You may also use one of the gazillion flavors of a media center. But you need a PC to feed it. And a TV. Have you surfed on a TV? <insert puke here>
And there are no standards, no coherence between the various user interfaces, it's a jungle...
You could say Get a Mac. But a mac still is a tad expensive for Mr John Doe and is largely overpowered to read an mp3. A mac is more of a content creation machine. Not everybody needs a Royce to surf with.
And that's where the iPad fits. For people who won't photoshop or who won't studio this or that. For John Doe.
People who surf, watch movies, read books and listen some music. People who trust the iPod or Phone and want to scale up the experience with their mail, web, movies, books and cool apps.
Remember. Apple doesn't sell hardware. Apple doesn't sell software. Apple is selling a unique user experience. And Apple is great at it.
Of course the experience will be kinda locked in because Apple doesn't want your pleasure to be disrupted by bad-party software... But it's a seamless and quirkless trip. The iPad is just that. A kind of super sleek netbook, somewhat closed but reliable, intuitive and fun. Just as the iPod is the best of its class or the iPhone the sleekest and funniest phone, the iPad is your next book, web and content hub. It has one function. To get in your hands and have you enjoy it while exploring your media libraries...
Of course, everybody is free to disagree ;o)
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first published as a facebook note the 5th of April 2010 - 7:15PM
