Even if the consumer is not concerned about a significant monthly bill for the service, you still have to get the iPad with the GSM interface if you want to have the iPad be a replacement for the Kindle.

I did not think the iPhone would fail. I thought it was an excellent idea, mostly because of my experience with previous smartphones' applications, which were theoretically useful, but a pain in the ass from pretty much every aspect. I wanted one from the get-go, but I didn't want to pay $70-$100 a month for service. (As mentioned elsewhere, I got a Nexus One and put my company-provided Blackberry's SIM card in it. That's the first iPhone-generation smartphone I've had.) I think that Apple tends to do a great job with integration, consistency, and just generally making the damn thing work.

As far as the iPhone goes, people already had experience with PDAs, and, in some cases, PDA-phones, and also phones that had applications on them. I think people were generally frustrated with them. The main thing that made the iPhone work was the fact that applications were easy to find, and were, barring bugs, guaranteed to work with your phone and your carrier.

People were happy to replace their existing cell phones and PDAs with a combination device that did both things better. (Okay, the phone itself has had some problems, but half of those were AT&T's fault, and the Apple ones seem to have actually been worked on.)

On the other hand, the iPad combines a number of disparate devices that people aren't clamoring to consolidate, and which already work pretty well on their own. I see two possible markets: a toy for people who already own those devices that they want, and the sole device for people who currently have none of them.

Let me take a step back and try to detail my points without being argumentative.

First, let's detail the bullet points of the iPad.

• Portable, but not so portable as a PDA or smartphone
• Bigger/higher-res screen than a PDA or smartphone
• Runs iPhone apps and iWork, but no other apps
• No physical keyboard
• Not a phone

Let's look at potential consumers:

The person who only has a laptop: The iPad would give him somewhat more portability at the cost of some flexibility. This person would need to feel that the savings of a few pounds is worth limited function (in comparison to his laptop) and $500. Would it replace his laptop? If not, in what situations would one be used over the other? Would he carry both certain places? Why?

The person who only has a PDA: The iPad would probably give him some interface improvement, an eBook reader, and a portable semi-standard office suite, but he wouldn't be able to carry it around in his pocket. It also wouldn't replace his cell phone. It's probably not going to replace his PDA, as he probably has that because he can take it everywhere. If this person got one, it would basically be a limited netbook. Unless he was particularly enamored with the tablet UI, a netbook would be cheaper and have more features. Or he could get a smartphone with similar features and retire his PDA.

The person who only has a smartphone: The iPad would give him an office suite and a usable eBook reader. The outcome here is similar to the person with the PDA.

The person who only has an eBook reader: Gains an office suite and a semi-portable PDA. If they got a smartphone or PDA instead, they wouldn't get the office suite, but they would have a universally portable device.

The person who has a laptop and a PDA/smartphone: People are largely going to carry their pocket device everywhere. If the person takes their laptop, there's no point in taking the iPad. If they forego the laptop for the iPad, they save some in weight, and lose a significant amount of computing flexibility. They don't gain an office suite or eBook reader, because they could have had that with their laptop.

The person who has a laptop and an eBook reader: Gains a semiportable PDA. I guess there's something to be said for people who want to travel light, but want to do some minor computing beyond what their eBook can do.

The person who has an eBook reader and a PDA: Gains an office suite.

The person who has all three: Again, this is toy territory.

The person who has none of those: It might make sense here for a couch-side device. Some web surfing while watching TV or whatever, and go to the desktop computer for serious work. I think the price point is too high for that, though.

Ultimately, the iPad is only more portable than a notebook in situations where small differences in weight are significant. In most situations, that's really not the case. It is when traveling a distance, especially by plane, where bulk can be an issue. (I assume that the iPad charges off of USB current, so its charger is likely to be significantly less bulky than a laptop's brick. Or do you have to have the docking station? Tangentially, what is the Air's charger like?) But imagine you're going down to the coffee house. You can take your iPad or your laptop. What factors would lead you to take one over the other?

The tablet form factor is advantageous in a few instances, like eBook reading and as a remote control, but really not many. Does getting a $500 device for those instances make sense, when it's likely mediocre at those tasks? (I still claim that an actively lit screen for an eBook reader is bad.)

To reiterate, the iPhone made the smartphone non-irritatingly functional. It did everything that previous smartphones could do, and did it better, plus more. The Kindle made ubiquitous reading possible. There was no way before to be at the airport and decide that you wanted to read that book you just heard about, and do it immediately (unless it was one of the three stocked at the weird airport bookstore), or take your whole library with you because you didn't know what you might want to read once you got there.

The iPad, though, has some nice features, but a number of significant drawbacks. It kind of takes a smattering of the ideas from several different products and smashes them together in a way that's, I'm sure, functional, but just doesn't do anything that couldn't already be done better. It's kind of like the Swiss Army knife of electronics. It can do a bunch of stuff, but it doesn't really do any of it particularly well. The difference is that you can't take it everywhere; you have to make a conscious decision to bring it along. It's like a Swiss Army knife that's got a gas station bathroom key fob attached to it. (Actually, maybe this will be a bigger hit than I expect with women who carry those gigantic purses with them everywhere. I don't know what they have in them now. Maybe it would be lighter than that complete printout of the Internet that they could fit in there.)

Phew. I hope I was less argumentative this time.