I love Apple's products. It's not a secret. I don't think I'm quite the raving fanatic fanboy that some people I know of are, but I'm most certainly an avid fan, and don't feel that there is any shame in it. I've successfully switched probably a dozen or more people from PC to Mac in the past 10 years and not one of them has ever had a word of complaint after making the jump. I find their products to be reliable, stable, virtually virus free, intuitive, fun and, most importantly, user friendly. There really is a lot of truth to that old slogan "It just works" when it comes to Apple's products. Once you get your head out of the tangled and messy world that PCs operate in, and come to terms with how simple Macs are to operate, they are simply a pleasure to use and returning to a PC is a questionable idea at best.
Having said all of that, I'll be the first to admit that I was pretty underwhelmed when the iPad made its world debut this past January. The man behind the magic, Steve Jobs, hailed it as being magical, and rumor has it that the company spent somewhere on the order of one billion dollars in the development of the product. To me it just looked like a bigger iPod Touch, and I didn't really understand the need for a product like this. It can't do everything that my laptop can do, and it also can't make phone calls, so......what's the big deal, right?
The device isn't magical. But it certainly does have the potential to be revolutionary for a number of key reasons.
1. User Interface - The iPad is incredibly user friendly and intuitive to use. It's a snap to set up, and I don't think in any way intimidating to users who aren't terribly computer savvy. My mom has had one for 3 days and has already paid her bills online with the new gadget. She's now beginning to delve into the wealth of applications that already exist for it due to the iPhone's huge library, and will probably be reading a book on it in the next few days.
2. Portability - Yes laptops are easy to tote around, but they can still be a drag, and their batteries are notoriously short lived. The iPad is basically the size and thickness of a Time magazine, seems to be incredibly rugged, has a battery life of 10+ hours and, if you get the 3G model, can be online anywhere you want to take it. Freeing it from the leash of power cords in a lot of ways, and the necessity to be on your home network. Drop it in your purse or backpack and off you go for a full day of light-duty computing with nary a cord in sight.
3. Web Browsing - It's just better in this venue honestly. Whipping around pages with your fingertips, tapping on whatever link you want to view, zooming in and out with ease, it's just so much more pleasurable and fun than the mouse or trackpad interface.
4. Applications - This is where the iPad is really, I think, going to sink or swim. iPhone has excelled in the manner it has not because of AT&T's phone service (which is questionable at best) but because of what independent developers have been able to create in the way of applications. There are now something like 200,000 applications to be found in the iTunes app store and the sheer variety of them and what they allow you to carry around in your pocket from productivity and games to interactive yellow pages, fitness regimens, and personal budgeting tools is utterly mind-blowing (and can often be overwhelming.) If developers race to and embrace the iPad with just as much enthusiasm then the platform will definitely change the way computers are viewed in the home. Even just the first inkling of iPad specific applications are already pretty stellar....and it's only the first week of public consumption. Programs like Sketchbook, Starwalk, and The Elements: A Visual Exploration are shining examples of how this new platform can be used.
5. Accessibility - This basically echoes my first point, but is worth stating again. The iPad is a perfect platform and vehicle for those individuals who may not be terribly comfortable with computers, or for those people, like my mom, who don't need their computers to do a lot of heavy lifting. Can I run my drafting program on it, can I build a website on it? No (at least not yet.) But I wouldn't want to draft or build a website on the iPad, that's a task better left to my laptop or desktop. But can I email, surf the web, listen to music, look at pictures of my vacation, put together a Keynote presentation for work, watch a movie, play some video games, do a crossword puzzle, play a game of Scrabble with a friend on Facebook, figure out a new recipe for dinner, watch some videos on YouTube, and read the newest Stephen King book?
Yes. I can. And that's just the tip of the iceberg.
To be completely honest, and Steve Jobs has admitted this himself, you can't get a full understanding of how this will change the way you want to use a computer, until you spend some time getting your hands on it. That's the truth of things. It's easy to dismiss as being "a big iPod Touch" if you just look at a commercial or read about it in a magazine, I get that. But once you actually get your hands on it, the attraction of all it can do, and the potential for all it might do, becomes evident pretty quickly.
After all this you're wondering if I've got anything bad to say about it right? I'll admit that the lack of Flash support is kind of a drag. Apple has stated that they've got no interest in supporting Flash, as such, the iPad will only show you a little box with a question mark sitting in it if you try to go to websites that are solely driven by Flash (my own site included, yes, I will be re-tooling it this summer.) But the device is completely HTML 5 compliant, and the future of the web is HTML 5. It's capable of doing much of what Flash already does, so if you just give it time, you're not even going to notice the Flash issues. And many websites are already being altered to rely less heavily on Flash.
I'll also say that the 2 separate models is kind of a downer. One model of the iPad is Wi-Fi only meaning that you need to be near some manner of wireless internet connection to get online, while the model coming out later this month is both Wi-Fi and 3G enabled. The 3G enabled model works on a pay as you go basis with AT&T where you can pay $14.99 per month for up to 250mb, or $29.99 per month for unlimited, internet usage. While I'm thoroughly enjoying this new piece of gadgetry and see it replacing many of the base uses of my laptop in every day usage, the Wi-Fi model I've got does leave me longing a little bit for the 3G model that I could take to the beach, or the local park, or on a road trip where the internet might not be as easily accessed.
Guess my next upgrade will be iPad 2.0 with Wi-Fi and 4G internet, and who knows what that future will look like. I can't wait.
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