Apr 06 2010
This is a first for me, but I’m not lusting after the iPad
Call me strange, but the iPad is the first device from Apple in a long time that I haven’t lusted after. The iPhone was revolutionary; the iPod was as well. But the iPad looks too much like a mish-mash of phone and computer, with too much of one (the phone) and not enough of the other (the computer).
This is weird for me, because usually I buy right into the hype that goes along with a new Apple device — I gladly drink the Kool-Aid, if you will. But the iPad Kool-Aid tastes a little too acidic, and like a four year-old’s disappointment when he doesn’t get what he wants, I feel like throwing a tantrum.
I know what would have sent me over the moon with the iPad: Mac OS X. I would have been doing fucking somersaults if it ran Mac OS X. But since it is just an overgrown version of the iPhone, I’m very disappointed.
My netbook still beats it on webcam, desktop application and Flash support. Is Flash really that important? Unfortunately yes, as it is the de facto standard for video on the web. A lot of multimedia sites (like movie websites) rely heavily on Flash. And despite Apple’s desires to the contrary, not everyone is going to be off VHS immediately just because Apple released a DVD player. Yes, the DVD player is much sexier, but it will be ten years before everyone (i.e. webmasters that paid ridiculous amounts of money for Flash-based websites) is using HTML5 and not Flash. So Flash is a fact of life that the iPad is in denial of. Apple and Adobe can do all the name calling of each other that they want; Mac OS X would have solved all these problems.
If the iPad miraculously supports Flash in Safari sometime soon, then I will reconsider. If it gets a webcam I’ll reconsider. If it ran Mac OS X I would jump on it like a dog in heat. If someone hacked it that would be great. But as long as it runs the iPhone OS, I’ll just wait for something else.
Hell, even the HP Slate is looking better than the iPad right now. And that’s a Microsoft product!
