Why Android tablets should be compared to the iPad, but not hams
Wayne Rash’s now much-quoted piece over at eWeek:
Why is it that I’m comparing the PlayBook against a Virginia ham? Well, why not? It makes at least as much sense as comparing the PlayBook against an iPad […]. But in fact the iPad was designed to be a lot like the iPod Touch, except with a screen sufficiently large that it has a lot more utility for visually oriented tasks.
As you may know by now, the PlayBook is getting a lot of negative press, due to a lack of native apps (about 3000 in total), no 3G, iffy Flash performance, and the glaring lack of built-in apps for email, calendars and contacts. And yet quite a few pundits, including Rash, are steadfastly defending RIM—and I utterly fail to see why.
Rash makes two arguments: people shouldn’t compare the PlayBook with the iPad, because they’re different devices, aimed at different audiences, and if you compare the iPad against any Apple device, it should be against the iPod touch.
On that second argument, the PlayBook still comes up short. It has a bigger screen, which in theory makes it superior for advanced applications, but the iPod still has the edge when it comes to productivity, due to the sheer number of decent apps available; more to the point, the iPod ships with native and usable email, calendar and contact applications.
On the first argument, though, why the hell shouldn’t everyone compare the PlayBook to the iPad? Haven’t RIM’s co-CEOs been bullishly doing so throughout the device’s creation? They’ve not at any point said: “Actually, we’re not aiming to compete with the iPad at all—we’re creating an add-on for anyone with a BlackBerry.” Although they’ve made arguments about the PlayBook’s supposed superiority in enterprise, they’ve regularly rattled on about how the device will blow the iPad out of the water for everyone—and it hasn’t.
There’s also weirdness happening in reviews giving RIM a break. It’s somehow become ‘unfair’ to compare the PlayBook against the iPad, or reviews judge RIM’s device on the basis of what it might become, rather than what it is. This is bullshit. If you release a half-finished product, too bad. And if a reviewer doesn’t review that half-finished product as it is today, they are not doing their job. You can only make direct comparisons with what exists today, not what might happen in the future.
Perhaps the PlayBook will become amazing in six months from now (although I doubt it), but RIM’s already changed its plans a bunch of times, and so reviewing a product on the basis of how it might hypothetically be towards the end of 2011, comparing it against how an iPad is now, is just stupid. Tech industry: stop doing it.
As I said the other day, RIM should have released it as a special limited edition for BB owners, required preapproval to buy, etc. Would have changed the press entirely.
I think if they had marketed the device as a “BlackBerry extension” rather than an iPad competitor, reviews might have been more favorable. Unfortunately, they positioned themselves as “the iPad for business”, which you can’t be if you don’t have anything to offer businesses that the iPad already has.
I posed the following question on my blog the other day: “Why didn’t RIM do with the PlayBook what it did with the BlackBerry – i.e. develop two versions, one for consumers and one for the enterprise? With the original BlackBerrys, you had a version with a camera (for consumers) and without (for corporate accounts). Give the consumer PlayBook native email, contacts and calendar and take them out of the enterprise version.”
That seems to make more sense than releasing the PlayBook the way it is now for both consumer and enterprise areas.