The Future is Here

There's been a lot of talk lately about a bevy of tablet devices due to hit the market for this year's Christmas shopping season.  If you believe the rumors, no less than ten devices from several well-known manufactures will join Apple, Dell and Samsung in a bid to capitalize on this nascent market currently dominated by Apple's iPad.  Like the Dell Streak and Samsung Galaxy Tab, most of these new tablets will be Android devices and each manufacturer will add their own customization in an attempt to differentiate themselves.  The one company not following this formula is HP.  Having recently bought Palm, Inc., Hewlett Packard has announced they will be introducing several WebOS (the portable device operating system Palm introduced with the Palm Pre smartphone) devices before Christmas.  As 2009 was the year of the net book, 2011 will no doubt be the year of the tablet.  In my opinion, for good reason.

I was first in line for the iPad, ordering it the first day Apple offered it for sale.  Aside from my "techno-lust" disorder (a story for another day) and compulsion to own virtually everything Apple has to offer, I immediately saw the potential of the new form factor.  I've been an iPhone user since its introduction in 2007 and have become completely enamored with its capabilities and ease of use.  Like many other iPhone and iPod Touch users, the thing I longed for most was a larger screen.  While iPad critics lament the fact that the device is simply a "big iPod Touch", we fans understand the larger (10") form factor increases the utility of the device at least ten-fold.  Lets face it, while web browsing, e-book reading and video viewing are quite doable with the iPhone, they are just that, doable. The iPad's larger screen make these tasks a real pleasure.  The form factor also lends itself quite well to newspaper and magazine content.  The New York Times, Wall Street Journal and several other publications have introduced apps for viewing their content and the iPad has become my preferred method for reading them.  Apple introduced "iBooks" and an electronic book store when the iPad shipped and Amazon supplies a free Kindle app for reading their books.  Between the two, I haven't bought a paper book since.  According to many, consuming published content electronically will soon be the only way to do so as printing and distributing paper will quickly become cost-prohibitive.  Several smaller publications have already abandoned their print versions and USA Today is making similar noises.  It may not happen next month or next year, but I'm sure it will happen eventually.

While consuming media is greatly enhanced by the tablet form-factor, creating it goes from near-impossible on a cell phone to quite easy.  The best smart phones are just adequate for creating e-mail and writing notes and text messages.  By contrast, I'm writing this article on my iPad using Apple's "Pages" app.  The on-screen keyboard is infinitely more usable on the larger screen and the iPad allows connection of a Bluetooth keyboard.  With the addition of Apple's camera kit ($29), virtually any USB keyboard will work.  Every rumored tablet I've seen will offer the same capability.  Many will also sport cameras (both front and rear-facing), HDMI ports for connecting to HDTVs and a host of other options.  The good news: tablet producers are just getting started.

Samsung is already complaining about tablets cannibalizing their PC (mostly netbook) sales.  I'm not sure how true that is, but sales of smaller laptops have definitely taken a dive of late.  With iPads sold out almost everywhere, the story makes sense, but PC makers seem to enjoy blaming Apple for their woes.  Just because iPad sales number almost 4 million and notebook sales are down significantly, there's no way to prove consumers are choosing one over the other.  What is true:  The same manufacturers who were building net books a year ago are now producing tablets.  They seem pretty convinced that's what's happening.  Why is all this good news?  Because competition is good for us consumers.  The more companies there are competing for our tablet dollars, the higher the likelihood of more features and/or lower prices.  Good, old-fashioned capitalism.  You gotta love it.

For us geeks, the dream of a paperless world where documents only exist as electronic bits on a thin handheld screen began on the bridge of the starship Enterprise.  For those of us old enough to remember the 70s, tablet computers fulfill a thirty-plus year fantasy.  Obviously, Steve Jobs understands this.  Just before introducing the iPad, he said it was "the most important project of his life".  Considering his prior accomplishments, the Apple I & II, the MacIntosh, iMac, iPod and iPhone to name a few, that places the iPad atop a very prestigious hill.  For now, geeks like myself account for the vast majority of tablet sales.  That's usually the case when a new technology is introduced.  I suspect that demographic will change significantly after this Christmas.  My iPad attracts attention whenever I take it out in public.  Complete strangers have approached me in restaurants asking how I like my new gadget and wanting to get a closer look.  I know this evidence is completely unscientific, but others in the tech community have similar stories.  Some may question the public's desire for a tablet device, but it's obvious to me.

Since my iPad arrived, my laptop sees less and less use.  The iPad is infinitely more portable and performs many tasks just as well.  It has become my default device for e-mail, web surfing and reading books, newspapers and magazines.  I also find myself doing more and more work on the device, like writing this article.  With hundreds of thousands of apps available through Apple, I'm sure I've just scratched the surface.  There is quite literally, something for everyone.  My daughter plays several different games and while not a gamer myself, Apple has just opened a new game center for playing hundreds of titles on-line and I admit to spending some time there.  The iPod Touch has recently become the best-selling portable game device, outselling both the Playstation Portable and the Nintendo DS last quarter.  All the games designed for the Touch work perfectly on the iPad and new, iPad-specific games are introduced daily.

The most exciting part of using a tablet is realizing these devices are in their infancy.  As I'm finding more uses for my iPad every day. I can't help but wonder what they'll be like a couple of years from now.  It's certain they'll get faster, more capable and less expensive.  Today, an iPad does enough to replace some people's computer altogether.  It doesn't take much imagination to see that happening regularly in the very near future.   My iPad is as powerful as my desktop of seven or eight years ago.  At the rate these things normally progress, in just a few years a tablet may be all the computer any of us need.  Maybe the creators of Star Trek weren't as forward-thinking as we once believed.