Yeah man, your not getting the point of the post. I said they have the better opportunity to define the market, which they do.
I really like Czachorski's post, really well thought out. But my problem with it is why did apple make this only for old people and they want it for a commuter, but won't be able to use it like that either. At some point, they are gonna run into a wall. They will go to a website to look at a video, but wont be able to. They will go to download something, but won't be able to. So even they will need a laptop or desktop still. But I really like your post, and I can see how they wanted to position it. I just think even that market would grow frustrated at it's limitations. That and touch screen keyboards are too new for them haha.
I think people are forgetting that i said the iPad is a great product, it is really good at some of the stuff it does. I just don't get why jobs said it is a net book replacement, when net books do some things better. It is better at viewing the web, just not more fun to use to do it. It is better at content creation, just a lot slower to use. It's even better at content consumption, you aren't locked to getting everything from one place. So if you judge it just like jobs said you should, is it better than a net book, overall the answer is no. It just beats it in speed and ease of use.
Before Apple hits that wall, they will evolve the device, just as they always do, and also preserve their very high standards of top-notch user experience while adding those additional features. It's an approach that works real well for them, and they have yet to hit a wall with it when used in the past on the iPod and iPhones. Remember for just a second, that the first iPhone has zero apps available for it other than the 10 or so that Apple shipped it with. No app store, no vendors, no way to do anything with the phone other than those few Apple apps. The original iPod was Mac only, for god sakes. Can you cripple yourself right out of the gate more than that? And yet Apple focused on user experience, incrementally improved the device while preserving these high standards, and emerged as the market leader with a highly functional device without sacrificing the end user experience. It's what they do.
I think I see better where you are coming from, hearing your perspective of how netbooks are better than an iPad for many things, for you. They key words here being "for you", because I think most people in the market for a true mobility computer would disagree or not care about most of what you listed as netbooks advantages. The market will bear this out (or you could say
is bearing this out, judging by the huge iPad sales in the first 8 days).
For example, I hear many people make the claim, just as you did, that you are "locked in" to getting
everything in one place. This is not an accurate statement at all. The
only thing that this it is actually true for is the app store, and I think that most people won't care or notice, because 1) there are thousands of vendors providing apps, not just Apple, and 2) people will see the high quality app user experience that results from having the app development process tightly regulated by Apple, and will value that over being able to buys apps from multiple "stores". As far as ALL other content, you are absolutely not locked in, with the ability to get music, videos and even books from other sources besides Apple.
I don't understand the comment about netbooks being better to surf the web. I find surfing the web on a touch screen to be far superior and convenient than using a tiny touch pad on a small mini-laptop. If you were referring to the inability to download files, as previously stated, there are 3rd party apps like GoodReader that do this now, and I am sure the clunky file management is something Apple will address later (all part of that incremental improvement process that they use so well).
I also think that the statement about netbooks being superior for content creation would be disagreed by many. With apps like pages, numbers, keynote, Omnigraffle, Autodesk's Sketchbook Pro, ArtStudio, Bento all available for iPad in the first week, with a tidal wave more coming, all with interfaces
custom designed for the iPad's touch screen interface, I think the content creation potential of this platform is very high. Were developers custom designing apps to run on the form factor of netbooks (I honestly don't know, having never explored it, but I would doubt it). Was the hardware of those netbooks and the OS they were running custom designed to optimize performance and work together to enhance the end user experience? I know with more certainly that was not the case.
Netbook makers slapping a copy of Windows on their underpowered computers and hoping that content creation apps designed to work on much more powerful hardware and with much more screen real estate simply results in a miserable content creation user experience. It's like netbook makers are starting with 2 strikes against them and batting with a kiddie-plastic bat for the ability to generate a good user experience with all their limitations in their approach, business model, hardware integration, software vendor model and OS licensing model.
This is the real advantage that Apple has with the iPad, and why I believe that it is absolutely a netbook killer. I also believe it will finally tap the gigantic untapped market that netbooks started to tap and never fully reached - people seeking a true mobile solution with a good user experience.
So perhaps, "for you" a netbook may be a superior device, but I believe that your case will be the exception, so much so that I believe that the iPad will be the death of netbook as we now know them.
