The Obligatory, Reactionary iPad Review

On a day when the President spoke about creating new jobs, many of us were instead listening to Jobs speak about creating a new precedent.  During the days hence, the internet has been abuzz with reactions to the iPad... some heralding it as the seed of a revolution, some calling it just another piece of Apple-flavoured candy, and some claiming it’s nothing more than Apple sauce. I decided not to rush out my entry, but instead read the reviews and opinions, and think about the long-term impact of such a device.

So it was back in November when i penned “Print is Dead. Long Live Print.” discussing the sad decline of the publishing industry.  I ended my article with the line, “So I guess the real question is… How long until Apple introduces an eReader that saves the publishing industry?” and it looks like I now have my answer.  When I watched Steve Jobs maneuver his way around the iPad, I instantly recalled my school days, lugging around a 30lb bag of beat-up textbooks, getting detention for not keeping them covered with brown shopping bags, and kicking myself for leaving my homework on the kitchen table.  The iPad has relegated these problems to the past.  Soon every child in the country will have an iPad-like device which contains all of their textbooks, homework, and assignments. I’m already looking forward to giving my future offspring the “When I was your age, we had to carry around these things called ‘Books’...” speech.

The iPad’s classroom applications alone are ground-breaking, but that doesn’t take into account the entire scope of what this device portends.  Sure, the critics and Apple-haters have called it nothing but a large iPod Touch, and even the most loyal Mac fanboys have lamented the lack of a few desirable features, but these are merely speedbumps along the road to revolution.  Calling the iPad a glorified iPod Touch is hardly an insult.  In fact, that’s part of the beauty of the device…. building on an existing format and taking it further.  Let’s face it, our parents and grandparents have trouble with Smartphones and iPods.  The small type and tiny interface is just too much for aging vision and slowing dexterity.  Could we imagine them using such small devices to read books or magazines? Absolutely not. Even i wouldn’t bother reading anything substantial on a teeny iPod/iPhone screen… the level of eye-strain, and the slowness zooming and resizing is enough to turn off many people. The iPad addresses this issue elegantly, building on an extremely intuitive touch-screen technology combined with Apple’s usual beautiful interface.

Many other critics posited the iPad as merely a really bad laptop, and this argument is harder to discount.  A small flash drive, no USB/device ports, no CD/DVD drive, no camera, the inability to run multiple apps… all valid arguments.  Correcting these issues would’ve made the device a whiz-bang foolproof success, but unfortunately, the technology just isn’t quite there yet.  And let’s face it… it’d be extremely difficult to include a powerful processor and still expect 10 hours of battery life. And therein lies the genius of Apple’s design… they accepted the necessary compromises to launch this device NOW instead of waiting another decade for it to be the perfect. 

Once people get an iPad in their hands, and can appreciate this long battery life, I feel many of these complaints will subside.  A cross-country flight with an iPad will likely make anyone a fan. Where once we had to carry a Discman, a zippercase of CDs, an iPod, a DVD player, a book, a couple magazines, a moleskine, and even our laptops in our backpacks, now we just need this one small device.  It’s really the ultimate travel device… consolidate all of your media along with your email, IM, address book, and a few lightweight apps specific to your personal needs in one tiny device.  While the iPhone gives you many of these features (plus a phone), it’s not an ideal media-viewing device.

A significant drawback of the iPad is that, even more than the iPhone, it seems a device geared towards the Apple audience, as the iPad would seem to work best when synced up with an Apple desktop or laptop, or at least another computer of some sort. This would seem to be the biggest drawback of the iPad – It’s not a truly stand-alone device, and I can’t imagine a time I would carry an iPad without still needing an iPhone.  This ‘tweener’ status for this device means it’s not an ‘essential’ device like a laptop or a phone, but rather an ancillary, vanity device, which in my estimation will mean sales of the iPad won’t be anywhere near that of the iPhone. The market may view this as a failure.  I would view this as expected, especially in this recovering economy.

Given this need for another computer, it would likely seem that an Android or Windows-based device could, in a year or two, top the iPad in sales. Granted, they might not look as pretty, but it’s been my experience that people prefer functionality and ease of integration over style and beauty when it comes to technology (not to mention the freedom from AT&T).  In fact, the JooJoo tablet (shown right) is just as pretty as the iPad, launches a full month sooner, but has yet to generate the buzz that Apple does without even trying. Similarly, the Skiff tablet (shown below) made a splash at CES with it’s flexible and durable eReader, though it lacks most of the robust features of the iPad and JooJoo.  While it’s clear that Apple has set the bar high, it’s also clear that the rest of the computing world isn’t gonna stand by and watch Apple dominate the market.  It took Android two years to build a rival to the iPhone, and with many companies already in the eReader business, we can expect the market to be full of iPad clones by early-mid 2011. In fact, rumor has it Google’s version will debut later this year.  The number of clones that we see already hints at the true potential of the tablet format. We wouldn’t see such an explosion in this market if there wasn’t good, solid data backing up the desire for such a device.

Certainly the publishing industry hopes to feel the effect of this device.  I, for one, would buy it simply as an eReader.  Saving the publishing companies millions annually on printing costs will be a life-saving measure.  Unlike the Kindle, which completely ignores the beauty of book design, the iPad will reinvigorate book design to include usability and interaction, while helping to visually frame the tone or narrative.  Were I a book designer, I would be chomping at the bit to explore this new format, and as a web designer, it may behoove me to do so.  Apple’s decision to utilize the open-source ePub document format is an extremely smart move, for unlike Kindle’s proprietary format, one ePub document could be viewed in the iPad as well as any clones that come along.  Being able to include features like inline dictionaries and links to related content on the web are essential to the future success of these devices, and is what will separate them from the rather primitive Kindle. 

So we must accept that a device this potentially revolutionary comes to us in it’s nascence. After all, the Internet’s been around for 20+ years, and we are still only coming to grips with it’s full potential. To lament the iPad’s shortcomings while failing to recognize the future it heralds is merely a symptom of short-sightedness in the eye of the beholder. Sure, there can be comparisons to the Newton. Both devices were far ahead of their time, but this time, the public is ready for such a device.  It may take a couple generations for the technology to catch up to the full potential heralded by the iPad, but by 2015, tablets will likely be as ubiquitous as the smartphone.  While it certainly isn’t a perfect device, Apple’s iPad has shed a greater light on the tablet platform, and with it’s dedicated audience, will certainly shake up the computer market in coming years.