ummm.... you can use it to bash a whiney hobo over the head with. Oh, and the whole iWork library at the tip of you fingers.

Personally, the bashing the hobo over the head thing is a ton more appealing than iWork

 

True...maybe it's best it just stays where it is and clogs up AT&T network. Plus I don't care for any with touch screens. I want to feel buttons.

 

Again, why does it not have Leopard???

 

It 100% is a tablet and was always intended to be, unless you are going by some ultra-specific definition I'm not aware of.

What blanks is it filling in? It does everything worse than the other devices it isn't trying to be.

 

I think someone's suffering from a case of an incredibly narrow mindset. No worries; it's quite common.

I haven't worked with the iPad, so I'll be reserving judgement; however, what they're excited about in the video you linked isn't exactly a minor thing.

The Holy Grail, so to speak, of industrial design is to create a device that you don't think about. A device that you interact with in the same way as, for instance, you do with a pen and paper--the interaction itself is so intuitive that it takes place at a sub-conscious level. To be frank, Apple has proven itself to be at the leading forefront of that push.

The mindset with technology today is that it has to take our breath away. It makes for fun keynotes & chat, but truth be told, it's the wrong approach; revolutionary developments in UI design are the ones that underwhelm us; underwhelming precisely because of their revolutionary nature.

The iPhone proved that. The iPad continues down that same path; recognized or not.

If they feel they've only taken a small step in that direction, they have every right to be excited. While it might not be a "cure for AIDs," the constant pursuit of technological improvement has already proven itself to have such a fundamental impact on the human race as a whole that it cannot be discounted. That's something I find worthy to celebrate.

P.S. Since we're being so smug, it's "you're" and not "your."

 

So, I was just able to mess with the iPad in the city...after an hr of waiting. And I still think it's all hyped up nonsense.

Typing on the virtual keyboard is a joke...the backside is curved so it wouldn't sit still when I used both hands, but I guess if you had it on your lap it would be fine, though the one I was playing with was almost scalding hot. One-handed typing is slow and retarded, but thats just my own opinion.

I wanted to confirm the inability to multi-task...you cannot, I repeat, CANNOT even play music while using iWork or any other app, no toggling between apps nada.

I asked around if it would be able to play *.mkv hd formats / popular hd torrent downloads, and they told me very unlikely...shit, my entire library is bit torrent bootleg... that's why I dumped my AppleTV for a mac mini because it wasn't powerful enough to play my hd downloads.

It is very light though, and looks awesome...the next rev should be interesting.

 

So I was just talking to my mom on the phone, and she was basically like "day 1" lol. She loves to read, has been holding out on the Kindle, and uses her laptop almost entirely for celebrity gossip sites. Despite loving the interface, and the iBookstore, she couldn't understand why it didn't have a forward facing camera because the same person who is going to love the photo and mail apps to share pictures and video with family is going to want to iChat with their family. Just another take.

 

I like it. I think it will be a while before we know what directions it will go in and be most useful for. I'm sure we will get a couple and try them out.

 

Totally agreed. Sure it's not perfect, but it is the future, I have no doubts about it.

 

LOL... how is this the future? Tablet PC's running fully functional OS' have been out for years, and have only been getting better.

Wanna know would have been the future? A tablet PC running a new version of OSX made to take advantage of the incredible form factor, with a front facing camera and video iChat. How about pressure sensitivity? Instead, we get a stagnant OS, with no multitasking, a crappy keyboard, no camera, and a bunch of adapters.

I'm sorry, but I feel like this is a cop out. They didn't revolutionizing anything, and I for one expected more from Apple. As a consumer, and user of the products I feel like its our job to scrutinize them.