Simon's Blog

So what exactly has a penguin chick got to do with iOS 5? Well nothing actually but I just like this drawing I made. Having lived now with iOS 5 for a few days I am starting to understand how it works and it is true it is a lot better than the previous incarnation. Whether it is better than any other OS out there is not really the issue. iOS 5 is more about consolidating Apple’s hold on its customer base rather than innovation.

I understand that the new iPhone 4S is flying off the shelves despite its lukewarm reception from the geekology who view products that don’t have 20 new amazing features as an utmost failure. Apple have contributed to this by their outlandish hyping of their products. If you ever listen to the late Steve Jobs talk you would think that he had a very limited vocabulary centred around the word amazing. In truth the new iPhone builds on the real power behind the Apple success – iTunes or to put it another way – it consolidates – another unword to some of the Apple fan boys. This is not a particularly radical observation but it true nonetheless. You could not have the success of the app word without iTunes and without the apps then smartphones are well, not that smart.

Viewed from this position then iCloud is the next logical step whereby you can integrate more of your life with Apple and iTunes. Which is why it is surprising that Apple haven’t found a way of integrating all the AppleID’s – perhaps one day but it really makes it confusing when you update to iOS 5 and put in the wrong ID, as I did, and then find you can’t buy anything from iTunes because you haven’t used your iTunes AppleID.

After all this nonsense it brings me back to the penguin…

Sent from my iPad