Colin Charles Agenda

In my continuing quest to see how my tablet strategy is going to be going forward, I walked into an Apple reseller yesterday, in Singapore. I typed on the retina iPad, and realised that I was using only about four-fingers. This tells you that even before in landscape mode, I was never typing like I do with a keyboard. Or maybe I never really type that way, who knows? :)

I then tried typing on the iPad Mini. I found that I could reliably, in landscape mode add text, without much ado. It goes back to dimensions. The iPad Mini isn’t really a 7″ tablet, its almost an 8″ tablet.

Typing is not a good idea on the Nexus 7. I’ve tried to do so in Evernote today, and the keyboard takes up about half the screen. Its error prone, and I end up always going back to portrait mode for typing.

Asking the retail assistant if they had the iPad Mini in stock, they said they did. But it was only the 64GB version. This is how I bought my first iPad on the day/second day after it was released in the USA – it was the only available sized model. Never again will I make such a decision. 16GB or 32GB is all I’m after at best (probably the former).

All in, I decided to go home, and give the Nexus 7 a fighting chance. I’m going to load up all the software I use regularly or find equivalents. This means paying for an equivalent of Instapaper. This means finding an alternative to GoodReader whom have no plans to make an Android version. But what about those travel apps that I use infrequently, but are invaluable when I visit a place? 

Its these “what if” applications that make iOS popular. Most people are happy with a small number of apps, but there are scenarios where you need more.

Tablets are great for consuming & creating content (with the right size). Have we thought how long we are to use a tablet for?

I would like to consider cost vs. long-term computing utility, with OS upgrades. Warranties are also thrown into the mix, alongside TCO.

With phones, this is a tad easier. Many people have 2-year contracts, so they use their phone for 24-months. The upgrade cycle from what I’ve read/anecdotally is usually around 18-months on average (sorry, no references). Phones are subsidized (heavily in countries like the USA where they are locked; not so much in Malaysia where consumers are conned). Any additional time over 24-months is probably borrowed time (in the USA, Apple sells warranties for 2 years on their iPhones; in Malaysia there is no such thing as AppleCare+).

With laptops & desktops, warranties usually last 3 years (with the extended warranty option). This is a sensible amount of time to use a computer (36 months). Of course people extend the use of this and there is always a second-hand market, so the useful life of laptops & desktops can be extended quite a bit. My MacBook Pro which I use daily is already 42 months old (yes, I know it is out of warranty and time for an upgrade). The operating system can generally be upgraded from version to version without much issues (this is true for OSX, Windows, Linux).

What about tablets? If you buy a cheap device like a Nexus 7, it comes standard with Android 4.0. I guess the latest update is Android 4.2, but how long do you expect there to be upgrades?

In contrast, what about if you buy the cheapest iPad? Cheap for tablets usually relates to size, and the smallest iPad is 16GB in size. How long do you expect to get upgrades?

What happens if you buy the largest-sized tablet? Do you feel further entitled to get upgrades for longer? The increments roughly are about USD$100 per size upgrade (16->32->64GB).

For the cheapest iPad (16GB iPad4), you can already purchase a netbook/cheap desktop. You will get OS upgrades for a long time using a PC, but on a tablet, you may at most, get 2 years. 

Companies are now rolling out tablets in droves. Where are the TCO studies for this? I’m not saying Apple’s 2 years are bad. There are many Android-powered devices that have gotten less than that in terms of OS-upgrades.

How is group IT managing this new cost? What happens to older tablets?

I’ve been watching the digital loyalty space quite closely (see: THE CHOP SPACE (DIGITAL LOYALTY CARDS) IN MALAYSIA). I love being loyal to a business that rewards me. This forms the basis of how I choose what airline (alliance) to fly, or what hotel (chains) to stay at. I’m fortunate enough to be able to use multiple alliances and chains as I spend hundreds of days on the road every year, and live in a location where my business prospects are limited.

Why are digital loyalty cards great? I’ll let you in on a secret: I hate fat wallets. I’m sure you do too. My wallet is a Mighty Wallet, given to me as a gift at Christmas 2011 from Sara. It holds my essentials: credit cards, ATM cards, ID, drivers license, and cash. It expands to hold receipts and contracts when I decide to process them. Its unlike any leather wallet I’ve ever used as it doesn’t crack, expand out-of-shape or require care. My only complaint is that it is a little faded; I guess it just brings out its character.

Where did all my physical loyalty cards go? My old business card carrying case. In there is my Founder’s Card. My hotel loyalty cards from Hyatt, Starwood, and InterContinental. My Regus card. Two travel insurance cards. My Haagen-Dazs ice cream discount card. My Coffee Bean & Starbucks stored value cards. And many, many more. You get the drift I’m sure. Where does my business card carrying case go? Into my backpack.

In Malaysia, when I last counted, there were four playing in the digital loyalty space. There are many more that have launched since that post, and it has only been about two months since then.

What has this caused? Fragmentation. There is no one digital wallet for my needs. Instead of filling up my business card wallet, I’m filling up my phone with loyalty card applications (which you can now group thanks to folders). They all essentially do the same thing: scan some QR code. These wonderful applications have taken the physical cruft problem into the digital world. To some extent, it is worse because everytime they push an update, I have to download megabytes worth of application to my phone. Some turn on default sharing to Facebook which annoy me to no end (but apparently, merchants love it).

Google may have a solution to this. They call it Wallet. But its far from ready to take over my physical wallet & NFC has been around since 2006 in many a trial. A more elegant solution to me that I’ve seen work and have many people embracing it (including Starwood, Hyatt, Valet, etc.) is Passbook. You can use the Pass Kit APIs in your application. Passbook is more than just loyalty cards: boarding passes, tickets, etc. can be stored there. And it is location aware.

The best part about Passbook? You can use the PKPass files, and it works on Android phones with an application like PassWallet. How far Apple allows this is a good question, but we’ll leave that thought to another day.

Last week, Nazrul pointed me to an article: How to get your business on Apple’s Passbook.

I then heard Joe Beninato of Tello on This Week in Startups #298 and it hit me. Not only do you keep loyalty cards (via Tello’s PassTools – events, boarding passes, coupons, store cards, etc.), you can also provide feedback. User generated content (UGC) with a reward so to speak. So thats Yelp + digital loyalty. Malaysia isn’t a market where customer service is winning – many people expect more, and it is generally crap. Guess the private feedback option makes sense ;) The analytics feature is pretty standard for digital loyalty platforms – if you don’t have one now, you’re as good as dead.

Can Tello work in Malaysia? Possibly the Klang Valley/Penang (just like all these digital loyalty card services). You really need higher end phones for this sort of thing to work. Singapore is decidedly the land of iOS, so it might do a lot better there. It isn’t clear if there will be Android support or not. Android is growing in leaps & bounds, so I’m inclined to think this platform is rather important.

Why is UGC important? This digital loyalty business hits on two fronts: you have to grow the business by getting merchants as well as users. It really is a chicken & egg situation, because users do not come if there are no merchants, and merchants do not embrace if there are no users. UGC not only encourages others to visit the place (see how Yelp, Qype, Tripadvisor work), the feedback mechanism allows owners to write back. Overall, value provided for both the business owner & the user.

That said, not a single Malaysian company that I know of has started using Passbook, with the exception of Malaysian Airlines (their services might not be up to par, but their technology is usually ahead). I’m in Singapore as I write this and I’ve not seen a Singaporean establishment use Passbook either. There has been mention that Jurong Point, a mall, has started using it, and the claim is that they’re the first in Singapore to do so. I’ve never been to Jurong Point, and I don’t expect many people that don’t live there visit it either, but it could be a great case study. I expect great movements in this space come 2013 (after all, iOS6 is just a few months old now, it will get more mainstream next year; also the iPhone 5 is not even sold officially in Malaysia yet).

When FaceTime was announced, it was said to be built on open standards and it would be open allowing others to build on top of it. This was in September 2010. 

It has been over two years, and there is no such thing as an open standards compliant FaceTime. Today you still need to use an iPod Touch, iPad, or iPhone to make use of FaceTime.

When I unboxed my Nexus 7 tablet, the first question Sara asked me was if we could now FaceTime using that tablet. You see, we’ve gotten quite used to using FaceTime to keep in touch with each other as we are frequently thousands of miles apart, as I travel a lot.

Lately, Apple has even enabled FaceTime over 3G if you have an iPhone 4S or greater. I’m sure they fear that if it were an open standard, it would probably work on my iPhone 4 as well, thru third party software.

Most importantly as to why I’d like to see FaceTime to be an open standard? Ubiquity. Wouldn’t it be nice if I could use an Android tablet to talk to an iPad?

There was a 3G video standard quite some time back. I think Nokia might have pioneered it. Video calling over 3G was made popular on the Three network in Australia for example. This was in the early days of 3G usage (most phones still did GPRS, then EDGE, back then). I recall being able to make 10 minute calls over Three for free. It meant many people carried one regular phone, and one Three phone. Most importantly, this was based on open standards: an LG phone, spoke perfectly to an Ericsson one, which in turn spoke perfectly to a Nokia one.

I recall Apple denouncing video calling over the 3G network when FaceTime was launched. You needed bandwidth they said, so the experience was best delivered over WiFi. With the advent of LTE, they now believe you can do it over the wireless networks (in iOS6). But you’re locked in with whom you can speak to – other Apple users.

So, the late Steve Jobs vaguely promised that FaceTime would be open. Will the current Tim Cook make this happen?

I wrote this post entirely using my Nexus 7 (a 7″ tablet). I found that I couldn’t type well using it. I had to use it in portrait mode, and use my thumbs to type, which meant that it was utterly slow to generate a post.

On my 10″ iPad, I can comfortably type using the virtual/on-screen keyboard in landscape mode. In portrait mode it is nigh impossible.

In either situation, I’m naturally faster using a regular keyboard, and I do have an Apple Wireless Bluetooth keyboard for this purpose.

I’m now toying with the idea of getting a new iPad (retina display, 4th gen) or an iPad Mini. I’m enjoying consuming content on my Nexus 7. I wonder if I can justify creating more content on the iPad retina? Or do I just satisfy myself with a low-res iPad Mini, which will get updated to a retina display in a year or so?

Others have written about the typing situation: typing on iPad mini, John Gruber hunts & pecks.

I’ve had many dealings with SK Planet, in South Korea, so when they asked me to speak at their inaugural Tech Planet, I jumped at the opportunity. I was already pre-given a topic titled “NewSQL”, so I talked about the evolution of SQL -> Big Data -> NoSQL -> NewSQL, all thanks to papers written by Google research, and then focused on how MySQL & MariaDB is gaining many new interfaces: mariasql, HandlerSocket, dynamic columns, memcached InnoDB plugin, node.js with NDBCLUSTER, CassandraSE, LevelDB, Galera Cluster and more. This is a topic I will talk more about later.

The event was great. It started with a speaker’s dinner in where the CTO of SK Planet & multiple VP’s dined with the speakers. We had a private room at the InterContinental COEX, and started with smoked salmon, Russian crab meat & cream cheese. This was followed on quickly by crab meat soup. The main course was beef tenderloin, mero fish & steamed black rice, asparagus and black garlic. We ended with a cranberry tian with raspberry sauce. This was filled with lots of Equus red wine. 

The next day, we had the day of the event itself and it was huge. There were probably over 800 attendees, and SkySQL had a booth maintained by the Korean partners: OSS Korea, PrixMedia, and Oh New Innovation. This was followed by lunch with the CEO of SK Planet with great conversation & food. Started with tuna & avocado, to clear the palate, some lemon sorbet, and a great main consisting of beef tenderloin & king prawn with red wine sauce. We had much to chat about, and as lunch came to a close, it was time for me to give my talk.

It was well attended, there were some good questions, and there are naturally some good action items. I’m glad that the whole ecosystem provided me multiple opportunities to talk about amazing work being done. The press covered the Tech Planet event. I managed to snag an interview as well. More photos of the event at my techplanet2012 tag on Flickr.

All in, an exciting space to be in now. Thank you so much for SK Planet for the invite, and I look forward to being around in 2013.