Filed under: Cult of Mac, iPhone
Tog on iPhone
Bruce Tognazzini has written another great article expounding his take on the iPhone. The mouse and other pointing devices, Tog reminds us, were around for 20 years before Apple made the technology work in an affordable and accessible manner. Multi-touch gestures are no different, he affirms. "Multi-touch gestural interfaces have been hanging around in the laboratory, screaming for release, for as long as the mouse hung around...Apple didn't invent the concept of the multi-touch interface. They've just, by all evidence, built the first one that, like the Mac before is, is (relatively) inexpensive, attractive, and accessible." He discusses the design from both a hardware and a software perspective. It's a great column, and I highly recommend that you get a nice cup of coffee and set aside some time to read it, enjoy it and savor it.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Victor Agreda Jr said 4:12PM on 1-19-2007
love me some Tog. great read!
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Speedmaster said 2:52PM on 1-19-2007
Agreed, I love it when Tog comments on these things, but his entries have been VERY rare of late. ;-(
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DrWho said 3:57PM on 1-19-2007
"I have yet to get my hands on an iPhone—frustrating! (You can imagine Bill Gates’s frustration. He probably has a cadre of engineers ready to take it apart, put it back together with a couple of screws missing, and paint it brown.)"
thats too funny.
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Tom said 4:45PM on 1-19-2007
Yes multi-touch has been around a long time, as was the mouse, but technology just sitting in a laboratory is useless. Apple is great at bringing formerly obscure technologies to the market and revolutionizing the industry in the process. I bet we'll see a lot more multi-touch devices once the iPhone arrives.
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Dan Woods said 4:47PM on 1-19-2007
"(You can imagine Bill Gates’s frustration. He probably has a cadre of engineers ready to take it apart, put it back together with a couple of screws missing, and paint it brown.)"
Fantastic.
Of course, it would take Microsoft engineers 2 1/2 years to do this; the amount of time it took Apple Engineers to design the iPhone "from scratch".
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Tagbert said 10:42PM on 1-21-2007
Great article & I agree with most of it.
It is odd that he shares a criticism that a lot of people have made of this phone, that of its 5 hour talk time. Not to be confused with standby time, 5 hours talk time is about typical of phones. Most will last for much longer in the typical mix of use and standby. Apple lists 16hrs for playing music.
I've lost count of the flaming posts that talk about having to get chargers for home, work, and car just to keep the thing from dying. A little perspective, please.
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