The iPad Is Here

Personally, I think the iPad is "meh" at best and if I was going to get a tablet, I'd get something else. That being said, there were folks lined up at Best Buy this weekend to get one (thanks Michael at StandAloneCode for the vid):

Best Buy apparently started with 10 units of each of the models: 16, 32, and 64 GB. Then UPS dropped off another 20 of each. So by the time they opened, they had 90 to work worth. Any idea if they sold out?

They still don't support multi-tasking, but there's a reason for it.

Robert played with the iPad for a bit and posted a quick review on it, based on one he saw over at Connecting Point.

And 24 hours after it was released, the iPad has already been Jailbroken.

In other local Apple news, this was also the same weekend that the iPhone was officially available. I was over at the ~~Mountain View Mall~~ Cascade Village Shopping Center the day it opened on a completely unrelated matter, and the new AT&T store was absolutely packed. Did anybody here pick up one? Personally I'm waiting for my contract with my phone to run out before I decide what I'm doing, but it probably won't be an iPhone, because AT&T's plans are ludicrously expensive compared to Sprint's.

Posted by Jake on 04/04/10 @ 07:19 PM
Posted in Geekdom, Local | 6 Comments | Permalink

6 Comments

Barney Lerten said on 04/05/10 @ 07:31 AM:
I love how the 'true geeks' have meh'ed the iPad to seeming irrelevance. 'Not a REAL computer,' they say.
Well guess what? It wasn't DESIGNED for you. It was designed for everybody else, and those shortcomings are ones many won't care about.
You won't be able to code a Cray supercomputer from it? Who cares?
But if it forces other manufacturers to lower their cost, up their battery life, provide a better, easier to use experience in a lightweight tablet I can surf on the sofa with... I'm grateful.

Jake said on 04/05/10 @ 09:28 AM:
My biggest problem with it (other than the lack of user-replaceable ... well ... anything, forced App store/iTunes usage, etc...) is the lack of Flash support. While Flash is annoying on many sites, it's integral to the functionality of many sites (including yours, Barn). While Apple's trying to spin in that folks should just recode their sites in HTML 5 instead, and how realistic is that for most Web sites out there? People are going to be quite annoyed when sites they're used to visiting suddenly have functionality issues.

There are folks like Apple, who are trying to make folks work their way, while folks like Google, who are genuinely trying to make Web browsing less complex for everybody by building Flash right in.

Hell, I have Flash support on my phone, which is far less powerful (hardware-wise) than an iPhone or iPad. Apple just doesn't like the fact that they won't be able to control something, which is why you won't see Flash running on those systems.

Don't get me wrong, the iPad, the iPhone, and many of Apple products have great hardware, and even really good, easy-to-use, powerful software. It's the locking them down to doing things The Apple Way™ that bothers me the most (don't get me started about the lack of user-serviceable parts -- we shouldn't have to send our stuff away or go to an Apple store to have our stuff fixed).

To quote somebody much smarter than all of us: "First-generation Apple products are for suckers. Only lemmings with no self-control and excessive disposable income buy first generation Apple products, especially in a new gadget category. When they do, they pay the double the price for immature hardware and software."

Robert Kieffer said on 04/05/10 @ 08:19 PM:
@Barney...
(Actually I suspect you can code a Cray from it.)

I really don't see this as a geek thing. The geeks panning the iPad are the same ones that raved about the iPhone. And that certainly wasn't designed for them either.

What has geeks *meh*ing the iPad is not that it's not designed for them, it's that it's not really clear who it _is_ designed for.

It's an overgrown iPhone, but you want your phone small, not large. Ditto for iPods. It's an e-reader, but with 10% of the battery life of a Kindle. It's a notebook, except without all the features that make a notebook such a productive work environment.

Honestly, I don't know anyone, geek or non-geek, who has actually gone out and bought one. Which certainly wasn't the case for the iPad's predecessors.

Jake said on 04/06/10 @ 04:21 PM:
What has geeks *meh*ing the iPad is not that it's not designed for them, it's that it's not really clear who it _is_ designed for.

Couldn't have said it better myself, Robert.

jared said on 04/06/10 @ 10:49 PM:
Jake,

Google the HTC Supersonic. The mobile is coming out for Sprint and it is a BEAST! I am dieing to dump my Palm Pre because it is such a pile, so my hopes are that this thing will replace it.

Allan L. said on 04/10/10 @ 11:58 AM:
Magazines.

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