The Descent of Apple

Heavy is the head that wears the crown.  The release of the iPhone 5 will be looked back upon as the turning point for Apple.  Throughout it's history, Apple has been innovative and it's stock has grown massively.  It's all about to change.  Apple will become just another company that updates their products and grows slowly instead of an industry leader that blazes a trail.  Let's take a look at the history of it's development. 

1st iPhone - January 9, 2007

Although the original iPhone would now be looked at as a brick with an awkward headphone jack and sluggish 2G capability, make no mistake about it - the iPhone revolutionized consumer mobile phones.  Absolutely changed the game.  Back in 2006, there were smartphones, but they were not comsumer friendly.  The hippest smartphone back then was the Blackberry Pearl, and the other options were the hard-to-use and uncool Palm and Windows smartphones.  iPhone changed all that in several ways that we probably take for granted now.  

The minimum requirement of a smartphone now is having some sort of iPod/music feature.  The iPhone introduced the music feature to smartphones.  The iPhone leaped ahead with the capability to browse the full internet, not just mobile WAP sites.  The iPhone was the first phone to have a multi-touch screen and no keyboard.  Few, if any, mobile phones threaded text conversations before the iPhone.  The pinch-and-zoom feature was incredible and unbelievable like a futuristic movie, and no other phone did that at the time.

iPhone 3G 2008

Of course 3G was a major upgrade and people were much more pleased with the speedier performance.  Can you imagine an iPhone without the App Store?  Well, the 3G introduced that, and although it started out small, it is huge now.  With the App Store the iPhone would become capable of doing almost anything.  The 3GS was basically an upgrade to the system and internal components, and didn't introduce anything revolutionizing, which is why it was not called the iPhone 4.

iPhone 4 2010

The iPhone 4 saw a significant change to the shape of the iPhone, going from rounded to more squared off and industrial looking.  The Retina display was impressive to look at.  An upgraded camera and front facing camera for the new Facetime App was ahead of the industry.  Many people were expecting iPhone 5 when iPhone 4S launched, and it may have deserved the title when it introduced Siri, but it seems that a new number iPhone requires changing the shape of the phone.  Siri was a really cool development.  I can now tell my phone to remind me every Sunday night to set my fantasy baseball lineup and Siri does it.      

iPhone 5 2012

The iPhone showed up with a longer body and larger display, as expected.  It's also thinner and lighter, as it should be.  It has the retina display, nothing new.  It's faster and will perform better, which we expect from new phones.  The new upgraded camera will be able to shoot in panoramic views, which is nice but if you don't hike mountains maybe it's not that useful.  The iPhone 5 doesn't have the wow-factor previous new models had. 

The 5 is the first iPhone released since Steve Jobs passed away, and I fear that Apple's ambition and creative genius went to the grave with him.  Apple, under Jobs, would unveil new products that went beyond customer expectations, not simply meet them.  Apple used to make us say "wow".  Now Apple makes us say "yup, that's what we were expecting."  I suppose it is very diffcult to maintain creative and innovative dominance, so Apple's run of most excellent consumer technology company had to end.  Apple has been great, and it has been great for you if you owned Apple stock, but I reckon the glory days are over.  Apple will maintain a share of the smartphone market for the near future and the stock will probably go up a little, but things will flatten out and people will stop lining up around the block the night before to get the new iPhones.       

Goodnight, Apple, you had a great run, but the crown is up for grabs, let the game of thrones begin. 

P.S. iOS 6 looks like it will have some nice new features, but I'm not going to get into that because it will be available to older iPhone models and not unique to iPhone 5.  Also, I borrowed the Jobs/grave line from my pal, JBFunk. 

       

September

The beginning of September might be the most exciting time of year.  Going back to school and the start of football season coincide to make it a time for rebirth and new beginnings.  January 1st might mark the start of a new calendar year, but the real new year begins in September.  In January the weather is cold and the gym gets crowded for like a week, but nothing really changes.  In September, I go back to school and meet over a hundred new people that I will be will be working with over the next ten months.  There's new names to pronounce wrong for a while and a new schedule to remember.  I love the summer time for the freedom and the nice weather, but it is nice to get back into a routine.  Learning about new people is interesting because we're all so different, yet very much alike.  

The new football season is upon us as well.  I really love football.  Football makes Sundays in the fall the most thrilling day of the week from September to February, and it's a real treat that the Patriots have been so excellent for the past decade.  All the other sports play too many regular season games.  The playoffs are exciting in every sport, but the regular seasons is too long.  Look at these season lengths - basketball 82, hockey 86, and baseball 162.  Football only has 16.  Each football game is critically important.  I think that we love the things we can't get enough of the most.  My only complaint about football is that there isn't more of it.  

It's a very fun and exciting time of year and the start of the school year has been great.  The new people seem ready to learn and create a good classroom community.  Working with students that know education is important makes my job much easier, so I'm grateful for that.  The Patriots handled Tennessee fairly easily today, so things are off to a great start all around. 

I Hate Good-byes

Today I have to say good-bye to someone that has supported me for sixteen years.  It is never easy to lose someone that has stood by you for that long.  It is especially difficult when you have to throw them in the trash can.  In 1996, I bought the best plaid shorts I have ever owned, and today I feel it is necessary to throw them away because of rips, tears, and fraying.  If I hold onto these shorts any longer they will just take up space and I already have too many clothes, like I said, I hate good-byes.  If I continue to wear them people will most likely start thinking that I am homeless or destitute.

These shorts have been with me since I was in high school, and I'm pretty sure that I started the trend of wearing plaid shorts at Watertown High School because up until that time other boys generally wore jean shorts - it was 1996.  I have to admit that sometime around 2005-2010 there was a period of many years where they were forgotten and sat in the bottom of a box or at the bottom of a shelf, but they have had glory days these last few years as I rediscovered the style and excitement of them.  One thing that makes these shorts stand out is that they are pleated front and also have an elastic waist.  

The last ride of the Union Bay pleated, elastic-waisted, plaid shorts deserves to be told.  The last time I wore them was yesterday and they served me well, but I also realized that it was the end of the line for them.  Yesterday, September 2, 2012, I woke up early and went to the gym, which was nice and quiet and just the way I like it.  Then I went back to my apartment and had breakfast and took a long, hot shower.  I put on the plaid shorts and a Nantucket tee shirt and I was ready and feeling good.  I was heading to Watertown, the town where I grew up, to meet my hometown buddies for a fantasy football draft.  In the car ride down I noticed on the shorts that the left leg was fraying and also a hole below the left pocket.  I didn't really care if anybody at the draft would notice - it just didn't matter, at all.

The draft started with some major drama.  I was the first to show up at my buddy's house because I wanted to catch up with him before the madness of the draft began.  One of the first things I did was check the wi-fi connection to make sure it agreed with my laptop.  I logged on and launched the draft room with no problems.  Forty minutes later right as the draft began my laptop lost connection and the window went blank.  Big, huge, major problem!  So I scrambled around the house to get a stronger signal and quit applications hoping it would reset itself.  Five minutes later sanity was restored and I was back in the draft room and had to make a rushed, panicked first pick.  I picked Roddy White, and if you are not familiar with fantasy football I would compare the level of excitement with picking him to going out for ice cream and spending ten minutes going back and forth between Moose Tracks with extra fudge, Chocolate Caramel Swirl with Peanut Butter Cups, Almond Joy Coconut with Cookie Dough, and then after all the pressure and anticipation, choosing vanilla.

I still wasn't settled by the time my second pick came back around and I accidentally chose Maurice Jones-Drew, who had been holding out for a new contract all summer and had just showed up yesterday, probably fat and out of shape.  I had a rough start, but the rest of the draft ran smoothly and my team should be competitive, and all this happened during the last hurrah of the plaid shorts, so it was a great day of seeing old friends and enjoying the last big weekend of summer.

When I got home I changed into my lounging uniform, which is maximized for comfort, mesh shorts and loose fitting tee shirts.  As a held the plaid shorts in my hand I noticed the threads were bare and thin, and I could see my hand poking through a three-inch hole on the backside that was right above another smaller tear.  Sixteen years is very old in clothing years, it is probably equal to at least 175 human years.  I knew that was the end, but it was a glorious end, and if my fantasy team has success, part of that success will be due to the plaid shorts, who still had one good day left.  

Zac Brown Band's Uncaged

This summer I was hanging out with my friend, also named Dan, who is a huge fan of country music and he was telling me about how much fun he had at the Jason Aldean concert.  My exposure to country music is limited.  A few years back I went to Countryfest with my hometown buddies and I started to like a couple of Kenny Chesney songs.  Up to that point I was adamantly opposed to country music, and as I think back there was no good reason to be opposed to an increasingly popular genre of music.  It is very difficult to enjoy something that you are philosophically opposed to, so it wasn't until I opened my mind to country that I started to appreciate it.         

Dan's enthusiasm for country got me thinking and I decided to get an album and see what happened.  I remembered watching the Grammy awards sometime in the past few years and seeing the Zac Brown Band win some award and I felt that this band had a good buzz about them, so I decided to get their new album Uncaged, which they released on June 6, 2012.  The album was not entirely what I expected, but if I added up all my summer music listening I'd say that I listened to this album more than anything else.  

Uncaged starts with the song Jump Right In, a catchy song that has a fun, vacation, dance feel.  Jump Right In is an invitation to hang loose and have a good time, and I am all right with that.   Zac Brown sings these lighthearted lyrics:

If you get the notion
Stop on by and play a while
Simple tune to get your love light glowing
Keep your heart wide open
Disappear just like the tide

Let it roll on by

The second song is titled the same as the album, Uncaged, so I feel there is extra significance to it.  It has a southern rock feel and it sounds like Zac Brown wants to bust out and cut loose.  I really like this song because it's about getting out there and living to the fullest.  If we become so stuck in our daily routines it can feel like we're trapped in a cage and I think this is Zac Brown's anthem for celebrating freedom and opportunity.  His way of telling us to go out and do something we've been thinking about or putting off.  

Goodbye in Her Eyes has a slower, sadder feel and is obviously about breaking up and the pain that goes along with it.  Listening to this song you know that Zac Brown is singing about real hurt and it reminds you of hurt that you have felt.  The song is almost perfect but there's two lines that I just don't get. Zac Brown sings "Sometimes I feel like a clown, who can't wash off his make-up".  These lines stick out to me because they don't fit and seem forced.  I can't figure them out.  It seems like he thought this was a clever thing to say and wanted to use it in one of the songs.  Well, he picked the wrong one.  If anyone can make sense of how these lines fit into the song, please comment below.

The Wind speeds up the tempo and has a bluegrass sound.  If the previous song is about love lost then this song seems to be about missed opportunity.  It isn't nearly as sad but the story seems to be about something that could have been.  I think we all have moments we remember that we wish we would have done something or said something to someone, so this song has universal appeal.  Zac Brown sings "My love will find you anywhere", which is nice.

Island Song makes feel like I'm lying on a sunny beach in Jamaica.  It has a fun, reggae feel and is about unwinding and taking it easy.  I like this song because leisure time is important to me, and since I have spent days on sunny, white-powdery sand beaches in the Caribbean this song evokes fond memories. 

     

Sweet Annie is a slower song and sounds very country.  This song has good harmonies, and throughout the album there are good harmonies, but particularly on this song.  Zac Brown sings "Can I stay with you a while, cause this roads been puttin miles on my heart" and those lines sum up this song - it's about pursuing something, pouring yourself completely into it and then having the need to settle down and rest for a while, or at least for a moment.    

Natural Disaster is one of my favorite songs on the album.  Zac Brown sings about a woman, but the idea is that there are lots of things that move us and change us, and that doesn't necessarily mean other people.  It is also about having too much fun and the potential danger of too much of a good thing, but, again, it sends the message that Uncaged does also - we're meant to feel, live more aware, face our fears and explore the unknown.  

Overnight is a very sexy song, and that is an understatement.  Overnight is about the excitement of finding someone new.  There are some funny metaphors to our legal system of judges, juries, and search and seizure.  Overnight is an awesome song because it achieves exactly what it sets out to do.      

Lance's Song is about loss.  There are many people we feel are gone too soon, but that's life, and there's no right or wrong, good or bad, it just is.  Lance's Song isn't a total downer because it sends life-affirming messages of appreciating what we have and to do the things you want because life is short.  

Day That I Die is about making sure that you understand yourself and do things that make you happy.  Zac Brown sings that he wants to be able to say that he "was a man who really lived and never compromised".  Can't argue with that I suppose.  

The last song, appropriately titled Last But Not Least, is about all the tough choices we face.  There are lots of things we feel responsible for and people we feel responsible to.  The stirring climax of the song addresses what this song is ultimately about - the notion that nobody is perfect and that life is hard.  No matter how hard we try some people might be disappointed because we can't please everyone, so the most important thing is to make yourself happy.  During the most intense part Zac Brown sings with a fervor:

I go left when I should go right
I chase the dark when I see light
I trip and fall down every time I try
To walk that line
The sun comes up I look for rain
I search for joy and I find the pain
I swear I will not forget about
Last but not least

Uncaged takes you on a journey that explores life, love, and death.  The album cover captures the darkness that pervades the album, but the Zac Brown Band shows us that there is also much goodness in life and it must be celebrated.  The band has a spirit that can help set you free.  You got to get Uncaged!