IPad: $1 Billion Later, What Do You Think of It Now?
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To the people comparing the features and price to a netbook and saying 'I just don't get it' - it's about the design i.e. how it works not just what it can do. I think that the crowd here owes it to themselves to take a close look at one, ideally find a friend who has one, and play with it in a relaxed environment. There is something quite different about the experience that you won't understand by comparing feature lists, and even if you dislike Apple and don't want to buy one, it's worth understanding this because it is a real change to how we interact with computers.
Secondly, I have found it to be a great device for traveling. I am visiting London at the moment and got a 10gb microsim for 15GBP. I get to use the thing all day and the battery and data supply is ample. I can catch up on tech news, read docs, read books, and watch movies etc. I could do these on my laptop, but this is way better, and I can carry it with me everywhere and even use it in public without being antisocial, whilst my laptop stays at our base for the odd moment of coding.
Finally, an obviously revolutionary moment came for me yesterday. I was looking up details of a medical center, and my father who is nearly 90, was asking me questions. At a certain point he just reached over and took the iPad from my hand and started reading the webpage and scrolling through the document himself. This was the first time he'd touched the thing, and he hasn't used a computer since he retired more than 20 years ago.
It might not seem like a big deal, but to me that signifies a profound step in terms of both usability and sociability of computing, not to mention the ubiquity of he web. Smartphones and laptops are both still very much personal computers. The iPad may be the first mass market interpersonal computer.
It's visceral computing.
It brings the data "in there" to a place where we can handle it "out here." It really is the web, in your hands, where you can pass it around, and that's a very different experience than on a laptop screen.
Being able to reach out and touch data and objects on the screen -- like we can do with EVERY real life object we interact with in the world, that we evolved with -- is totally transformative.
Laptops are like feedbags -- they're glued to your face, meant for an audience of one. The iPad is like a plate of hors d'ouevres, finger food for everyone.
We get huge leaps in revolutionary innovation by Apple, followed by strong evolutionary innovation as strong competition arrives (eg. Android) and forces Apple to continue improving, lower prices, etc.
For everything else it's just a cool toy.
But, as it is, there's no way I can justify the cost with an iPhone in my pocket & laptop on the table.
What I'd really like to do is see whether my new behavior sustains itself, or whether it's a function of the "New shiny thing" - my iPhone, Two (three?) + years later gets used every 30 minutes, every day, for _tons_ of functions - so clearly that was a sustainable technology shift.
The iPad's form factor was instrumental in revolutionizing my interaction with books. I can buy a book whenever I think of it. Programming books? I can carry an unlimited number of them with me! In this it's just like the Kindle with two big differences: 1) it's much better for searching 2) it's a much better web browser/computing device.
edit regarding printed media: If by "revolutionize" you mean "kill dead" well, yeah. And it's not just the tablet's thats doing that. Writing's been on the wall for, what, 30 to 40 years.
It's not that I didn't expect the IPad to be a success. I mean, it's a sexy piece of hardware. The mobile processors mean that we finally have enough firepower in this small of a case.
However, hasn't anyone learned yet not to buy the first Apple implementation of anything? Next year will be a new IPad and it will have a camera, a faster processor, and who knows what else that will make everyone go, "I don't really have the money, and I have this one, but that's really cool! I wish I had waited."
Damnit, Apple. How do you do this.
I look at it completely differently - In one year, my $800 iPad, which I've kept in pristine condition, will have a resale value of around $400. The question I need to ask myself is - Did I get $400 worth of value out of the iPad in a year. That's a no-brainer for me.
I think I'm the _only_ person in the office who refuses to carry his iPad into meetings with him - It's just not the right tool for a highly multi-tasking and textually intense environment.
But, with all those caveats aside, there is just something strangely social and engaging with the iPad that I never really got from a Laptop. A few use cases:
o Walking to Work/Dropping in to a restaurant for breakfast - I would never consider yanking out a laptop to read a newspaper, and the iPhone just never really worked for me in that medium - so I would typically drop some change into the Newspaper Box and read/discard a mound of paper. Now - every morning, I walk to work reading the WSJ, or, if I'm waiting for a friend to show up for breakfast, I can pop it out and get caught up.
o At a restaurant, or Movie Theater, we have a 10-15 minutes - I frequently spend time flipping through photos of events, sharing face book pages, etc.. I guarantee you I never have (and never will) do that with a laptop. And there is something about sharing pictures on a 9" screen that makes is viscerally different from doing so on a iPhone.
It's small enough that I always carry it with me, but large enough that reading on it doesn't feel awkward.
I'm a luddite, in that I don't like change, and I have zero intention in replacing my laptop use with an iPad, but, I have zero doubt that having some time of slate/tablet (whether it be Apple, Android, WEBOS) will be a permanent part of my life going forward.
And yes, future versions will be much better. I would _kill_ for a stylus capable device - and not the crappy capacitance low-resolution stylus that I use with my iPad, but something that I can actually draw, and take notes with. Do you know how silly I feel about taking out pens and napkins to sketch out a drawing while carrying an iPad equipped with SketchBook Pro?
Syncing is still too slow - USB 3 or some other gigabit+ sync would be much appreciated. And, for low-volume syncs, over-the-air syncing would be nice.
It's early, it will get better, but it's definitely here to stay. And it's definitely made my life better. Increased the quality of social interaction. Allows me to dynamically share memories and experiences in a richer, more meaningful form.
Napkins + Pen are about 10x faster for quick sketching, and about 15-20x more accurate for fine-grained details.
The iPad is many things, but a replacement for my pen and notebook it is not.
I'm in a lab right now, and a quick network sketch of the components took me 30 seconds. Using omnigraffle, (God, I pray I somehow manage to get my $50 out of that App), it took me about 5 minutes.
Of course, the difference is I now have a rich-vector drawing that I can email, modify, update, and _always_ have with me.
I would be very, very interested in hearing about other people's experiences using their iPad as a: o Sketch Book o Technical Diagramming Tool o Not Taking Devices.
Particularly your success and techniques. :-)
But Omnigraffle is not for drawing, it's for formalizing. Just like an outlining tool is not for thinking, it's for expressing what you've already clarified in your head.
Computers require you to formalize -- make decisions, order, and choose form -- totally prematurely.
I find pen & paper to be the best thinking tool there is because it's completely free-form.
If you want the next best thing to paper, try that stylus hack and a doodling program, not a tool like Omnigraffle.
I wouldn't mind an iPad, but I hate spending money. It is not so much an argument of value contra price in my case. I'm sure it will be a great toy, albeit one I am sure to find much more interesting in a second-generation edition. Not having any of the video-streaming tools outside of the U.S. is also a bummer.
I'm with him, as I am with the rest of you. I bought a first generation Macbook: battery problems who led to hard drive problem (tic tic tic no more hard drive) and fan noise problems. The worst of all? Dealing with Apple support. Horrible here in Portugal, paying premium for subpar service really gets you angry.
Am I buying an iPad? Yes, but I will at least check for problems with the batch I'll be buying. It's not expectable to see the regular consumer having this behavior but you should.
Second - By the time Gen 2 comes around, the apps will exist to make this device ever so much more usable and useful than it is today. Again, this is an N=1 problem that does not apply to N+1 where N>1.
What's ironic is that for the longest time, the major hit against Apple was that it didn't put much effort into providing backward compatibility with it's platform, unlike, say, Microsoft that would let you run your DOS Application in an operating system built 30 years later.
Now, the tables have turned, and almost all of your original iPhone applications run just fine on your iPad. It actually drives me crazy how friends of mine ignore the newer iPad apps so they can play the old school iPhone games that I transferred from my iPhone.
With that approach, you end up waiting forever.
That's longer than 6.5 years.
I don't know what you're talking about. I bought the first iPhone model, and while it was a deeply flawed device in several ways, the overall ownership experience was amazing. Besides being the most solid example of "1.0" hardware I'd purchased in a long time, it just kept getting better after the sale, with various new features and performance improvements coming out every few weeks. Almost every complaint I had, from stability to the lack of an SDK, was eventually remedied. Apple seemed to be committed to the overall ownership experience to an extent that was unlike any other hardware vendor I'd ever dealt with.
It was only much later that they started removing features, enforcing absurd contract terms, micromanaging the scope of the user's experience, and generally acting like a company run by Mormons and led by Tipper Gore. I'd say the early iPhone ownership experience was a solid 9/10 on the warm-fuzziness scale, and now it's a 4 at best.
For its part, the first-gen iPad contains no revolutionary or untried technologies that weren't already shipped in the iPhone, and its only real problem is inadequate WiFi reception. There have been some complaints about the iPad's charger damaging iPhones as well. Other than that, the iPad delivers exactly what it says on the box. It doesn't really need a faster processor, but I imagine a lot of people will find a front-facing camera useful.
http://singularityhub.com/2010/05/29/sonys-new-flexible-oled...
1) The user experience is really nice, and pretty well thought out despite the constraints of the design, like no multi-tasking. The instantaneous reaction to swipes and zooms and such are a necessity on touch platforms, I'm convinced of this after using the iPad. Other devices that aren't absolutely instantaneous shouldn't even be on the market. I only say this because on the very few occasions where the interaction stutters a hair, I really noticed it.
2) This is a $300 device, not a device that starts at $500. I can't believe that there is seriously a version of this device that sells for north of $800. For $800 I expect this thing to come with 500GB of storage, a dockable keyboard, cameras, USB, flash, and a 3g plan for 2 years etc. etc. etc.
I'm just not sure I can sink that kind of money into something I won't use for much more than surfing the web from my couch (which I will admit, it provides a superior experience to my netbook for that use-case). Perhaps if I owned one instead of borrowed one I would find other uses for it. It's potential applications for board games and such are vast.
However, considering it's pitched as a casual usage device (Jobs even premiered it from a couch), half a grand is serious money, not casual money.
I found it to be "adequate" as an e-book reader. The apps were "ok", user interface inconsistencies were as common as anything else I've seen on any other platform. It surfed the web great, I spent one of the more enjoyable 3 hour wikipedia link clicking sessions on it that I can remember.
I missed flash fairly often. In particular, I was shopping around for some cell phones, I had no idea that some of the carrier sites have upwards of 6 or 7 flash apps containing all the content on the site. The iPad was useless for those among many others.
I'd probably be interested in getting a 2nd or 3rd gen version if it was significantly cheaper and had usb.
Ah, so here's an interesting something about that keynote in which I was probably the only one to take note of.
The chair Jobs was sitting on was Le Corbusier's LC-2, and I believe it was paired off with Saarinen's Tulip side table, presumably with the extra-white marble top. Realistically you can expect to spend $4,000 for that chair and another $1,500 for that table. Taxed, shipped and delivered that's easily a $6,000 pair.
Like Apple's products - in which Ive is known to draw on Deiter Ram's influence, as those of other modern designers - they're simple, extremely well-made, beautiful, and try to provide a great experience in at least one area. I'll agree the iPad has some usability shortcomings, but it's still a very solid 1.0.
The average person would love some great furniture. However the average person has a hard time justifying spending such a great premium for some excellent design qualities, and most would agree that such a decision to compromise on price is perfectly normal. However at least in terms of price, something like an iPad or iPod is more accessible to people, whereas beautiful furniture and homes - of which the costs can be terrifying - are not. They're (Apple products) still without a doubt luxury items, but they're within the reach of most.
> but it's still a very solid 1.0
I absolutely agree. Considering the rubbish that was tablet computing before the iPad, this device comes from a completely different universe. It's an awesome 1.0 effort.
There was/is quite a bit made that it's basically a big iPod. But having spent some time with the device now I have to disagree. It really is something different than a big iPod or what we've come to think of as tablet computing. The brilliance was in not trying to adapt a bunch of GUI metaphors meant for a mouse to a touch screen, but in building an ecosystem from the ground up around touch interactivity metaphors. This I think is what's made it click and seems to obvious in retrospect.
But this is not just an iPad thing, this is a tablet thing. It's quite amazing to see so much power being put into such a slim device.
Nothing beats playing some racing game in crazy 3d and then turning the tablet around and realizing just how slim it is.
How can so much power be cramped into such a small device.
We surely do live in exiting times not just because of the iPad but because of the state of computing power and what it allows us to do.
Not really, though, as Wilson also says he prefers web apps to native apps on the iPad.
I have tried very hard to ignore all of the Apple hype.
Somebody please make it stop.
If the iPad were a 1/100th of everything people make it out to be, the world would be transformed. Instead, it's just Apple doing a bang-up job on taking the slate to the next level. Let's leave it at that and move on with our lives. Geesh. Enough already.
We are more than the electronic trinkets we carry around. And if we're not, that's not something to be bragging about.
Taking an aspect of computing to the mainstream is often referred to as a revolution. The whole World Wide Web could be considered in this light. By mainstreaming the slate, Apple is doing exactly this and making a handsome profit.
http://referenceapps.com/bible-hd-iphone-app-review/
Kindle / iBook is for reading page by page. A good bible program has many methods of jumping around as reference material.
(I may be a little extra aware of this: my father was born in 1916, my grandfather was born in 1860, and my great grandfather (on my father's mother side) was born in 1795. All left significant documents about their life. And of course my father's still talking...)
Instead of having different media, we have a convergence of datatypes and a divergence of soft presentation gadgets, both "real" and "virtual." What effect would data glasses, that didn't make you look like a dork, combined with ambient networking have on media?
Throw in virtual reality and truely smart software agents and I've just described the anime _Dennō Coil_ which everyone interested in this topic should check out. (As well as the user interface and displays visible in _Pale Cocoon_.)
I asked my grandfather once if he ever knew someone in the Civil War and he got offended, but it could have just barely worked -- he was born in about 1930. Wow, you must have some interesting family history!
My father's father was alive at the very beginning of the Civil War. My mother's family, while containing a few more generations :) also has some interesting stories from that period.
I've read that the last civil war veterans dies in the 1950s; it's important to remember that lots of boys in their teens lied about their ages to join the armies on both sides. Even more amazing, the last civil war widow died in 2004! Talk about your May/December romances...
I'd like more options, of course. It took 4 years for someone to come up with a halfway credible competitor to the iPod (the Zune). I wonder how long it will take for the iPad.
So I won't buy one, since those 2 sites are pretty much my staples, along with HN of course:-).