APPLE iPAD announcement today

A couple of observations...

How can people be disappointed or criticize the iPad without actually holding it and using it first? I'll reserve judgment until then. An iPad is not simply a larger iPhone/iPod Touch, but rather the iPhone/iPod Touch are scaled down versions of the iPad concept which existed first.

The iPad is designed primarily to be a convenient and efficient way to consume digital media with productivity being secondary, although if anyone can create an intuitive and elegant multitouch UI for productivity apps, it's Apple. Up until this point, most tablet PCs have used not their own UI optimized for touch input, but rather a desktop UI (Windows) with a host of add-ons to enable touch. Not the optimal solution.

Netbooks - forget about them. They're simply cheaper PC laptops in every sense of the word "cheap". Are they better at browsing? No, it's actually a much worse experience with their lower resolution and pixel density.. They do nothing better than a laptop.

I can see getting an iPad to use around the house to read articles (digital publications - see link below), browse the web, and catch up on email. I can also see carrying it along with my iPhone instead of my 13" MacBook Pro when I travel. Much smaller, thinner, and lighter with better battery life, and it could be much better in the airport and inflight. Throw in an Apple wireless keyboard if I need to do a lot of typing. I can't tell you how many times I've tried to get by on a trip with just my iPhone, and found that it was only lacking in having such a small screen.

If you want to get a glimpse of how the iPad will be used to consume multimedia content and the future of digital publications, watch this video. They're already working on iPad versions of Sports Illustrated, Vanity Fair and Wired magazines:



Daring Fireball's John Gruber actually handled the iPad for about 20 minutes and has a good analysis here:

http://daringfireball.net/2010/01/ipad_big_picture

Originally Posted by ToddG

You wound me, sir, and I demand satisfaction! I suggest we meet at a time and place of mutual convenience for a test of skill to decide who is in the right. We will choose some random drill unfamiliar to either of us, such as this one, and we will both use a pistol which is unfamiliar to either of us, such as this one. Victor chooses the vanquished's next computer purchase.

Excellent, and too funny. I was a douche yesterday, well pretty much most days, but the only way I am challenging you to anything involving a gun is if we setup 300yds away, I with a bolt gun and you with a NAA Guardian with misaligned sights and in 32acp and we take headshots on a 1/4 IPSC target.

Deal?

The Ipad will be a slick little browser tool, book reader which is all the rage, and personal email retrieval tool.

Currently, I sit at my desk in my office at home, and check email, post to the net, and watch TV. I see the Ipad as possibly changing that dynamic. I actually like browsing the web on my Iphone, so the Ipad should be a little better at that...

Probably won't be ditching my netbook, full laptop or desktop for the Ipad, but then again I'm not sure that's Apple's intent.

Originally Posted by ballistic

Netbooks - forget about them. They're simply cheaper PC laptops in every sense of the word "cheap". Are they better at browsing? No, it's actually a much worse experience with their lower resolution. They do nothing better than a laptop.

Can you clarify on the resolution? The Ipad lists at 1024x768 for a 9.7" LED screen, but many of the netbooks are LED screens @ 1366x768, and range from 10.1" to 12.1".

Now the average netbook is also more than twice as heavy, but even a top of the line one is about $100 less than the cheapest Ipad.

I have a netbook for the wife, and understand where the Ipad is superior to it, but I'm not sure on the resolution.

Originally Posted by SHIVAN

Excellent, and too funny. I was a douche yesterday, well pretty much most days, but the only way I am challenging you to anything involving a gun is if we setup 300yds away, I with a bolt gun and you with a NAA Guardian with misaligned sights and in 32acp and we take headshots on a 1/4 IPSC target.

Deal?

Do I get a sight-in shot?

As I sit here in the Rams Head Tavern at BWI Airport patiently hoping that the last flight out to Memphis leaving in seven hours doesn't get canceled (unlike every other flight they've tried to put me on so far), I'm wishing I had an iPad. Or better yet, an iFlyingCarpet.

'Cult' of Apple hangs on Wednesday announcement - CNN.com

No matter what type of new product Apple unveils at its much-anticipated press event later this week, Xavier Yaffar says he will buy it. Whatever the cost.
"I don't even have to look at it," the 48-year-old said.
...
While cautious consumers might want details about the new device -- like whether it exists -- before stashing away money and planning to buy one, Yaffar and some other Apple fanatics say they trust the fashionable and notoriously forward-thinking maker of the iPhone and iPod so much that they'll buy whatever the company puts out, even if they're not sure why they need it.
...
For people like Yaffar, the rumor mill has been a blast. He said he spends about 4 to 6 hours per day reading online news about Apple. He hangs on all the details.
...
Yaffar said he hopes Apple will announce a slate computer, and he hopes the product will cost between $500 and $1000. Any pricier, he said, and he will still buy one for himself, but he might not be able to buy the new device for the four other members of his immediate family, which he otherwise would.
...
Greenbaum met his husband at an Apple fan group in the mid-90s. When they started dating, the couple hung out in Mac computer labs together as a form of courtship.

"Most other couples would go to movies. We mark a key point of our relationship when we both decided to go to Macworld [a conference in California] together in 1995," he said.

The couple now travels to Apple stores across the country, taking photos in front of each one as if the computer stores were national monuments. They always check out new Apple products, although sometimes they wait for a second model to come out before they buy. When the iPhone 3GS debuted, they waited in line at a nearby Apple store from 1 a.m. to 10 a.m. to buy the phone.

"It's a part of your identity," he said. "People are going to recognize you more by the computer you use and the phone you carry than by the car you drive."

lolwut?

Originally Posted by ForTehNguyen

'Cult' of Apple hangs on Wednesday announcement - CNN.com



lolwut?

Frickin' weirdos! Same thing goes for the Trekkies and Star Wars guys who site outside theaters for a week to be the first ones to watch the movie... there's a difference between being a fan and an obsession.

Originally Posted by ballistic

Netbooks - forget about them. They're simply cheaper PC laptops in every sense of the word "cheap". Are they better at browsing? No, it's actually a much worse experience with their lower resolution. They do nothing better than a laptop.

And this is a revelation to you? Laptops have less power than a desktop, but offer more portability. The smaller it is, it will have less performance than its full sized counterpart.

The iPad doesn't even have flash....

I hate Flash.....

Originally Posted by Littlelebowski

I hate Flash.....

While many people do too, half the internet uses flash.

If Carlson Survey, AutoCAD, CAiCE, Microstation, or InRoads ran on Mac I'd switch in a heartbeat.