A little something i'll try to send into the local paper

This is a response that I wrote to watching the newest shit on the iPad. I'll probably just send it in as a letter to the editor, but we'll see.

iPad? Not a Typo

I am literally blown away right now. Having just watched the informational video on Apple’s new brainchild, the iPad, I truly am impressed. Apple has done it again. The iPad is basically the combination of two of Apple’s most successful products, the iPhone and the Macbook. It is one giant screen, like an iPhone, but it is as large as a Macbook. However, the iPad is half an inch thick, just 1.5 pounds and has a screen a little less than 10 inches in length. Complete with a new set of applications specifically designed for the iPad, it has everything that was available on the other products as well.

They market this device as the ultimate Internet browsing experience, using the huge touch screen to manipulate the web page with your fingers. Aside from news and job-hunting, I haven’t spent much time “surfing” the web since I was fifteen, but I have to admit, it looks pretty appealing and easy on this thing.

It also seems to be a response or perhaps an extended impetus for eBooks. Until today, I thought the only real eBook reader was Amazon’s Kindle, but it appears all sorts of them are out there, including one by Sony. EBooks have always seemed silly to me. I love holding a book, flipping through the rough pages of an old one, and the feeling the crispness of a new one. Books will never be out of style for me, but again, Apple has made the prospect of downloading books a little more tempting. In fact, they have even created a store, exactly like iTunes but for books called…you guessed it, iBooks. I would have never bought just an eBook reader, but if it’s a part of something bigger, who knows? These two things just scratch the surface of what sets the iPad apart from other devices.

Of course, being purely touch screen there is no physical keyboard and that is huge no-no for me. But Apple has answer for that woe as well, having a dock and wireless keyboard at the ready. This thing makes my year old Macbook look like a computer from the fifties that took up an entire room, only to produce a simple math problem with the wrong answer. It is sleek, thin, and affordable, starting at $499 dollars.

Even as a twenty two year old, technology is getting a bit much for me these days. I can only imagine how the older generations are dealing with these advances. It seems every day there is a new program to learn and a new device to do it on, and the iPad is no exception. It takes everything to a new level and it really does look amazing. If all this technology is so readily available, I just have one question: Where’s my jetpack?