iPad or iPad Which One?

Fully agree. People seem to be slating the iPad for not being as good a reading experience as the Kindle, yet are happily ignoring the fact that the Kindle does far less useful stuff than the iPad.

I think e-readers in general are expensive one-trick ponies compared to what the iPad appears to offer. Not that I'll buy either to be honest, but the iPad bashing seems to be a little ridiculous.

You'll struggle, I think, to demonstrate that I'm incompetent, or indeed that matters have "turned out" in the way you've described here - but please do go ahead, I'll enjoy laughing at you.

Otherwise, I think we can safely disregard what you've typed, I'm afraid.

I wouldn't for a moment suggest that it will be a commercial failure; just the opposite I'm sure. But an awful lot of those people who do buy it will be buying it because it's the latest status symbol. Or perhaps, in many cases, because they don't realise that a small laptop or even a netbook would provide them with the functionality they need at considerably less expense, and indeed might prove to be more generally useful to them.

In a purely logical world you would be right. Consumers would make any purchase decision purely on funcionality meeting their specific needs.

Meanwhile, back on planet Earth, functionality meeting needs is only one variable which consumers take into account before a major purchase. The most important of these variables has always been and will always be desire. A product could be the best in the world in terms of funcionality, but until someone says "I want that" it counts for nothing.

This desire comes from appearance, price, opinion of peers, trends, etc. but rarely functionality. This is evidenced time and time again across all sorts of consumer goods:

iPod isn't necessarily the best mp3 player
Dysons aren't necessarily the best vacuum cleaners
Designer labels aren't necessarily the best clothes
SMEG don't necessarily make the best fridges
The list goes on.

People might well be better off with a netbook than an iPad, but they don't want a netbook, they want an iPad. If they bought a netbook they would be sat using it wishing they had bought an iPad.

You're speaking as if this sort of scenario never existed before the iPad, but it has been around as long as there have been things for people to buy, and will be around as long as we are.

I see.

So it's okay for you to casually insult all the Mac users on this forum, but you get the hump if I turn the tables on you?

Nobody should insult anybody. A discussion about iPads or anything else does not need to turn personal.

You know people, some good natured fun is fine by me, but let us try to remember..
huge corporations, electronics, products....
it's a debate, lets not be football hooligans overit....

unless you guys want to get together to kick a round a football ( I love that phrase, we call them soccer balls)...

then some of us could go all hooligan while the rest enjoy the photo op...
then debate about wether it's tacky to post images of the ensuing carnage on flicker..


seriously, back to the debate...

Sony's Beta format was vastly superior to VHS but longer recording times, lower prices, and content providers fearing loss of thier industry to Sony dictated the outcome...

What makes this product different in my opinion?

Sony wasn't offering a dying industry a lifeline...
Apple is....

link
case in point.

As Don has pointed out, content is king, and is often all but forgotten in arguments over gadgets / specs etc.

Google for Kindle and Macmillan for another example.

Another interesting fact to take into consideration when considering how you would publish an ebook would be the 125 million iTunes accounts that have active credit cards. A large audience to publish to that already know how to buy content.

Imagine your copy of Amateur Photographer being delivered every week with videos to watch, easy ways to vote on photo competitions. My other half for one would most welcome not having piles of magazines all over the house. You may even say that this will never happen, but before you do remember that 98% of single sales are now downloads.

This is not a gadget trying to replace a laptop, as anyone who has seen the keynote will know, so any comparisons to laptops are, in my eyes, pointless. It's a gadget to enjoy content on, that has other advantages, designed to go in a gap between a smart phone and a laptop, simple as that. If that isn't what you need, then look elsewhere.

Can already see Don taking one with him to meet clients and show off his photos on it!

Al right I was too fast with one post but where did I hit the nail so wrong that it is embarrassing?
Besides the iWork thing that is

Like said the ipad is for email, web and multimedia and not really design for work or am I wrong?

I don't believe anyone said that in those lines, just that an electronic paper is more pleasant to read then a TFT/LCD screen, nothing more nothing less.
Also coloured version are being prototyped for some time now and we might see them really soon.
So Danny, it seems the advice you gave me also is true for you
But hey, no one is all knowing
http://www.mirasoldisplays.com/ereader/

Wasn't it because Sony banned porn on the Betamax or is that all an urban myth?

Wasn't there a third player as well and what about the laser (video) disc and the the newest loser, HDDVD.

For photos everyone says it's important that you must calibrate the screen to get good colours so can you do that on an iPad, or would it be accurate enough out of the box...

I'm not questioning the device but just showing some concern of a matter we photographers take serious...

AP is more about the adverts, so the thought of an electronic version is unwieldy and not at all useful. Not to me at least. EPZ is my electronic magazine and I use that for the gallery mainly.

I didn't actually get the hump. Neither did I refer, even by implication, to all the Mac users on this forum.

I don't think I am. I'm only pointing it out here because it's pertinent to the discussion, not because it's a unique phenomenon. I only wish it were.