Mostly, I feel that much of the hype is justified.
They did a really good job of engineering the device and keeping the price down. You can find plenty of people talking about that. I recommend the reporting from Consumer Reports, since they're totally trustworthy. (That's why I personally joined up with them).
You do want to be aware that the iPad has unusual USB charging needs.
I'd like to see multitasking, and have confidence we'll see it. I'd like it because:
Again, a really good job of engineering.
Follow Craig Newmark on Twitter: www.twitter.com/craignewmark
Jose Antonio Vargas: WATCH: Not Everyone Has The iPad Spirit
Judging from the hype that preceded its arrival -- the cover of Time magazine! and Newsweek! endless chatter from media folks looking for a Messiah to technophiles anxious to get their hands on the latest gadget -- you'd think everyone was clamoring for an iPad. Well, not quite.
Craig Kanalley: iPad Review: It Has Only One Flaw
For millions of Americans right now, the unemployed, the hurting, and for those paying back college loans, the iPad's a tease. You're better off waiting.
yep i goes into things the iPad actually does & does not do, gee,
NOT just angst::
it's over on boing boing:
http://www.boingboing.net/2010/03/31/a-first-look-at-ipad.html
HERE's the KEY issue:: if Job$ & Apple won't be too anal & control-Freaki$h, then this is a winner.
It's a huge victory IF it's a comfortable book reader & media device BUT it's gotta allow for affordable stuff, e.g. OUR OWN keyboards versus lame-insanely-overpriced keyboard for 70 buck$..
HOWEVER i still feel it's a potential leap NOT because it CANNOT do what my powerful PC can do ((i work w/ 3d graphics & love multitasking))...
THE issue is a book-type-of-lightweight tablet that can STILL do alot of things we want such as reading, surfing, transferring OUR music/media from our PC to the iPad ((which it DOES do,,
thankfully))..
SO if Job$ // Apple can be wrestled by the market to KEEP from overpricing apps----so that REAL people can use it---THEN it's a winner...
YEAH i say REAL people----such as zillions of mid & low income kids so we can have a culture that goes beyond couch potatoes.
TURN kids on to exciting learning / info , BUT allow some TRUE computing / typing / input for those ebooks, etc...
...
But how exactly this price was set? It should be good to remember the best description of how prices are "set" and by "Whom". That description I consider the best was given by Ludwig von Mises in his Treatise on Economics titled "Human Action". It reads as follows,
"They are determined between extremely narrow margins: the valuations on the one hand of the marginal buyer and those of the marginal offerer who abstains from selling, and the valuations on the other hand of the marginal seller and those of the marginal potential buyer who abstains from buying."
As such, prices are the result of individuals that demand a product; the job of the guys in Apple (entrepreneurs) was to speculate on the closest price in which consumers were going to buy their product ie. the Ipad. Prices are the result of individuals' valuations and cannot be effectively determined by any single men. Surely, we will see the price of the iPad fluctuate in the near future. Just as it happened with the Kindle.
PS: for more info on The Pricing process I recommend you to check the chapter XVI of Mises' Treatise which can be found free online at the website of the Mises Institute.
Surely you can do that by looking up from the iPhone screen?
Software and hardware companies have a special term for early adopters: "beta testers"
The personal computing revolution was fueled by innovators with the ability to manipulate the actual hardware, to create ideas, opportunities and functions unimagined by the original creators. The iPad is a severely restricted, overly controlled hardware device that allows limited experimentation or use beyond what Steve Jobs allows you to do with it. The internet has advanced largely through open systems. Anyone could innovate anything at any time, and the best would rise to the top. You could have an idea, create it, introduce it, users could implement it. There was no middle man; the best simply rose to the top. Steve Jobs has created a horribly constrictive closed system where he is the arbiter of anything and everything you can and can't put on your device. Any and every way you could utilize the device has to be okayed by the mighty Apple company. That's just atrocious. A truly awful development. We do not need to be treated like children. I can choose what to put on any other device, the idea that Steve Jobs knows better than me what I want to do with my device is absurd. I will not be patronized by some egghead schmuck that thinks he can decide what I can do with the products I purchase. No iPad for me.
There are, as we speak, probably tens of thousands of software developers, writers, artists, and entrepeneurs rushing to develop games, social networking, scientific, multimedia, and productivity applications for the iPad. If ANY platform in the past ten years or so has "democratized" the creation and innovation of computer software it would be the iPhone/iPad model.
The introduction of the iPad does absolutely nothing to prevent you or I, or anyone else, from buying a laptop, desktop, netbook, or any other computer upon which to develop, innovate, or create to our heart's content.
I, for one, certainly don't need to be told how "inferior" or "sheeplike" I am for choosing to spend my own money on a beautifully-designed piece of technology by pompous asses who think that their peculiar vision for what a computing device should, or should not, be is the only one worthy of merit.
Don't want an iPad? Great. Don't buy one.
Also, don't use "quotes" for words that aren't actually "quotes" that I didn't "say". It makes you look, well, "pompous." I didn't say you were inferior or sheeplike, so don't pretend as though I did so you can be all righteously indignant. It makes you look desperate.
But maybe you do need to be told these things, because you obviously believe the fawning adulation the media has poured onto your great leader Steve and his pretty little pandora's box. They've fallen for the hype. You obviously have as well. I have not. I will not have all of my media consumption, from the shows I watch, to the music I listen to, to the applications I utilize, to how many I can use at once, to what platform they can be used on, be dictated solely by one solitary company in a closed system that declares to me what is and isn't available to me or acceptable for me without my input. I haven't dipped my feet that deep into Orwell's world yet. Looks like you're ready to take the plunge.
But really, the point is why do so many people feel the need to tell me why they aren't buying something that I never asked if they wanted in the first place? If I want to spend my money on one, I will. What's it to you? Enjoy your laptops and I will enjoy my supersized iPod Touch...err iPad.
I'm happy to be an Apple marketers dream. Just a moronic naive customer that only buys things because they are "cool." Good thing you are so smart and head strong that marketing tactics don't sway you into buying useless things.
Why so angry about something you don't want?
It fits the space between my iPhone and PC perfectly while allowing me to take movies, music and books on the road.
Fanned, FYI.