a poor player

Dunkirk NY – Recently I received an iPad as a present from my wife honoring my promotion to Distinguished Teaching Professor. Considering that she is not technologically adept, this was a major achievement for her. I was quite taken aback. Of course I wanted one, but I was willing to wait for at least a year or more before purchasing one. I am trying very hard these days to cut down on my use of technology and gadgets. I believe I am at the point where I have enough gadgets and technology to suit all my purposes quite well.

Nevertheless, I have enjoyed exploring the iPad and suspect it will come in handy as a replacement for a lot of gadgets. I took it on my recent MA vacation and it did about 95% of all the things I usually do on a computer. Once iOS 4.0 comes out for it to add multitasking, it will prove to be a replacement for many things. I will be taking it to meetings to take notes as well as record meetings if necessary. I will be using the Shakespeare app as my textbook and reference in Shakespeare class. It’s my newspaper, encyclopedia, reference tool, translator, YouTube viewer, music player and ebook reader all rolled into one. My wife got the 3G version, so as long as I can get a decent AT&T signal, I can use it anywhere. And the data contract plan is $25 per month for 2GB of data – no long term contract. I pay for a month when I want it, and don’t pay when I don’t. That’s nice.

But through all this technological wizardry, I began to sense something was amiss, and it came into sharper focus as I began to search for usable and interesting apps. And here is what I discovered: of all the things the iPad wants to do for me, the single most important thing it wants to do is entertain me. It wants to play my music and have me buy more music, have me watch videos and movies, play games, read books, surf the web, and…that’s about it. Sure, I can do things like write notes, make Keynote presentations, balance my finances and what not, but those things are somewhat hard to do on this device. What’s easy to do is entertain myself.

I am really just guessing here, but as I browsed through the various apps available, it began to feel as if 90% of all the apps in The App Store were entertainment apps. Now, I am not a computer gamer. I do not like to play games on the computer, except perhaps chess, solitaire or some other game of that nature, but even those bore me quickly. I do not surf the web for videos, and I do not generally like to watch movies much. I watch very little television, not even HBO. Sometimes I like listening to music, but I find that at this stage of my life, an attentive silence to the world around me is far more pleasant and interesting. I like being present to what’s happening right around me, not trying to shut out the world by sticking ear buds in my ears.

Nor do I live in a big city where there is a lot to do. All the lifestyle apps are therefore useless to me. They do come in handy when I travel, and that’s why I have them there, but then again, I don’t travel all that often, so I seldom use them. I don’t need UrbanSpoon to give me options on where to eat in the Dunkirk/Fredonia area.

So what have I been doing with it if not entertaining myself? Well, reading my email. It’s a good email reader. I use a feed reader to glance through news, blogs, etc. (which, it can be argued, is a form of entertainment). I do surf the web, but mostly I read news and information sites. I check Facebook because I maintain a FB presence for my department (I was also doing Shakespeare in Delaware Park for a year, but that has recently passed to a full-time staffer in their main office). I use it to check CraigsList (a very superior app). And as mentioned, I will be taking it to meetings. I am also using it to read a book or two.

But all this makes me a minority user of the device. What’s apparent to me is that Apple is selling this device, not as a tool for gaining and organizing information, but rather as a device for entertaining yourself. It’s primarily a lifestyle device, not an information device. Look at the commericals that sell the device – they are all geared towards lifestyle and entertainment. You don’t see someone on those commericals writing an email or taking notes at a meeting or reading the Times. You see them looking up movie times and finding the best restaurants, or viewing the latest music video and then buying the music or streaming a movie. The whole message about this device that with it, you can have an endless source of entertainment, as well as a trendy lifestyle.

So my question is – what happens to theatre in 50 years when these devices – and those that will follow – become as ubiquitous as the telephone, radio, or television, all of which have about a 98% saturation point in today’s society? Will there be an app for that?  -twl