Disqus - Latest Comments for ianbetteridge

Re: 85,000 reasons why Apple’s iPhone isn’t going to be disrupted

ianbetteridge — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 13:30:08 -0000

Just as a point of interest, in its last quarter Dell made $472 million profit. While that's not anywhere near as good as Apple, it's a long way from "the bottom".

Re: 85,000 reasons why Apple’s iPhone isn’t going to be disrupted

ianbetteridge — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 13:26:35 -0000

The fact that you think that Pre apps are "web apps" indicates that you don't know what you're talking about, I'm afraid.

Re: Digital iPhone cheapskates

ianbetteridge — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 08:35:26 -0000

Erik, I run a personal computing device which has no problems at all with "rogue, un-vetted software". It's called a Mac, and I think it demonstrates that having a true free market for software doesn't necessarily lead to "a security nightmare".

Re: Digital iPhone cheapskates

ianbetteridge — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 08:31:57 -0000

Erik, if it doesn't offer value to you, the answer is simple: don't upgrade.

Personally, I would have paid twice as much for it, even though I bought version 1. I think it's simply a brilliant piece of design, full of things which surprise and delight me.

Re: Dildo has issues

ianbetteridge — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 04:31:20 -0000

I called him "The Mac market's own John Dvorak" a few years ago - http://www.technovia.co.uk/2006/08/presenting-t...

He actually follows the Dvorak method almost to the letter. I'm sure he knows what he's saying is bullshit, but hey - like John D, he knows it gets the page views.

Re: Douchebags fondly eviscerated

ianbetteridge — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 04:40:21 -0000

Ahh, it's actually at the Roughly Dafted version of the post:

http://www.roughlydrafted.com/2009/09/05/inside...

Basically, you're a very bad man who is to be ignored :)

Also, he's started sock-puppeting again in the AppleInsider comments. "Andrew Levi Black" is him - back when Daniel was trying to game Digg, "Levi Black" was a registered user who strangely only ever posted RD articles, using exactly the same kind of language as Daniel did when he posted to Digg. Obviously, the fact that quite a few AI readers are commenting on the (ahem) "erratic" nature of his posts has got him reverting to old habits.

In other Dilger news, he appears to have a book coming out, from Wiley. Holy mother of God.

Re: Douchebags fondly eviscerated

ianbetteridge — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 19:15:14 -0000

His "response" to you in the comments of that awful piece is pretty amusing too.

Re: The new way to look like a dork with an iPhone: Augmented Reality

ianbetteridge — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 07:14:31 -0000

Oh wow, it's Zato. Hello Zato, long time no see. Are you still posting on every blog that might not be ideologically pure re: Apple? :)

Re: The new way to look like a dork with an iPhone: Augmented Reality

ianbetteridge — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 07:13:26 -0000

Hey, this is Robert we're talking about - he probably DOES want "a constant blast of AR 'Twitter bits'" blasting him all the time :)

Re: The new way to look like a dork with an iPhone: Augmented Reality

ianbetteridge — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 04:57:58 -0000

Augmented reality only becomes really useful (as opposed to "cool toy!") when it's potentially on all the time. That means embedded in glasses or contact lenses.

Re: Scoble, your blog still loves you (Scripting News)

ianbetteridge — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 07:00:20 -0000

No, it's not. All of the above might be good at what they do; they might be ahead of the curve when it comes to adoption of practices and technologies; but they're not "leaders" unless the rest of us are "followers".

I started blogging in 2001, after Scoble. Was he a "leader" to me? No - he was a peer, someone doing the same sort of stuff as me. I relate to all of the above as peers, not as "leaders". That's the great thing about the Internet - you're only a follower if you want to be one. You get to define your own power relations.

Re: Scoble, your blog still loves you (Scripting News)

ianbetteridge — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 05:09:44 -0000

Yeah. And this time let's hope they learn that if your only hope of revenue is "sell out to someone big", you'll never build something really good.

Re: Scoble, your blog still loves you (Scripting News)

ianbetteridge — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 05:07:48 -0000

Blogging has a "leader"?

Re: Scoble, your blog still loves you (Scripting News)

ianbetteridge — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 05:07:18 -0000

I wouldn't be fair to say that Robert got suckered, but he did forget the number one rule of business: The duty of any business is to maximise its value for the shareholders. It's something that gets forgotten the instant you cross the line from liking someone's products to be a "fan" or an "evangelist". If you give something for free, including your attention and your promotional abilities, don't expect a reward. You won't get one.

Re: How can ANYONE follow 10,000 or more?

ianbetteridge — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 12:50:36 -0000

There's a very simple channel for anyone to get my attention. It's called "email". You even get to say things that take longer than 140 characters! :)

Publish your email, or, if you want real time, your IM (although email is more real-time these days thanks to mobile email). You don't need to create a faux-friendship on Twitter to be open for others to stay in touch.

Re: How can ANYONE follow 10,000 or more?

ianbetteridge — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 12:48:12 -0000

And I'd actually argue that the readership of your blog is far more engaged with you than that Twitter audience ever has been. What you write here gives a much better indication of your depth of thought than is expressed either on Twitter or FF.

That's not to say "blog = good, Twitter/FF = bad", of course. They are all valuable. But in terms of how people engage with you, I think the blog is a level higher.

Re: How can ANYONE follow 10,000 or more?

ianbetteridge — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 12:45:04 -0000

Well now we're getting metaphysical :)

A chemist is a chemist because he *does* chemistry, not because he studied it. Someone who studied chemistry but gets elected to high office is a politician, just as someone who studies politics but does chemistry is a chemist (albeit probably a bad one!)

Likewise, being a person who listens is part of what you are - but what defines *you* is what you do on the basis of that listening, You're more than the sum total of your inputs. What defines you is your decisions and your actions.

Re: How can ANYONE follow 10,000 or more?

ianbetteridge — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 11:40:59 -0000

So are you really a different person now because of who you (don't) follow?

Re: How can ANYONE follow 10,000 or more?

ianbetteridge — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 11:01:41 -0000

"Here’s the rub: who you follow defines you."

Bullshit. What you say and do defines you. Who you follow is utterly irrelevant to who you are. Are you a different person because you now follow thousands of people less?

Really, Robert, that's about the most stupid thing you've said.

Re: Twitter’s platform shortcomings

ianbetteridge — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 18:35:59 -0000

Why should Twitter care if geeks love it? With god knows how many million users, it's gone way beyond the point when early adopters can affect it.

Re: You are SO unfollowed!

ianbetteridge — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 07:12:00 -0000

It's very tempting to say "I told you so"... so I will :)

Re: http://blog.louisgray.com/2009/08/will-mac-os-x-dial-go-all-way-to-eleven.html

ianbetteridge — Mon, 03 Aug 2009 16:47:15 -0000

Do you not think that something like OpenCL beats the pants off anything happening server side? If you think anything happening with JavaScript or AIR is more exciting than that, then... well, I think you're mistaken :)

Re: Gawker, the WaPo and the death of journalism

ianbetteridge — Sun, 02 Aug 2009 14:11:21 -0000

It's not so much the death of journalism, but the death of expensive publishing business models. When you look at the figures that he includes, in order to make the same profit mark up as Gawker, the WaPo would need to make around $950 from that story alone. Do you think that's likely?

And that if you're looking at the profit margin in absolute terms - to do it on percentages, it would be more like making $7,500+...

Re: Daring Fireball is wrong about Microsoft’s weakness

ianbetteridge — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 09:58:25 -0000

The netbook effect on Microsoft is interesting, because it's basically meant that they couldn't kill WinXP which (for obvious reasons) they'd like to knife. Vista runs like a dog on netbooks, so they had to keep XP around as a viable option.

7, though, could be a game-changer - it runs really nicely on netbooks. BUT... they could easily mess up on the pricing. It's a real problem for them, and one which they haven't sorted out yet.

Re: Watch out, Mac-using analysts: Ballmer knows where you live

ianbetteridge — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 09:46:21 -0000

Well, to be fair, it *was* an audience of analysts - and they all talk like that too :)

Sales-gibberish always takes some working out...