Call it what you like, I am still thinking about buying one

It started with this sad feeling: is this the best Apple can do with a tablet? I was not so much focusing on the features, but on the interface. The iPad interface looks like a large iPod touch, while I expected something more outrageously ingenious. I completely expected something which would incorporate some of the things I have been researching here on multi-touch multi-monitor systems. But the next day I switched from thinking what the iPad was not, to what it actually is...

It is like the first generation iPhone, but this time around, everybody was expecting the "revolution" of the iPhone as it has been. Few people remember the lack of GPS, 3G, cut&paste, etc. The iPad is adequate for now, but lacks some major features, both in hardware and software. I get the omission of a fat USB-port, but I really would have liked a SD-card reader. We will probably see some Dock-connector to mini-USB cables for your camera, bypassing the converter. The software will probably see some (major) improvements on the home screen and will incorporate more multitasking elements. The will probably keep a lid on free multitasking, improving push-support to create a viable alternative.

So now to the "why would you want one?"-part. Well, the iPad is not some mobile device in the way we interpret "mobile" now. It certainly is mobile, but I see it more as a pad lying around your house. You could read books on it, but I have to see whether or not the screen is adequate for it, but I want it for reading shorter material. I get flooded in papers and excerpts to read for my courses, or magazine-styled news I want to catch up with. I also like to cook and always walk between my laptop in the study to the kitchen and back to read it. The iPad would be ideal for all those cooking, hobby and reference books we have somewhere (or do not, because we are cheap and we have the internet).

I really did not have any interest - besides curiosity - in an Apple tablet, just like I did with the iPhone introduction. But the iPad is not an Apple tablet, it is an Apple e-reader. Sure, you can do a lot of things on it which have nothing to do with reading, but a lot of features of the iPhone have nothing to do with calling people... It is a device in the format of a phone or e-reader (a pad!) and adds features which are useful in that format.

I could use an e-reader, but do I really need it?