My closed-minded brain can't see much use for that thing. I'm sure a lot of people will find it useful in some way or another.
I think, however, it fails in all things it seems to want to achieve. It doesn't work that well as a book reader (Kindle says hi), it doesn't work that well as a notebook (USB says hi, keyboards say hi) and it doesn't work that well as a games machine (iTouch/iPhone say hi not to say NDS says hi).
Notice these are opinions of someone who never touched the device. Oh and by the way, [insert proper pad joke].
1) Why doesn't it work as a book reader? The iBooks application is better than Kindle (It's in color, and you can change the fonts and text size), but if you still like the Kindle, there's an Amazon Kindle App for the iPad.
2) The dock port is USB, just proprietary. There is a both a software and hardware
wireless Keyboard, or
Keyboard dock.
3) Why doesn't it work as well as a game machine? There's no such thing as an "iTouch".
I know you told us at the end that you were ignorant, but why post at all?
Over half a million people are complete morons today, it would seem. Sales estimates I've seen are projected at around 700,000.
It's just fine to say you don't understand it, or see the use for it. Now you call everyone who bought one a moron? You're calling me a moron.
I realize I'm swimming upstream in this thread, and obviously I'm not as cool as the rest of you that think I'm a moron or a mindless Apple fan. Just so I can get ripped apart, here's my reasoning for buying one.
1) It's more than just a giant iPod Touch. ("iTouch" is not a thing). It has a custom A4 chip and actually runs full computer-like applications Keynote, Numbers and Pages (Think Apple's version of Powerpoint, Excel and Word). Me being a Realtor, I will bring it to someone's house and go through my listing presentation (a Keynote file). SInce it's a pad, they can sign electronic documents on it, and I can page through comparable sales and their as-built survey, and if they want to see how I advertise, I can take them though my web site using wireless or 3G.
Unlike a Netbook, it's not a throttled down computer. It's a hybrid of the iPhone and a laptop. Things are built to run in it specifically, with a completely different interface than a computer.
2) I travel a lot. I'm the president elect for my local board of Realtors, so this year I'm going to Washington DC, Chicago, New Orleans and Juneau (twice). It's a huge added bonus to be able to watch movies on something that light, yet with such a huge screen, plus I don't drain my iPhone's battery while I'm on the plane, get off the plane and I can't call the Hotel shuttle.
3) All the previous iPhone / iPod Touch apps will work on it. You just tap on them to blow them up. Also, may of the developers have already made updates so you have the same ones in native resolution, and there are completely separate iPad versions as well.
4) Since it's an apple product, I can connect it to Mobile Me and sync it with my 1550 contacts, calendars, Safari Bookmarks and Mail. It makes a great planner. With the iPhone it was a little stressful to try to input appointments on it while I'm talking on it at the same time. It can be done, but it isn't fun.
5) iTunes / iPod functionality, and everything it entails. I don't need to explain that.
6) I've been excited about switching to eBooks, since I have a whole room full of books that I am tired of moving around when I move houses. I still haven't been excited about the Kindle. It only does the one thing, and it's not in color, so any graphic novels or magazines won't work on it. So iBooks sounds much better to me. I just wish my iPad was here so I could go through and browse the books they have. I want to start planning which books I'm going to replace, and which ones I will keep.
Negatives - It should have a front-facing camera for video chat. That's important to some people. I don't need it, but I recognize that it's missing.
- Flash Memory is still too expensive. The largest capacity you can get is 64GB. I'm sure in future versions the HD capacity will be much higher.
- Doesn't completely multi-task. Apple made a conscious choice with the iPhone to limit the multi-tasking. You can talk on the phone or listen to music while you do one other thing. If you try the droid, reviews say that you can easily bring the phone to a screeching halt and kill the battery with multi-tasking. Why give people something else to complain about?
