3 ms·

Convenience and price is how disruption starts. Why did anyone buy a cell phone if they had a landline? It was worse in every way, except portability.

• sliverstorm 16y ago
  Yeah, but what one way are tablets better than other things? You get to use your fingers? I'm still wholly unconvinced that is 'better'.
  • rudiger 16y ago
    One way? Simplicity. My feeling is that the iPad is considered better than laptops and netbooks because the Big Three operating systems (Windows, Mac, and Linux) are too complex for the vast majority of users. Of course, a simple OS should be possible on a non-tablet, non-phone device, but there's just too much baggage to just start from scratch. The iPhone/iPad had a clean slate.
  • othermaciej 16y ago
    One way: you can use it standing up. (There are other ways, but I hope this one is enough to satisfy your request and clear enough to not need a lot of debate.)
• mkr-hn 16y ago
  Except your option was a cell phone or a land line. In this case you've got a choice between smartphone, ultralight laptop, netbook, and tablet.
  • yardie 16y ago
    Your options were landline, cellphone, carphone, suitcase phone, VHF, and CB. Each one had their pros and cons. For example, Nextel IDEN phones had excellent PTT that rivaled VHF. The Nokia/Orange version was inferior in every way. Sprint eventually shutdown that band down and twitter (and facebook) took its place.
• rudiger 16y ago
  To be fair, portability is a huge deal.
  • burgerbrain 16y ago
    Since when are laptops not portable? It's not even like the ipad is particularly portable, like my regular laptop (although unlike my netbook.....) I cannot fit it in my pockets, I would need to carry a bag for it anyway. Throw in having to carry a keyboard and some sort of stand as well to make the thing actually usable, and suddenly laptops start looking way more portable.
    • rudiger 16y ago
      I was talking about phones.