I'm no tech oracle, but I pretty much saw this coming: it turns out the iPad doesn’t do a lot of things it was hyped up to. It doesn’t shoot laser beams, it doesn’t track UFOs, it doesn’t read your thoughts, and it doesn’t wipe your ass. As a result, the blogosphere has taken quite vindictively to the iPad - the same blogosphere that, up to a day before the announcement, was proclaiming this device would do everything short of curing cancer and powering our homes, and then some. Give me a break.
People are railing on the iPad from every angle, ranting on everything from its name (ok, I’ll admit, after seeing the MAD TV sketch from 2006, it puzzles me to think how they could have missed that one), to its less-than-stellar hardware specs, and way-too-familiar software... in fact, the gist of everyman complaints about the iPad seems to be “it’s just an oversized iPhone.”
Which, to a certain degree, is true. It runs the same operating system. It runs the same apps. It uses the same multitouch interface, and similarly employs an accelerometer and compass. It even runs on the same 3G network, at least in the US - and that's not even getting into the things the iPad lacks: camera, app backgrounding, HDMI output, etc. So, is it just an oversized iPhone? On the surface, yes - but if you look behind the specs, and look at the subtext to try and get a glimpse at what Apple is trying to achieve here, then the iPad’s potential becomes truly exciting.
Think about the iPhone, if you will, since we’re already drawing comparisons. What is it that really makes the iPhone stand out? It’s not the OS. It’s not the multitouch interface. It’s not the accelerometer, or its web-browsing capabilities. When it first came out, this might have been the case, but Apple is no longer the only, or arguably even the best, player in the smartphone market. Especially if you’re going by specs alone. What truly makes the iPhone stand out is, quite simply, the amount and variety of apps available to users.
Thanks to the App Store, there’s an app for just about everything. Games, news, organizers, social networking, imaging... you name it, there’s an app for it. This, more than anything, is what makes the iPhone so successful - the average iPhone user has almost everything he or she needs, just a few intuitive (another key word) finger strokes away.
Likewise, the iPad will not be defined so much by its specs or firmware - rather, it’ll be the apps that come out of the woodwork that make or break this device. And it’s here that the possibilities are truly exciting. Sure, there are some limitations in terms of hardware, firmware, etc. but keep in mind... this is a First-Generation Device. Think back to the first iPhone, or better yet, the first iPod to come out, and look at the progression. The iPad will get better over time.
And once it does, and as developers get more creative, the possibilities are truly exciting. Consider the possibilities:
- The iPad’s supposed to save publishing and print media. Whether or not it will ultimately do so remains to be seen, but it will open up whole possibilities for publishers to court and engage their readers. For instance, the iPad’s e-reader is simple now, but think about future potential for dynamic, interactive publications. Animated magazines, for instance, is an awesome concept that would absolutely shine on the iPad.
- It’s no secret that Apple’s trying to court TV networks into an iTunes-based subscription service. This could turn the iPad into the world’s first truly portable TV.
- Students should be excited. Backpacks will weigh a lot less when all your textbooks, and notebooks, are on the iPad. (Also, on a side note, Doctors could quickly pull up medical charts, x-rays and other information with this thing).
- The possibilities for games are endless. Obviously, MMOs immediately come to mind. And while I can’t stand the copious amounts of FarmVille spam on my News Feed, I will concede that real-time social gaming is ripe for expansion and maturity on a platform like the iPad. As for me, I’d like an expanded Civilization: Revolutions app optimized for the iPad.
- As the iPad gets more powerful, I’d love to see a fully-capable image or vector editing app... think full-on Photoshop or Illustrator, but on a touchscreen tablet... many a digital artist and designer’s wet dream, and it could finally come true.
And that’s just a few. Remember, this device is still in its infancy. It’ll take a while to iron out some of the kinks - keep in mind it took the iPhone a couple of years before it got cut, copy and paste - but should Apple show a willingness to learn from past successes and failures, and most importantly, build on feedback from both consumers and developers alike, this could be the start of something truly revolutionary.
Me, I'm hoping It could even replace the laptop - or be the precursor to those cool, holographic tablets in Avatar. How awesome would that be? More than likely, though, it'll start out revolutionizing content, rather than hardware (if you look at it from this angle, it's easy to be excited about this. More on that here.)
And who knows, maybe we’re just scratching the surface. Maybe this is just a transitional step to something better (just like the original iPods led into the iPod Touch and the iPhone, and in many ways, I’m starting to think, the iPhone led into the iPad), one we can barely begin to comprehend, yet probably already envisioned and being brought to fruition by Steve Jobs, a man always ahead of our time.
So in short, stay tuned... and give the iPad a chance. It may not change the world, at least not immediately, but it can certainly change your world. To say its potential is exciting is a big understatement.