My Apple-worshipping friends always tell me how awesome their iPhone, iPad, iPod, etc. is, and how I'm missing out with my GS3 phone and Surface tablet. "It's so great! It's super easy to use! It 'just works!', 'I wanted to have Steve Jobs' baby!". They talk up the iOS interface like it's literally the best thing, like, ever. I've never been a huge fan of the simplistic iOS interface in favor of the more customizeable, deeper, more innovative (IMO) Android interface, and now the new Windows Phone 8/Windows 8 interfaces have grabbed my attention as well. Just to placate my most vocal Apple Evangalist friend, I spent about an hour on his iPad and iPhone yesterday.
My take: It's just a grid of icons! What the... this is the best thing evaaaaar? The only thing I can see that's changed since the very first iPhone I picked up (which seemed really cool and innovative at the time) is that you can make folders now (woopidy doo). The OS itself is just a static, shiny app-launcher + iPod, it really does nothing on its own. Usability is: I download an app, I flick through my screens, then tap the icon to launch the app, then I use the app. Visually and functionally, the interface is essentially the same as on the original iPhone. The OS is super easy to use because it pretty much does nothing aside from presenting the user with a grid of icons to launch apps. It's not a bad interface per se, but I'm not sure it earns the gushing praise my Apple-loving friends give it. Don't get me wrong, an OS shouldn't be hard to use, but a little depth of functionality doesn't hurt.
I honestly feel like Apple has stopped innovating at this point and that both Android and WP8 have surpassed iOS on most fronts. Apple's mobile products have not really changed in years (aside from incremental hardware improvements), and their product line is just stale to me. Their biggest 'innovation' in recent years was the Siri app, which was originally available on all iPhones as an app, Apple purchased the developer, took off the App Store, then pretended was some new, amazing thing to get people to buy the 4s. I find it ironic that the company who's slogan used to be 'Think Different' has been stamping out the same thing with only small, incremental hardware improvements year after year (aside from the Maps debacle, that was interesting). Maybe the increased competition from Android and Microsoft will help spur them to innovate again, or maybe they'll be blindsided by a fast-changing industry.
Has Apple pulled a 'Blackberry'? Have they become too complacent with their initial roaring success, only to have their competition eventually out-innovate them? Nobody would have forseen Blackberry falling so quickly; could the same thing happen to Apple's iOS?
