I not only hate the Teletubby color scheme but it's also the lack of color and depth that Jony Ive has removed from the OS that also makes me hate using it. All of these razor thin lines and super-slim fonts, navigation elements that are so totally bland and look more like wireframes and placeholders for an unfinished product. It's so empty and lifeless. Not to mention how it's essentially killed my iPad 2 which we were all perfectly happy with but now rarely use because it's so unresponsive, sluggish and crash prone.
Again, I'm not complaining about the functional or utility aspects of the redesign. It's the aesthetics that look like total sh*t! And it's not just about the icons! Those are the most obvious and the most striking but my real issue is with regard to the user interface elements and "minimalist" approach. It's totally pencil thin with zero depth and just a bunch of empty space! How many people were complaining about the look and feel of any previous versions of iOS? Until Jony Ive put the idea into everyone's head that the OS was due for a refresh and was "old and outdated" how often did you hear ANYONE say "Gee, I really wish that Apple would totally redo their ugly-ass user interface! I can't believe people actually like this crap!"?
The major driving force behind Apple's success over the years is that they were able to mask their inadequate software and hardware with absolutely gorgeous graphics, icons and user interfaces. Apple put lipstick on all of their pigs and marked everything up like 1000%! How else could you explain the success of a product that for years after it's debut had no multitasking, no 4G, no video recording capability, no goddamn cut-copy-paste and for many years being available exclusively on the worst cellular network in the entire country, yet still have people line up outside their doors for weeks leading up to the release of each new version of the phone???
It was because the iPhone looked AWESOME!
It wasn't because the phone got better reception or could perform better. No. It was because it looked better than any phone that anyone had ever seen and had launched behind an already wildly successful portable music player known as the iPod so the ecosystem with the iTunes and App stores were already in place. It was all perfect.
But alas, now that the innocent child (that would be me) has declared that the emperor is truly wearing nothing at all what does Apple honestly have left to offer anyone?
My big epiphany here is just how hypocritical people are when it comes to their views about Microsoft and Apple. People are free to continue having bad taste in design and I'm just fine with that (I'm looking at you "flat/minimalist" people). It's your phone so it should be your choice. But here's the thing, when it comes to Apple, it's NOT your choice. You have virtually NO control over how things look, feel or function. Now this was all fine when Steve Jobs was at the helm with Scott Forstall in charge of iOS because I shared their love of skeuomorphism and beautiful aesthetics. But now that Tim Cook and Jony Ive are running the show I no longer feel like "Apple knows best".
This whole iOS 7 thing has been a real wake up call for me. It's like I've been living under this "authoritative regime" that when controlled by my own "religious sect" is totally fine but once there is some coup to overthrow the government and impose Sharia law on everyone...well, then I'm not a happy camper.
I have to say that I'm really starting to appreciate companies like Microsoft more and more every day. I mean say what you want about them but they never even came close to the level of evil that Apple has attained. I mean if the DOJ and EU were suing Microsoft right and left for monopolistic and anti-competitive practices well then where's the outrage over what Apple does ALL THE FREAKING TIME??? Microsoft may have given it's own browser prominence in it's operating system but it never prevented users from installing and using other browsers. No one could ever accuse Microsoft of creating a truly closed ecosystem for Windows like the one Apple has created. You could always run Netscape, Opera, FireFox, Chrome, WordPerfect, Oracle, DB2 etc. Hell! You could even run Java and Adobe Flash! It's Apple that won't let users sell software in their store that directly competes with Apple's own native apps -or at least that was the case for quite a long time, I believe that they have loosened the leash a bit over the years but it's still totally up to Apple as to whether or not your app get's the green light.
My point is that while Microsoft has been going out of it's way to be less dickish (I mean Ballmer is leaving so that's already a HUGE step in the right direction), Apple is just doing the complete opposite.
Everything Apple makes is proprietary. Every year they change some other input on their hardware products or remove some legacy device or interface (think floppy and optical drive) altogether to force you to upgrade. I'm not saying that removing the floppy drive was a bad idea but in most cases Apple tends to make decisions that are EXTREMELY self-serving and generally not in the best interest of the average consumer.
iPod/iPhone/iPad 40-pin versus lightning dock connector.
Thunderbolt and DisplayPort* instead of using DVI or jumping directly to HDMI.
What about USB 3.0?
*To be fair I actually really like DisplayPort and think that it should replace ALL other display-related interfaces.
Microsoft is all about openness and standards (yeah, yeah, yeah IE 6 was a dud but they've learned their lesson and we've all moved on). Another thing, Microsoft never COMPLETELY dropped support for ANY of their products immediately after they came out with a new version. There's no such thing as being forced to upgrade to the latest and greatest in the "Wonderful World of Microsoft". After 12 years Windows XP is STILL being supported (support will finally end in April of 2014) during which time three other MS operating systems were released. Did Microsoft leave their older customers high and dry? No! They supplied all the service packs, patches and security updates for years and years. And what does Apple do? They make you buy all new hardware so that it works with the latest software!
You know all that praise that Apple has gotten since their announcement that all future Mac OS upgrades will be totally free? Well let's just see how free it is once people discover that this was Apple's way of no longer providing any form of support to older versions of their software products.
Major security hole discovered in iOS 6?
Tough sh*t! We're not gonna patch it! You'll have to upgrade to iOS 7!
What's that? Your device hardware can't support iOS 7?
Well then you'll just have to fork over a couple of hundred bucks for a shiny new iPhone 5S -where "S" stands for "sucker"!
Why am I making such a big deal about all this? Because Apple cheated me and they cheated everyone else. I have an out-of-warranty iPad 2 that was working PERFECTLY fine until I installed iOS 7 and now it's practically unusable! And there's absolutely NO recourse! I have spent tons and tons of money on media, games and apps that are either shackled with DRM or are non-transferable to any other computing platform. I am basically being held hostage by Apple and it's just wrong!
