My Early iPad Review
so far the iPad has been a pretty interesting and although i’ve had only for a week i think it’s still to early to tell on how useful a mobile device it will become. instead of trying to read the tea leaves of what it might become, i’m going to break it down in some smaller chunks:
Things I Like
- great to read magazine length multimedia content on the interwebs
- i also prefer it as a newsreader and really a perfect couch computer
- great for viewing photo slideshows and movies
- at the end of the day it shines as a media consumption device
Limitations
- not really great for content creation
- iWork is buggy, editing rich text documents without a mouse is a pain (although it’s been shown you can easily hack a Bluetooth mouse)
- it’s a pain in the ass to type on (in relation i prefer to type much more on my iphone) i have pretty big hands and i have to peck out words one letter at a time
- using it with a bluetooth keyboard makes you miss the mouse even more
- no good Twitter client yet (twitterific is ok, wish they had echofon)
- to heavy to read comforably in bed or on the couch
- iBooks are too expensive. no reason not to continue using amazon and their very good kindle app for the Ipad
- multitasking would make many programs much more useful (textexpander, pastebot, 1password)
- screen glare is a problem, although works better in landscape
- not many must have iPad specific app yet (i assume this will change by the end of the summer once developers have adequate time to create and test their iPad specific apps)
iPad vs. iPhone
- after using it for a week i was surprised to discover that my iPhone is better for messaging and typing short notes and email. i think the form factor of the IPad makes it really a tweener mobile device. to big to do the basic mobile tasks, and not robust enough to do more than basic word processing.
- on the other hand i have found when teathering to my iPhone it makes the iPhone/iPad combination very compelling. one device for the mobile bits and a more robust device for the larger more complex tasks (reading, basic word processing, basic music composition/improvisation)
- like i said above i prefer to day most text entry on the iPhone. the iPad is too big and heavy to even write a long email.
My Favorite iPad Apps
- Instapaper i use basically as a tool to read most of the content i find interesting on the interwebs. it’s fundamental function is to strip out all the excess pictures and adverts to leave you with a text only version of whatever article/blog you were wanting to read
- simplenote is my basic plain-text word processor on the iPad and iPhone. i’m using it right now to write this article. the best thing about it is that it easily syncs between any mobile device your desktops. kinda like what google docs and pages should eventually be doing. although i used to be a big evernote user, the ease of use and the quick syncing has made simplenote my main tool to keep jot down quick notes on the go
- comiczeal is a very simple and effective pdf/comic reader. and have finally been able to enjoy reading graphic novels on my ipad
- Todo i have been using todo on the iphone for quite a while and it’s Ipad cousin is well worth the upgrade. i wish they would eventually have an OSX version (like things), but i’m very happy with the iPad and Iphone versions
iPad Case
Netflix
Kindle iPad app
- i really like that you can easily sync books and share your bookmarks and annotations publicly. i find that it’s to heavy for reading for long periods of time and think my kindle 2 overall is a better bookreader. i also noticed today that it doesn’t have the % read line at the bottom of each page, which for some strange reason i seem to prefer.
iPad apps that show promise
SkyGrid
- it’s kind of a curated newsreader. i don’t have any clear idea how it works, but if i just want to catch up on the news it’s great place to start. i wish it had instapaper support or would let me open another browser to save an article for later, but for now all you can really do is email a link to yourself.
textexpander, pastebot, and 1password
- i’m starting to use these more and more between my macbook/iphone/ipad and i can see them becoming more useful when multitasking comes to OS 4 later this summer (and they release an iPad specific app)
iPad as a Music Controller
PatternMusic
- so far it’s the most interesting music performance app. it’s a pattern based looper (similar to the session view side of ableton live) one of the great things about it is that it starts to show the possibilities of using the ipad as a stand alone musical instrument (instead of just a controller) right now its sound pallete is limited and would be great if it offered midi out and the ability to internally record it’s own performances
ChipPad
- mp3 based sequencer in which you launch your own loops. it offers an interesting alternative to the session view and arrangement views in ableton live
Electrify
- seems like a ipad specific version of the Electribe/Groovebox, andcould be useful, but still haven’t figured out how to make it sing
Eliss
- really not a music controller, but a interesting generative music game that was pretty cool on the iphone, but is much cooler (b/c of the bigger size) on the iPad
also if you haven’t tried this out for your iphone/ipad, your really should.
kindle too?
admittedly i’m a pretty big tech geek and have been looking forward to using an ebook reader for quite some time. i commute by train and use much of that time preparing for lectures and have been looking forward to the day when i can replace many of my textbooks and reference materials with ebooks. on the other hand after getting burned a few too many times by new products i have learned to hold out for the 2nd generation so not to become an unofficial “beta tester” for when a company releases something that is not quite ready for prime-time.
with that out of the way i have to day i really like it and it easily succeeds at its main goal (as a device to read long form content). its already changing the way i read but i have to say this still feels like a 1st generation device. during the past couple of weeks i found myself looking for features that don’t quite work or are not consistently applied but i still think the possibilities are pretty amazing and could fundamentally change the way we read, catalog, and share information.
that is if they don’t screw it up.
questions
overall the kindle 2 brings up more questions than it answers. and i think the future success in ebooks lies in the following questions:
the iphone is a great example of one direction that kindle/ebooks could develop. its mostly open and offers seamless integration and access to content on and off the device. (except for itunes, although interestingly enough amazon has created a pretty seamless workaround to get music on iphones and ipods through their mp3 downloader)
need access to an address in an old email? (gmail has got you covered)
want to check your online accounts? (mint has a solution for you)
looking for a great restaurant nearby? (yelp will help you sort it out)
reading and annotating content
so far the kindle has the right idea. i can highlight and annotate content while i’m reading (which is great preparation for my lectures) but once its tagged there is not an easy way to organize and access that information. to be useful the experience needs to become as integrated into services like del.lic.ious or evernote which give me the ability to tag and annotate anything i read online and then access it from any computer or iphone/smartphone. this is already changing the way i read and process information, especially in teaching and composition. creating twitter rss feeds based on the keywords “fired” and “job” allowed me to sort through thousands of twitter messages on my iphone to create my new electronic piece “not getting fired is the new promotion”
Not Getting Fired Is the New Promotion
book publishers need to understand that by opening up their content and allowing us share excerpts of their content with our friends will only help them out. sharing an interesting passage from neil stephenson’s anathem about parallel universes (which i am currently reading on the kindle) or sending back and forth great quotes from edward gibbons’s the history and decline of the roman empire with my friend john could be invaluable (who is currently using it as a source on a new project) . i already do this with video, audio, news and blogs that i find online and whether or not the kindle (and book publishers) embrace keeping the content open will be the primary factor on its fate.
with all of this talk of how integration, tagging and sharing is changing the way we read i have to point out that
podcasts and the iphone have already fundamentally changed how i read
like i said before the kindle 2 is great for reading any long form content (and i have to admit i have been reading less and less fiction over the last few years). reading newspapers and magazines on the kindle 2 is a pretty good experience, but after a few days i realized that preferred ‘reading’ the news on my iphone (through google reader rss feeds) or by listening to summaries of the news through podcasts (new york times, slate, the economist, la observed, kpcc radio, npr’s planet money…) i know for many podcasts (think tivo on the radio) still haven’t become mainstream, although last weeks podcast of the newly unemployed adam carrola and the king of podcasting’s leo laporte is a must listen if you want to hear the future of this technology. but when it comes to the news, i found i found that listening to the summaries of the daily news far more useful (while driving my car or riding on the train) than reading them online/kindle/paper. if something is really important or catches my eye, i’m more apt to bookmark it in my google reader (on my iphone) and then download it to the kindle 2 so that i can really ‘read’ it.
untapped potential
the potential of the kindle 2 and ebooks is pretty amazing. but here are a few innovations that could really make the kindle 2/ebooks better:
- i want to be able to click on any article and have it sent to the kindle 2. i’ll be happy to pay for it with micropayment or even pay a monthly subscription fee (like emusic) to a consortium of publishers to have this access (btw… your going to have to update your content throughout the day to stay relevant. slate is doing this well ($2.49 a month which i’m happy to pay for the convienence even though i can get it for “free” online), the and new york times (at $13.99 a month is not)
- i like reading magazines on the kindle, but the way the articles are presented, formatted and organized is very inconsistent between publishers. in general, browsing and reading articles on the kindle is very poorly designed.
- adding illustrations would help. they do it very well in the new yorker and many of my books. so why not in newsweek and the new york times? (although they seem to be adding more each week)
- i want to be able to tag and footnote what i read and integrate it into my social networking (delicious, digg, google reader) so i can easily share it with my friends while creating a library of bookmarks and annotations that are easily accessible for future projects.
update 031209
one big problem with the kindle 2 iphone reader is that you cannot sync any public domain books or .pdf’s (and newspapers and magazines that we paid for) to read on your iphone, this is a big problem. if we are going to be able to “sync” the device. we should be able to sync all of the content.
