Mit meiner etwas zurückhaltenden Einschätzung des iPads bin ich nicht ganz allein (Well, like any bright shiny gadget announcement my initial impulse is always, I have to have that. But then reality sets in: do I really need a third device?
), aber ein wachsender Chor von Beseelten betrachtet das iPad als Beginn des New World Computing. Ihre Argumente sind sogar einigermaßen plausibel:
The people don’t want
tablet computerswith Ubuntu and OpenID (worst name ever for a product attempting broad acceptance). They could honestly give a shit whether it’s a closed or open system. And, let’s be really honest, they probably care as much about DRM as they do about baseball players juicing; by which I mean not very much at all. They want things to work most of the time, and be easy to fix when they don’t. And if the process by which it happens is “magic” they are totally cool with that.
Da könnte was dran sein. Dass Leute wie ich es nicht schaffen, aus eigener Kraft einen Massenmarkt zu bilden, lässt sich kaum leugnen. Immerhin hatten wir bisher das zwiespältige Vergnügen, die Rolle von Schamanen in einem MMORPG zu spielen:
Secretly, I suspect, we technologists quite liked the idea that Normals would be dependent on us for our technological shamanism. Those incantations that only we can perform to heal their computers, those oracular proclamations that we make over the future and the blessings we bestow on purchasing choices. [...]
I'm often saddened by the infantilising effect of high technology on adults. From being in control of their world, they're thrust back to a childish, mediaeval world in which gremlins appear to torment them and disappear at will and against which magic, spells, and the local witch doctor are their only refuges.
Diese wilden Zeiten könnten also demnächst vorbei sein, auch wenn man nicht gleich das Ende des freien Internets beschwören muss. Was mache ich dann bloß mit meiner vielen Freizeit?