Phil's post in reply to mine was incredibly funny (http://www.nzmac.com/community-blog/why-darryn-got-the-tech-pundits-wrong.html). In it he accuses me of not reading what the pundits wrote (which I did) and then goes into a tirade that proves he never really read my post but skimmed through it and had a go at me for what he perceived I had written.

My post was purely quashing the negative comments that the pundits wrote about the iPad that were largely baseless in the first place. Many of the pundits had never seen the device so their comments were flame bait at best. Their posts were largely based on rumours that they themselves made up to get hits. They were wrong for saying the iPad failed to live up to expectations when those expectations were made up and not based on anything tangible. Phil however completely and utterly removed ALL context from my post and then made his post based on that contextless version of my post.

The context of the post was in the title. The tech pundits were spewing all sorts of rubbish that completely removed everything about existing history of iPhone OS based devices from the last three years to make it sound like the iPad is a bland device that will fail.

It seems that Darryn took exception to my last blog post, which was a response to his earlier blog entry. Unfortunately, he decided to respond on his website (you can read it here) and unfortunately, he obviously took my comments personally, despite me trying to make sure I didn't criticise him directly but his opinion, even signalling this in the opening intro. Unfortunately, in response, I think he's decided to get a little personal...speaking of a tirade of comments from me, of being hypocritical and oh....something about dancing and jellybeans?!

I also suspect, knowing Darryn, that he may have posted on his site because he knows I probably wouldn't have allowed the post here. Don't get my wrong, I welcome...heck, enjoy, a good constructive argument. But I don't allow personal attacks or rude words (it's a family show folks) so without being able to speak for him, I speculate that's probably why it got posted there.

Of paraphrasing and quoting

This started as a comment response to Darryn's blog post here, but I then (as usual) began to ramble...so I'm going to post this as a blog post. Darryn, sorry if this offends, but I continue to be staggered by your selective logic...and this from someone who deals with computers every day! There are three sections of your post that I want to deal with....Multitasking, Camera and Flash.

Multitasking
You begin by stating a definition of multitasking..."the simultaneous execution of more than one program or task by a single computer processor". I've added my emphasis into that definition. Multitasking can simply mean the running or more than one task, but as the definition also shows, it can also mean the running of more than one program....and it is the latter that the "pundits" are referring to when they express disappointment over the iPad. I said in an email to you that I felt you needed to read what was being said by people. I don't think you have. Please don't focus on the word "multitask"...read what people are saying.

You then go on to state a fact and opinion...."the fact that they can't run more than one application at one time" and "to perform two tasks at once doesn't make sense for low power devices".

In ten years of Microsoft trying to push the tablet as a computer the tablet just hasn't ever taken off. The one thing the naysayers of the iPad have never asked themselves is why has tablet computing failed up until this point?

The answer is simple... they're too under powered to do the work people think they should be doing. Essentially what is happening is people expect to work on a tablet the same way they do on a laptop but the specs of a tablet and the ridiculous price of these tablets make them useless for a computer replacement. In fact the idea that the tablet is meant to replace the computer is actually proof that no one really understands the concept of the tablet.

A tablet computer is not designed to replace computers but to act as a compliment to computers. It's best to think of it as a compliment to a desktop rather than a compliment to a laptop because as soon as you introduce a laptop into the equation people will think it makes no sense to replace the laptop with something so under powered. And to a lesser extent they would be right. That being said though a tablet does make a pretty good alternative to a laptop when conjoined with a desktop.