Catalin
Professional Streaming Consultant

The build of Windows 7 it uses is amazing, and fully functional with all Windows software. That includes Flash.

I’m guessing there are some huge issues in making that work, otherwise iPhone would’ve had a Hulu app for ages. It’s been rumored for almost a year. Some suggest Apple/AT&T won’t allow it to preserve AT&T’s 3G network. But, at least in the ill-performing TV.com iPhone app, it has been shown that streaming can be limited to being available only on WiFi on a per video basis.

That’s not something that more than a relative handful of people will do, but presumably if it works for Google/YouTube they’ll switch the whole site to HTML5 (although considering how long things stay in beta with Google, it might be our grandchildren witnessing the switch).

“Where does everyone get that APple locks their products down?”
You can’t install anything on the iPhone and the iPad except stuff from the Apple app store. Which has very strict, often arbitrary, rules as to what is allowed in there. If that’s not lockdown, I don’t know what is.
And please, don’t mention jailbreaking. One shouldn’t need to jailbreak their own frikkin’ device just to install an app not blessed by Apple onto it.

Let me give you a practical example of this kind of lockdown:
A MKV file with xvid video and vorbis audio. An AVI file with xvid video and mp3 or ac3 audio. An OGG file with theora video and vorbis audio… The processor in the iPad is more than capable of playing back all those files. But it can’t. You know why? Because the device is locked down to the stuff Apple tells you you’re allowed to use and nothing else. You can’t install a player onto the device that would be capable of handling those media files, the app store rules forbid it.

“APple is using an open standard for the ebooks as well.”
Yeah… but will you be able to transfer those books to another device? NO. They’ll be locked down with DRM. Music from iTunes is not locked by DRM anymore, but everything else *is*.

“The MP3 market was going nowhere till Apple came along”
Err, Apple does not and never has sold MP3 music. It was all AAC from the very beginning. Locked by DRM at first.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/01/27/AR2010012704222.html

Other things are how they plan to raise the price of e-books from the $9.99 that’s standard at Amazon, to $12.99-$14.99. I’m sorry, but I’m just not paying that much for an e-book that’ll probably be DRMed to hell anyway.

This is just further proof that Apple is only for upper middle class and rich people.

Microsoft is the one who has a browser not based upon open standards and wont run HTML5. Microsoft has gone against open standards for years. WMV is the most locked down proprietary system out there. SO is DIVX.
APple is using an open standard for the ebooks as well. Amazon locked down the kindle with its own format rather then using an open format.

Apple has long since been open standards. Why is there no flash? Because flash is dead. It wont be long before flash is gone and html5 is the new flash.
And hopefully HTML5 will go away with MS silverlight as well.

The idea here is that this could makes books no longer static but they could come to life in a way and then like textbooks a college student could carry 1 ipad rather then 20 textbooks around.
Even the iphone is not locked down just because apple does not want you using flash when html5 is available.
I must say the name could have been better but i see there is a huge market for this in the future. I also remember people laughing at the ipod, the iphone and even remember michael Dell laughing at Apple back in 97 saying shut the company down.

Now Dell is going in the toilet and is losing marketshare and money fast. Apple has more money in securities and investments then Dell is worth. Today Apple is worth 7x what Dell is.

Yes there were touch screen phones before the iphone but none that could repsond so fluidly and do as much as the iphone.
The MP3 market was going nowhere till Apple came along

The Apple apologists act like Apple is some dear relative we should be patient with. They are just another corporation and it’s fair to be skeptical and call things like they are.

And apart from the problems Robert raised, it also seems to be totally locked down by evil DRM, meaning essentially Apple decides what programs you run on your computer? You gotta be kidding. That’s none of your business Apple.

The problem here is Apple is deliberately not giving the market what it clearly wants: an apple netbook. Instead they are trying to sell a device that is essentially a fancy funnel for consuming iTunes and iBook content.

But that isn’t why people loved Apple, they loved Apple because it empowered people and helped them create. This isn’t a creation device, it’s just a consumption device, and as such feels un-Apple.

They don’t have to use Flash. And given its instability and heavy usage of CPU power it’s pointless. Flash had been the only way to deliver video because there was no better way. Now there are many better ways. MUCH better.

Even Hulu is steering away from flash with stand alone players on the Mac and Windows. I hope Hulu will be looking into an iPad app before too long.

*Sigh*

If there’s anything more annoying than all the speculation of all the many things that the iPad was going to be that will cause it to rule the world. It’s all the whining about what it doesn’t have and why it’s doomed to be a failure.

It must be some sort of disease…. “I-wanna-pony-itis”, I guess you could call it.

its basicly a to large ipod touch

i mean in what situation do you use this thing? I understand the ebook thing, thats basicly what it is, a high class ebook reader.

Lets see how the slate does. allowing flash could make or break the deal, cause thats the NEW moving picture format.

I have a $199 netbook that streams flash video just fine. And, hell, if I just want to watch a video, I’ve got a $99 Onda VX545HD with a 5″ 800×600 screen in a much more manageable 4×6″ form factor, and it even has 720p output… only via composite cables, not HDMI, but, still. And, hell, for ten bucks more (~$110), you can get the VX575HD, which *has* HDMI output, a USB port, and plays MKV files.

A solution in search of a problem. Go Apple!

Seriously? I remember a ton of people drooling over them. All the Apple-fanboys I know have had reactions ranging from “meh, I might buy one” to “why would I want this?”

It can’t do what my phone does, and it’s worse in almost every way (except size and having a touch pad, and I like big things) than my laptop.

Here’s my favorite picture illustrating the problems with the iPad http://i.imgur.com/5vREa.png

Even the most sycophantic Apple used seem to be having a hard time finding a use for this unneeded bastardized hybrid.

Ten Things Missing from the iPad

http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2010/01/ten-things-missing-from-the-ipad/

1) Flash
2) OLED Screen
3) USB port
4) GPS
5) MulitTasking
6) Real keyboard
7) Camera
Verizon
9) 16:9 aspect ratio
10) HDMI output

Adobe comments on lack of Flash for iPad

Apple makes some fantastic products, but it’s usually best to wait for at least the second generation.

Downloading songs is a great idea. The downloads are short, you can sample the songs first, you can play the songs over and over, and they’re great as background sound. Downloading TV shows and movies is not so good. Many shows/movies are not worth watching all the way through. Very few are worth keeping. Even the ones that are worth keep, I don’t want to keep watching over and over. Netflix’s streaming is a much better idea. Hulu is great, and I wouldn’t mind paying for Hulu if the price is right.

Who knows? But I am skeptical of the success of this, but then I have been very wrong about technology before, turning down the offer to be president of a Tech Company getting into PC technology before the IBM PC was born and thinking to myself just how many of these things are going to be sold!

But everything else on this device… no multitasking (wtf??) and completely locked down, the only way to get apps is through the app store.
This means you’re limited to the video formats Apple allows you to watch and it doesn’t matter that you could watch other formats too with a different player. But nope, app store policy forbids apps that duplicate built-in functionality. Nice way of locking out competition, Apple. Also, no usb ports, no card reader…

Sorry if this comment turned out as an anti-Apple rant, but no access to Hulu is this device’s least issue.
Too bad it’ll probably sell anyway, just because it’s Apple. Me, I’ll stick with my Linux powered netbook.