iPad Calculus

Yes, the fuck­ing iPad is finally here. Now, at least, the crap­tas­tic blog posts and arti­cles can have some basis in reality…or not, this is the blo­gos­phere we’re talk­ing about here. As we all know, the ques­tion burn­ing up the intar-tubes is, what does Darby think of this thing. Well, dear read­ers fear not, for all shall be revealed. Read on to learn the truth.

iPad: When Myth Becomes Reality

While Apple may not have par­tic­i­pated in the pre-announcement col­lec­tive loss of san­ity, they cer­tainly haven’t tried to calm the hys­ter­i­cal masses post-announcement. Calling your new prod­uct “Magical and rev­o­lu­tion­ary” takes balls; giant cast-iron tes­ti­cles. But this is Apple we’re talk­ing about, when they roll the bones they go all in. And good on them for doing so. Half mea­sures are for losers. My, far saner take is this: Steve Jobs came down from the moun­tain to reveal the myth­i­cal Apple uni­corn, and it turns out that the uni­corn was actu­ally a horse. The thing is, there is noth­ing wrong with that. See, uni­corns aren’t real, horses are.

So what does this horse look like. You can read the offi­cial fea­ture list here, the tech specs here, and the pric­ing break­down here. I won’t regur­gi­tate the bul­let lists, but the short ver­sion is:

• 9.7” IPS Multi-Touch screen at 1024×768 resolution
• Custom Apple built proces­sor which is appar­ently crazy fast
• Available in 16, 32 and 64 GB configurations
• Apparently runs a close vari­ant of the iPhone OS
• Can run most extant iPhone appli­ca­tions either in a 1 to 1 pixel map­ping or a pixel dou­bled mode.
• Accompanied by a new iPhone OS SDK to allow devel­op­ers to lever­age iPad spe­cific features.
• 802.11n stan­dard on all models
• 3G avail­able as an option on all models
• 3G ser­vice by AT&T in the U.S. on a non-contract pay as you go basis
• Bluetooth (includ­ing the abil­ity to use a BT keyboard)
• All of the var­i­ous crap that peo­ple com­plain about regard­ing the iPhone and iPod Touch remains the case
• OMG No camera!

In my opin­ion, an over­all good first out­ing. The key thing to take away from the design and specs of the iPad is that it isn’t intended to be a net­book. It’s Apple’s answer to the use-cases that spawned net­books. Nor should the iPad be looked at as a lap­top replace­ment. Instead, I think that the iPad should be viewed as a lap­top alter­na­tive.

The $10,000 Question

Of course, the only ques­tion that really mat­ters is: am I, The Angry Drunk, going to buy one. Let’s begin to answer that by ask­ing a ques­tion: What pos­si­ble use would I have for this prod­uct? To answer that, let’s look at my use-case.

I’m not look­ing for a replace­ment com­puter. My 2006 24” Core2 Duo iMac works suf­fi­ciently. When I do replace the iMac, it will prob­a­bly be with the 27” quad-core i7 iMac. The iMac is the core of my “dig­i­tal life.” I record the Angry Mac Bastards pod­cast there. I write these bril­liant blog posts there. It’s where I store all of my music, pho­tos and videos. It’s where I do the vast major­ity of my web brows­ing. No tablet com­puter, no net­book, no lap­top can really replace that for me.

I’m also not look­ing for a new com­mu­ni­ca­tions device.I have an iPhone, and what it does it does bril­liantly. The iPhone is per­fect for mobile com­mu­ni­ca­tions. I use the iPhone to update Twitter and the var­i­ous social net­works and to inter­act with a num­ber of var­i­ous ser­vices. When I’m bored I have a selec­tion of games to divert me. I also have a brace of eRead­ers so I can access my large library of eBooks on the go. In fact, I do my eRead­ing almost exclu­sively on the iPhone. What I don’t do on my iPhone is cre­ate con­tent or do inten­sive web brows­ing. Sure, the iPhone can do those things, but for me at least, it doesn’t do them well.

So, what do I want? Between my iMac and my iPhone there are two basic gaps. The first is the read­ing com­po­nent. I hate read­ing books on the iMac; it just isn’t com­fort­able. Currently my iPhone, with the addi­tion of var­i­ous eReader soft­ware, makes a ser­vice­able eBook reader, but it’s not ideal. Mainly, it’s the size. The iPhone’s screen is just too small for com­fort­able read­ing. Prior to yes­ter­day I would have said that I was the per­fect audi­ence for the Kindle…nah, who am I kid­ding, I would have bought a Nook.

The sec­ond gap is the mobile con­sump­tion of “stuff,” and con­tent cre­ation. Part of that “stuff” is eBooks, so the prior state­ments apply there. Another part of “stuff” is the web. Mobile Safari is a fine browser. In fact, one could go so far as to say that it set the stan­dard for mobile brows­ing. Unfortunately, Mobile Safari (on the iPhone) is insuf­fi­cient for the bulk of my brows­ing. Sure, it’s won­der­ful for the quick look-up or to set­tle a bar bet, but it quickly becomes imprac­ti­cal when try­ing to browse forums or read longer con­tent. The iPhone’s mail client suf­fers from sim­i­lar issues. It’s great for a quick check of the inbox, but a pain for longer email ses­sions includ­ing draft­ing in-depth responses Then there is the “con­tent cre­ation” piece. Sure, the tools exist that would have allowed me to write this arti­cle on my iPhone. Had I attempted such though, I would have prob­a­bly killed myself by now. The iPhone form fac­tor just isn’t right for that.

So what device should I get to fill this huge gap in my soul? Prior to yes­ter­day I would have said a Macbook. The thing is, I don’t want a Macbook, or any lap­top for that mat­ter. First there is the price. $1000 dol­lars to start is too much moolah for a device that is only going to be used on my patio, in a pub or when I travel (which is rare). Second, I don’t want to deal with the has­sle of main­tain­ing a sec­ond, fully func­tional com­puter. Sure, iTunes shar­ing and Mobile Me sync help with this, but the bot­tom line is that I would still be run­ning a full OS X instance just to browse the web, read a book, draft an email or write a blog post. For those who would counter, “get a net­book,” I would respond, “Fuck you in the ear, ass­hole.” My hands are already too fucked up, last thing I need is typ­ing on a netbook.

Which brings us to the iPad. For me, for my use cases, since I don’t already own a lap­top the iPad looks to be per­fect for me. For other peo­ple, and other use cases that may not be so. As a lap­top alter­na­tive I think the iPad is won­der­ful. It has just enough of the horse­power, and very lit­tle of the over­head of a Macbook. Now, some­one click the Paypal but­ton and send me $830.

disclaimer…don’t actu­ally send me $800.