The 10 Worst Tech Products of 2010 203
Barence writes "PC Pro has a count down of the ten worst tech gadgets of the year. Included in its hall of shame are: iPad Made Simple, 'a book containing 704 pages of advice on how to use a device that's universally acknowledged as being ridiculously easy to use'; the Dell Inspiron Duo, 'a tablet that leaves you longing to return to a keyboard and a touchpad'; and the £99 Next Tablet, the highlight of which was the 'eight-page Quick Start Guide.'"
Time to put PC Pro on a list like this... (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm not inclined to cut Apple any slack and even I would not have put the Mini on that list.
Overall, this list seems pretty lame and mostly filled with stuff that doesn't really belong there.
Re:Time to put PC Pro on a list like this... (Score:5, Insightful)
TFA agrees with you, and points out that they're being a little unfair. But what they really wanted to do was bitch and moan about £650 for something specced the same as an Acer Aspire Revo; and worse, ripping you off on "optional upgrades" by charging "triple the price difference".
All of which, if true, is pretty shitty. They could probably have found better "worst products of 2010" if they'd wanted to, but their criticisms of the Mac Mini seem valid enough.
Re:The list was lamer than the products (Score:5, Insightful)
People overestimate how easy the iPad is to use. My first introduction to the iAnything was watching other people struggling to use their new devices. Without watching the screen, I could tell it was not the intuitive interface that everybody claimed.
When I finally got an iPhone I discovered the problem for myself. The interface is littered with hidden features that have no visual indication that they exist, let alone how to use them. Then there is the problem of the inconsistent user interface.
The great example that I always use is to ask how you delete things in iOS. It seems that every app has its own way to do it. Some of them rely on the user just having to know that they have to strike through an item or click and holding on an icon until a little red X appears. The only way to find out how to do it is to try out all the possibilities. I still can't say for sure that you can't delete a song from the iPod app, because maybe there is some method that I haven't tried. Either way it is a rubbish interface.
So I think that there is definitely a use for an iPad how-to book.
No no no.. the iPad itself! (Score:4, Insightful)
I say the iPad itself stands as king on Mount Crapmore for 2010. So far, all the people who bought one of those tablets can _not_ tell me what they are using it for. I can think of very few people who'd actually have a legitimate use for it. Others would be better off with a Blackberry or a cheap netbook.
I've witnessed a conversation that illustrates my anger. I do sysadmin work and one of the systems is an immersive 3D Cave system to examine medical images. When two ladies heard an iPad was going to be purchased for the Cave so you can take notes, they exclaimed "How modern!". Right.. A visual system that runs on 6 servers, a number of beamers and camera's costing up to half a million euros isn't modern until we add a fucking iPad! You know what even works better then an iPad to take notes with? A pen and goddamn clipboard!
So because the whole world has been brainwashed that it's oh so useful, this is the most horribly useless product of 2010.
If you disagree, (and I expect many will), please, PLEASE tell me what you actually use it for. And if you say something that can be solved better by a cheaper product, (like ebook reading, for which a kindle is better and cheaper), I'm going to hit you on the head with a wiffle bat until you're free of your Apple worship affliction. I wouldn't accept an iPad if they offered it to me for free.
Re:No no no.. the iPad itself! (Score:4, Insightful)
THANK YOU GOOD SIR.
I wholeheartedly agree. The iPad is one of the most ridiculously overpriced pieces of garbage out there. You're paying 450 dollars for what? An app store and a browser on a touchscreen. Sweet mother of baby jesus. Buy a laptop or a netbook. You get so much more for what you pay for. I have to hand it to Apple though, if they can brainwash their lemming customers to buy this useless piece of plastic, they can do anything, especially when you have full OS tablets out.
And that is what worries me. Users don't care and aren't interested in the backend of computers. They never were. That is why the app store idea is so popular. Google with their Chrominium OS and Apple's appstore idea are driving the next gen computer user-experience. No one cares what goes where, how things are installed, or how the backend is functioning. All they care about is that they can press a button and download Angry Birds or Bejeweled then press another button and play. Who cares where it went as long as I can find it. This is exactly the same kind of nonsense that spawned from iTunes users where they think their music is magically "inside" iTunes rather than being parsed as a library from a location on the hd. Common users don't care about understanding these core components of the computer experience. They want simple, dumbed down, minimalistic experiences, which provide lean options but also minimal options to fuck up their system.