Today I felt it: the first twinge of darkness and deflation, when I wondered to myself, “What comes after the iPad?”
You see, for the past half decade, we have been treated to a nearly perpetual, unending cycle of anticipation of two revolutionary pieces of technology. Long before they were officially revealed to the public, the Apple Phone and Apple Tablet were mythical entities, anticipated with ferocious appetites by millions of people around the world. From gadget geeks to your average Apple fanboy to creatives, futurists, and technology lovers of all stripes, these past several years was an era when a better tomorrow was soon – oh so soon! – to become actual reality.
This Age of Anticipation began with the iPod, which first whet our collective appetite. After sneaking onto the scene shortly after the bursting of our last prior moment of future-love (the dot-com bubble), the iPod slowly gathered steam, seeping its way, version by version, into society as it evolved from
The iPod evolved from a fringe device into a global cultural phenomenon, fundamentally changing the way we consume music.
fringe player into a global cultural phenomenon, fundamentally changing the way we consume music, and the entire music industry along with it.
The iPod’s titanic impact set the stage for the hope, expectations, and hype that Steve Jobs might unleash the magic of Apple upon the stale and stagnant phone industry. Anticipation intensified. Hearts beat more quickly. Message boards, gadget blogs, techno-pundits, and Apple junkies everywhere talked of the possibility. Thousands of fake and imagined renderings of the potential magic phone spread like viruses across the Internet. We were excited, we were exhilarated. We knew that somehow this phone would change the world for the better. We didn’t yet know how, exactly, but we knew to expect a lot. For years, the buzz built. The wait was long and frustrating, but then in the dead of winter in January 2007, Steve Jobs revealed to all of us the iPhone – a mobile internet device, the best iPod ever, and a phone.
The Jesus Phone.
The iPhone created a seismic shift in the phone industry.
All was right in the world. The design was revolutionary, paradigm shifting. If it didn’t quite upend the entire phone industry, it’s impact created a seismic shift in course. Naturally, the skeptics and critics complained about minutae like megapixels and missing 3G antennas, removable batteries and SDKs. But all that didn’t matter. We, the faithful, knew, and when the iPhone finally was released, lines lasted for months outside our temples of worship – the Apple Store.
The hope and anticipation was, of course, not over yet. For the next iteration of the iPhone, we knew, would have more awesome capabilities, faster connection speed, and most of all, the promise of native apps, truly revolutionizing our world, enabling always-connected computing in ways beyond imagination. And lo, in the summer of 2008, the future arrived with the 3G and the App Store.
The iPhone has, since it was first introduced, reigned over our world. New releases are covered on every national and local newscast, on the front page of the NYT and Newsweek. It earned Steve Jobs endless accolades, such as being hailed as CEO of the Decade. Together, iPhone and iPod created a multi-billion-dollar accessories industry. And every new remotely similar device from every competing company is always and without fail compared to them (usually negatively).
As the iPhone cemented its supreme status in the world and in the hands of well over 50 million owners worldwide, our consciousness moved forward. The interface magic and technological brilliance of the iPhone, while still appreciated, no longer could hold our attention all the time. We needed a new object of desire.
Many gadgets tried to stir up our emotions: Netbooks. Apple TV. Blu-Ray. Unibody Macs. Android. Pre. …Android. All interesting in some way, but none ever came close to actually exciting us. The CrunchPad, before it was stillborn as the JooJoo (!), actually managed to stir some emotions. But all along, we knew.
All along, we had no doubt that once again, the next new Apple device would in some way change our little blue planet.
We had no doubt that once again, the world would be gifted a miraculous new device that would in some way change our little blue planet. That Jobs’ precisely formulated recipe – with a beautiful, brilliant UI, magnificent industrial design, and leaps forward in connectivity – would combine once again and produce that elusive alchemy only he can seem to manifest.
A new discussion began to bubble. Propelled forth by the monumental impact of the iPhone – an order of magnitude greater than that of the iPod – set the stage anew. We dreamt that Steve Jobs might once more unleash Apple’s magic upon us. Again, hope rose. Again, dreams of the future filled our minds. And once again, message boards, gadget blogs, techno-pundits, and Apple junkies everywhere talked of the possibility. Thousands of fake and imagined renderings of the potential magic tablet spread like viruses across the Internet.
We knew that somehow this tablet would change the world for the better. We didn’t know how, yet, but we knew to expect a lot. For years, the buzz built. The wait was long and frustrating, but then in the dead of winter in January 2010, Steve Jobs, arbiter of what is right and correct, presented the world with his latest creation – the iPad. “The most important thing I have ever done,” he’d said about it. Something new, now, in our hands: A huge, brilliant, perfect, multi-touch screen; blazing speed; access to all the world’s media, hi-def video, and new horizons in gaming, design, and interaction now at our fingertips.
And thus years of hope and anticipation – and the seeds of it trace as far back as the first Newton in 1993 – have now, finally come to a conclusion. (OK, OK. Yes, we do still have about two months to go before we can hold one in our own hands.)
And that is it: No more miracle devices to long for. 10,000 songs in your pocket: check. Pocketable mobile communicator/Internet device: check. Magic tablet with limitless software potential: check. The only thing now ahead of us: feature updates, size variations, and perhaps one day really fast, truly ubiquitous WiFi.
Unless nanotechnology really takes of soon, this era of culture-altering new devices has concluded with the introduction of the iPad.
But unless nanotechnology really takes of soon, guess what: we’re in for a slow evolution over the next ten to twenty years. This astounding era of anticipation and hopes fulfilled is now in its final phase.
I know I’ll be holding onto it tightly. Because I took a glimpse around the corner, looking for the next new hope down the road. And I saw … nothing. The Age of Anticipation is over. And, man, that is depressing.
