“The target market for the iPad isn’t as clearly defined as it is for most Apple products,” Ryan Faas writes for Computerworld. “Is it appropriate for business use? Is it a media player or e-reader? How would it be used in educational environments? Is it just an oversized iPod Touch? Exactly what needs does it meet that a smartphone or notebook can’t fulfill?”
“We won’t fully know the answer to those questions until the iPad hits the market in March or April or for a little while after it’s released,” Faas writes. “But maybe the point isn’t what the iPad is, but what it represents.”
Faas writes, “The iPad is the latest and most striking example of Apple’s use of multi-touch technology. True multi-touch capability was more concept than reality before the iPhone’s debut in 2007. In less than three years, Apple has taken that technology and baked it into every one of its product lines. After the iPhone came multi-touch trackpads on Apple’s laptops. Then, last fall, came the new magic mouse. And now it’s being used in a full tablet. With each advance, Apple rolls out new ways to interact with devices.”
“The iPad’s arrival also demonstrates Apple’s continued ability to push the envelope in other technologies, including battery life,” Fass writes. “Over the past year or so, Apple has pioneered the concept that innovative battery design can lead to better battery life and better design. Not everyone is happy about the trend toward built-in, nonreplaceable batteries, but Apple at least makes the concept seem feasible, and even desirable.”
“Finally, the iPad is proof positive that Apple has the financial resources to develop completely new products from the ground up,” Fass writes. “The fact that Apple designed and manufactured its own processor specifically for the iPad speaks volumes about the company’s vitality, even in an uncertain economy. And it bodes well for Apple’s ability to innovate in the years ahead.”
Fass writes, “All that said, I have no doubt that even if the immediate market for the iPad isn’t obvious, Apple wouldn’t have developed the device without believing it could be a vital product… So, what sweet spot is Apple aiming for?”
Full article, in which Fass looks at all of the markets to which iPad appeals (entertainment, business, education, etc.), here.
MacDailyNews Take: It’s simple really, just look at it when it’s off: iPad is a blank slate. Apple’s iPad is for moms, dads, grandparents, kids, teens, and single adults. It’s basically for humans (and some primates) ages 1-100+.
@ Jim TIV
I’m envisioning a photojournalism workflow around the 3G model. Not sure how it all work out, since I don’t know what apps might come out between now and then, but this is how I see it happening-
1. Shoot stuff with Real Camera (in my case, a Canon XTi or G10)
2. Take notes on iPad, record voice memos or interviews with voice recorder. Mark key locations with Map application. Add contacts to address book.
3. Download images to iPad for review. This would replace the need for a laptop or a digital wallet in the field, and would have significant advantages over both – Multitouch, which is the world’s best way to interact with images, and the ability to fit easily into my camera bag. The disadvantage compared to a lappy would be the lack of a high-level Camera Raw image editor, but more on that later…
4. While still in the field, Write – use notes, recordings, and images to begin writing. In my case, I’d start a WordPress draft document, which I could do regardless of WiFi availability.
5. At the end of the day, sync iPad with computer, and import images to a real editor (Lightroom) and 2 big screens for more complex editing.
Now this is the part that has the most potential. I don’t see an App Store application that has anything like the power of Lightroom. Yet. Ideally, I would love Adobe to create a mobile version of Lightroom so I can organize images, add metadata and keywords, star ratings, labels, etc, and have it all sync to my main system when I get home. Until then, just being able to review my images on a bigger screen with excellent navigation will be a huge advantage over looking at them on my camera’s LCD. I think a lot of tasks will still need to be done on the desktop machine, like complex layers-based editing in Photoshop and maybe some web layout in Dreamweaver. For now.
I also like to move finalized images to the web server (my Mac Mini) at home because it’s a hell of a lot faster and I can just use the Finder rather than FTP.
6. Publish – Once imaging tasks are done and the images are on the web server, it’s just a matter of finalizing the WordPress draft. Again, with the 3G I can do this from anywhere. Maybe I need to do a follow-up interview in the field – no problem, I have the document right there with me. As soon as I’m happy, hit the publish button.
I seriously can’t wait.
Fraser Speirs sait it best :
The Real Work is not formatting the margins, installing the printer driver, uploading the document, finishing the PowerPoint slides, running the software update or reinstalling the OS.
The Real Work is teaching the child, healing the patient, selling the house, logging the road defects, fixing the car at the roadside, capturing the table’s order, designing the house and organising the party.
Think of the millions of hours of human effort spent on preventing and recovering from the problems caused by completely open computer systems. Think of the lengths that people have gone to in order to acquire skills that are orthogonal to their core interests and their job, just so they can get their job done.
If the iPad and its successor devices free these people to focus on what they do best, it will dramatically change people’s perceptions of computing from something to fear to something to engage enthusiastically with.
— Article Future Schock on his blog.
A blank slate is a great view of this product. It’s a product that will be custom tailored to an individual based on their needs and desires through software, same as the iPhone except with greater usability and reach.
I will add that the iPad is what I’ve been waiting for ; first as a Book Reader and second as a writing pad. (Maybe I’m in the minority, but I like virtual keyboards.)
Add a camera, a usb port, and a firewire port, and it’s for me.
Add a camera […]
— m159
I prefer a real camera, my small Leica D-Lux.
Technically, multitouch trackpads appeared on Apple’s laptops – the PowerBook specifically – way before the iPhone was released. Remember, two fingers is multitouch.
C1
Do you shoot in RAW, and if so, do you reckin’ it will be able to import those files?
Or maybe shoot in RAW+JPEG and import just the JPEG, save the RAW for the workhorse?
And do you have that nifty Polaroid program to make your nice shots look like a crappy instant from 1978?
The killer feature it must have for me is iTunes streaming like an appletv does. If it does this out of the box I’m in.
@ TT
“Do you shoot in RAW, and if so, do you reckin’ it will be able to import those files?”
Right now that the biggest wildcard. The simple work-around is to shoot RAW+JPG and use the jpegs for review on the iPad, and edit the Raw files when I get back to Lightroom. But I’m hoping Raw support with come to the iPad.
@ TT
I obviously got excited and didn’t read your whole comment. >.< And yes, I have all kinds of tricks to make my nice photos look like shit.
Me Me Me Me…I want one too!!
After a lot reading since the keynote there is a high likely hood in my mind the iPad is, yes, for all the above, but but still somewhat of mystery whose utility cannot be fully understood because it was really designed to be used with iPhone OS 4.0. A large blank space needs to be preserved in everyone’s mental construct of the iPad’s place in technology’s firmament. The construct can be completed when, probably in March, iPhone OS 4.0 is revealed. I have read comments that iPhone OS 4.0 makes the iPhone (and now the iPad by association) “more computer like”. That has a lot of positive implications for me, if true.
I thought it was for people?
We should all shoot raw in the raw and make large cat noises.
Do it. Make it loud.
Everything will make sense.
Wow! When the iPad was first shown there were a lot more negatives on this site. Looks like people are starting to see how great the iPad really is.
I can’t imagine a photographer, graphic designer, web developer, realtor or sales agent not being very excited about this. And that’s just business people.
Watch the video on this page.
http://www.slashgear.com/amazon-yank-macmillan-books-over-ipad-price-protest-3072126/
Then tell me that the iPad ain’t gonna be great. In the video when she is demoing photos I saw the option to send it to MobileMe which is fantastic. I figured it would be there but you never know until you see it. That means I can keep my iMac, iPhone and iPad calendars, contacts in perfect sync.
Cool Idea:
If I was building a new house, I would buy iPads for every bedroom and living room and build charging units into the wall and make some easy open picture frames that would enable you to quickly plug in the iPad. iPad would be a digital picture frame and would always be charged. Three bedroom house would only cost $2000 in iPads. Not that much when you consider the hundreds of thousands in construction costs.
Someone will build this. Griffin? Belkin?
TT:
“And do you have that nifty Polaroid program to make your nice shots look like a crappy instant from 1978?”
There’s an easy way with PS. And I know C1 knows.
Just listed my 8 year old daughters iPod Touch on eBay. She came running up to me after school yesterday, “Daddy, can I get that new iPod Touch?! That big one?”
Her birthday is in March also – so looks like it’s a go.
Funny when people say “it’s just a big iPod touch.” Duh! We know that – that’s why we all want one. The fact that it will be the best mobile presentation tool ever invented is icing on the cake.
Do any of you remember what happened on this date in 1982? It’s the day Elk Cloner appeared in the wild for Apple II.
Really stupid people. With more money than brains.
All I need to make the iPad useful for me would be FileMaker, and an outliner that has handwriting recognition.
I can’t remember the program, but my iPod Touch has a note taking program with character recognition & it works pretty well. (I still miss my Newton)
That plus what it already does with iWork would be enough to bridge between the studio & the office quite well.
And for entertainment, it’s potential isn’t yet clear, but I want the iPad to interact with the video and audio seamlessly in my home network. A bigger version of the Apple remote program with more feedback would be outstanding.
I say the iPad will be just what I want & need in about another year.
@Dallasm
Hyuck! Hyuck!, that`d be me!
next up, trading in the car for a unicycle with square wheels, maybe I`ll juggle some molotov cocktails too.
@ Dallasm
Really poor sentence structure.
All this talk about a camera. OK – maybe forward facing specifically for video chat only. But are people really asking for a real camera to take photos/movies with? I can’t imagine a worse form factor than the iPad for a picture taking device…
It’s for people who have an iota of intelligence, creativity, imagination, vision and a desire to be productive and artistic.
That leave all the pc”ers out thank god …