Thursday, June 30, 2011

H.P.’s New Tablet Enters Market Late, but Looks Marvelous

H.P.’s New Tablet Enters Market Late, but Looks Marvelous, article.
A lot of limitations, but some big promises too.

You know how people “jailbreak,” or hack, the iPhone to run unauthorized apps? Apple fights jailbreakers incessantly with software warfare. But H.P. welcomes such shenanigans. You agree not to bother H.P. with whatever trouble results, and you can restore the factory settings by resetting your tablet.

Now that's a healthy attitude. I honestly don't know what's up Apple's ass that they have to fight this all-out war with people who want to install non-approved software on their iPhone or iPad. Just give them a warning that they will void their warranty, and let them play their game, for pete's sake.

4 comments:

Bruce. said...

It's a tech support issue. Mom and Dad buy the product, their teenaged kid hacks it without them even knowing, and the next time Mom or Dad try to call tech support they are informed that their warranty is invalid. Apple doesn't want that to happen.

Eolake Stobblehouse said...

I can see that, but it can't be a huge issue, must be more rare than kids racking up a bill on the App Store, and that's an issue between kids and parents.

Bruce said...

Apple is selling an experience, not hardware or software. They want to make sure people get the experience that Apple specifies. The easier they make it for hackers, the more people end up using Apple products without getting the Apple experience. That's potentially damaging to Apple's reputation.

There's certainly room in this world for different approaches to this. At the opposite end of the spectrum, I like my hacked Nook Color. Some guy is actually selling Nook Colors on eBay with CM7 already installed.

Eolake Stobblehouse said...

Kool.

I think B&H are not so happy, because they are earning little or nothing with the Nook Color, and selling very few books to them.