I’ve owned a 3rd Generation Apple TV for about a year now. During that time Apple has issued several updates that seemed to apply to the device just fine. Well no longer, today Apple put out an update that made me jump thru hoops that basically pissed me off.

Here’s what happened.

• Apple TV prompted for the update, I responded yes.
• It did the download then applied the updated and restarted the device.
• Instead of coming up normally, the screen displayed a picture of the device and a cable connecting the device to an iTunes logo. WTF?  This is a device for my TV, why do I need to involve iTunes?

Now, at this point I’m mad. A simple update is already going off track and Apple, in it’s arrogant manner, assumes I am supposed to figure out what the screen is trying to communicate. Well no, I don’t grok what Apple wants so I Google, only to find out that I am supposed to;

1. Find or go out and buy a cable with mini-usb on one side and usb on the other so I can connect the Apple TV to a computer that is running iTunes.
2. Connect it so iTunes can fix the botched update.

I am steamed now. I am not an Apple fan and don’t have these cables laying around and I find it mighty presumptuous for Apple to assume I will have iTunes installed anywhere. Roku doesn’t do this to me when I update either of my Rokus. Chromecast doesn’t do it to me. Only Apply forces me to use a piece of software that has nothing to do with my TV.

So, I borrow a cable and try to connect it to the Apple TV device. But no, nothing can be easy. It will not fit since Apple put the two connections way too close to each other. The fat HDMI cable makes it impossible to insert the mini-usb connector.

Back to Google. There I find a post that says to disconnect all cables from the Apple TV except the power cable. Not fucking intuitive at all here Apple. I’ve been performing an update on your damn device all along while getting the feedback on the TV screen, and you somehow expect me to just know that when I connect to iTunes I should disconnect the TV screen? I cannot believe you do this to your customers and still hold onto them.

So finally, I get the Apple TV and iTunes communicating. And what does it do, it does a ‘recovery mode’ whatever that is. When it finishes it tells me to disconnect the Apple TV and reconnect it to the TV.

I do so, and now I get even more angry. Seems that recovery means factory reset! All my settings are gone. Everything. I must now go thru the painful and slow process of inputting everything all over again. At this point, Apple is a bad word in my house. I am cursing the day I wasted my money on Apple products.

To anyone thinking about buying one of these I say don’t. The Roku is a much friendlier device and priced the same or cheaper so save yourself the aggravation and go with it.

Flipboard seems to have a winner with their new magazines. They are easy to assemble and look great. I can envision them becoming an important publishing tool with a few more improvements. Some areas that need beefing up include:

• The ability to add editorial content to flipped content.
• More flexibility with images included in the flipped content, like choice of image used.
• The ability to embed content that isn’t hosted elsewhere, for example an index to the content or a publishers statement explaining the purpose of the magazine.
• An easier way to manage expiring content. As it stands now, the magazine just grows and grows and grows as more content is flipped into it. I would prefer a way to expire off older content (perhaps by age or perhaps by article count) so the magazine doesn’t become unwieldy. Using the Flipboard Editor to manually delete pages is a pain.

For an example magazine, check out the NotSoFAQs Mag.
View my Flipboard Magazine.

Flipboard Android, Flipboard iPad and Flipboard Web are all available to view the magazines.

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.