The Future Of Publishing Blog by Thad McIlroy
July 4th, 2010
The release of Apple’s iPhone 4G has become a midsummer blockbuster. No vampires — just out of control electronics, deceitful software, and scary artificial limbs. It started as a winner… But a problem fixed became a problem created… And of course the lawsuits start flying left and right. Suddenly Steve Jobs generates one of his infamous…
January 27th, 2010
When we evaluate new technology I believe that the key equation is “push or pull.” It is the rare new technology product released to the public where the reaction is an immediate: “I want that.” I suppose Facebook and Twitter are recent examples of “I want that” being a very common refrain. It certainly didn’t…
January 27th, 2010
…except that you can’t use it as a phone (not out of the box, at any rate). And it’s not really a computer, because it runs on the iPhone OS. So yes, as Steve Jobs pointed out, there are currently 140,000 applications for that OS, but most of them are better described as “applets” rather…
January 7th, 2010
Above is the headline in a tiny article in today’s New York Times. I reference it because it states what I believe to be true: “Stuck between the still-evolving smartphone and the emerging tablet computer, the netbook computer would seem to be doomed.” It’s not so much that I necesarily feel that the NetBook is doomed,…
September 21st, 2009
I’ve been preaching ad nauseum that a dedicated eBook reader just doesn’t add up. In Thad’s The Laws of the Future of Publishing I’ve often quoted law #19: “There is a limit to the number of separate digital devices people want to carry. That limit is one.” People often say, “But what about the cellphone…won’t…