Tablet Post Mortem

Okay, so even some of my "safe" predictions were wrong. This thing is basically an iPod Touch on steroids - bigger screen, faster processor. It does run the iPhone OS, which is still called the iPhone OS, and not all that much has changed. I can't talk specifics because the new SDK version that supports the iPad is under NDA, but if you know how to program the iPhone, you know how to program the iPad. They didn't even change the major version number (much to my joy, given that we've got the version number in our book titles).

My thoughts: at $499, it's amazing. Now a lot of developers are a little disappointed. Frankly, we're not the main intended audience. For a lot of people, this is the perfect computer. For my mom, who doesn't really like computers, for example. This combined with the keyboard dock is all the computer she wants or needs. Her music, her movies, she can e-mail, browse the web. That's all she does and would do. That's all she wants from a computer. The iPad does all that and doesn't confuse her with a desktop paradigm, she doesn't have to remember to empty the trash, or try to traverse the file system to find things.

A lot of people are wondering if there's a place for this. I have no doubt. At this price point, a lot of people will go with this over a frustrating $350 netbook. I'm actually considering going with the iPad for my kids when they need new computers. At this price, I can afford to. They would have iWork, Mail, Safari, and can play some games, and that's the vast majority of what they do.

Now, for me, I don't really have much of a use for this. I'll buy one, maybe even two, so I can develop for it and play with it. But it would never suffice for my main computer, and I'm not sure there's really a need for it since I have my iPhone. My interest in this device is professional, but I'm not a typical consumer.

The iPhone wasn't successful because geeks liked it. It was successful because everybody (well, almost) liked it. I think that's what's this is going to be. This is a non-geek's computer. This is the perfect computer for somebody who does e-mail, surfs the web, plays a few games.

I hope there's a way to get pictures and music onto this thing other than through the iTunes store or through a Mac. I hope this thing is capable of standing completely on its own. I'm not sure yet if it is, but to me that seems like the most important thing. If I ONLY have an iPad, can I get pictures off my digital camera and onto it? Does the keyboard dock have a USB port. I don't know, but if not, I think it will be its Achille's heel, because I think the biggest pool of potential users of this thing are non-geeks who will use this instead of a Mac, not in addition to one.

Apple has an accessory called the Camera Connection Kit that allows you to pull pictures directly into the iPad from a digital camera or SD card

And, fortunately, it doesn't have Flash.