Hell has frozen over and here’s a little video to go along with it. 🙂
This video has a great deal of meaning today because, in the last 72 hours, my wife Elana went from having neither an iPad nor an iPhone to having both. Yes, “another one bites the dust” as Elana is pulled further into Apple’s reality distortion field of awesomeness.
To be fair, this didn’t come out of nowhere, and a bit of history is important. When I first met Elana she was a student at the School of Visual Arts. It will come as no surprise that she, along with all of her classmates, used Apple computers for her work. After all, it was, and continues to be, known as the computer for those who are artistic and creative. It was only when that computer died that I pushed her to get a Windows PC, since that is what I was using. She only came back to Mac a year and a half ago when she got an 11″ MacBook air.
She did not, however, get an iPhone. In fact, 2 1/2 years ago or so she tried one for about two months. Ultimately she not only gave it back, but she gave it back professing her love for her Palm Centro and pledging never to use an iPhone again. (Okay, that was a dramatic overstatement.) Yes, she loved using a Palm and continues to lament its demise.
Her issues with the iPhone were many. She detested the soft keyboard. She didn’t like the number of taps it took to get from one place to another. And she didn’t like the overall feel of the device. “It is too heavy.” Since then, any time I have suggested she get an iPhone, she has looked at me and said, “I don’t want one. Don’t you recall I tried it for many weeks and I hated it.”
Fast forward to last week. She has the MacBook air and she loves it. She has been using a BlackBerry curve for the last few years and, for the second time, hers broke. The first time it happened we were able to replace it (thanks to Wayne). This time she went to a Blackberry Bold. She likes it well enough, but she thinks it is too large, too slippery, and she finds that she is increasingly limited in her ability to record everything she wants to record because she is using a number of different platforms. In fact, when she initially made the move from the Palm to the BlackBerry, she lost a huge amount of information and has not trusted electronic records since, preferring to keep everything on paper. Not the most efficient approach, and one that she knows has to change.
Last week we got an old iPad when a family member upgraded, and I set it up on Friday. She decided that she is going to use it in the kitchen and to bring it with her when she is with clients in case she wants to show them a menu, a video of a workout or other such things. On Friday I told her since she now uses both an Apple computer and tablet she might want to revisit the possibility of using an iPhone. In fact, I pointed out that her friend Heidi gave up her BlackBerry a few weeks ago. The first day she e-mailed Elana saying, “I hate this thing.” but not 24 hours later she sent a second email that said, “I completely and totally love my iPhone.”
Elana gave me the same reply I have always heard. “I don’t like the virtual keyboard. I know it is great, and I like everything else about it. I understand the benefit of being entirely on one platform but I just don’t like the keyboard.”
I mentioned the iPhone again yesterday and got the same reply, although this time she said, “I’m seriously considering it but just don’t see doing it and time soon.
This morning I handed her my iPhone and told her, “When you hear the beep please say “Remind me to call Dan at 3 PM this afternoon.” She did, and Siri created the reminder right on the spot. My point: with global voice recognition she, will only have to use the soft keyboard some of the time since, more often than not, she can use voice to type and bee even faster than she is on the BlackBerry with its physical keys.
Impressive, but not impressive enough to change her mind. Or so I thought.
As I was getting ready to head into the office this morning, Elana came into the bedroom and said, “On your way home, do me a favor and pick up an iPhone for me. I’m done having the hassle. I’m done not having everything integrated. I just want things to work, and I’m done giving it so much thought and energy.”
It is for that reason that today’s theme song is, “Another one bites the dust.”