“I don’t get it. It costs $500 for the basic model, when you could get a laptop with a lot more functionality for about the same price. The iPad hype machine has been in full effect this week, and I still think it’s just that—hype,” Alex Cook blogs for Seeking Alpha.
“Nobody has ever made a commercially successful tablet computer,” Cook writes. “So, why then is there so much hype? It’s not just a rhetorical question. For one, even if you are not a Mac user, everyone loves Steve Jobs… That said, Steve Jobs has been wrong before. One of his earlier projects before he was ousted as the Apple CEO (and obviously before he was re-hired later) was the Apple Lisa. It was a computer built in 1983 with a graphical user interface and features now associated with a modern computer—significantly ahead of its time in 1983. Unfortunately, it was horribly expensive and ended up as a commercial flop.”
“The iPad could be even worse. At least the Lisa was ahead of its time. The iPad isn’t ahead of anything, but it’s certainly expensive,” Cook writes. “Tablet computers didn’t flop when HP was making them because HP lacked vision or creativity; they flopped because tablets were a bad idea.”
Cook writes, “I don’t buy the iPad hype. Analyst expectations for iPad revenue are way overblown. If I turn out to be wrong, I’ll gladly eat my words, but I’m pretty sure that I’m not wrong.”
Full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: iCal’ed with relish.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Robert S.” for the heads up.]
Reading this article on another “flop” (according to SB) – my iPhone
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Relish and a nice merlot . . .
Some folks just hain’t too swooft.
Picked up my iPad 64GB yesterday at the Apple Store, La Cantera, San Antonio. Due to a long day driving around shopping after buying the iPad, I didn’t get to set up and use the iPad until we got home late…but that didn’t stop me from using it!
I caught up on my daily Internet browsing, reading in bed laying on my side with the rotation lock ‘on.’ Even after setting the brightness to lowest setting, it seemed very bright. Those reviewers who’ve said you have to use iPad to appreciate it are 100% right. Hooked up to our home wifi, it is almost as fast loading webpages as my Mac Pro. Whoever designed and built the A4 processor has done a fantastic job. I’ve used iPad for about 4 hours, and it’s still sitting on 3/4 ‘full’ of battery charge. I occasionally glanced at the battery when I started, and it seemed like it took forever to get off 100%, at least an hour.
I bought an Incase leather case, and it is very, very nice. The young man at the La Cantera who handled our purchase gently nudged us to try it over the Apple one, and I’m glad we did. Altogether, with the case on with the cover over the screen, it is about 1″ thick, and the leather is very ‘tactilely.’ I think the cost was $59.95, which seems a bit pricey for me, but I’m already glad I got it.
Typing is going to take some time to get used to…just like it took me to get used to typing on the iPhone’s keyboard. One thing’s for sure, one doesn’t rest his fingers on the home keys. I saw Andy Ihnatko demonstrate his typing on the iPad on a Youtube video, and he was fast…saying he’s up to 50 – 60 wpm after about a week’s use.
It’s hard to stop writing about iPad, but I’ll leave it at that right now.
surely microsoft was single handedly responsible for the failure of tablets in the past. without a dedicated touch based OS, how could tablets ever have succeeded ? to this day they have not made such an OS, so surely that is the only, but crucial, innovation that apple has brought to the table/t.
700k sales
in ONE DAY
nuff said
Right, I mean, no one has ever shown that this type of interface is something people like. Well, with the exception of the tens of millions of people using modern smart phones like the iPhone.
The flaccid concept that a windows crapbox with more, but poorly performing “features” is more appealing is simplistic. Comparing tech products solely by a spec sheet is no longer useful. Netbooks vs iPad is lemons vs Apple. Even in the early days of the iPod when tech pundits were comparing similar items, the spec sheet technique did not work. An FM tuner, more buttons, and more options did not make the Zen more popular than the iPod. Here, the environment of the iPad, thoroughly tested and honed by Apple on the iPhone and iPod Touch, sets the iPad significantly apart from a netbook.
Tablets have failed before. True. But none had the iPhone/iPod Touch as predecessors to vet the environment and train/enthrall users.
Cook writes, Nobody has ever made a commercially successful tablet computer..
Nobody ever made a commercially viable MP3 player or smart phone. Yet, here we are post-iPod and iPhone.
Laziness has him go 20+ years in time to find a flop when he could have easily listed the more recent Cube, puck-mouse and the HiFi iPod Radio. Alas, when trapped in your zealot stance to point out the wrongs, credibility takes a back seat.
“Wow, either he’s a moron or a hitwhore.”
The two are not mutually exclusive.
@Arnold
You write as much as you want. You write well for a pig. Fred raised you right.
I own a touch already, so I can live without the iPad for a little while longer. What I enjoy reading about though, is how you all are using it. There’s no point in describing it anymore, especially after today. But don’t spare any words describing how you get stuff done!
Cheers!
I am awaitng my “flop” 3G but yesterday afternoon out of curiosity I went to a local Apple Store and ending up purchasing a “flop” wi-fi device. I love it. This guy is an absolute moron which is an understatement.
Mr. Cook doesn’t get it, because he is afflicted with three errors. The first is that he compares the iPad to netbooks and notebooks by summing the parts, but the iPad is a whole that is greater than the sum of the parts. It is a qualitative different thing that provides a qualitatively different experience. This new experience will even for expert and intermediate users of computers provide a new way doing thing that will be both delightful and useful in ways that aren’t possible with a netbook or notebook.
The second problem is that Mr. Cook gets even the sum of the parts wrong. Many of the things that he finds are missing on the iPad simply await the development of new apps and others, such as multitasking, appear to be around the corner in Apple’s upcoming iPhone OS 4.0. See http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/ 10/03/31/apples_iphone_4_0_to_support_multitasking_via_expose_like_interface.html. For example, Mr. Cooks says that you can’t make calls on the iPad. Well, the iPad is perfectly capable of being an excellent cell phone. Why Apple didn’t put this technology in the initial iPad probably has more to do with third-party business consideration. But notwithstanding that, third parties are rushing in to permit making calls on the iPad. Truephone has or shortly will release an app for making calls on the iPad, and Toktumi with its Line2 app, Vonage, Skype, et al. can’t be far behind. The point is that Mr. Cook has confused either business issues or the time that it takes to develop new apps with incapacity. Let time take its course, and we will see that not only is the iPad quite capable but that it will have capabilities beyond those available or beyond what can be well implemented in traditional computing platforms.
The third point is really an outgrowth of the two forgoing points. As people begin to use the iPad and developers write apps for it, people will use the iPad in ways that are not only novel but that aren’t contemplated. The iPad’s new paradigm of computing will open new vistas; it will provide new uses, some of which are likely to be the new killer apps.
“Estimated 600,000 – 700,000 iPads Sold Saturday”
-Gene Munster – Piper Jaffray
http://digitaldaily.allthingsd.com/20100404/600000-700000-ipads-sold-saturday/
Now, now, now. Come on, folks… let’s cut the poor guy a little slack. After all, he does lead off his little piece with “I don’t get it.”
And he obviously doesn’t.
I can understand some pundits antipathy towards the iPad. Mainly because it’s an Apple product.
This guy just seems completely clueless.
What better proof of it than that he concludes his piece with a link to David Letterman’s Top 10 spot about the iPad and says Letterman “nailed it”… as though he didn’t realize Letterman’s Top 10 spots are sarcastic humor pieces. Letterman was clearly getting in on the hype.
It wouldn’t surprised me if Steve Jobs thought it was funny also.
Hmmmm… This guy picks the Lisa, the machine that brought the GUI to Apple just before the Mac, and before MS borrowed the GUI to create windows – – He takes this ground breaking machine that was the parent of Mac and Windows and uses it as an example of a failure….
There is no brain in there.
I’m going to apple.com to cancel my 3G order right now.
If Alex Cook says it’s a flop what else do I need to know?
Sorry Mom and Dad. Cancel both your orders as well.
I wonder how many iPads Apple would have to sell to totally recoup their costs for the project. I’m sure they’ll accomplish that in no time flat, and after that it’s all gravy. I assume that even a “hobby” like the Apple TV is profitable, and I highly doubt that the iPad will be any less so than it is, what with all of the free exposure.
Alex Cook is just another insignificant blogger without vision.
Yeah, seriously. He draws on a decision from 1983?
Uh, remember that time in 3000 B.C. when Glugg tried to make fire by rubbing two snails together. Boy was that silly in hindsight…
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It’s so nice for someone to give shorts another reason to short … more fuel for the furnace.
People with vision get to live in the future before the past catches up with those that resist change. The iPad and the future are inevitable.
@Arnold Ziffel
Yes, La Cantera store very nice, in a beautiful setting. They treat you like royalty.
@the article:
“Steve Jobs has been wrong before.”
The only big mistakes Steve Jobs has made were A): trusting John Sculley, and B): trusting Eric Schmitt. I wasn’t too keen on the blue-and-white, hockey-puck mouse. Other than that, his life is a parade of genius. Count on it, this company will be bigger than Exxon.
Clueless hit troll…just ignore these blowhards. Don’t even waste our time by republishing this drivel…
If I’d asked my customers what they wanted, they would have said a faster horse. – Henry Ford
I can understand this guy’s thinking. He is among the large minion that do not have an interest in the product. So be it. Can anyone remember a product launch that caused so much fervor and anticipation? I can’t. So, I would be willing to put some hard cash on this product being an overwhelming success. I know…I am sticking my neck out
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But, I saw on the late news yesterday that a survey was done on the local station here in DFW. 80% of the respondents had no interest in the iPad and viewed it as over-hyped. 3% had already gotten one and 7% were interested. Not sure what the other 10% responded. I think the 80% are called the laggards in the product life cycle. To have 10% of the general population interested in the product on Day 1 is pretty incredible.
RE Melina…
You are correct when he says that it fits right in the middle… it’s the iPad… Between your private spot and clothes… the iPad.. for your protection use a Maxipad!
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Alex go back to defragging your PC