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Comment by bmalicoat | Hacker News Reader

I was having a hard time figuring out why I needed an iPad. Even after watching the keynote (besides the 'new, shiny' lust) I had no real reason to want one. Then I realized the 3rd party opportunities for this thing are insane. Yes, there have been tablets in the past but there has never been what basically amounts to a cheap, 10" piece of glass that can recognize all your fingers and an array of gestures. I am very excited to see what other inspired developers do with this device.

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I'm wondering about the possibility of building dynamic multi-touch interfaces for any scriptable desktop app.

The iPad has high speed wireless connections and so at least potentially could act as a very powerful input peripheral client for many desktop apps talking through a server running on a "real Mac" (or even Windows).

Something that could "remote control" any app through some form of App-specific remote window sharing would be a good start. That would sell very well for awhile.

I think there's huge potential in this:

http://www.insteon.net/

I note that they have an SDK and what looks to be a whole bunch of PC apps. The iPad could communicate with your home Mac or PC to a USB dongle which acts as hardware interface.

Maps and mapping technology are ones that do sharply stick out as more than a natural fit for the tablet form factor combined with touch screen compared with today's mobile devices. This space has plenty to gain in innovation with the iPad.

Watching video from online (iPlayer etc.) would be my ideal application for this - an iPhone is too small, a laptop is too clunky and uncomfortable and I hate watching video sitting at a desk.

Another thing that might be a hit is multiplayer games. I was playing an air hockey game with my son on his iPod Touch and it was surprisingly good. With a bigger screen that could really be an interesting thing to watch.

Lots of board games might work pretty well on something like the iPad as people could sit round it.

Put a camera on the next generation. Augmented Reality is where it's at. Imagine an App like a Frommer's guide that did information overlays on whatever you were pointing at! Then you could zoom out to a map view and see what was around you, then zoom back in to a "Street View" to where you want to go.

Agreed. The touch interface on the iPhone/iPod version of Google Earth is a great illustration of the potential.

Let's just hope that enough people buy it in its current form to make it attractive to app developers.

It does 95% of the things people usually do with their computer with 5% of the headaches. Shouldn't be a problem.

Not to mention 75M people already know exactly how to operate it.

Yes, but they already own an iphone. And they'll need to keep that iphone because apple, smart as they are made sure you can't make voice calls with this device.

So either they will have to convince those 75 million people to carry two devices or find a new market.

I intend to buy iPad. I don't intend to carry it much: I see it being used at home, comfortably on the couch.

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