in looking to the future and were one of the first companies to move away from Floppy drives and to other mass media formats so their record is consistent. Furthermore, Apple has always put the user experience first and controlling that experience is extremely important. They have been able to charge a premium for that user experience and anything that detracts from that experience lessens their unique selling proposition.

While I can appreciate some aspects of Adobe’s argument and would question Apple’s openness I tend to agree with Jobs that the most advanced and innovative platform is what we need to create the best apps. Ultimately we want technology to get so good it goes away and simply allows the user to do what they need or want to do. Mobile devices like the iPhone, iPod and iPad are getting us much closer to this state of technological development and if we need to leave Flash or any other technology behind in order to advance, then that is what we need to do.

Read Jobs’ full letter…

In Innovation, iPad, iPhone , , ,
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Potential iPad Rival?

Dwayne Harapnuik —  April 29, 2010 — Leave a comment
http://blogs.zdnet.com/gadgetreviews/?p=14227

HP Slate with webOS: The potential iPad rival from HP’s acquisition of Palm | The Toybox | ZDNet.com via kwout

When people starts using a one device to measure another it generally means the device being used as a measuring stick is either a standard or the best of the breed. The iPad has very quickly become the defacto standard for tablet/slate type mobility and is perhaps currently the best of the breed. The HP Slate is not yet out but with HP’s purchase of Palm the potential of porting of the WebOS to the Slate could provide a potential competitor for the iPad. This is good for everyone because competition and constant measuring will force Apple and the entire industry to improve.

Time will tell–fortunately with the rapid acceleration of development in mobility it won’t take too much time for everyone to start reaping the benefits.

In iPad , ,
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