Tablets Equal Today's Netbooks?

For many years after Apple introdued the iPad, sales were increasing at a rate that eclipsed even some of the best selling smartphones during their early days.  It was thought that the PC market would die of a quick death after the failure of the netbooks and there was no answer from the PC guys for tablets like the Galaxy.  Microsoft's own misguided attempt with the Windows RT versions seemed to have put to bed the dominance of the Android and iOS in the tablet market.  Windows was in trouble as PC sales slowed.

Well, not so fast.  The PC market did continue to decline for years but lately has shown some resilience and growth in some market even as the general world-wide sale has dropped.  It was mainly due to Asus (Gartner).

However, it doesn't seem like people who stopped buying PCs are replacing them with tablets either.  Hence, this is likely why the smartphone market continue to experience robust sales with annual upgrades. 

Now, the question is whether the tablet market is experiencing a netbook effect, albeit at a much slower place and likely won't go away entirely.  Tablets today a much cheaper than when they first came out and with better mobile and touch experiences.  And they are generally used for consuming media.  So, it is not as if upgrading tablets annually or even every 2-3 years is absolutely necessary. 

One could look it it this way:  either tablets are built to last longer than most companies expect or that there generally has been a lack of innovation in that market.  For instance, there is no reason why tablets with bigger form factors should not have just as good as cameras as their smartphone counter parts.  Go ahead, just charge more for it, Apple and Samsung.  And while Apple spent the last couple of years playing catch up with the pencil support with the iPad Pro, there has not been any notable innovation in the Android market either.  If anything, it's the integration of Google Play into Chrome OS that is most exciting but that had been anticipated for years. (Google)

So, there is still a chance that the tablet market can return to some growth but expericene has shown that it'll be overshadowed by smartphones and possibly gears that support augmented reality or virtual reality (unless tablet markers find a way to support AR/VR) and a PC market that just won't go away.  Growth will could come but slowly and the prominence of tablets of yesteryear will never return.  But hey, what company does not want to sell a few tens of millions of tablet each year?

Social: Fake News Ads Still Being Fed?

With the influence fake news had in the 2016 US election and now in places like France, one has to assume that social media and ad giants will  done more to prevent fake knees from seeping onto the We and search engines.

Unfortunately, this is what I saw this morning when I went onto the Yahoo new site.



Now, I don't know what bombshell Mark Zuckerberg's wife might have dropped or what those rumors are but you would think this is an issue for Zuckerberg should a similar ad appear on Facebook or if such ads about Google's CEO or founders ended up on Google's search results.

This is why while I think fake news are a concern to Silicon Valley, it is overshadowed by the profit they bring in for them.

You only have to look to the EU elections and pending elections and see what a concern they have for fake news.

Apple Winning Premium Phone Market - Can Do Better

Pointing out the obvious, this BGR post points out that Apple is winning the premium segment of the phone market (still don't like calling it the phone market since most people do not use their iPhones or Android devices as phones anymore) - and the lead Apple has over Samsung (and not really anyone else has any meaningful share here) has increased.

It's likely that Apple can increase its lead even more with the next iPhone, no matter what Apple calls it, since it will likely have a new design and features.  What Samsung can do to slow down Apple's increasing lead in terms of percentage is make sure it has a flawly Galaxy 8 and Note 8 launch.  No more exploding phones - it's that simple (or not quite that simple). 

But Apple can really put this thing to bed if it answers Samsung's one unique feature in its premium device:  that the Note has a stylus.  Of course, Apple would never support the use of a stylus on the iPhone.  So, it can add Pencil support to the iPhone.  That may draw so much sales away from Notes that Samsung's mobile profit will shrink even more, perhaps to mere single digits.

According to Fortune, Apple took more than 102% of the mobile profit in the third quarter of 2016.  That is possible because Sasmung broke even because of the Note 7 disaster (not bad considering) while other mobile players in the market lost money.  It's unlike that this will happen again in 2017 and Samsung should be able to mount some sort of a comeback once its next generation flagship devices launch and ship.

A better comparision would be 2015 when Apple had 90% of the profit in the same third quarter while Samsung has more than 10%.  So, should Apple maintain its momentum, it could conceivably knock Samsung's 2017 profit share down to less than 10% even if there is a penned up demand for its Note 8.  Of course, Apple could make sure Samsung has less than an optimal quarter if the next iPhone Plus supports the Pencil.

Personally, I rather have picture-in-picture support for the next iPhone but I'll make due with Pencil support.

Touch Bar on Apple's Standalone Keyboard Will Take A While If It Ever Happens

Almost immediately upon learning about the Touch Bar on the new MacBook Pro, the next thought that occurred to me was when Apple will bring it to their standalone keyboard.

I've left it on the table for a bit and allowed it to simmer for a few days. With Halloween on the horizon, I didn't think about it until now.

I've seen a decent render of one but I'm not impressed and that has lead me to believe when Apple bring the Touch Bar to the standalone keyboard and other devices, it will work very differently and much more useful.

More at On Apple.

Best To let Macs Be Macs - You Know, With Intel Chips Inside

Source:  On Apple.

There is a lot of speculations about what Apple will or will not do with the Mac products as the level of anxiety has risen over the lack of new hardware from Apple.  Rightly so since most of the Macs on the market, the Macbook being the only exception, have been around for more than a year without any new hardware update.  

And for most of us, it does not help when even leading Apple blogs seem to suggest that Apple is no longer focusing on Macs and has shifted even more resources to the development of iOS devices and the faster growing apps and service segments of its business.  

Let me assure you that Apple will not abandon the Macs. More at On Apple.

If Fujitsu Can Create A Supercomputer with ARM Chips, Apple Can/Should Create A Superdupercomputer

Call it the superdupercomputer from Apple - or the Mac S as in super or the Super Mac.  See, Fujitsu decided to use ARM chips over SPARC to design its next supercomputer (Source:  Duckduckgo).  The Japanese tech company is looking to use ARMv8 architecture to be the brain behind its next computing machine, dubbed the Post-K, due to exceed the K Supercomputer in 2020. 

So, given that Apple also use the ARM design as the basis for its iOS devices and with rumors that Apple has been spending time and effort to put its A-series chips as a potential replacement of Intel chips for its Mac computers, I wonder if Apple had considered designing its own supercomputer and perhaps even make it easier to link iOS devices and Macs together to share processing power. This would be especially useful and quite possibly necessary as mobile computing becomes smaller and even more portable as wearable devices begin to populate the mobile market.

First, let's speculate a bit about the Apple superdupercomputer (SDC) a bit.  Faster, more efficient, and scalable than anything on the market, the SDC can be build deep within the new Apple campus, allow it to power and process everything that Apple needs for its R&D.  After all, supercomputers are not build to display as many 4K frames of the next hottest computer game.  It's use for research. 

With Apple getting more and more into designing its own tech and making sure it can stay ahead of its competitors, it makes sense for Apple to build and own the SDC.  It create simulations for its car designs, create models, and even test algorithms that can make Siri smarter. 

Imagine banks of Macs or Apple TV-like devices that are faster and more efficient than anything else on the market, not to mention that it requires much less power than anything else on the market and that it operates at a much power temperature. 

And as with tech and features Apple create, they can trickle down from one product to another.  While we do not need a 10.5 petaflops of computing power the Fujitsu Post-K is capable of, just imagine a bank of A-series chips for the home that can process your mobile and home needs.  On top of that, this could be just the key that Apple delivers as far as privacy is concerned and making Siri even smarter and faster.  All the processes and learning is done right in your home and office. 

Forget wanting a separate answer to Google or Amazon's Echo.  A redesigned Apple TV or ARM-based Mac that serves as your home's central nervous system and Siri's own backbone.  And then suppose you can link a box filled with Apple designed chip or another Mac and create a device with more processing power. 

Of course, this is mostly wishful thinking on my part.  I'm sure smarter folks at Apple have through this through and probably dismissed it as impractical and/or create a better solution.   Make no mistake, our homes and offices will need and require this type of computer, one that does not sit necessarily sit on a desk but, perhaps, by the TV.  The Echo, Apple TV, our phones, and other hubs are only the beginning. 

Turmoil Within Google: Nest That Wasn't, Time to Sell It Off, And Holding Off on the Smart Home

After reading this Arschnica post on the tumultuous period between Google's acquisition of Nest and last Friday's firing of its former CEO, Tony Fadell, AKA "the godfather of the iPod", the missteps Nest took, and the power struggle within the Alphabet company, the take away seems to be that making and launching a product is not as easy as Apple, Google, and a few others make it seem despite having almost unlimited resources and smarts.  And that perhaps, even as I go through my home improvements, my decision to go very slow with smarting up my home is the right one.

Take some of the failed products like Nest's smoke alarm as an example.  Or the discontinuation of Revolv hub device. These are big name and products that you'd think you can trust and rely on.  But not so.  And walking through the small section of home improvement stores like Home Depot, it is tempting to get on my phone, read a couple of reviews of the products they sell, and pick the ones that seem to work best.

But you never know what will happen next to these companies and their products.  As far as the smart home is concerned, it just feels like there is first a land grab by dozens of small companies hoping to gain some market share and name recognition before the big boys come in and snatch them up or just muscle them out of the market entirely.  I've also looked at products from Honeywell, GE, and a few others but there does not appear to be any comprehensive solution.

Sure you have Echo from Amazon but Google just announced their competing Google Home.  Who knows what Apple will offer this year or in the years to come. The real issue here is what is a smart home.  And that is what all these companies are struggling with.  Being able to control the lights or opening/closing your front door with your smartphone does not make your home smart.  But with Echo, Google Now, and other potential AI just barely beginning to show signs of "intelligence", we will have to wait a few years before knowing what smart tech really is and can do for us to make our lives eaiser.

For now, I say wait.  There is no hurry at all.  The Next issues within Google may not have anything to do with power grabs, personalities, or other corporate nonsense but that no one knows where we are headed just yet with smart tech.