Feeling out of touch

There is a certain disturbing disconnect between the promise of the iPod touch software update 2.0.2 and the actual behavior of the iPod post update.

Let’s see, since the update lacked any info beyond “bug fixes”, I relied on the blogosphere’s reports, which summarized much faster back up, faster application loading and better performance overall. Oh blogosphere how you failed me.

My iPod touch now takes almost a full hour to back up (up from about 20-30 minutes before the update) and that, in my book, is not even close to much faster, quite the contrary. There is also a change in the way the App Store updates the apps on the device, it no longer offers the option to install all updates at once, so yesterday I was faced with 5 updates that I had to install by picking one at a time. And they installed very very very slowly, in which time the iPod was almost unusable.

I was a shore under the waves of frustration as I held the device, staring into the activity void that was its screen. Wishing it had at least something similar to Mac OSX’s spinning beach ball of death (or even that dreaded Windows hourglass) to show that its own private matters were more important that its owner’s.

Does it show that I’m pissed? Good, because I am. This is after the replacement iPod having one of those blue tint screens that makes me feel a taste of metal in my mouth AND annoy my vision with poor grey on white rendering at the same time.

AAAND the alarm clock on the iPod STILL doesn’t wake it up to a music playlist.

There, now that I got it all out of my system, I am feeling somewhat better. Vindicated you might say. Although it’s that kind of “NO, you are stupid, so… so… THERE!” vindication that doesn’t solve anything really.

Now isn’t this a “refreshing” change of style from this.

Backshift

Well that serves me well… The iPod touch is now in the shop because the backlight stopped working. Which means that I have to rely on cellulose based books to provide my pre-sleep entertainment.

It’s a kind of karma, isn’t it? I was just praising it in the previous post and now it’s lying somewhere on a technical bench waiting to be probed and tested and then hopefully fixed.

The shift

Ever since I updated my iPod touch to the new 2.0 firmware and installed a bunch of apps on it, the battery life got a real beating. Am I really using it more? If I were to make a mental statistic of my usage pattern, it should be roughly the same. With one major difference. Before this new update, I used the iPod mostly for listening to music and the occasional web browsing.

However, things dramatically changed when the update arrived. I can’t even remember the last time I plugged in the headphones. So while I may not be using it more, I am using it with its screen constantly on.

For me, the device mutated from a music player with some additional abilities to an Internet device with the ability to play music. I am still amazed when I remember getting it, and thinking what a wonderful music player it is. And just when that shine was beginning to fade, this new firmware gave it a new meaning and purpose.

It’s no longer an iPod to me. It changed the way I use the Internet. I don’t know if this is the future of computing. I don’t think this type of device is going to replace a “full fledged computer” very soon. I work with lots of desktop applications that I just can’t see on an iPod right now (think Photoshop, Lightroom, Flash et al.) But I do think it is the future of lifestyle computing.

It may sound like I am a bit infatuated with Apple and their stuff. Maybe I am. But I remember two distinct events in my life when I was so amazed by a piece of technology: when I got my first ever personal computer (a blazing 486DX2 running at a mind boggling 66MHz). And the transition to the Mac many many years later, which was like discovering a whole new world.

These were moments when I felt like I was 12 years old again and I’m unpacking the much desired PC, inhaling new smells and trembling hands. After the 486 I got a bunch of other computers, yet I never experienced that emotion and sheer desire to discover what that new thing can do.

I guess this is what people call Apple’s ability to give people a sense of “childlike wonder” and “capture their imagination” about their products. Because we all remember our first contact with an object that we wanted and that changed the way we experience things in our life, whether it was a computer, a car, or a washing machine.

When Dell or Sony or Microsoft or whichever company will be able to put out a product that can do that, I’ll be more than happy to give them money for it.