Lately I’ve noticed a trend amongst Australian news sites, where bashing Apple products is all the rage.  This could either be because it incites a fan-boy war in the comments which drives more interest to otherwise subpar articles, or if the writers are inherently anti-Apple.  Either way it leads to some gross exaggerations (and/or) bold-faced lies.  After 2 bottles of wine on a bored Friday night, I’ve had my fill.  Let’s explore the latest by renown (ha) author, Adam Turner.

Why would I want an Apple Television?

The latest SMH article basically breaks down a product that hasn’t been announced and makes some ludicrous assumptions, which are backed up by strong statements of personal distaste.

“…I still don’t think they make much sense for Apple or for us. Apple’s future lies in content and services, supported by tiny throwaway devices sold at premium prices…”

The fact that the author of this article (Adam Turner , @adam_turner) believe that the sole purpose of Apple is to create ‘tiny throwaway devices’ is somewhat laughable.  He seems to have missed the time period where Apple revolutionized the portable MP3/Media and mobile device markets, let alone the fact that Apples (as in their computers) increased market share last year, while PCs declined.

I do realise that Apple weren’t the first to do either of these (I owned a Compaq ipaq before the iPod) — but they were insanely successful in creating easy to use devices that allowed the general public to run rampant.  I’d also like to point out that I’m no Apple zealot, I created this blog to moan about Mac OS Lion.

Next up, an uneducated comment on someone who has clearly never written a line of code in his life:

“Owners of the original Apple TV got burned when Apple released a new model and declined to add many of the best features to the old model.”

What he’s referring to, of course, is that the new Apple TV 2 offered features unavailable to people who purchased the original Apple TV some 24 months earlier.  Now, I’m not sure if he’s noticed – but the technology industry moves fast.  Like really fast.  I’m not sure if Apple ‘declined’ to add the features, or the law of physics simply prevented this from happening.  The ATV2 has technology that allows things (such as AirPlay mirroring) to occur, where the original does not.  That’s also why your old 486 can’t play Crysis, Mr Turner.  I’m so sorry it’s taken someone this long to tell you.

Here, I’ll make a bold statement.  The landscape of mobile phones and portable media would be drastically different without Apple.  Why should the TV market be any different?

Think about this for a second.  Airplay (with mirroring) that allows you to fire up a AAA gaming title like Infinity Blade II on your (or your friends) TV.  Hell, connect a bluetooth controller and play some real premium gaming titles.  You’ve already done what the next generation PSP and Wii-U are trying to achieve without even reaching market — and at the same time, you’ve taken away all the ‘soft-core’ gamers from the PS3 and 360 camps, that’s a lot of gamers.  Now add the ability to stream your iTunes, iPhoto and other media libraries from the ‘cloud’ to any TV set and you’ve got something that’s pretty much unbeatable.

Oh did I forget to mention streaming services from Netflix, Hulu, Grooveshark, Pandora (just to name a few)..?  AND the ability to use PVR abilities remotely (hello, Siri?) all bound to an intrinsically Apple and, therefore, straightforward, easy to use interface.

Any one of those features have me chomping at the bit to buy an Apple TV.  It’s probably why most manufacturers are leaping into action and trying to pre-empt the inevitable.

There’s one last point Mr Turner makes:

Chances are the Apple Television’s big attraction will be Siri, but I don’t think the ability to talk to my television is enough to entice me to hand over complete control of my lounge room to Apple.

If he truly thinks Siri, which is a beta service basically offered as a way to entice people into buying the 4S, is the ‘killer’ sale pitch, then he surely hasn’t done due diligence.  Post a news article when you’ve done a little research, next time.

Here’s the thing.  I don’t use the mouse that much, and I never subscribed to the whole ‘gestures’ thing.  I’ve always used keyboard shortcuts, as I find them to be far more efficient than waving a mouse around.  Mission Control requires you to use your mouse to do anything useful, either by using gestures or hot-corners.

This wouldn’t be such a problem in it’s own right, however Mission Control is nowhere near as powerful or feature packed as the combination of Expose’ and Spaces in Snow Leopard.

Here’s a list of functionality I used daily that no longer works (or at least I can’t find) in Lion:

• Align virtual desktops in a grid – now you’re forced to work entirely horizontally
• Drag applications directly between spaces – you have to actually go to the space, then go into Mission Control mode, then you can drag to other spaces
• Use keyboard shortcuts to quickly jump directly to a specific space
• Load applications in specified space
• Show open Application windows by click-holding on an Application icon (you have to click ‘Show All Windows’)

When full-screen mode was announced for Lion I had a slight hint of excitement at the thought of having true full screen apps spread over multiple, dedicated monitors.

Unfortunately Apple’s implementation falls a little short. If you attempt to ‘full-screenerize’ an application on an external monitor it simply makes it full screen on your default monitor, and replaces the external displays with a grey slate background image. Useless.