“Brace yourself. Before the month is out, they will be knocking at your door, insisting that Apple’s iPad tablet―for sale on or about April 3 (pre-orders started March 12 at 5:30 pm PST)―is just the gadget that will solve a multitude of IT problems while, simultaneously, giving your IT strategy a leg up,” Robert McGarvey writes for CIO Update. “It will not.”
MacDailyNews Note: In what we expect will be just the first of many corrections, iPad pre-orders started on March 12 at 5:30 am Pacific, not pm.
McGarvey continues, “What it will do, say many experts, is create problems. And those problems will become your problems… Even if your company has relented and now supports the iPhone, as growing numbers of businesses do (70% of the Fortune 100 are at least testing it, says Apple) you’ll want to say ‘No’ to the iPad and other tablets.”
McGarvey’s 10 reasons to nix Apple’s iPad in your IT strategy:
1. Slow is as slow is: James Wolf, an assistant professor of Information Systems at Illinois State University [says that] moving your hands around a screen is clunky. “The keyboard/mouse is much faster and easier than the tablet’s input.”
MacDailyNews Take: Ooh, an assistant professor; of Information Systems, no less. We’re sure some assistant professor somewhere also claimed that typewriters were faster than word processors way back when, too. Nobody makes typewriters anymore.
2. The iPad does not run common office productivity tools
MacDailyNews Take: No, it runs good office productivity tools that just so happen to be compatible with the common ones.
3. No camera
MacDailyNews Take: So, use your iPhone’s camera. Camera’s are not a requirement for your “IT strategy.” They can even be banned from workplaces for security reasons.
4. No [third-party] multitasking allowed on the iPad
MacDailyNews Take: Yet. And, even if it never, ever happens, it’s not valid reason to “nix iPad in your IT strategy” which, if your IT department is anything like most, is a strategy based almost exclusively on job preservation and the stifling of worker productivity for the sake of IT’s convenience.
5. No Flash on iPad: That means no watching Web videos (unless it’s on YouTube, for which a special player is promised).
MacDailyNews Take: What is this poor idiot talking about? iPad supports H.264 video up to 720p, 30 frames per second, Main Profile level 3.1 with AAC-LC audio up to 160 Kbps, 48kHz, stereo audio in .m4v, .mp4, and .mov file formats; MPEG-4 video, up to 2.5 Mbps, 640 by 480 pixels, 30 frames per second, Simple Profile with AAC-LC audio up to 160 Kbps, 48kHz, stereo audio in .m4v, .mp4, and .mov file formats; Motion JPEG (M-JPEG) up to 35 Mbps, 1280 by 720 pixels, 30 frames per second, audio in ulaw, PCM stereo audio in .avi file format. Yes, MR. IT Doofus, iPad even supports your ancient, piece of crap .avi format.
6. No USB out of the box
MacDailyNews Take: Dock connector, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, and iWork.com, dummy. Welcome to this century.
7. Money talks: A decent netbook can be had for half the $500 Apple is expected to price the bare bones iPad… A data plan for 3G capable models is expected to add another $30 monthly to the tab.
MacDailyNews Take: There’s no such thing as a decent netbook. And a 3G data plan for a netbook would cost more than an iPad’s.
8. Speaking of money, there is no money in the company budget to pay for iPads.
MacDailyNews Take: Depends on the company and how forward-thinking its leadership is.
9. Not supporting iPad will be the enterprise norm: ”Consumers will buy the iPad to use as an e-reader,” predicts Chris Hazelton, research director for Mobile and Wireless at The 451 Group. “But the iPad will not be bought by enterprise.”
MacDailyNews Take: iCal’ed.
10. Tablets have never caught on: Apple won’t change that. As far back as Comdex in 2001, Bill Gates predicted tablet computing would change the world. You know what happened to Comdex and tablets, too.
MacDailyNews Take: Typical IT drone. We pity these type of dinosaurs. Of course, many of IT’s beloved Bill “Whoops, I Missed The Internet” Gates’ predictions over the years have been absolutely atrocious.
Full article – Think Before You Click™ – here.
MacDailyNews Take: Shouldn’t IT people be out front, trying new things, pushing the envelope in order to drag their companies kicking and screaming into the future in order to boost productivity? Unfortunately, they’re all too often the complete opposite: erecting artificial barriers built on shaky or nonexistent foundations, resisting change at every turn, just like the fearful, little Mr. McGarvey.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Tony H.” for the heads up.]
This man is a worse dummy than even Rob Enderle..
And that says it all..=*^&)
Does an assistant professor wear knee pads?
3. No camera
Oh, yeah, that’s a solid reason why IT pros should be concerned about the iPad.
Jeeezus, what a douchebag.
Businesses and professionals everywhere are gonna love the iPad. There are endless possibilities for it. This guy is a nut.
the more fear the more success
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One reason to nix Robert McGarvey for ever – he’s a dork.
Small Businesses, the largest contributors to GDP, don’t have the money to pay IT bozos, so….. they use more Macs, are more productive, have fewer IT issues, etc, etc, etc….
I can’t wait for my iPad to ship because I know my productivity will be on the rise when I start using it.
@MDN Take: “Nobody makes typewriters anymore.”
Royal Typewriter
Just sayin’.
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The reason IT people hate apple products is the fact that apple products are IT job killers
@ breeze
subtle, but oh so funny.
“Unfortunately, they’re all too often the complete opposite: erecting artificial barriers built on shaky or nonexistent foundations, resisting change at every turn, just likethe fearful little Mr. McGarvey.”
That’s because most of them preside over a Windows network held together by spit and wishful thinking. There is always a risk with Windows that any new element introduced into the environment will be the straw that breaks the camel’s back. They’ve had decades of experience watching fragile networks break. They’ve got their house of cards built; please do not disturb.
“As a busy freelance writer for more than 30 years…”
This says it all about this guy – he has never actually had anything to do with creating, implementing, managing, or supporting an “IT Strategy”.
“A decent netbook can be had for half the $500 Apple is expected to price the bare bones iPad”
There is not a “bare bones” model. They all do the same thing.
Different memory sizes. WiFi and or G3.
People that view the iPad in the abstract can not digest the utility that this gadget will receive from the applications that are soon to follow it’s release. Things like a cop writing a ticket to a restaurant host checking the availability of a table. This in reality could be a much bigger hit than the iPhone, but idiots like this that lack imagination are a dime a dozen.
@NikonFox
You nailed it. This is why we’re going to continue to see this dribble from “respected” IT publications for years to come or until a majority of CEOs die off and are replaced with individuals who will more than likely have been properly exposed to the Apple platform.
While there is nothing wrong with a CIO to take a Wait and See attitude about the iPad, especially until it actually is in people’s hands and field tested, nevertheless the tone of this article is ludicrous. Reminded me of a comment one of our IT “pros” made back about 1993 when viewing a demo of the latest Apple computer: “I’d never recommend a computer that used a mouse.”
If you’re an assistant professor at Illinois State, you’re not exactly in the big leagues. Not even the little leagues. No indifference to ISU – I know many sharp folks who graduated from there – but if you are going to quote someone, don’t quote “James Wolf”. Screw the keyboard and mouse already – those will probably be a staple of computing for a long time anyway. Why waste any thought and overburden us with such stupidity when the iPad should not even be compared to a desktop or laptop anyway?
I know of at least 5 IT managers who have stated, unequivocally, that they are seriously looking into the iPad for a variety of functions, including monitoring server activity and load, potentially using Safari to surface mission critical data to managers that need it immediately, and even scorecarding and dashboarding of key performance indicators for large retail chains. And one of these companies is a large retail chain that already has done some internal development of an iPhone app that will be used for some of these functions as well.
There are so many uses for this device that no one has even bothered to think about in terms of practical use – business or personal. People who write articles like that not only seem to get pleasure out of riling up us Apple fans, they also fail to think about the broad spectrum of uses of this device. If one puts a little bit of thought into it, they’ll get the fact that this device is the beginning of a revolution that will bring with it applications that no one could have thought possible. This is the problem with so many so-called IT journalists – they are full of opinions without being able to justify them in any serious way, shape or form.
And BTW, yeah, a camera might have been a nice touch, but this is version 1.0. It’ll show up down the road, but for me it’s not a deal breaker.
“Rob McGarvey has written over 1500 articles for many of the nation’s leading publications―from Reader’s Digest to Playboy”
Top of the line enterprise journals? Sounds to me like he writes more for general consumers, not enterprise decision makers.
How credible is CIO as an information source?
That’s IT for you. Entrenched. Afraid of change, afraid to grow. I know SO many IT people, all the same. Trying to hold onto ‘their’ stuff, with all their secretive BS. Times are changing. Adapt or die. Unless evolution isn’t your thing.
Brilliant analysis:
Don’t support it because not supporting it is the norm so if you support it not supporting won’t be the norm.
No wonder the US is falling behind in technology. Another drone who memorized the questions and answers to the Microsoft CE exam.
Not really worth a comment
I love the image of that Fortune 500 IT department supporting the (half the price of the iPad) “decent” $250 netbook. They’ll be on the Apple bandwagon in no time.
Once we reach the point where large companies are significantly more efficient than their competitors thanks to moving away from a Microsoft-dominated IT infrastructure, bozos like this will be looked upon as fools attempting to mindlessly maintain an inefficient & wasteful status quo.
MW: growing
I think a lot of the points in the article are stupid as well…however it feels like MDN is run by a bunch of 13 year olds…really you have to resort to name calling when you could make valid points alone?
Another educated idiot that wants his butt kissed (he needs to move his nose first).