I like the Electronic Frontier Foundation generally. They’re sort of an online ACLU, and while they tend toward the strident, civil liberties in this day and age need that type of advocacy more than ever. I’ve supported them financially in the past, and I expect I will in the future as well.

But it drives me crazy when they get stuff wrong, as I believe they have in Police Who Illegally Broke Into Gizmodo Journalist’s House Deride Seized E-mails as ‘Juvenile.’

The iPhone 4 story, in case you’ve not heard it, goes like this: Apple engineer loses a prototype iPhone 4 in a bar, two dopes find it and sell it to Gizmodo who publishes all kinds of info about the then unreleased iPhone despite Apple’s repeated attempts to get it back.

At the time, police executed a search warrant on the home Gizmodo editor Jason Chen, who they believed had purchased the stolen phone which is a crime in the state of California. Here’s what EFF says:

…regardless of whether Chen or Gizmodo could have been charged with any crime related to obtaining and discussing the phone, state and federal law plainly barred the issuance and execution of the search warrant directed at journalist-held information “obtained or prepared in gathering, receiving or processing of information for communication to the public.”

The search warrant, of course, would not have had anything to do with Chen’s journalistic endeavors. It would have been concerned with the buying of stolen property and the recovery of the property itself. In essence, EFF is arguing that the journalist shield law is so strong that it allows journalists to traffic in stolen property without police or court interference. I disagree.

Let’s say I break into the EFF offices. If the police suspect me can they execute a search warrant looking for evidence? One would think yes. What’s unclear is why that should be any different if I’m a journalist.

I further object to this conclusion:

It turns out that prosecutors concluded that neither Chen nor Gizmodo did anything wrong after all. Legally, that is.

What the District Attorney concluded, of course, was that there was insufficient evidence, which is hardly the same thing.

I do agree with EFF’s assessment that the DA’s comments on Chen’s unpublished email correspondence were unprofessional. As someone who’s read Gizmodo occasionally, I’m also not surprised that the DA termed the email “juvenile.” But EFF is right in saying that the information should not have been publicly disclosed by the DA.

I wish they had the other parts right as well.

I met Jennifer Thieret Westermeyer at the Nice, France train station in the summer of 1990. She was on a train in, I was departing. We spoke for 5 minutes, then it was time for me to board. We promised to write.

We did, and over the years our correspondence tracked the changes of our lives. She married in ’92 and divorced in ’93. Graduated law school in ’95 and married again in ’97. Worked as an attorney and a public defender. I will miss her letters and emails because, whatever the information they contained, they always reminded me of our fond meeting in Europe, and, by extension, the hope it gave me for meeting new friends no matter where I go.

I wish that I could have known Jennifer better than I did. She was proof that it only takes 5 minutes to change someone’s life for the better, and for that and for her, I shall remain grateful.

I met Sal Reyes when I was 12 or 13, and he became instantly the best soccer player I knew. My first glimpse of him was at tryouts for a Salem-area U-15 select team. He was doing rainbows one after another at a full run. I remember thinking that if the rest of the squad were this good, I didn’t have a chance. Of rainbows I could do exactly one in a row, most of the time, and only if the ball were stationary. I was a bit young to be on the team—Sal and most of the other players were a couple years older than me—and seeing that level of touch and skill was instantly intimidating: I needed to get a whole lot better.

Happily for me and my peace of mind, Sal was the star of that team. Nobody had his talent. His English was iffy, but who cared? On the field, he was tricky, shifty, smart, and darn near unstoppable. I remember in one game watching him dribble virtually the entire opposing team, walk the ball into the goal, and get called for being offsides—which incensed us to no end, since how can you be offside when the ball is on your feet the whole time? To this day, I have no idea how he dribbled like he did. He was a wonderful soccer inspiration for me during my teenage years.

I played with him intermittently after high school. We took an indoor team down to a tournament in Eugene, and he was as amazing as ever. Played with him for a few seasons of outdoor Over-30 soccer until the cancer left him too weak to play. I remember in particular his last outing at Bush Park, where a group of us Salem Kickers gather regularly to scrimmage. He was so grateful and so delighted to be out there playing, and he was, of course, as dangerous as ever with the ball.

As recently as March, he had emailed with high hopes of joining us in this coming outdoor season. Obviously, it was not to be. Tomorrow, as the saying goes, is promised to no one. But 44 seems too young an age to die. I am thankful that the length of his illness gave him time for goodbyes and that I had the opportunity to express directly my admiration for him, both via email and in person at his 25th anniversary celebration in January. I know he was at peace, because he said so and because that is what the tone of life reflected. He had come to terms with his own mortality, even if perhaps I’ve not, and to the end of my acquaintance with him, he exuded a classiness and a style that leaves me hoping, once again, that I can someday emulate him.

We’ll start with the positives: Diane Lane is gorgeous, and it helps considerably that she’s in virtually every scene. The film is well-acted. It’s based on a true story. Secretariat is arguably the best race horse ever. Um…I’m running dry here.

Unfortunately: This is not so much the story of Secretariat as it is the story of Secretariat’s owner. Since owners of horses don’t really do a whole lot other than, you know, own horses, a lot of drama had to be manufactured. The jockeys, the trainers, the stablehands, well, they do the actual work. Any of theirs would have been a more compelling tale. Instead we see them in limited, very clichéd supporting roles. “Secretariat: A Horse and Her Owner” would have been a more accurate if not better title.

The film attempts to link Secretariat’s greatness to the women’s liberation and the anti-war movements of the early 1970s and to apply a Christian veneer to the owner’s faith in her horse (we open with a voiceover of Job 39:19-24), the latter of which is not wholly off-putting at the start but certainly is by the end when a Gospel choir seems to be equating a race horse with Jesus. These flaws, while egregious, are not the worst of it.

The conflicts in this movie are either quickly resolved (evil trainer is fired), nonsensical (inheritance tax of $6 million can only be paid by the sale of Secretariat), or forgotten (family issues conveniently disappear). The evil trainer scene was so trite that it was painful to watch. The inheritance tax issue which was to become the central conflict, driving all manner of choices and decisions, made no sense. If the farm is worth enough that they will owe $6 million in estate tax, the farm and its assets must be worth more than that because the US estate tax rate has never been 100 percent or, I guess in this case, more. (In real life, Secretariat did not save the farm. It was saved the year before by Secretariet’s stable mate Riva Ridge who won 2 out of 3 Triple Crown races.) Finally, the family issues: Mom is gone an awful lot, Dad is rightly aggrieved, and the kids don’t seem to care. Well, these all disappear in the last act, because who needs that kind of unresolvable unpleasantness when Secretariat runs so fast? It’s a horrible bait-and-switch because it means all the family issues that drive the first act are filler.

This is the type of movie you get when the writing stinks. Disney’s live action films have this tendency (“Remember the Titans” indeed), because theirs is a saccharin vision that never was or will be. Real conflict with messy complications and difficult choices has no place in their world. Unfortunately, that means there is little to be gained in watching their live action films. Despite the greatness of the horse, Secretariat is a case in point.

I’ve written at length about the dismaying slide of Scott Kurtz’ PVP, my one-time favorite web comic. I’m not a daily reader any more—I could no more handle the plummeting there than I could watch Matrix Reloaded again. I check in every once in awhile, though, just to see if perhaps Kurtz has returned to his senses. He did, after all, publish literally years of great material. Sadly, PVP has not changed since I wrote last year: It’s still an unmitigated mess.

Here’s a question for any long-time PVP reader: How would you describe Skull? Big blue troll, sure, but more specifically: Gentle giant, friendly, well-intentioned, flatulent, happy, and dopy-as-hell. For all his wonderful qualities, and they are many, he’s a dip. And that’s OK! He’s a great character that way. To wit, this comic from around 10 years ago:

Great comic, of course. Brent is snarky (as he should be) and Skull is happy and dumb. It’s a great little scene, true to both characters, and frankly touching too.

Here’s today’s comic:

What is Skull supposed to be there panels 1 and 2? Suave? Dear God, he’s never suave. He’s a dope. He’s happy-go-lucky. He’s incapable of even attempting to be suave! This is such a gross violation of character that it borders on what George Lucas did to C3PO in the droid factory. Characters in PVP have lost their characterization. This should be a scene of Francis meeting Marcy, not Skull and Sonya, but characters in PVP are now virtually indistinguishable from one another, so there we are. And it is painful.

Thought experiment: Re-imagine the above scene, staying true to Skull’s character. For me, it goes like this:

Skull (with eager expression): Hey, Sonya…Wanna see a movie tonight? Uh, with me?

Sonya: That’s sweet, Skull, but…

Skull (surprised): But what?

Sonya: I have a boyfriend.

Skull (happy): Oh, that’s OK. He can come too.

Everybody stays in character, you get a little Ghostbusters homage in there, and you’re set up for a wacky time at the theatre.

My best guess—and I don’t know the artist personally, though I did write him an email about these problems a while back—is that Kurtz is burned out. Maybe he has been for a few years now, and figured the recent move to Seattle might recharge the batteries. It won’t help, because PVP’s problems aren’t an issue of artist location or creativity. It’s that he’s moved away from the very things that brought him success, namely a superb comic style art and strong characterization.

As I’ve said before, I think Kurtz on his game is as good as it gets. He’s just been off his game for awhile now, and the above are some of the reasons why. I continue to hope he’ll get his mojo back.

Is it wrong to celebrate the death of an enemy?

I mourn the loss of thousands of precious lives, but I will not rejoice in the death of one, not even an enemy. Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that.—Martin Luther King, Jr 

Yet the world is an undeniably better place without Osama bin Laden in it. There is evil in the world, and at times the good must rise up and extinguish it. Surely, two world wars can have most of us agree on as much. Unless we’re willing to live with enslavement and tyranny, I see no other solution than force of arms for keeping dictators, madmen, and terrorists at bay. It is the sad nature of humankind that evil exists.

I think it folly to suppose that Gandhi’s and Martin Luther King, Jr.’s efforts through nonviolence and civil disobedience, as successful as they were in India and the American South respectively, could avert war between nations, stop international terrorism, or bring outlaws to justice. Indeed, without British shame and Kennedy’s National Guard one wonders how successful the aforementioned nonviolent movements would have been.

Nonetheless, nonviolence does not compromise one’s soul in the ways that violence does, and that is an enormous strength and value that should not be underestimated. Within a civil society, nonviolence protest can be the most effective and least diminishing course of action. It takes a willingness on the part of the oppressor to accept change, but it can be highly effective. (Case in point, the recent nonviolent revolution in Egypt.) That would be similarly true on the larger geopolitical stage, except that I don’t believe that it generally works. (At least I can think of no ready example.)

But none of this makes the good Reverend wrong. Hate begets hate, and darkness easily consumes the soul. Nations must fight wars with great reluctance not only because of the physical destruction that takes place, but because in war we dent our humanity, and after the experience our souls are never quite the same. The soldiers returning from the front lines are only the most obvious casualties. No one can convince me that our national psyche is better now than it was on September 10, 2001.

People are in the streets celebrating the death of bin Laden today, which strikes me by turns as macabre and idiotic. Celebrating death might be fine at an Irish wake, but it’s another thing entirely to be jubilant at the murder of another human being, no matter how heinous. Grim satisfaction seems a more appropriate response than jingoist pride—especially when in so many ways we’ve lost the undefinable “war on terror.”

Having spent trillions of dollars, instituted Big Brother-like surveillance both internationally and domestically, and dramatically curtailed civil liberties, how can we claim to have won? How will we ever? We’re on a path to literally bankrupt our country, and we’re less free (individually and collectively) than we’ve been at any time in living memory. Of this, what changes with the death of the world’s leading terrorist?

On this final question, I can only be happy if bin Laden’s death serves as the beginning of the end of US overseas military entanglements, and then not so much at his death as the possibility that we may begin to remake ourselves into a peaceful, solvent, freedom-loving nation. If his demise marks a necessary first step in a return to our better selves, so be it. What I celebrate is not his death, but the prospect of personal and national peace and the hope that such a thing is still possible.

A little over a year ago I decided to buy a new digital camera. The Canon Digital Elph I’d been using was still giving me good stuff and the portability was (and is) fantastic, but I felt like I was missing some great shots because of its minimal optical zoom. I’d always had good luck with Canons both personally and professionally, but I was enticed by a Panasonic Lumix DMC-ZS3 and it’s shiny 12x optical zoom.

The Panasonic wasn’t as easy for me to use as the Canons, but that could be my familiarity with Canon rather than any particular deficiency with the Lumix. For about 6 months, I really enjoyed the shots from the new camera. It wasn’t as portable, but it was small enough that I took it most places and the 12x optical was every bit as cool as I’d hoped.

Unfortunately, the camera stopped working. I have no idea why, but one day it simply refused to turn on. I bought a new battery to see if it was a battery issue, but nope, it seemed like a camera issue. So I called Panasonic for service under their 1-year warranty. They gave me an RMA number and had me send in the Lumix.

The next communication I received from them was what appeared to be a form letter informing me that the camera had a dented lens and would not be covered under warranty. I could spend almost $200 to buy a refurbished model from them or they’d just send me back my nonfunctional unit.

I’m a computer consultant by trade, which is to say that I’m well-versed in the proper and careful handling of electronics. If this camera has a “dented lens” it got it as part of normal use, not because I tossed it in the back of my car. (Subsequent investigation of online reviews reveals I’m not alone in having this “dented lens” issue). I explained this to Panasonic in a letter, but to no avail. They returned my broken camera unfixed and washed their hands of the matter.

I realize there are legal options available in this sort of thing, but frankly it’s not worth my time. I’d sign up for a class action lawsuit in a heartbeat, but

What I will do is this:

• Never again purchase Panasonic electronics of any kind—not an idle threat since I buy a lot of electronics;
• Tell my story as far and as widely as the Internet allows, which I’m happy to say is fairly far and fairly wide.

All manufacturers will have the occasional lemon. It’s part of any mass production process, and I accept that. I’m not even terribly concerned that my camera happened to be one of those. What’s unconscionable, however, is for a company to not stand behind its products when they fail. That I won’t abide, and I recommend you don’t either.

Just saw Rebecca Black’s “Friday” video, rightly voted the most hated on YouTube. I didn’t mind the video itself so much as the song, which was about as Autotuned and lyrically awful as anything I’ve ever heard. It’s almost like the song was programmed to annoy adults. For those outside the tweener demographic that this is clearly aimed at, the idea of a 13 year-old “kickin’ it” and “chillin’” and “cruisin’”—the latter being particularly remarkable since 13 year-olds can’t drive, so she’s doing all this with who exactly?—is another example of kids trying to act adult(ish) when it’s so painfully obvious they’re not. We all grow up in fits and starts. Most of us don’t (or didn’t) pretend so forcefully that we’ve already arrived then broadcast those attempts to the world.

So I’m clear—since I understand that Black has received personal messages of dislike from the looneys on the Internet—I’m not saying anything against her personally. In fact, I wish all the best and congratulate her on the success she’s achieved. I wish she would lay off the Autotune so we could hear the real her. But I also agree with Simon Cowell, the notorious judge of American Idol as well as a fine an evaluator of musical talent, who said Black should not “listen to anyone over the age of 18. I’m being deadly serious. Whatever she’s done has worked. Whether you like her or not, she’s the most talked-about artist in America right now. Nobody over the age of 18 should understand her or like her. So she should just do it her way.”

Last year I wrote:

Having just concluded three days of Macworld SF 2010 after taking part in various user conferences and walking the show floor, I remain somewhat skeptical of Macworld SF 2011.

The joy of being right is rather muted by the embarrassment of actually attending this year’s dismal show. This year’s Macworld is even smaller than last year’s. I’d say that they’ve shoehorned the affair into the smaller Moscone West except that there are so few vendors there’s no shoehorning needed. No Apple obviously, but also no Adobe, Microsoft, Brother, Canon, Nikon, etc. When one of your star vendors is Dexim, a company I’ve never heard of, you’re in real trouble.

Macworld has already announced dates for next year, but unless there’s a dramatic announcement (“Apple returns!”), I can’t see how the show makes it. I’ve been going to Macworld for about 10 years, but this is it; I’m done. I arrived at the show late and covered the whole thing in under three hours. Given Apple’s record sales in Macs, iPads and iPhones, I can only conclude trade shows—or at least this trade show—are going the way of the dinosaur.

NOTES

• iGrill by iDevices is a Bluetooth cooking thermometer that connects wirelessly to your iPhone. Demos well. iPhone-owning BBQers rejoice.
• iPhoneLife magazine, already so in need of a renaming that they append “+iPad & iPod Touch” above the title, is a dismally written affair. The glossy paper and layouts are fine, but this is a good example of what you get when you ask non-writers to be writers. Quality goes up and down by the page. Some of the reviews are coherent—informative, even—but for God’s sake don’t make this the only tech magazine to which you subscribe.
• New magazine i.Business is worse. They intend to cover Apple technology and business, two subjects that have apparently never come together before, and I wish them well. The first issue wasn’t promising, but in life you get points just for showing up, so I’m happy to revisit the periodical in another year—assuming, of course, that there’s something to revisit.
• I had an extended conversation with a fellow from Marketcircle about the state of the show. Previously Marketcircle had a huge presence. This year, only a small booth in which to meet and greet. We didn’t really get into their products, since Billings (still) won’t integrate with QuickBooks properly and Daylite (a product in which I was even certified at one time) is far too confusing for the average business owner. (How confusing? You probably have to hire a certified consultant to show you how to use it.)
• The iPad app Art Authority looks terrific. It’s $7.99, which is expensive relative to other apps in the App Store, but for a historical overview of artists and artwork, it looks fantastic. Bought it as soon as I got home to the iPad.
• I’ve already got covers for my iPhones and iPads, so I didn’t find this compelling, but if you’d like to make a customized gel skin cover for your device, these are the GelaSkins are the guys who do it. About $40 for an iPad case and $20 for an iPhone one. They’ve got a bunch of fancy pre-made ones if you don’t want to do your own, but I think the only reason to do this would be that you want to put your own artwork on the outside of your iOS device.
• If you’ve found yourself desperately wishing you could go swimming with your iPhone, iPod Touch, or, God knows why, even your iPad, the solution appeared in the form of Dry Case. Waterproof down to 100 feet, the kit can be augmented by optional waterproof earbuds and sports belts. So confident is Dry Case of their technology that they offer a one-year Dry Case replacement guarantee. That is to say, they’ll send you a new case in which to place your now waterlogged iPhone. What could be more reassuring?
• What’s that? You say you have an idea for a great iPhone or iPad app but no idea whatsoever how to code anything? Did you also say that you have a minimum of $2,000 (and more likely $4,000) to make the idea a reality? If so, AppMuse can find you the programmer you need. Give AppMuse the idea—they’ll sign a non-disclosure agreement if you like (and you really better like, if you know what’s smart)—and they’ll put it out there to their roster of programmers, three of whom will submit bids to work on your project. I have every confidence that AppMuse and several thousand bucks can make your iPhone/iPad dream a reality.
• The number one thing you can do to make your Mac faster is to place it aboard a rocket ship. A close second is to replace the Mac’s internal hard drive with an Other World Computing (OWC) Solid State Drive (SDD). Don’t worry if that’s a lot of acronyms, most tech words barely make sense anyway. Be that as it may, SSDs are insanely fast compared to traditional hard drives, and as I’ve watched the prices creep down from the thousands into the hundreds I’ve become increasingly tempted to upgrade my laptop with one of these. Most everyday tasks become 2-3x faster. See this video for proof.
• San Francisco at night is a dim, broadly-lit place with a pervasive sense of unreality. I feel like I’m inside somebody’s performance art project.
• Want to download that YouTube video with the dancing monkey? Of course you do, and darn Google for making it nigh impossible. Happily, Jaksta will let you do it. It’s not free, but use coupon code JMACWORLD (valid until Feb. 15, 2011) to get $10 off.
• If you’ll be handing off that new iPad to the kids or if you’re the clumsy sort, Ektopad iPad cover is the most rugged thing short of an uber-expensive Otterbox. I’m not saying you should turn your iPad into a Frisbee to test it out, but for an accidental drop you’ve got much better odds that the thing survives.

So, the end of an era. I won’t miss the CalTrain (any more), and the six block walk to Moscone got a little old, particularly the stinky under the bridge part. But I did enjoy the Macworld event itself for many years, and I will miss the coming together of people to celebrate all things Apple. I’ve been through technological deaths before, notable Commodore with its Vic-20, Commodore 64 and Amiga. Apple’s never been stronger, so this isn’t that.

Rather it’s a change in the way people sell things and how they receive information about products. Apple’s internalized some of it with the app store for the Mac and for the iOS devices. The Internet and the ever-increasing number of Apple Retail Stores take care of the rest, I suppose. For me, though, nothing will ever take the place of a really good Macworld show. I’m sorry this wasn’t one, but I had a few and that’s more than many can say.

Pretty layouts, glossy paper, and alluring subject matter will get you in the door, but if the content’s not there (and boy is it not), you’re going to have a rough go of it. I’m looking at the March-April 2011 edition of iPhone Life that I picked up for free at Macworld, and ouch. It doesn’t bode well when you have to augment your periodical’s title (“+iPad & iPod Touch”). Presumably they’ll keep throwing names up there until Apple stops introducing devices or they run out of space on the cover.

Started flipping through and the ads look nice. The Editor’s lead commentary runs down what the issue covers rather blandly, but it’s the same sort of schtick every month, so I’m always inclined to cut slack there.

The “Meet our writers….” and iPhone Life Staff page is rather amateurish. A number of writers have professional head shots, but several look like they’re out on the beach surfing, one appears to be a mime, one is holding his kid, and another is driving in his car. The author descriptions are similarly disparate. The first fellow is a “Systems test and integration engineer” and you think, “Super! He’ll know what he’s talking about.” But then we get a freelance blogger, a “technology enthusiast,” and an “uber-cool soccer mom of four.” Methinks there might be a problem in the vetting of writers.

So it’s with skeptical eye that I turned to the first column, the “Social Media Report,” entitled “Using Social Media apps for Customer Service.” Really, it was just poorly named. It should have been “Using Twitter and Hootsuite for Customer Service.” But the article did close with what appears to be a theme:

I would love to know how you use your iPhone and iPad for customer service. Feel free to post directly to our Facebook page to continue this conversation.

This is intriguing in two ways. First, an author rarely ends a piece with a call for help. While it’s certainly fine to acknowledge that one can’t and doesn’t know everything about a topic, the job of the writer is to learn and share, not plead for assistance. Take that offline and do your research. Second, this is not a conversation. There is no two-way dialogue to continue. You may start a dialog on Facebook if you like and if others choose to pipe up, but this is not that since no one was quoted in the column and it wasn’t a Q & A.

In the reader mail section, a reader writes asking for iPhone Life to institute a star rating system on their reviews. The Publisher/Executive Editor answers:

In theory, I agree with your suggestion for a rating system. However, in practice, the engineer in me finds star ratings too subjective and inconsistent. We have at least 20 authors per issue, and it would be very difficult to standardize star ratings and to a lesser extent pros and cons about every product. Further, given that there are 200,000 apps in the App store, if we write about it in our magazine, chances are it’s a top app, so the difference between 3 and 4 stars wouldn’t be meaningful.

You think, “Great answer! He agrees that star ratings are nice but explains why it doesn’t make sense for the magazine. Perfect.” But then he tacks on this:

“Having said that, a rating system is an ongoing discussion, and eventually likely you will see it here.”

What the heck? You just finished elaborating why it didn’t work for your publication! So your answer to a star rating system is “yes, no, yes”? If this is the level of backbone coming from the publisher, I dare say all is lost. Don’t be afraid to offend your readers. Or minimally, disagree with them politely. Good Lord, man, it’s your magazine.

We turn then to the lead article, the one the cover touts as answering the question, “Next iPad: Still the best?” Now this is unknowable. Apple hasn’t released iPad 2 and they don’t talk about future products. So that’s a tall order to fill unless you have insider information. As you might have guessed, they don’t. Instead, we get a run through of what Apple rumors sites and pundits have speculated that a next generation iPad might have and a comparison to other tablets all of which are vaporware except for the Samsung Galaxy Tab. In other words, we’re comparing a hypothetical tablet against other hypothetical tablets excepting the Galaxy Tab, which runs a non-tablet operating system and which “many users complained…felt like a big phone.” Excellent. Good article. Let’s tackle how many angels on the head of a pin next.

How to conclude when purporting to answer the unanswerable? Here you go:

This is definitely the year of the tablet, but the big question is, will Apple still be on top when the year comes to a close? With over fifty competing tablets looking to take a market share, the iPad will have some stiff competition. Will other platforms be able to challenge Apple’s App Store lead in both iPad optimized apps as well as compatible iPhone/iPad touch apps? Will the next generation of iPad come out with any unexpected features? Time will tell, but one thing is for sure…It’s going to be an exciting year for tablets!

Yes, the tablets I’ve talked with are all very excited. And to answer your questions: Yes, no, and probably. Thanks for your help in sorting through that, “Enterprise Editor.” I see from your bio that you “strongly believe in the technology not for the sake of technology, but rather to improve capability and efficiency,” a stand for which you should be applauded in the face of a world that takes a diametrically opposed view. For who among us—other than the Enterprise Editor—doesn’t say to himself, “I need a technological gizmo that will do nothing for me, that neither improves what I can do nor how quickly I can do it. In short, I need to have this gizmo simply because it is a gizmo.” A brave stand, indeed. I can’t wait to read what you write next.

And there it is on page 18: “Apple’s Innovative Evolution: How Apple is facing the ‘innovator’s dilemma.” The Enterprise Editor graces us again:

In 1997, Harvard Business School professor Clayton Christensen wrote a book entitled The Innovator’s Dilemma in which he described a phenomenon where new technologies have a tendency to be quite disruptive in the market. Market leaders are focused on meeting the needs of their existing customers through incremental improvements in existing technologies, leaving the door open for new market entrants to leverage disruptive technologies. The disruptive technologies might initially only be attractive to a small, niche, or low-end sections [sic] of the market, but once they begin to mature and gain traction in the market, they can overtake the existing technologies with the previous market leader unable to do anything about it.

That’s a powerful idea (not his, of course), horribly written (absolutely his words). Are they paying you by the word? Let’s see what we can do with paragraph one:

In 1997, Harvard Business School professor Clayton Christensen wrote The Innovator’s Dilemma. He described how some new technologies can be quite disruptive in the market. Market leaders meet the needs of existing customers through incremental technological improvement, allowing market entrants an opening with revolutionary technology that initially only appeals to small or low-end customers. Once these technologies mature, they can quickly gain market traction leaving the previous market leader unable to compete.

That’s an admittedly imperfect quick fix, but it reads a lot better and, I should note, I’m not the Enterprise Editor for a national publication. The larger problem is that nobody cares particularly that some Harvard Prof wrote a book. It’s not the worst lead in the history of journalism, that quaint now-much-scorned academic discipline, but it’s not Edward R. Murrow either. So a better start might be something like:

In 1896 my great grandfather travelled from Montana to Oregon by covered wagon in a hard and somewhat dangerous journey of two weeks. Years later, he would fly the same distance in the relaxed comfort of an airplane in the span of just two hours. This is a story about Apple, technological change, and about what happens to the builders of today’s covered wagons.

Is that more compelling? I think so. It transports the reader a bit, at least a few of whom are likely saying, “Thank God. Not another iPhone app review.” More importantly, it draws the reader in while describing what the story is going to be about. I can write about technological change and Apple and iPhones, no problem. I’ve gotten the reader to at least the next paragraph without inducing narcolepsy, and I’ve probably decent chance at getting him to read several more paragraphs as well. Maybe the whole thing if I don’t mess it up.

Anyway, we get to the end of the piece and what do you suppose we find? Questions? But of course:

…What does Apple have planned next? Will they bring the simplified iOS to a laptop form-factor like the MacBook Air? Will the app revolution invade the living room with an iOS-based Apple TV? Since only Steve Jobs knows, we will all just have to wait and see.

Now that may be the single worst conclusion to an article I’ve ever read because it prompts one further question from the reader: Why on God’s green earth did I read this?

That in mind, I flipped through the rest of the magazine and watched as the quality of the various app reviews and articles bounce up and down. How could this be? Well, the answer is at www.iPhoneLife.com/writersguidelines and it goes like this: “Up front, please understand that we don’t pay authors.” Excellent. So what level of objectivity can we expect authors and, more importantly, reviewers to have? If I’m an iPhone app developer, like it turns out the Enterprise Editor is, why don’t I just have my brother/friend/cousin/mom write a review of my work for you because, you know, they really like it. Best thing since covered wagons. I’m not saying that’s what’s happening; I’m saying that’s what could happen based on the non-payment policy in place. You can’t argue, after all, that you’re paying your authors to be objective.

So I appreciate the free issue at Macworld, but no, I don’t think I’ll be subscribing.