“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.]
This guy never gives any good keynotes with a beamer???
“Another Douche iCal’ed”
Sorry, but Steve Job recognized that Lisa was an overpriced flop very early on and that is why he grabbed the best and brightest from around Apple and formed the Macintosh Team to fulfill his vision.
A flop, huh? Let’s do the math on the estimated first day sales of the iPad…700,000 units x avg cost of $599.00 USD (the mid priced model) = About $420 million USD in one day. Yeah, I don’t know how Steve Jobs sleeps at night.
No one has ever made a successful tablet
apple has never made a tablet
apple has sold more ipads on launch day than any other tablet device has sold thruout their sale span.
That makes it the worlds most successful tablet
get it? It’s already over.
Everyone can have an opinion, and it’s nice to see non-fanboi articles on the matter. Everybody just keeps repeating the same stuff so this is refreshing.
The bottom line is, the iPad is very cool and looks like it will be a game changer for the industry. Yet, nobody can predict even the near future on matters like this: it’s not certain the iPad will be a success. Even if they sell a lot of units early on, if people find some months down the road they don’t like it, and start abandoning it, that’s not really successful, is it?
Time will tell…
The iPad is destined for a plethora of uses not imagined nor designed yet. This unit will take on a fabulous life of its own with musicians, artists, photographers and the movie industry creating apps that will not only be multifunctional, but will define a generation.
The gaming platform alone will be a HUGE success and who better to promote the iPad than the world’s youth. Schools will hand them out like books and this unit will likely end up being the ultimate remote control device for the home entertainment and security system.
I could even imagine some smart kid mounting it in a steering wheel like case designed for driving and flying games.
If I were a 7+, I’d be driving my mom & dad crazy over this little masterpiece.
The man who wrote the article just lacks imagination… the man who made the iPad has just created a new world of enjoyment.
It’s funny, too. After I bought the iPhone… all I kept thinking is I’d love to have another model… only bigger.
@MDN! where’s the ical’d remarks for all the reviewers now saying the ipad is too expensive now who said before it was announced that it would be $1000+ & were floored when priced @$499?… not saying, just saying… can’t recall off the top of my head but i’m sure a few thought it could come in around $1500…
The Original Macintosh
Anecdotes about the development of Apple’s original Macintosh computer, and the people who created it. (119 stories)
http://www.folklore.org/
– Want to know about the Mac’s history –
Hi
I agree with the reviewer, I m a Mac user for over 15 years I have a iPhone, mac book air and I do not see the need to get a ipad due to the fact that I can do more with what I already have.
Thank you
M
I got my iPad yesterday morning about 11AM. My wife snuck out early, drove to the Apple store and bought it as a surprise. I started playing with it seriously about 11:30 at which time it showed an 80% charge. I used it practically non-stop ’till 1AM and the batt was at 30%. (and fyi, when i hooked it up for sync’ing, it said “not charging” so it didnt get any juice from the Mac) Excluding the fact that it’s the sleekest most brilliantly designed thing I’ve ever used, the ability to have a portable email/browser/game/movie/you-name-it device that I can actually use for more than 5-6 hours (with wifi on at all times) is worth the price of admission. My wife and I use our iPhones constantly and the biggest issues have always been battery life and screen-size for web surfing. The iPad makes both of those a non-issue and we’re both stunned by how fast this is and what a pleasure it is to use. I could go on and on but I wanna go back to enjoying the most brilliant ‘flop’ ever.
I love my flop and we’re already getting another one of the flops…just can’t decide if we wait for the 3G flop. Thanks for iCaling this one!
It’s the form factor that’s going to really make this thing sell. it’s hard to pick up a laptop and quickly look something up, but it’s easy just to graph this and have everything at your fingertips.
well…no smart@$$_ comments from me in this post. All I have to say is……..touché.
I’ve been pushing and defending Apple computers and subsequent products since the early 90’s.
I don’t why anyone would want an iPad.
Say No To The Kool-Aid my friends.
i joined Seeking Alpha just to respond to Mr. Cook by saying the following…
I don’t get it? These journalist wannabes that post on blogs such as “Seeking Alpha” like to think their word and work is something to be given credence!?! They berate the iPad because they don’t understand what it is and what it will be. I bet Mr. Cook didn’t understand the iPod, iTunes, ITMS eco system either. Fortunately for Apple’s Bottom Line, Steve Jobs did!
“Nobody has ever made a commercially successful tablet computer” sounds more of a slap at Bill Gates then a hit on Apple’s iPad. Rewrite your blog 5 years from now, when everybody and their cousin will have their version of a lesser extent Apple iPad or as Microsoft is so fond of saying, ‘a close enough device’ and report back. Then maybe you’ll be enlightened. Then maybe ‘You’ll Get It!’
The funny thing is…. Haters like to bring up crap from 1982. It’s 2010, I don’t give a rat’s a$$ about Apple 28 years ago.
Posting this from my 64 iPad. Bought this since I need one for work while I wait for the 3G to arrive for home use (can’t drag it back and forth every day!). And now am already finding the MDN iPhone app great to use at 2x. All the other iPad apps? Fantastic. I’m going to use this to login to all my Windows (sorry) servers at work using Winadmin. This thing is *great*!
As I intimated on the original an economist commenting on technology is rather like a banker advising us on card tricks, though the latter may have more sense to it than anything in this particular joker’s contribution. Difficult to take seriously anyone who needed to be told by his college Professor at the time that Apple was running itself into the ground in the mid nineties and reports it as if it were Dumbledore revealing to Harry Potter the secrets of wizardry. Though he quotes how the so called IT experts slate it (one gets the feeling this goon still thinks Bill Gates is the font of all innovative knowledge) he then refers to David Letterman as the only source of comment. I suspect he needs to give his doddery old Prof a call to bring him up to speed. Whatever you do don’t take investment advice from this clown.
If you don’t like it… don’t buy it. You don’t deserve it.
I don’t know. This thing is mad addicting to use. The small footprint makes the iPad a much better alternative to a netbook. This thing has practically limitless potential
The Lisa? Steve put together a team to crate the MacIntosh at the same time. They were two applications of the same new GUI. It really was a revolutionary success.
I must say, I am disappointed the iPad is not a stand alone computer. It really is more of a piece of hardware to use on a computer. You have to dock it, like an iPod, or you cannot maintain it or put much new on it. At least that is what I am hearing. I don’t really need that when I already have a Macbook Pro.
“Wow, either he’s a moron or a hitwhore.”
I think he is both.
I read on MDN that
loptops are for creating content
ipads are for using content
right on the money
I will use both
I hope Apple incorporates the chipset and iBooks into iPhone
Wow! I am an Apple fan, but I have to say the comments on this site are getting pretty overblown. The author has a few reasonable points, so why not address them?
Version 1 of the iPad is just a big iPod Touch. That’s pretty neat, but surely it leaves a lot to be desired?
Don’t we all want the iPad to mature into a tablet version of the iMac, running the full Apple operating system and sporting usb ports, a camera, etc etc etc?
As time goes by, as a community we should keep the pressure on Apple to deliver more.
“Version 1 of the iPad is just a big iPod Touch”
Most of the positive reviewers said they felt that way, up to the point that they used one.
You’ll also notice that there are quite a few commenters here who claim that no one should want one. So it is not surprising that a lot of people are disputing that.