The iPhone and the iPod are two truly amazing products that are capable of a lot of things. And so is the iPad, and any other advanced digital device of our generation. The iPhone and iPod, in fact, have been breakthrough products that have changed the ways we listen to music and communicate immensely. Yet, there is still this one crowd left, the people untouched and dismayed by the amazing products that Apple has presented them – the Windows/Open Source OS’es Users. Which is the market Apple is trying to target with their stupid iTampon iPad.
I can’t say that I enjoyed being an iPod Touch User if I did not jailbreak it. There are just too many restrictions on the device itself. You can’t do this, you can’t do that. You can’t run this and you can’t run that. Everything has to go throw Apple’s gate, and everything that they won’t really benefit something from – or may be to their disadvantage, will never land on any of these devices I’m talking about (iPhone/iPad/iPod).
Apple is going for the big fish with their iPad product. They want the mainstream consumer market who use their laptops/netbooks/desktops merely for personal entertainment or some other -not so geeky- stuff. The iPad is going to amaze them, for sure, and I bet a lot of people -including me before I thought about this and read an related article- were starting to put aside some money to get one of them.
I feel enlightened after reading the post I linked to above. It makes me feel very foolish to have believed that the iPad is going to be a awesome replacement for today’s netbooks in the near future -but it’s not.
It is just another money making machine for Apple. With the launch of the Online Book Store, the already established App Store and iTunes Store; Apple can make heck lot of money from the iPad and their future users, as you have to PAY for ANYTHING that is GOOD since crap applications are most of the time, free. I don’t want to be one of the people chained to Apple and their stupid Stores (Book/iTunes/App).
Do you?
I just can’t think of the digital world dominated by Apple and their stupid online stores from which only they benefit from. I’m very much happy how the internet and the digital world works at present, as I can say that at least, the MACs are able to run free software like any other operating system. But I fear the day will come, that the iPad will replace the freedom, and their users come to pay the price and look back…
Apple has indeed created a breakthrough product which has doomed the freedom of computing… forever.
About Georg Kevin
I think you're rather overstating Apple's market, especially out of the US.
Whilst there's no doubt the iPhone has been a success, the market share overall is still pretty darned low, and other phone manufacturers are responding quickly, bringing out models that are far higher spec. (The iPhone spec is really quite crap already).
I can't see the iPhone market share really going up that much more than it is now.
The iPad was always going to be a niche product. Admittedly the fanbois will buy it, but I have confidence that only a fairly small percentage of consumers will be buying it, especially with the luke-warm reviews it's had thus far.
I do dislike Apple's vendor lockdown, but I think that many people have shown that they will accept it. It does have its advantages (quality floor is set by Apple so you don't have to deal with apps that could be crappy or contain malicious code most of the time).
An important point to make is that you are free to buy any other device. Apple's devices haven't become popular because they are the only choice; they are far from it. Chinaren has a good point in that they really don't control that much of the market. They are simply an option that some will like and others (as in your case) won't.
The iPad probably is a pretty big gamble for Apple. Instead of making it a full-fledged tablet running OSX, they have made it more like a glorified iTouch. Sure, it has a bigger screen and more powerful processor, but will that really matter? Many developers will want the biggest slice of pie possible, and that means developing for both the iPhone/iTouch and the iPad simultaneously, so they won't be taking advantage of the iPad's processing power. It is missing many features, such as an SD card reader, that one would expect to see in such a device.
But one has to consider that those giving the iPad negative reviews are by and large techies. And for those who don't remember, many techies thought Vista was pretty good during its beta. It just goes to show that the opinion of the masses can vary widely from the opinion of the relative few who are experienced in the field.