Steve Job is reportedly a tough businessman, fully capable and willing to pressure other corporations into giving up their products in favor of his little cult worship. As example is how he pressured Cisco into giving up their use of the Iphone name in favor of Apple's use for their product, even if Cisco already had an established product under that name previous to Apple's release of their so-called smartphone. The argument threatened to be used? That Cisco was underutilising the Iphone name. Some call this tough business, I call that bullying.
As part of their drive to take over high-tech consumer markets, they have launched a "new" product, a tablet computer called the Ipad, with the optics of stepping in between the Iphone and the netbook.
Right.
Besides the incredibly lame product name, let's have a look at what they came up with: something that looks like a giant Iphone, but with the capacity to read etext. Wow. Great breakthrough there, Steve. It can surf the web, play music, view movies, stuff like that. But only one thing at a time. You cant read a book AND listen to music at the same time. The memory is ridiculously limited, there are no USB ports, the screen type is reported to give headaches, the battery cant be removed (probably as a bid to make sure that you keep on visiting their in-house techs) and the only applications that will run on it are found... in the Iphone app store. Oh, and they're not wi-fi compatible unless you pay extra. And the entry price is expected to be $499 for 16 gigs of memory. And its not capable of running any flash applications.
So, let's see, its supposed to run against netbooks (who are dwarf laptops really) which can mutitask, have cameras, are wi-fi ready, better onboard memory and are about the same entry price... oh sure, their battery life is longer (by a couple of hours), but its still way below the already existing ereaders, many of which are also net compatible... and cheaper. They are also supposed to competed with smart phones, except that they are way bigger, cannot mutitask, smaller memory (when you get right down to it, the 8Gig Iphone is far cheaper at $99 and can fit in your pocket, make phone calls, take pictures... you get the idea), aren't very practical... and are an easy invitation for a repeat of the Ipod muggings that happened when the devices came out. Cause seriously, if you carry that thing so that you can read while on public transportation, then you are just inviting random criminals to just take it off of your hands, especially when one consider the retail value of the devices, the Apple brand desirability and the fact that its incredibly limited as far as security features are concerned.
I can see the attraction of the tablet computer. Seriously, I do. But, between you and me, I'm waiting to see what the XO-3 will be like when it comes out. Besides way cheaper. I have to admit that I am very reticent to using a touchscreen, given how much the touchpad on my netbook annoys me (and my partner by hers), but to each their own. I see very little value at the moment to switching to eprint, because no matter the reader used, they are all obnoxious to use, uncomfortable, and all are obstructed by the far too exclusive variety of proprietary formats. At least, I can chose to read pretty much anything on my netbook, since that, at worst, all I have to do is set up the program required, or the attachment that will make it compatible.
As far as I'm concerned, the Ipad is a money pit that serves only one purpose: to give Steve Job yet another opportunity to get his butt on a stage and bask in the adoration of his adoring fans.
Good for him, sucks to be you.
*Above image taken from the Huffington Post
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