Haha, i love how everyone is like "uhm, yeah, it will change our future, appple is so genius, but i don't know why and how, but somehow it must be true because i say so".
Translates to: Nobody knows, there is no evidence, people are wishing for the ipad to become the computing device of the future, but dont know how that new computing future could be different from tomorrow.
But, since apple did a great marketing job, as always, you are not alone. There are hell of a lot of people who will buy the ipad, but don't exactly know why. I know a lot of people that want an ipad, but when i ask them what would be so great about it, what would they do with it, they don't really know, they just think it's awesome. Which in my oppinion, is a result of good marketing (and neat design). It looks neat, the whole world is talking about it, apple is cool, so i need one too!
This discussion is somehow the same, but discussed by geeks: It's cool, it's easy to use, those dumb other 99% of computer users will need this, but i don't know why. :)
Ok. What's your point? Is someone supposed to know?
I think people didn't really have any idea how the iPhone would really have an impact. At best people said, "Now I don't need to carry a phone and an iPod." That's probably one of the least touted feature today because it is simply taken for granted.
The thing with iPhone is that it really removed any threshold to mobile applications. Sure, I could've probably done everything on my laptop that I do on my iPhone. But who wants to bust out their laptop every 5 minutes to check Facebook, find directions and beam someone money using PayPal? Oh yeah.. you'd also have the barrier of actually having connectivity no matter where you are.
I will say that there will be a similar evolution with the iPad. Certain applications lends themselves better to a touch interface with a lightweight form factor. These applications need more screen real estate than an iPhone but less power than a laptop. The most obvious? A book reader.
I can see any sort of designer app being huge: web page designing, graphic designing, photo editing. Personally I would love a personal entertainment console. In a perfect world, I'd have a smooth, user friendly and rich touch interface to pick a movie to stream from Netflix and have it start playing automatically through my Apple TV.
Translates to: Nobody knows, there is no evidence, people are wishing for the ipad to become the computing device of the future, but dont know how that new computing future could be different from tomorrow.
But, since apple did a great marketing job, as always, you are not alone. There are hell of a lot of people who will buy the ipad, but don't exactly know why. I know a lot of people that want an ipad, but when i ask them what would be so great about it, what would they do with it, they don't really know, they just think it's awesome. Which in my oppinion, is a result of good marketing (and neat design). It looks neat, the whole world is talking about it, apple is cool, so i need one too!
This discussion is somehow the same, but discussed by geeks: It's cool, it's easy to use, those dumb other 99% of computer users will need this, but i don't know why. :)