tf2

# ipad needs a "hypercard"

## (so we can make our own personal apps)

https://d262ilb51hltx0.cloudfront.net/max/800/1*QUgDZw6nWKjMm26e-E3b8A.png

the ipad had a debut where it experienced sales that were quite explosive -- shocking people who had scoffed about "no demand" for the form-factor -- and it showed sustained evidence of solid growth in the years that followed.

until this year, that is, when the growth started to show signs it had leveled.

the argument goes that laptops are getting lighter and lighter, while phones are getting bigger and "bigger than bigger", so the ipad is getting squeezed.

i maintain that that is nonsense. indeed, given its performance/price ratio, the ipad is the best prizefighter across all the weight classes. *the* *very* *best!*

and it could be *even* *better* if apple would allow it to make phone-calls...

but there are other errors, even more serious, that apple is making as well.

specifically, apple is making two big mistakes, closely related to each other.

***

## 1. apple fails to see the natural ipad niche.

even before there was an ipad, there was a group of people who i could see would be a can't-resist-it niche of customers for a form-factor like the ipad.

i even named my imaginary form-factor after them: _the_ _clipboard_ _computer._

that's right. the natural niche for the ipad is *people* *who* *carry* *clipboards.*

they are already carrying something, and are using it for some kind of data.

your first reaction might be that there are lots of people who use clipboards.

precisely my point.

> _the_ _natural_ _niche_ _for_ _the_ _ipad_ _is_ 
 > _people_ _who_ _carry_ _clipboards_

that's why i believe these people are a large untapped market for the ipad... anybody who is carrying a clipboard _might_ be more productive with an ipad.

so why is this niche _"untapped"?_ that brings us to apple's second big mistake.

***

## 2. real people can't "program" their ipads.

the issue is this: how do you program an ipad? how can you make an app?

i don't wanna talk about all the twists and turns apple has made on the way, from the start when web-apps were pitched as the only way to code for ipad, up to today where apple largely controls what apps _we_ can put on _our_ ipads (except, in a strange twist of fate, the very web-apps where the story began).

the fact is that it's hard to program a personal app you can run on your ipad.

and sure, you can, if you're a programmer, and know html/css/javascript, but most real people out there in the world do not have that particular skill-set. (blimey, even some of the people who _make_ web-apps aren't very good at it.)

so let us cue up a story from the past.

once upon a time, there was a program, only on the mac, called "hypercard".

hypercard was _fun._ hypercard was _simple._ hypercard was a _brilliant_ program.

https://d262ilb51hltx0.cloudfront.net/max/800/1*J6bMUcTnvIIeOnjoj_1KAw.jpeg

hypercard let you make a "card", on which you could put text, pictures, etc. even working buttons that you could have do an action if they were clicked.

and you could create a "stack" containing multiple cards. so you might make a button on each card with the action of "go to the next card in this stack". (the cursor-keys did that naturally, but you could have a button for it, too.)

further, one stack could call another stack. so you might have a button that would perform the action of "open the _'address-book'_ stack and find _'leslie'"._

hypercard was _fun._ 
 hypercard was _simple._ 
 hypercard was _a_ _brilliant_ _program._

a great many people got their introduction to programming from hypercard. they didn't even know they were being introduced, it just kind of happened.

it happened because hypercard was easy (with a very gentle learning-curve), and fun, and you could get stuff done. silly stupid stuff at first, yes, but then often turning "interesting" shortly after and "downright useful" before long.

> _you_ _didn't_ _have_ _to_ _be_ _a_ _programmer_ 
 > _to_ _make_ _something_ _useful_ _in_ _hypercard_

hypercard had a scripting language underneath, which is what turned people who had just been "playing around" into active and devoted "programmers"; they then learned other computer languages, some making careers out of it. apple eventually ditched hypercard, so it's not so much true today, but there was a time (maybe a decade back) when 2 out of 3 computer people woulda told you that hypercard was the one thing out of many that got 'em started.

but let's forget about that hypercard scripting capability for the time being, because what's more important to the argument that i'm making here is that people could make useful hypercard "stacks" _without_ doing much scripting.

you didn't have to be a programmer to make something useful in hypercard.

real people could -- _and_ _did!_ -- make useful stuff in hypercard from the start, creations that those real people found to be useful in their real lives. really! there are likely businesses, to this very day, dependent on hypercard stacks.

and did i mention that hypercard made people creative too? it certainly did. there was a game called "myst", huge in the early days of computer gaming, which was built in hypercard. but, ok, that was not built by "a real person". the brain-power needed to build "myst" was genius, and not "a real person". still, it's really true that many real people made useful stuff with hypercard.

anyway, sorry for waxing nostalgic, it just happens when i discuss hypercard.

https://d262ilb51hltx0.cloudfront.net/max/800/1*Es0h0aZou8mxa3MJNBP74Q.png

but let me get to the point. people carry clipboards for forty million reasons. forty million *different* reasons. so those people all need *different* apps, and there's no way we're gonna find enough coders to program all of those apps. especially because, these days, people want perfect apps. which cost a dollar.

in order for apple to convert that niche of clipboard-carriers to ipad buyers, each person will need to have a tool for _making_ _the_ _specific_ _app_ they need. the tool must be fun!, and drag-n-drop easy, with enough functionality that there is no need for "programming", per se, so people can help themselves.

> _the_ _ipad_ _today_ _needs_ 
 > _a_ _hypercard-equivalent,_ 
 > _updated_ _for_ _the_ _21st-century._

i've coded several hypercardish clones over the years, and i do believe that i'm going to make yet another one. and this time around, i am also *sharing* my thoughts with the world, because others might do it better, or *different.*

pay attention: i am not talking about turning real people into programmers, but gifting people with a fun ability to create personal tools *without* coding.

there's no need to reproduce hypertalk, or any scripting ability whatsoever. indeed, i believe if you go in that direction, you won't be nearly as effective, because you will make the tool less simple, plus offload your responsibility to incorporate needed functionality (via the excuse "they can script that").

this probably separates me radically from most of the hypercard revivalists. but the ipad has, inside itself, such inherent power that we can offer people the ability to do whatever they'll need to do to accomplish their job at hand. and we can do it with the lure of "having fun", versus "doing programming".

> _today's potential ipad users --_ 
 > _especially the "clipboard" niche_ 
 > _-- need a hypercard-equivalent,_ 
 > _updated for the 21st-century_

the ipad has the capacity to handle audio and video (even their recording), deal with text and photos, pull resources from the web and push 'em back, create and utilize forms that would collect and analyze and spit back data, and, of course, the ability to "compute"; so it becomes entirely reasonable to think we can provide enough "general glue" so that our clipboard-people can cobble together tools with functionalities to e-upgrade their clipboards.

***

https://d262ilb51hltx0.cloudfront.net/max/800/1*QUgDZw6nWKjMm26e-E3b8A.png

***

sadly, this type of "make-your-own-programs" app might not get _approval_ to appear in the apple store. so i'll be coding my effort as a web-app instead. and it'll be free, as a gift, to help jumpstart a culture based on gift-exchange. if you want to help create such a culture, and appreciate the gift of my tool, and want to reciprocate that gift, you'd be welcome to offer a gift in return. maybe a copy of that useful app you thought you'd created just for yourself? or a copy of that novel you wrote? or, you know... cash. cash is always good...

-bowerbird

bowerbird@aol.com 
 (since 1995; told you i was old-school...)