“Walt Mossberg has a 500-word section on ‘Drawbacks’ in his review [yesterday] of the iPad 2,” John Gruber writes for Daring Fireball. “The whole thing is a crock, an example of trying to be fair/balanced/objective by bending over backwards to find negative things to say about the device. No one is arguing that the iPad 2 is beyond criticism. But almost nothing in Mossberg’s list of drawbacks is valid.”
One of Mossberg’s so-called “downsides,” is “that battery life for movie playback — with the brightness set 25 percent higher than Apple’s factory default — exceeds Apple’s stated 10 hours by nine minutes,” Gruber writes. “Apple says you can play video for 10 hours, Mossberg gets 10 hours and nine minutes, and it’s a downside? You can argue that it should be a ‘downside’ because he got over 11 hours on the same test with an original iPad, but none of the other reviewers seem to be seeing a 10 percent drop in battery life for video playback between the original and new iPads. I saw nearly identical results between the two. Josh Topolsky at Engadget saw better battery life from the iPad 2 than the original. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen a review where a product that exceeds the manufacturer’s stated specs for battery life gets dinged for battery life.”
Now we get to the good stuff:
“Finally, there are two big omissions, one old and one new. The old one is that, like Apple’s prior phones and tablets, the shiny new iPad 2 still won’t play Adobe’s Flash video in its built-in Web browser. This is a deliberate decision by Apple, and puts its devices at a disadvantage for some users when compared with Android tablets, which can play Flash, or say they will soon, albeit not always well.” – Walter S. Mossberg
Gruber writes, “So the Xoom doesn’t play Flash but promises to eventually, the Galaxy Tab does but often not well, and the iPad 2’s lack of Flash is a disadvantage? No mention that there are clearly trade-offs in play. Like that Flash Player might have some sort of effect on battery life. Or that the lack of Flash on the iPad is an impetus that motivates developers to write native iPad apps.”
“Mossberg’s entire review is only 1,500 words; measured by the word, a full third of what he has to say about it are these ‘drawbacks,'” Gruber writes. “By contrast, his 1,200-word review of the Motorola Xoom — a tablet nearly everyone, including Mossberg, agrees is inferior to the iPad 2 — contains one 62-word paragraph of ‘downsides.’ Stating the plain truth, that the iPad 2 has no serious competition as a mainstream consumer device, doesn’t make you biased. It makes you accurate.”
Read more in the full article – very highly recommended – here.
MacDailyNews Take: It’s nice to finally have some company on this. For years now, we’ve been discussing such things as Mossberg’s “Android Tourette’s” (dropping Android randomly into Apple product “reviews” for seemingly no reason other than to concoct the appearance of being “fair and balanced”) among other inconsistencies (see Gruber’s full piece for some nice examples). And, it’s not just Android, either. Mossberg’s issue simply seems to be Apple. (See: What’s wrong with Walt Mossberg? – MacDailyNews, October 22, 2009).
If we had to guess, we’d say that for many years Mossberg was properly reviewing Apple products objectively, but somewhere along the line he was accused of being an “Apple fanboy” by someone that mattered to him. (His employer? Apple competitors? His dog? Who knows?) Regardless of the reason why, Mossberg, in some quixotic quest for appear objective, has for some time seemed compelled to gin up “negatives” in his “reviews” of Apple products while also overly praising what are clearly inferior wares from companies that stamp out Apple product derivatives. What Mossberg still doesn’t seem to grasp is that the end result is that he appears to be biased against Apple and/or a cheerleader for any company attempting to compete with Apple.
Maybe the addition of Gruber’s criticism will help Mossberg to wake up. Regardless, in our eyes, Mossberg’s hard-earned reputation for accuracy, objectivity, and independence has been severely tarnished and irretrievably squanderd. And that’s sad, for we used to hold him in the very highest esteem.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Jax44” for the heads up.]
Related article:
Mossberg reviews Apple iPad 2: Moves the goal posts; lighter, thinner, more powerful – March 10, 2011
A Rolling Stone gathers no Mossberg.
Or instead of Mossberg hanging it up we could violate two rare do-do birds with one index finger and hang him up?
I don’t pay any attention to anything negative Uncle Walt has to say about the iPad. He has to earn his druthers after all – if he’s way too positive about the iPad he’ll stand accused of being a flaming Apple fanboy. Of course sites like MDN are designed to cater for this type of behavior but the Wall Street Journal has to be more Catholic in its tastes.
I don’t think Uncle Walt’s opinions will sway anyone for or against getting an iPad – after all how difficult is it to walk into an Apple store and try one out for yourself. If you’re an existing iPad user you’ll have formed an opinion of the iPad even without being told.
I think the iPad 2 is a step forward from the original iPad. The only disappointment I harbor is the lack of a Retina display but I get it that Apple could not incorporate a high density display and keep prices as low as they are. This alone will cut the legs off any Android pretender to the iPad throne.
As for the Playbook and Touchpad I think they have very litle chance of surviving without massive corporate support because the market to which they’re targeted is corporate buyers. Here it’s a win for the iPad too due to the proliferation of apps and the ability of corporations to sideload apps in company owned iPads.
Oh the shame, a reviewer actually has the temerity to say anything slightly negative about an Apple product. Opinion and truth be dammed, we only want uber positive comments about the perfection achieved by the iPad 2. Only an electronic hanging will assuage our anger.
To another brain-dead moron, the same comment as before.
Could you even try reading Gruber’s post before screaming to the entire site how retarded you are?
I second that.
Let’s make an effigy of Mossberg and BURN IT!!!
Snark.
And in other news, In the spirit of “fair and balanced” The USA newsfotainment industry will now give voice to those who argue the earth is flat and that gravity is just a theory.
Yep. That’s how it’s all reported now. First half of article: Celebrating the 40th anniversary of the moon landing. Second half of the article: Interviews with people who say it never happened.
There’s yer news.
I’ll bet he got the article handed back to him with a copy of that day’s Xoom ad and was told to do a rewrite.
Walt Mossberg always looks depressed. Rarely smiles, never laughs. He looks terrified that he’ll offend the Windoze drones who obviously comprise the lion’s share of his regular readership. Walt Mossberg is an unhappy whore who can’t bring himself to give up his fat paycheck. Does anybody with half a brain really care what Walt Mossberg has to say about the latest Apple product? Not.
Wait…
This is MDN, anyone who has ANYTHING negative to say about Apple should just retire !!!
How dare you give your opinion Walt !!!!!!!!
Hey, stupid troll.
The problem here is that Walt keeps glossing over serious flaws with Android devices while grasping at straws in order to come up with flaws in Apple devices and harping on them at length.
It’s got nothing to do with his opinion, and everything to do with his increasing dishonesty.
It’s like briefly mentioning how you found a severed human finger in your meal from Dell Taco and oh it wasn’t really a big deal, but then spending 500 words in your review of Taco Bell complaining about how that one tortilla was sort of overcooked.
I don’t understand. Walt writes a positive article and gets attacked. I do have my facts straight don’t I? He said it was the best tablet out there and by a considerable margin. For this he gets subjected to suggestions that he should retire?
Mossberg is following his bosses directive.
The WSJ’s readership are investors who have invested in those loser companies (Microsoft, Google, Adobe, Linux-based companies, et. al.).
WSJ is caught between a hard place and a rock but it finds it easier to criticize Apple, since that’s what everyone does anyway, rather than tell the truth–that these investors and their loser companies are getting their asses kicked by Apple.
The camera observations are spot on – the cameras in the iPad are subpar and will be upgraded in future iterations. I just don’t know why Apple decided to ship with such cruddy cameras in the first place – if you do something, do it well, don’t sell us camera technology from 10 years ago.
If anyone hasn’t noticed… and I don’t even watch TV anymore…. All the news you see on TV is negative. Why you say? Put up a news title saying “boy finds lost puppy in back yard”… and in another paper put…. “boy gets mauled by small dog in backyard” The majority would flock to hear the news about the boy getting attacked. Nothing at all is interesting about a boy finding a puppy… everyone wants to hear negative news 24/7. Its the same with the stupid reality shows and all their BS drama.. but people love it. Even the ones who say they hate drama are the ones who usually help create it.
Same crap goes towards Apple. So many hear Apple is great!! new product awesome…. ipad 2 will change your life… None of these at all sound interesting unless you write up a title saying “Apple, not so #1 in the industry” people would be diving over news stands to read about what the person wrote. One part would be the Apple fans wanting to disprove any word they say.. and the other would be the Apple haters who would just agree completely on every negative remark and use it as a resource for debates.