One of our writers purchased The Incident and emailed me the application file. I copied it to my Applications folder, and ran it without a hitch: No iTunes verification needed.
[…]
It’s starting to look like this lack of “DRM” is falling on the shoulders of the developers. Apple has apparently given them the tools (AppStore receipt validation) to implement security measures for their apps. Whether or not a developer includes it is solely up to them.
Category: Apple
Thoughts on the Mac App Store
Here are some thoughts, in no particular order. I’ll be updating them throughout the day.
Initial Thoughts
-
Updating to 10.6.6 was crazy fast. Not surprising, since about all the update does is add the Mac App Store.
-
The Mac App Store looks a lot like its iTunes cousin. Layout is very similar to the iOS App Store on the desktop version of iTunes.
-
Holy cow, why so many gradients?
-
It is nice to have an app besides iTunes to use for editing my AppleID.
On Apps and the Web
Tomorrow, Apple will open the Mac App Store, and assumedly, a flood of new apps will be available to OS X users.
I fear that most of these apps will be not unlike iOS apps — simple, one-task apps that just re-arrange web data. While that works on mobile devices, I’m not sure it will on the desktop. I don’t want another 45 apps in my Dock to do what I can do now without them.
The Tablet Market
There’s an iPad market, and the iPad could be classified as a tablet, from a hardware-centric viewpoint. But the market for non-iPad tablets is about as big today as it was before the iPad, which isn’t nothing, but it’s close enough to nothing that Apple doesn’t need to worry about it.
Go read (or Instapaper) this right now. Marco’s dead on — the iPad is a stand-alone product, and the tablet market is just as sad today as it was a year ago. If not more so.
‘Without Hesitation’
I haven’t felt so thrilled by a new piece of hardware since I bought our first iPad, and the same feeling of experiencing a new class of device is present here too. If you’re tempted by the 11-inch model’s portability but are worried about whether you could get your work done, put your concerns aside – it’s an excellent machine and more than up to the job.
Having owned one for more than a week now, using it every day (including for development work in Xcode) and traveling for most of that time, I can recommend it without hesitation.
‘Something from Apple’
Marco has written the list of the year, as far as I am concerned.
Cultured Code’s Biggest Problem Isn’t OTA Sync
Cultured Code has a problem. And it isn’t with its products.
Yes, bashing Cultured Code’s Things family of programs has become popular. And not without good reason. The more complex OmniFocus has OTA sync. Simpler to-do managers like Remember the Milk and TeuxDeux do as well.1 In a world where most people own at least one iOS device, it’s critical to have a solution in place that makes data on all devices stay in sync. Patronizing blog posts and fancy status board updates do not a feature make.
Apple: 2010 in Review
Check out my newest editorial at Macgasm, outlining the hits and misses of Apple’s year.
Dropbox Gets Reviewed
Put simply, Dropbox is an amazingly useful combination of a Web service and a Mac OS X program that work together to make your data accessible from anywhere and to keep it synchronized between your computers
[…]
If this sounds a bit like the iDisk feature of Apple’s MobileMe service, that’s because it’s similar…except that Dropbox is fast and reliable. Dropbox is also more secure than iDisk, as files stored on the Dropbox servers are encrypted and are transferred using SSL.
13" Air Named GigaOM Gadget of Year
The iPad didn’t make the cut for the top spot, mostly because of my work rhythms and how I do it. And despite my own early excitement, I have not been able to make it an efficient part of my work flow.
That’s the same dilemma I have.
‘It’s Like Loaning Money’
We tend to forgive the features that Apple left behind, though. We’re confident that Apple will get around to it in time. It’s like loaning money. We understand that there’s a risk in giving Apple our $499, but the company is a good credit risk and we’re confident that within 12 months they’ll give us a feature that they never outright promised to deliver.
Lovely. The danger there is that we might someday accept all of this as normal. It isn’t. Our expectations should always be high and should never lose our ability to feel a sense of disappointment.
Year of the Tablet
So what happened to the year of the tablet? The answer is simple: the iPad. Apple offered a slatelike computer that incorporated its perfected iTunes app experience, at the right price point, and with an intuitive interface that helped the company quickly sell millions of its newfangled device.
As we move into 2011, the murmurs coming out of the next Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas all have to do with tablets again. There will be Microsoft tablets, Hewlett-Packard slates and a number of devices running the Google Android platform. All hope to take on Apple. And so we’re looking at another Year of the Tablet.