Everybody and their monkey’s uncle is now opining on how the new device is a dud because it doesn’t have a camera, or flash, or will suck a golf ball through a garden hose, how it’s not as good as a laptop and pricier than a netbook; these people are completely missing the point:
The iPad could help revolutionize Jr. High-postgrad education.
Instead of breaking kids backs with 50 lbs of textbooks, they’ll just have 1.5 lbs to schlep around to do their homework, reading, testing, you name it. Anybody teacher or school district can put together their lesson plans online, can find superior lessons plans beyond what the traditional publishers put on offer. Lesson plans and text can be updated instantly to correspond with the changes in science or politics. School districts can keep books for K-4 or 5 because the subject matter is fairly constant, but after that every child should be issued one. Kids won’t want to steal them because they all have them. Now with kids having an Apple product may entice parents to convert the home to a Mac along with airport express for ease of function. It plays movies to boot? YAHTZEE!!!
Prices on “e-xtbooks” will be driven down due to both a lowering of barriers to entry and by publishers being able to slash overhead on printing and distro.
Schools are already buying iTouches for schoolkids, the iPad is right in their wheelhouse. They can buy in bulk and get their money’s worth on the warranty plan.
3G won’t matter except for a different market segment who will need it for offsite work, say Census Bureau enumerators.
I won’t buy one, but this device isn’t for me.
I am exclusively looking to checkout the Apple iPad, and I am excited to see what kinds of games and apps will be deployed for it. I just don’t grasp some of the nitpicky criticisms in this website. Size of the bezel?? Damn!