The Spirit of the Stairwell

Now we know where Apple got the name from …

Take a look at this picture.

It’s a pretty rubbish picture, isn’t it? It’s grainy and someone has taken chunks out of it. It’s low resolution and you can’t see much of anything.

Well it may interest you to know, gentle reader, that this unassuming picture is currently making the internet geek out in a fairly major way. Because this might very well be the first public photo of the iTablet – the new Apple product Steve Jobs is set to present to the world at 6.00pm GMT today.

Rumours of the iTablet have been rife since 2002 when everyone thought it was basically going to be an iPod with a keyboard. Since there it’s gone through many rumoured iterations, everything from a flat MacBook to a giant iPhone. But the really funny thing is, all of this furious product development is in our heads. Apple has kept completely silent about the thing, it won’t officially confirm it exists at all. Even the invitation for today just says:

So what we’re talking about here is a fictional product that the public has seemingly willed into existence just by dint of WANTING it so badly. At some point in the past, someone presumably thought ‘Wouldn’t it be cool if Apple made a tablet device?’ and from that inauspicious starting point we’ve collectively worked ourselves up into a frothing mess. Without Apple lifting a finger. It’s a wonder they bother doing any advertising at all. (Especially when it’s this smug and irritating)

So if Steve Jobs does present the technological equivalent of the Loch Ness Monster today, there’s a good chance it’ll look like the photo above. There have been many a photoshopped hoax before, ranging from the plausible:

To the slightly silly:

… but nothing as realistic as the above. It’s bolted down, it doesn’t give anything away. It has the whiff of authenticity.

The other thing is that we’re not really even sure what we want the device to do. “Tablet” is a form factor, it’s the body the clever stuff is housed in, it doesn’t give any clue as to what the gizmo would actually do. Is it a slightly more portable laptop, an ebook reader, a PDA writ large, an entertainment and games system? Knowing Apple it’ll probably be a lot of these things but there are still a myriad ways to implement those functions. Do you go for a traditional OS X set up with files and folders and a simulated desktop environment or something more like the multi-function iPhone OS which basically transforms the entire user interface on the fly depending on the function you select? We may firmly believe that this thing is going to revolutionise portable computing forever (like the iPhone arguably has for the mobile phone industry) but as it stands we just have no conception of what it actually is or what it’ll do for us.

Until now.

Because that picture above gives away more than it seems to. If it’s genuine (and I think it is) then we’ve finally got some answers to at least some of our questions. For a start that’s undeniably a massive version of an iPhone application, so we now know it’ll be running something at least closely related to the iPhone OS. Also notice the wifi icon at the top of the page and the “no service” mobile phone signal indicator. So it’ll probably have wireless and a (persistent?) 3G connection – something akin to Amazon’s Kindle – allowing the user to download books, newspapers, movies, albums and browse the web. The iTunes store will become the iGeneral store and Apple begins to take on Amazon on it’s home ground. You can also see a home button at the bottom, identical to that on an iPhone so we know something about the styling. Other rumours suggest a 10.1 inch screen and an aluminium back to fit in with the new iMacs and MacBook Pros.

So there we are, it’s the day of the launch and we’ve finally been able to define the device pretty well. What surprises haveApple managed to preserve?

Well for a start we just made up the name iTablet …

The Tories are going to get into power. It’ll be like the 80s all over again. We’re in a fix.

But until then there’s this …

To see more (and to make your own), go here - http://mydavidcameron.com.

Let’s make the most of it while we can. The guy is going to be our leader soon.

Our leader.

It’s like a horrible dystopian nightmare.

1. Write this blog more.

2. No, seriously, I’m going to write this blog more.

3. Change every part of my life that is annoying, dangerous, stagnant or similarly lacklustre.

4. Change every aspect of my personality that isn’t how I want it to be.

5. Learn to do the following – ski, sing, improvise better, play the ukulele, rock climb, use Adobe Design suite, Final Cut Pro and Aperture, use a digital SLR properly and ventriloquism.

6. Create stuff I’m proud of – edit my novel, write a musical, direct a film, produce a podcast, design a website.

7. Excel at my job.

That just about covers it I think.

An article I wrote for Ctrl.Alt.Shift.

The town seems unnaturally clean, the streets are straight and uniform, stretching out at right angles in all directions. Large friendly signs hang above each road clearly stating what you can find along them ‘schools & library’ or ‘park & duck pond’. Everything in neat little rows – from the terraced Value Estates to the mansions and castles in *Finest Heights. The citizens move slowly down these pathways as if sleep walking, wearing their identical blue and white-striped blazers and name badges. The cars are activated by putting in a pound coin but tend to swerve all over the road. Suddenly a deafening public address system crackles to life: Bing-bong. Citizens should note that there is a 2-for-1 offer on school entry at the Value Comprehensive. Thank you. Bing-bong.

Welcome to Tesco Town.

It may seem like the kind of satirical dystopian future that would spring from the fevered imaginings of Chris Morris or Armando Iannucci but worryingly Tesco Town is a very real possibility. Reports came in yesterday of Tesco’s intention to build a ‘supermarket suburb’ next to the Olympic site in Tower Hamlets. The area is already groaning under the weight of 10 new Tesco stores built in the last two years but it seems the supermarket giant wants to go for a total scorched earth policy, an 11-acre site with a 24-hour Tesco Extra hypermarket at its centre. Tesco are also planning housing, hotels, parks, schools and a library called, in true Orwellian fashion, the Idea Store. Creepy.

Most of us have come to terms with the fact that we now live in a world where 6% of the population own 59% of the wealth. We know large multinationals are richer than most emerging economies but it does seem to be taking the piss a bit for them to actually start building capital cities. How long will it be until we get Tesco Cathedrals with ‘Every Little Helps …’ carved over the vaulted entrance in Latin? Or the Tesco Political Party promising to save the economy with the same ruthless single-mindedness it uses to crush local stores and family businesses?

Tesco’s chief executive Terry Leahy has already thrown his hat into the political arena, describing Britain’s school system as “woeful”. Thanks for that Terry but I’m not quite sure how a career peddling low-quality foodstuff to the hungry masses gives you a mandate to comment on education reform. It’s probably best you go back to putting Whoops! stickers on the chicken that smells a bit dodgy. You’re good at that.

The Tesco Occupied Territories of east London. We’re through the looking glass here, people, the war of attrition with major corporations is just beginning. And to the future residents of Tesco Town let me just say this – squeeze the produce before you buy. It might be rotten and leave a bad taste in your mouth.

Okay, watch this video …

Now if, at any point, you found yourself nodding in agreement with that (if, in fact, your response was anything other than a nauseous, hollow void opening up in the pit of your stomach accompanied by a deep all-consuming sadness that people feel the need to treat each other in that way) then I don’t think we’re ever going to be friends. It’s probably best we part company at this early stage before we become too attached to each other. Freedom of speech sounds like such a noble concept until people use it to spout self-righteous, unsubstantiated poison.

For the rest of us there’s this to reassure ourselves we’re not alone: