PC World has published an example of how to write for Digg. Let’s break it down.
Title
“Rumored Apple Tablet is a Tran Wreck.” Many believe that an Apple tablet is imminent and the buzz is increasing lately, so nice use of keywording there. Plus, “Train Wreck” is exciting language. “Apple Tablet will Flop” is less exciting. Personally, I hate headlines that Capitalize Every Word.
Linkbait
PC World quickly baits Apple fans with these lines in the 2nd paragraph.
“… this device would be a flop. This concept is such a train wreck from start to finish that I don’t know where to begin.”
Apple’s most fervent fans, the ones who read tech blogs like PC World, are also the most vocal. They’ll comment, tweet, post on their own blogs and so on.
Ridiculous arguments
In the 3rd paragraph, author Michael Scalisi displays his ignorance of Apple’s process:
“The tablet form-factor in general is good only for a few things … There are lots of things that tablets are not good at. Take watching movies, for example. Since a tablet is designed for lying flat, you have to be looking straight down to view the computer. Actually, that makes it suck for most things. I guess Apple could build in some sort of stand, but that detracts away from the sort of sexy minimalism that it is famous for.”
For someone who claims to be familiar with “…[what Apple] is famous for,” Michael isn’t. Apple excels at identifying a method of doing something that’s far superior to existing models. Before the iPod was released the market was full of barely-useable MP3 players. The same is true of the mobile phone market. Apple didn’t invent the digital music player, mobile phone or even the personal computer. They did invent the best way to use each.
Michael is assuming that an Apple-branded tablet will function just as existing tablets do, and he’s completely wrong. The innovation won’t be the device itself but the way the consumer uses it. Finally, Micheal throws in some more exciting language with “sucks.”
Baseless assumptions are your friends
The rest of the article is full of them.
“While I think a multi-touch display is a great idea, using it to host a virtual keyboard takes too much real estate on a petite 10-inch display.”
There’s no evidence to support the claim that this non-existent device has a virtual keyboard, but Micheal writes as if he’s got one siting on his desk.
“While the iPhone OS might seem like an obvious choice due to its small footprint and contribution toward long battery life, it has glaring limitations on a larger device. A huge audience for a tablet is the artist community, and they need full-fledged OS X to run the apps they’re accustomed to. While Apple certainly has reason to want to build on the success of its App Store, those apps are designed to run on a 3.5-inch screen and most won’t translate very well to something larger.”
This part’s a bit slippery. What we know as iPhone OS 3.0 is a variant of OS X. That’s to say, the aspects of OS X that are applicable to a mobile phone plus new bits that make the thing work. Mac OS X is comprised of the aspects of OS X that are applicable to a home computer plus different specialty bits. To think that a tablet would run the iPhone version of OS X is ignorant. Of course, Apple would develop yet another unique iteration based upon the needs of that device.
Again, these two paragraphs are meant to goad people like me into posting rebuttles. When you’ve sat down to write, abandon the urge to write something that will be picked up on Digg, various blogs or Twitter. Write because you have something insightful, funny or witty to share. If you’ve done a good job, it’ll get spread around on its own merit.
I don’t begrudge Michael’s opinion on Apple’s plans to release a tablet, but I dislike the way he’s presented it.
Update: On 8/16/09, this story came to its inevitable conclusion. My only consolation is that the miserable indignity has ended. Our nations’ health care system — and attitude towards the elderly — must change. Dramatically.
– Dave
Sometimes life lets you down in an incomprehensible way.
Followers of my Twitter stream undoubtedly noticed that I was in Oneida, NY this weekend. My grandfather, now 92, has moved from his house to a nursing home and frankly isn’t doing well. My sisters, mother and I went up to see him for what was likely the last time. Already, I wish I could remove this memory from my brain.
Let’s back up. My grandmother (his wife) died about 12-15 years ago. She received Hospice* care at home. I visited during her illness, but not when it was bad. My selfish reason was simple: I wanted to my last memory to be of the incredible woman with the aqua blue ’58 Plymouth Fury who drove us kids to Niagara Falls, served bologna-and-butter sandwiches on antique bone china, hosted my sister and I for two weeks every summer so my parents could get a break and otherwise loved us as her own kids. I wanted her gravel-y laugh, curly hair and giant glasses to stay with me, and that’s what I’ve got.
By contrast, my last memory of my great-grandmother is of her withered face in a hospital bed, little more than a skin-wrapped skull with tubes protruding from her nose. Speaking with her, I knew she had no idea who I was and it was awful for both of us. She was uncomfortable and confused, I was a wreck. Sure, I remember her cooking for us when we were kids and picking figs off of the tree to toss at my great-grandfather, but any memory I recall mutates into the hospital scene and I hate it.
Back to my grandfather. Other than my immediate family, he is by far my favorite relative. To keep a long post short: Exceedingly kind, very quiet and private and the most talented artist I’ve ever known.
He hand-spun sliver and pewter. For decades, he worked for Oneida, Ltd. designing flatware, bowls, serving dishes and so on (here’s one of his patterns). His work was terrifically intricate and sold all over the world. He also painted in oils, pastels and charcoal. He made copper busts of his children which are incredible. He wrote short fiction. He designed and built his house (a boxy, Mid-Century Modern affair that I absolutely love) and local church. And, as we learned while cleaning his house, he sketched endlessly.
My aunt uncovered hundreds of sketches and blueprints on velum, cardboard, paper and so on for lamps, flatware, furniture, homes … on and on. We had no idea how much work he had done. It was amazing and will take months for us to catalog.
A mere portion of the work we found
Among the stacks were some gems. For example, there are two ornate lamps in the livingroom that I’ve always admired of cast bronze that he designed. We found the early sketches, adjustments, presentation materials and finally detailed measurements and instructions for the workers who actually built them. Incredible.
He and my aunt — his daughter — have a volatile relationship. Always have. She inherited the artistic ability but squandered it. She started painting at 12 and, by the time I was old enough to notice, was very good.
Not in her eyes.
Everything she ever painted, and I mean everything, went into the trash. She found a reason to be unsatisfied with every canvas, every sketchpad, every watercolor. Into the trash can the went. You’ll never believe what we found in the basement.
Every single one. All of them. The only way my grandfather could have collected these would have been to sneak into the trash can when no one was looking, remove the painting and tuck it in the basement.
I could go on but suffice to say my respect for him as an artist and a person has grown a hundredfold. So where is he now?
Sitting in a hallway littered with old people in wheelchairs. Just stuck there, motionless, like potted plants. What a rip-off. What an insult. What an undignified end to an incredible person. That’s what you get? After a lifetime of creativity, dedication and love, that’s your reward? The existence of a rag doll?
Now, that’s my last memory. My proud grandfather, hunched over from years at a drafting table and the workbench, sitting in a hallway filled with wheelchair-bound strangers. Awful. I sincerely hope I die before I get old.
CameraBag [App Store link] is an app for the iPhone/iPod touch that lets you apply any of 11 filters to your photos, including Fisheye, Magazine, Cinema and more. My favorite is “Helga” and I’ve been playing with it for the past few weeks. It applies the exact same effect to every image, but it’s still a lot of fun. Below are some of my recent favorites.
It won’t replace my Holga, of course, but it’s still a nifty little toy.
Part of what I do for a living is write. The other part is read. Much like a red-assed baboon who can’t shower you with palmfulls of shit until it has filled itself with starchy zoo food, I can’t do the writing without first completing the reading.
Years ago, I’d drive the Dodge Dart to the mall, flush with paper route money to buy a novel. Slowly moving from shelf to shelf and aisle to aisle, I’d look at each book in turn. Once I made my selection and paid the patchouli-scented cashier in the Ramones T-shirt, I’d refuse a bag so that I could hold the book itself as I walked back to the Dart.
At home, I’d go into my room and read every word. The cover, the jacket, the reviews on the first few pages. The introduction and the author’s bio.
Mmm, starchy zoo food.
With each chapter completed, I felt smarter. Hell, I was smarter. My vocabulary increased, I considered ideas that weren’t native to Scranton, Pennsylvania. It was lovely to have the time and inclination to do nothing on a Wednesday evening but read.
Today I read in bursts. Press releases are a great example. “Dear iPod vendor,” one might begin. It’s the personal touch that I appreciate. And the fact that I’ve never sold an iPod. Next comes what I call the “parade banter.” This is the type of tripe that’s typically passed between Matt and Willard during the Macy’s Parade. The copy that makes the “Suite Life of Zach and Cody” writers say, “For the love of God, shut the fuck up.” Finally the pitch goes on for at least 1,200 words.
While that’s long-form torture, Twitter is like the spray of a sawed-off shotgun, each pellet a 140-character projectile, and the shooter is the fastest in the west.
Chick-chick, POW! Chick-chick, POW!
The thing is, I love being shot. I love the techy articles. I read them all day and then … well, and then I attempt to have a meaninful conversation. Or I sit down to write someting here and the cursor asks, “Got anything good up there, Davey? Your colon full of starchy zoo food?”
The answer is no. I don’t have 3,500-word thoughts anymore. I have 250-word thoughts. I blame the reading. The reading feeds the writing. I picked up SputnikSweetheart by my man Haruki Murakami and intend to sit on the bed, turn off the tweeting and read something that isn’t a pitch, has more than 2 sentences and maybe, just maybe, generates some new brain cells. Because right now I could really use some more.
There’s a hill in Dickson City, PA that overlooks Scranton. At the top sits a Denny’s. Many years ago, my father and I were walking from the restaurant to our car, looking down on Scranton. I saw cars driving in every direction and asked, “Where are all those cars going, dad?”
“Oh,” he said, “That’s people living their lives. They’ve all got destinations to get to, people to meet, things to do. They’re just going about their day.”
Since then I’ve been fascinated with people’s stories. Even today when I’m stuck in traffic, I think about the people in the other cars. Are they going to visit someone who’s dying of cancer? Are they off to pick up eggs and milk? Is there someone waiting for them at the airport? Did they just get the best news of their life? Where are they going?
Then I’ll think of why I’m in the car at that moment and how important my life’s events seem until I realize that I’m only a single line on a single page of the enormous tome of human existence.
With this podcast, I’ll explore those stories. Each episode will feature a conversaiton with one person I admire, respect, know or want to know, edited down to the best 20 minutes (I once heard that a conversation experiences a natural pause at the 20 minute mark, so that seemed a logical place to end). Here is episode 1: Jeannine Luby. Enjoy.
“It isn’t the best music player, but it’s the cheapest!”
That’s the sentiment in Microsoft’s new Zune ad (as you might have noticed, that’s Wes Moss from season 2 of The Apprentice in the role of “Certified Financial Planner.” Who trusts a financial planner these days?), which claims that it costs $30,000 to fill a 120GB iPod classic* with music from the iTunes store. Let’s examine that claim.
The assumption is that all of the music on an iPod will come from iTunes. Most of my music came from CDs that I purchased years ago, which transferred for free. That’s sunk cost, yes, but those tracks consume storage space just as greedily as new iTunes tracks do. Also, they’re assuming that you buy all of your music one track at a time. An album is cheaper than the same 10 songs individually.
As an alternative, the ad promotes the Zune Marketplace. For $15/mo., you may download and keep as many songs as you want, as long as you maintain your subscription. Additionally, you may keep 10 songs a month for good. So, you’re purchasing 10 songs at $1 each, and paying $4.99 to rent unlimited songs. It sounds like a good deal but I don’t ever want to rent music.
The ad also assumes that there are no videos, TV shows, movies (rented or purchased) photos, free podcasts, audiobooks or data stored on the iPod. Those who buy the 120GB model are certainly using it in disk mode.
In the end, price is the deciding factor here so let’s talk price. I’ve recently canceled my Netflix, Sirius Radio and a few other subscriptions in an attempt to save money. If I don’t want to spend money in iTunes during a given month, I don’t. My music library is unaffected. If I cancel my ZunePass subscription, the vast majority of my collection goes with it. Finally, my friends have set goals for themselves other than “Fill my iPod to the brim with music from the iTunes Store.”
*Microsoft calls the 120GB iPod classic “…the lastest iPod.” Actually, that model was released on September 9, 2008. The latest iPod is the iPod shuffle, which was introduced on March 11, 2009. At 4GB, it would cost $1,000 to fill the shuffle with new iTunes tracks at “…a buck a song.”
As a young Catholic, I learned 3 things: 1.) God is watching. 2.) There’s this thing called a clip-on tie that doesn’t require any tying. You just hide the nubbin corners behind your shirt collar and fold the metal clasp against your Adam’s Apple. Plus, your friends will give you a dollar to wear one of yours when they’ve forgotten their own to avoid detention. So keep a supply in your locker. 3.) You’re no better than anyone else.
Number 3 stuck. When a new idea arrives in my head, my first thought is, “That’s dumb.” Also, “Crap, we’re not wearing a tie.” Then I remember that I’m 38 and not in school anymore.
I am 38, if only in theory. It’s necessary to occasionally remind myself that I’m not the dumb guy in the room, or the 10-year-old who stood with his nose against the chalk board for 30 minutes. It’s my wife’s job to remind me (along with earning the bulk of our income. Occasionally I’ll assert myself, stand in the middle of our home and announce, “I paid for slightly less than one half of all of this.” THAT shows her).
Unfortunately, I can’t carry my wife around all day, and must occasionally remind myself. You’re not the dumb guy in the room, even if Sr. Dolores said so.
The Kindle DX has prompted people to predict Apple’s response (including me). At TUAW, my colleagues and I fantasized about a hybrid computer/ebook reader we dubbed the “iDevice.” Imagine a full-featured, color touch screen eBook reader that also displays your photos, videos, music and iApps. Of course, Apple has a history of presenting the best way to do something that’s already been tried and in a manner that no one considered, so our guesses are as good as yours.
What’s certain is that Apple vs. Kindle isn’t a zero-sum game. Apple needn’t defeat the Kindle to succeed. Think of a subsidized Kindle with a newspaper subscription like a cable box. Those who want something better get a TiVo. Or, in this case, whatever piece of magic Apple is peddling.
“The Kindle DX seems to have three primary markets: textbooks, newspapers, and magazines. Other companies, including Hearst and News Corp., are said to be going into the media pad space to save their magazine subscription dollars. They’re doomed. In exchange for your monthly contract, the iPad will give you the whole Internet, and 35,000 iPod touch applications, including—get this!—the Amazon Kindle application.”
It’s arguable that Apple saved the music industry with iTunes and legitimzed the mobile application market with The App Store. They could rescue newspapers, but it would have to be done exactly right. Sascha’s right when he says that a full-featured device from Apple would trump the Kindle from a consumer’s perspective, but you’ve also got to consider how easily publishers get their content to the device, how consumers retreive it, etc.
Earlier this week I reviewed the forthcoming Gas Cubby 2.0 for iPhone and iPod touch. This post is a supplement to that one.
While using Gas Cubby, I realized how an application’s features and benefits affect its longevity. Specifically, the features attract your attention, while the benefits grab you for good.
As I said at TUAW, Gas Cubby makes it easy and even fun for me to record my automotive expenses. And that’s crucial, because if something’s fun to do, I’ll be more likely to repeat it. The best part of this app is the charts. Perhaps is my years of training in ABA, but I love analyzing data via charts.
[Gallery not found]
To enter data you simply choose the type (gas vs. service) and fill in a few fields. Data can be exported via online sync or CSV export.
Those are the features.
The benefit is peace of mind, and that’s why Gas Cubby is a keeper. It’s important that I record this data, and other methods were failing me. I’d be stressed that I forgot to write down some service, fill-up for other travel expense. That would bother me and potentialy make tax time a hassle. Gas Cubby eliminated that worry.
No, it doesn’t fart, illuminate a dark room or use the iPhone’s unique features (like the accelerometer) in a “because we can” manner. Those are features. That’s the real reason I love this app is the benefit: It allows me to know that I’m doing what needs to be done, and that’s worth a lot more than $9.99 to me.
I love Scranton, Pennsylvania. The way Di Nero loves NYC. The way Bostonians love David Ortiz. I love it.
I love the endless rows of nearly-identical homes wrapped in faded aluminum siding. I love slate sidewalks. I love sitting on the front porch, the fake “grass” underfoot and talking to the neighbor across the street who’s sitting on his porch, for hours at a time.
I love the chili dogs served at St. Ann’s Novena. Travel the entire planet and you’ll not find a tastier combination of hot dog, bun, chili and mustard. Served on their own, each ingredient is ordinary, but the combined result is transcendent. Don’t ask me how.
I love that I can still recall skits performed by 107 DJs Daniels and Webster when I was in jr. high school because they were that damn funny. I love that the Christmas lights in the Times Tower never come down.
I love a city populated by 70,000 honest, hard-working blue collar people who want to put in a week’s labor, catch a Yankees game, grab a tray from Maroni’s, bring the kids to Nay Aug and go to bed content with happy children, bills paid and friends and family nearby.
I love that while my wife and I were touring Italy for our honeymoon, she turned to me upon entering a small, family store selling meats and cheeses and said, “Wow, this is just like Catalano’s.”
I love buying bootlegs in The Electric Mind Shaft. I love Electric Mary. I love people who remember Skateaway, Hatchy Milatchy and Manny Goron. I love the IGA and South Side bowl. I love driving down Fireman’s Hill with the lights off.
I know that you love Scranton, too. Really love it. Let’s talk about Scranton. What do you love? The comments are now open.
