You were. And for the first time you've put forth some valid concerns. However, these are concerns that, in the past, I've already agreed with for the most part. I've already told you that I agree with most of your thoughts on the general un-marketability of a typical tablet device. You don't have to convince me of these points and it wasn't these points at all that I was trying to diminish nor convince you of otherwise.

Many people made similar points about the iPhone. I will argue that the iPhone was a success well before the app store and availability of any third party apps. That most of its customers did not have any previous smart phone nor PDA. That is last part is more true today than it's ever been.

I do think that in making your use-cases for the iPad you've gone a bit extreme. The points are still valid for the most part, but they are very specific. And I concede that there are other cases out there or within your specific outlines that will garner many customers. If anyone can make this form factor succeed, it's Apple. If Apple can't do it, I don't think anyone else is going to do it within the next 5 years. Within that time, Apple, regardless of how well it sells this device, will do better than anyone else.



It's interesting you've said that because that's generaly been the consensus about tablet PCs. However, this device is not a PC. And Apple's main proposition is exactly the opposite of your statement. They set out to make a device that was better than a smart phone at some things. Better than a notebook at other things. And better than both at some things. I believe they actually said better that both in the keynote and didn't differentiate, but IMO, not every default feature is actually better than the experience on both those other device classes. eMail for instance I believe to be far superior on a notebook.

You don't need anything but the low-end $499 device without any 3G data to be able to do what the Kindle does now. Yes, the stipulation is that you do need another form of connectivity, namely a wifi connection. But this device isn't really something I think everyone will carry around out of their homes. In the home or coffee house situation, or even the airport situation, for the majority of people it completely supplants the need for a dedicated eBook reader and offers the possibility of reading the web, newspapers, magazines and comics. You can't do those things on the Kindle devices, not even the DX which costs the same price.

It's not something I think I could use every day. I barely use my iPod touch frankly. And while I've used an iPhone quite a few times, like you I just can't get over the subsidies and crappy contracts to break down and get one for myself.

You're running into the same problem so many others are. You just can't see this for being the middle device class between a phone and notebook. I can clearly see that and while it's not a class of device I need, I can see how Apple are positioning and molding it like no one else has before. The biggest advantage to this platform is Apple. I'm not arguing for the device class in general and that's an important point. I'm saying Apple's devices are going to make an impact. Everyone else will likely try to offer some catch-up device, but no one has anything of significant value to drop into this space at the moment.

Sure, you could slap Android on that MSI machine. What does that buy you? It doesn't buy you a better OS environment and it certainly doesn't buy you even close to the same number of usable and quality applications. It's going to be interesting how many optimized iPad apps are available at launch - quite a number of developers have already publicly announced they're jumping in with both feet.