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Stephen Fry is gadget blogging

September 20, 2007

Stephen FryZOMGBBQ!!11

Stephen Fry is blogging?

Stephen Fry has an iPhone?

(and apparently everything else Apple has ever produced)

Yep, and yep.

What’s more he’s doing a damn fine and well informed job of it:

Server side apps only. No, no, no, no, no. This is NOT good. It’s one thing to want to keep the proprietary system closed, but to present a device sealed in digital Araldite is a Bad Idea. An Ubuntu flavoured Linux for mobiles is in the works, and you don’t get more open source than that. Damn it, there’s Linux for the Palm available these days. Even Microsoft are making gestures towards client-side open source apps. Only amateurs are going to want to create server side apps for the iPhone. In case you don’t know what I mean, I should explain that the only third party programs available for the iPhone are run out of Safari (the resident browser) pages. You can’t download squat. Enthusiastic individuals will come up with WorldMate or Splash Photo or other top ten smartphone app lookie-likies but until Apple introduces a Java implementation or allows the bonnet to be unwelded and lifted up, the device will remain a fraction of what it should be.

Not that that’s a terrible surprise — I think at this point I’d be more surprised to find Fry holding forth on a topic he wasn’t well informed about (I’d be nearly as surprised to find out a topic he’s not well informed about exists).

If he keeps this up (and if they can keep the server up; it’s been down most of the day since everyone started posting about it), this is going to be a joy to read.

(Speaking of Stephen Fry — apparently a new season of QI starts tomorrow, too!)

(Umm… That’s on the “bittorrent” channel for those of us outside the UK — I suspect hell would freeze over before QI ever aired on US TV.)

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