Why The iPad Is Disappointing (So Far)

I think it is pretty safe to say that many people are slightly (if not more) disappointed with the announcement of the iPad (Apple’s new Tablet computer). I surely am. While a tablet computer is what I asked for, the end result that Apple provided is disappointing. Why is that? I did some thinking and came up with the following reasons as to why the iPad is such a letdown (so far).

The biggest reason I can see people being disappointed with the iPad is due to the fact, it really didn’t introduce anything new. When the iPhone was announced, Apple introduced a lot of new features and things that hadn’t been done before – multi-touch, buttonless (except for the home button), touch screen, a huge full color display, visual voicemail, fully functional mobile web browser (though no Flash even to date), etc. These were all things no one had seen before. Today, it is expected to be common place on all Apple products and I would even go as far as all smart phones (e.g. Droid, Nexus One, Palm Pre, etc). So the fact that the iPad is really nothing more than a giant iPod/iPhone thus far is a disappointment simply because it’s nothing new. We all expected something completely revolutionary.

It doesn’t have a camera which was something I think a lot of people were expecting right off the bat. A camera would be great for video conferencing with people on Skype. I mean, after all there is already a Skype app in the App Store.

Sure you can buy books, but I think a lot of people would like to be able to subscribe/purchase magazines and newspapers via their iPad. Not to mention how much that could help save the newspaper industry.

While both the camera and the ability of being able to subscribe and/or purchase magazines and newspapers from the iPad may be a possibility in the future, they currently aren’t and that is disappointing.

Additionally, the lack of background processes (which is we are expected to see in iPhone OS 4.0 or maybe even 3.2) is another disappointment.  I read an article yesterday where the author praised the iPad and one of his points absolutely baffled me.  Here’s an excerpt:

As many Apple-watchers had predicted, the device runs a version of the iPhone operating system. This itself is a breakthrough. Apple is departing from—if not dispensing with—the multi-window, desktop metaphor that it invented with the Mac and that has come to dominate PCs via Windows. The iPad has no windows. Like on the iPhone, all programs take up the entire screen, commanding constant attention.

Are you kidding? A breakthrough? Any computer with the inability to handle multiple processes or windows at once is a step backward, not a step forward. That even includes an iPhone if you think about it as a mobile computer as well as a phone.

Nonetheless, I see some major potential in this device (more on that in a later post) and I expect the second generation to much improved similar to the way the iPhone 3G was to the original iPhone.