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iPad, therefor iAm
Posted by: automatix on Jul 12, 2010
I've been the proud owner of an iPad for exactly four weeks now, and where I was a staunch nay sayer in the beginning, I now find myself converted to the iCause. Firstly, let me make clear that I am not an Apple fanboy. I don't have any tattos of fruit, nor do I bash anything PC.
"I'm never getting an iPad," used to be my stock reply whenever the subject came up. Steve Jobs said it was designed to plug the gap between your laptop and your desktop. I had no such gap. Furthermore, people hailed it as the greatest ebook reader yet, but I had no interest in ebooks. Paper is still where it is at, baby.
But then I saw one in the flesh. I stroked its smooth metal edges, and I felt its reassuring weight in my paws. And I fell in love. Granted, it looks like an iPhone on steroids, but as a famous car designer once said when asked why his new Jaguar looks a lot like the Aston Martin he'd also designed: "How is that a bad thing?" Indeed.
So I went all-in and purchased the 64GB version with WiFi. There weren't any 3G models available yet, so I figured I'd get by with my stonking little MiFi device. This awesome piece of kit allows you to hook up up to five devices in a wireless setup. It is the size of a credit card (a fat one!), and it has four hours of battery life. And that ain't bad...
Looking back, I should've probably waited for the 3G version - but that might still come. For now, however, the MiFi works quite alright, thank you. And if you jailbreak your iPhone, you don't even need a MiFi, as you can then share your Internet connection from your iPhone wirelessly with your iPad. Or, if you have a Nokia (or other Symbian phone), you can just purchase Joikuspot, and get exactly the same thing.
In the mean time my love affair with the iPad has grown into a fully fledged case of obsession. I don't go to the toilet without it anymore, as it now contains all the books I am reading, all the comics I want to read, all the music I enjoy and many movies, podcasts and TV shows that I find amusing - both on the toilet and off. As a matter of fact, it is absolutely invaluable when travelling, and thanks to the 10 hours of battery life, you really can watch a lot of stuff on a long-haul flight.
Did I mention that all my books are on the iPad now? Yes they are. Despite my love for all things pure, paperback books have one major flaw: They're made of paper. And paper weighs a lot. So when I travel, I usually take one book in my carry-on, and one more in the hold of the aircraft. But now I take 20-odd books with me, plus all my comics, DVDs and CDs, and it weights no more than a single book! And using iBooks is absolutely easy. I can hardly imagine reading a normal book again. How sad.
And the keyboard is suprisingly handy. I can write short articles or TV scripts on it without any problems, and then e-mail or Dropbox or whatever it right from the iPad. The games are awesome, the mapping apps are great, and if you have a US iTunes account (let me know if you need help setting one up), the world really is your oyster.
I still don't think I have a gap between my desktop and my laptop. But the space between them has become really cosy with an iPad nestled there. And by the looks of things, I'm not going to let go of mine any time soon...
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