Lifergeek.com

Back in January Steve Jobs finally came out with the iPad, one of the most sought after devices for the past year.  After the dust settled and the specs revealed many people seemed disappointed. Many a fan boy of the previously mythical tablet hung their head in disappointment.  Not saying it was without love, just that some expected more.

I too was waiting for the iPad to come and after hearing it was basically the iPhone OS with more power, much bigger display and the classic iPhone walled garden iTunes store I decided against it. It just wasn’t for me.  I wanted something with a little more “umph”, power, something I could get down and dirty with.  This was not that device, at least not for me.

Then I stopped and thought, who is this for?

This is the device like the iPhone that will bring people into the tablet arena.  The iPhone brought the masses kicking and screaming into the smart phone world.  Like that, the iPad will fit the need people (the masses) didn’t know they have.  People like commuters and students will find this device among their required gadgets.  Here is a device that in it’s initial release will allow:

• Portable Music
• Portable Movies / TV
• Book Reader
• Game device
• Web Browsing
• Email
• Applications
• Less Pain

That last item is the most important.  This device is made from the ground up as a tablet device OS. The applications are made for touch screen use from the start, something that on Windows, Linux or OSX isn’t the case.  The Walled Garden approach means all software has been at least checked once for malicious intent, something you can’t say for most software you can download from the internet.  Yeah you pay a premium for this type of service, but this is the crowd that will be serviced by this unit.  They will want it just to work, may complain about the cost here and there.  In the end they will pay cause they will know if they want a movie, song or book, it’s as simple as click/download. Internet will be peppy because it’ll be the lightweight browser you get on the iPhone plus a few power tweaks for the new form factor.

In the end, I know this unit will succeed.  It won’t be the last in this arena and many will try to improve on it, some able to, other not so much.  The lack of difficulty to do the basic things will be the major selling point.  Something even us geeks complain about it things that don’t just work.  Difference is we tend to dig in and make it work if it doesn’t.