A very strange thing happened at Yankee Stadium recently. A woman was refused entry because she was carrying an iPad. More hate from the Google-Microsoft-Sony Bloc or something else?
Turns out the iPad is considered a laptop and laptops are banned. Which is interesting in itself, that Yankees management would weigh in on a social-tech issue and declare the iPad a laptop. The reason for the ban is... um ... well that's not clear. It's unlikely to be a security risk as iPads are allowed on commercial flights, and unlike laptops they don't have to be taken out of their cases.
It should be noted that pocket-sized, telephone-capable iPads are allowed.
There is the possibility that they could be used to live blog the game which could be a breech of broadcasting rules. But then again the stadium provides free Wi-Fi (you hear that Westpac Stadium? Free!) and so enterprising bloggers could simply tweet the game from their non-prohibited iPhones. Maybe the Yankees don't know about Twitter?
In any case, it again opens up the age old nerd-jock hostilities.
A laptop, and especially an iPad, would be perfect to have a ballgame. It's slow, like cricket, so you know when to look away. And more over the iPad can run a fantastic little app called MLB At Bat, which is a bit like having cricket's Hawkeye system in your hand while you're at the game. And that doesn't even include the people who score the games (perhaps the geekiest things in the world).
But in general this is discrimination against the laptop-carriers of the world:
The biggest problem is not whether or not its appropriate to bring a laptop or iPad, but rather that it affects a large portion of attendees during the week. Because both Yankee Stadium and Citi Field [home of the NY Mets] are on commuter rail lines (subway for Yankees, LIRR for Mets), there are a lot of people that go to games directly from work, and they go via train, carrying everything with them when they go.
There's no car to leave your laptop or iPad, and you often times can't (or don't want to) leave this stuff at work. So you have a choice of going to a game and leaving your laptop/iPad at work and getting it the next day (which can be a problem if you need it that night), or not going to the game (or possibly going back to work after the game, but seriously who's going to do that at 11pm at night!).
Yeah, they don't need you fancy macbook-toting web-designy types in The Bronx.
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On a side note. During the recent Cricket T20 World Cup on ESPN Sportscenter the two presenters bantered about how they didn't understand cricket because it was too confusing. And while it is compared to baseball, it's nothing compared to football, hockey and basketball.
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On a side note and a complete tangent. You know when C3P0 and R2D2 get turned away from the Cantina in Mos Eisley? I always figured that was because it's a working man's club. The droids represent a real risk to the livelihood of the average working class schmo who is just trying to earn a living for him and his family/brood/clutch of larva. So naturally droids aren't allowed, it'd be like John Henry having a beer with the steel driving machine.
Although I will concede that no one in the cantina looked like they were a translator though there had to be at least a few astromechs in there.