The iPad ends my radio silence!
I stand corrected, I had thought the iPad would just be a big phone and a novel toy at best. It’s not, it’s soo much more and has in one day changed the way I consume media, think about my laptop and also my actual needs when it comes to a “computer”. I firmly believe that while Apple may not end up making the best or most innovative tablet, they’ve got the ball rolling on a platform shift in computing that companies like Acer tried and failed to do 7 to 8 years ago because they focused on trying to shift address an industry need (medical at the time) and not build a change in platform perception. The pitch for Acer’s tablets at the time was something along the lines of a “flat laptop that you can write on with a stylus”. Not to sexy right? I mean, that’s sort of describing an overly heavy piece of paper.
Before yesterday, tablets for me were just that, big flat laptops with some novel software uses, but ultimately were a gimped laptop and a heavy sheet of paper. However, I was very wrong, tablets are gong to be cool. The iPad is revolutionary because it focuses on how people consume, not what they can produce and that is what makes it so magical and why Acer still probably shifts product literature showing a Getty Image doctor standing next to a Getty Image nurse looking over a glowing giant white tablet. My iPab became magical when I subscribed to the Wall Street Journal yesterday purely because the physical copy annoys me (perhaps its the lingering knee-jerk reaction I have to physical newspapers that comes from years of having to take out the trash and sort the newspapers every Tuesday of my life until a college decided to accept me and let me escape chores… See dad, I do know what day the trash had to go out, I just selectively remembered). Consume the Journal while sitting at a desktop is limiting and annoying, but being able to “flick” through it on a small device that presents it cleanly and in a form that is very close to what you’d want in the physical version is why iPad will work for me as a laptop and doorstep media replacement.
The second reason it works for me is that it just works. I shifted off of the iPhone platform because it was too limiting. The phone didn’t do what I wanted it to do and I had to use three apps to do what my Google based phone does naturally, so the switch was easy. However with the tablet, I disagree with Corey Doctrow’s take that because it can’t be opened it shouldn’t be considered. (http://www.boingboing.net/2010/04/02/why-i-wont-buy-an-ipad-and-think-you-shouldnt-either.html) I got it because I don’t want to mess around with it, when it comes to just consuming I want it to be easy, I have a partitioned MacBook to putz around on and play with.
More thoughts on the iPad to come as I use it exclusively at home and leave the laptop at the office.
Oh, and I’m back to blogging. Here’s a sweet pic to go with this post. Dad, “blogging” in ‘87 with video games and uh, awesome glasses on the boat. Today, this would be with an iPad, Pandora playing off of Mom’s iPhone and some weather thingy chirping somewhere…
***** note, this post was done entirely on the iPad.
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