My soon-to-be-eighteen-old daughter wants an iPhone for Christmas. This is the only thing she wants for Christmas. With the recent price drops, I believe the initial cost to be around $400. Split this amount among grandparents and parents and it does fall into the realm of reality.
So she drags me into an AT&T store, conveniently located to the only Panera Bread in town. (We both love our Panera but it is on the other side of Terre Haute so it is a special occasion when we go there.) The store is not busy and we are able to play with the iPhone with just a small amount of help by a customer service representative. What can I say? It was neat. It sucked me in to thinking that even I would carry it around to access the web. It was slick and easy to manipulate. Now we start to discuss phone plans and I see the monthly cost skyrocketing. My daughter and I beat a hasty retreat out of the store.
Now I am reading an article in the November/December 2007 issue of Computers in Libraries. On page 42, Daniel Chudnov discusses The Multi-Touch Tipping Point for Reading Online. He makes the case for reading from screens is going to overtake printed materials in the coming decade or even half-decade. In 2006, at the TED (Technology, Entertainment, Design) conference, a guy named Jeff Han gave a presentation about the multi-touch monitor.
The demo, which drew spontaneous applause and audible gasps from the audience, begins with a simple lava lamp, then turns into a virtual photo-editing tabletop, where Han flicks photos across the screen as if they were paper snapshots. (From the TED website) At TED2007 he brought along a larger, wall-size version that TEDsters actually try. This eight foot by 3 foot multi-touch display is now available for purchase throught Neiman Marcus.
From the advertisment:
Creativity is not a static pursuit, and we were never ones to stay in our seats, minding our P's & Q's. Passion, energy, motion—that's what gets us going. Luckily, the future is here with the Interactive Media Wall from Perceptive Pixel.With an eight-by-three foot screen, the entire wall becomes your canvas, allowing you to navigate, locate, and manipulate information by touching anywhere on the screen. No longer chained to cumbersome physical input devices, your imagination can fly at warp speed in a medium that can easily keep pace. Tap out a sonata with your fingertips, flip through manuscripts with the swipe of your hand, or crop photos with a pinch—it is perfect for grand gestures or the lightest touch. Call 1.877.9NM.GIFT to live your dreams in color.
The price: starting at $100,000.
I think I like my cumbersome physical input devices like my keyboard and mouse much better than spending more than I paid for my house. This certainly puts the iPhone cost in perspective. Also the new HP commericals which feature Shaun White and Serena Williams using a multi-touch approach are very attractive to me and my coworkers. Who knows, the mouse clicking may become a thing of the past.
So back to the Christmas gift, I teach a monthly class at a local senior citizens' center. The Tai Chi instructor who uses the room prior to me has an iPhone. She says the monthly costs run just $10 dollars more than her old phone. Her argument regarding cost hold more weight with me than a sales person. We'll see about the iPhone.....
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
3 comments:
Bonnie,
I suggest you read the horror stories the first iPhone owners told of receiving their first phone bills. Some were five-digits long, not counting cents!
Purhaps this is not the right question, but why does your daughter want an Iphone? Is it because it is new? I think I overheard my young cousin say the same thing. But what use could they have for such a phone?
Wow! I just finished watching the Jeff Han presentation. I had to show it to folks in the SLIS office. The $100,000 price tag is so affordable I'm sure Santa will bring it to me this Christmas. :-) It is fascinating to dream about the implications for libraries.
Post a Comment