My opinion on the iPad

One more Steve-note and the feeling of DejaVu is stronger than ever. Once again I feel disappointment (and anger). Apple seems more interested on their bottom line ($50B, no less) than providing a magical product to the users. Don't get me wrong, iPad looks like a great product, but it's an evolution, not a revolution. Just enough functionality is added while leaving important features for a future revision.

The announcement was totally expectable. Actually, the only surprise was the omission of a 'ah, just another thing...' moment. The device looks exactly like an iPhone, the UI is a mix of iPhoneOS and MacOS. No cool new gestures, no innovative methods of collaboration, no new experiences. The most interesting part of the announcement is the A4 SoC silicon, but hey, CPUs are a commodity these days.

The eBook reader was a major let down. I expected a revolutionary new format for Books or, at least, PDF versions instead of plain ePub. And what about magazine/newspaper subscriptions? To tell you the truth, I am not sure that iPad is a Kindle killer. Kindle is more suitable as an eBook reader, mainly thanks to the eyes-friendly ePaper display (I really hate these 'i's and 'e's)

Thankfully, the iPad is a netbook killer. In a year or so, crappy netbooks will be part of history. iPad looks like a great way to surf the Web, write emails, edit documents and ..play games. The price may be relatively low, but the base model does not include 3G, a camera, card slots, etc.

A missed opportunity, if you ask me.

My opinion on the iPad

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