6 ms·

Nobody Knows What an iPad Is Good for Anymore

47 points by iamben 12y ago

russnewcomer 12y ago
I'm a developer, but my iPad is my primary computing device while at home. My laptop died about a year ago, and I decided to save money and just use the iPad that I got as a Christmas bonus. About the only thing I ever feel I lack is legacy support for older Windows games. With the occasional keyboard pairing for longer emails, I would say that the only thing it really lacks is the ability to archive photos from my camera. Maybe I'm in the minority here in that I specifically don't do any development or really intense computing tasks at home, but I think that my use case mirrors much of the non-technical world. I know of many people who use iPads as their primary computing devices. I think it's more accurate to say that tech journalists don't know what an iPad is good for anymore.
blueskin_ 12y ago
Did we ever know? I will concede that it was good for the random user doing some casual internet use while watching TV before phones got big enough for that, but I would contest if it ever had a single unique use other than that even at launch. Any device with a single purpose seems likely to fail, I think. >Innovations like automatic transmission I'd count that (or indeed, tablets) an 'innovation' in the same way as PRISM or systemd. Sure, it is one in that it's new and a different approach and even helps a very specific class of users, but not a net positive. I guess that's just the state of the world though, that we will always be forced to accept 'innovation' that does nothing but make life hard for the power user, the enthusiast, the person with an above-room-temperature IQ. >had to be “far better” than a phone or a laptop That's where it gets interesting, I think. As stated above, better than a phone contemporary to its launch, yes, but it was never better than a laptop bar "easier to pick up and carry around", which rarely applied to what are so often sofa-bound devices, or shoved into a backpack on a long journey at most.
- ceejayoz 12y ago
  > I guess that's just the state of the world though, that we will always be forced to accept 'innovation' that does nothing but make life hard for the power user, the enthusiast, the person with an above-room-temperature IQ. I like how not wanting to use computing devices in the same way you like to is a mental defect in your world. Wow.
  - toothbrush 12y ago
    The way the GP put it is a little harsh, yes, but i can see where they're coming from. Personally, i think a device that "just works" is great. Really. For certain people (i agree, not low-IQ people, just non computer enthusiasts). And this is where the iPad shines. My gripe, though, would be that it doesn't cater to the power user who wants to modify components and software / create (whether that be a novel, a song, or a piece of software) in the same way that a general-purpose (and i'd go as far as to say open-source/libre software) computer does. I like hacking at my editor and being able to plug in an Arduino, and an iPad wouldn't let me do that. Having said all of that, my response is: if that is a deal-breaker for you (like it is for me), don't buy an iPad. Simple. The iPad has it's target market very well defined and served (even if i do lament the fact that it's such a DRM / walled garden / evil spying companies experience, where the user is the product).
    - mikeash 12y ago
      I can't really see where they're coming from. The existence of an easy tool doesn't eliminate the more powerful tools, and even advanced users sometimes want easy tools. I'm a computer power user by any reasonable definition. I program for a living, I customize a lot of stuff, and I get pretty upset whenever I try to run an unsigned binary and my Mac decides this is too unsafe and makes me jump through hoops to make it happen. But I also use my iPad a lot. If I'm reading on the couch or watching a video, it gets the job done much better. It's fine to say that it's not for you, but it's ridiculous to say that simpler tools must only be for people who are incapable of using advanced tools.
      - autoreleasepool 12y ago
ZanyProgrammer 12y ago
My iPad Air is much better than any phablet for reading books on Kindle-and lets me honest, the way tablets and phones are designed these days, its not like carrying an iPad Air and my trusty 5s takes up a lot of weight or space. There's practically no weight/space penalty these days for carrying a dedicated phone and tablet.
ebiester 12y ago
The iPad is good for letting me keep my work and play separate. I play on the iPad -- I work on my (linux) laptop.
turnip1979 12y ago
Bit of a stupid title. The iPad has changed my my mom's life and those of her siblings (all retired). My father clings to his PC and constantly asks for tech support. My mom went from having to be taught how to use a mouse (double click was her nemesis) to be able to play games, browse the web, send email and most recently - Facetime! It has significantly improved her quality of life and I am really glad this tech exists. I am in my 30s and the iPad is pretty useful for me as a device that just works and provides access to books, the web and YouTube. Heck, we use it as an awesome remote when we cast YouTube or Netflix to our apple tv, ps3, chromecast, etc.
- salimmadjd 12y ago
  Same story here. My mom was also an IT support headache (for me) and now on her iPad she forwards me email, photos (a new headache) uses it for Skype and other connectivity tools. I told her to buy a new laptop, she said everything she needs to do iPad can do it. She likes it so much that she bought my grandmother an iPad...
- mikeash 12y ago
  I agree about the title. As best I can tell, when they say "nobody" they mean "nobody in the marketing department." In short, there's no single overarching theme that describes what iPads are good at, so it's hard to advertise. Personally, I use my iPad pretty much the same as you do. When it comes to casual web browsing, reading, or videos, the experience is a lot better than a laptop.
  - tessierashpool 12y ago
    I agree about the title. As best I can tell, when they say "nobody" they mean "nobody in the marketing department." In short, there's no single overarching theme that describes what iPads are good at, so it's hard to advertise. Mainstream media continues to be surprised by the numerous use cases of a Turing machine.
    - marcosdumay 12y ago
boca 12y ago
Barring the title, the article touches upon some right notes. Ipad quarterly sales are down by about 21% YOY going by the latest quarterly earnings report from Apple (1). With the Iphone 6 and Iphone 6 plus coming out, I guess there's not much reason, except for certain use cases, for people to buy an Ipad. Apple surely recognizes that and is probably looking to reverse the trend with the rumored Ipad Pro (2). (1) http://venturebeat.com/2015/01/27/apple-breaks-its-sales-records-with-74-5m-iphones-in-q1-2015-but-ipad-sales-decline-21-to-21-4m/ http://venturebeat.com/2015/01/27/apple-breaks-its-sales-rec... (2) http://www.macworld.co.uk/news/ipad/big-screen-ipad-pro-plus-release-date-rumours-leaked-images-stylus-3492180/ http://www.macworld.co.uk/news/ipad/big-screen-ipad-pro-plus...
- pivo 12y ago
  I used to work for Gazelle, a company that buys used iPhones, iPads, etc. from consumers. We found that the iPads we bought were generally in much worse shape than the iPhones. We believed this suggested that people were using their iPads quite a bit. Anecdotally, among my friends and family iPads are in almost constant use. So even if we don't know what iPads are good for we seem to use them a lot. I wonder how much of this is just that people are not upgrading their iPads as often as they upgrade their phones. I'm still relatively happy with my iPad 2 and I've had three different iPhones during the time I've owned it. A lot of my friends are in similar situations. I think we all kind of agree that iPads are too expensive to justify frequent upgrades, especially when they're still useable. I bought an iPhone 6 Plus thinking it would replace the iPad but found that, while I still really like the 6 Plus' size, it doesn't really work that well for prolonged reading or the lazy internet surfing the author mentions in the article.
  - JoeAltmaier 12y ago
    The market for pads has peaked, right? Means people are using other things, not upgrading/replacing pads. Maybe because phones are bigger?
  - digikata 12y ago
    I think your observations re: Gazelle point to the situation that telecom companies drive shorter upgrade cycles for phones, often hiding their cost and allowing three year upgrades. In contrast people generally pay full price for tablets, and upgrade less frequently.
bradleyjg 12y ago
My computing devices are: an iphone (4s), an ipad (air 2), and a windows computer with a 27" monitor. I also have a kindle, but that's not general purpose. I could probably replace the computer and ipad with a macbook, but 1) it would cost more money and 2) wouldn't be as mobile and easy to use as the ipad (for surfing in bed / on the couch, watching movies while eating, listening to music) or as usable as the windows computer (for coding and playing games) because of the smaller screen size and the relatively crappy keyboard / mouse. I could remedy the latter limitations with a docking station, separate monitor and keyboard, but now the solution is not just more expensive but much more expensive and even more cumbersome as compared to the ipad.
roozbeh18 12y ago
My Mom practically pays all her bills, watches youtube, does whatever she wants with her iPad. Same for other family members who aren't computer savvy and just need to get by.
programminggeek 12y ago
This is a dumb article. Sales growth has slowed because iPads are computers and don't have a 2 year repurchase cycle. There are only so many people out there who don't own a tablet of some kind and an iPad will last a lot longer than an iPhone. The iPad 2 is still a very good tablet for a lot of people. Not a huge reason to upgrade until it breaks. Also, nerds might not love it, but my wife adores her Kindle Fire HD and uses it all the time. For recipes, surfing the web, and watching videos, that is all she needs.
- AmVess 12y ago
  I agree that the article is dumb. Apple sells two Ipads a second every second of every day of the year, which tells me a lot of people know exactly what an iPad is good for.
- slantyyz 12y ago
  >> iPads are computers and don't have a 2 year repurchase cycle If you regularly update to the latest OS release, you will barely get past the second year. In my experience, "the final major version OS to run on any iOS device" is generally annoyingly slow. It might be better these days, but it wasn't the case with my original iPad, iPhone 3G and 4. I'm glad I told my wife not to update her 4S to 8 (i.e., the final major version that will be available for the 4S), because updating to 7 had already noticeably slowed down her phone.
  - mikeash 12y ago
    iPads are different, because Apple refuses to retire the iPad 2. Officially they don't sell it anymore, but they still sell the original iPad mini, which is just an iPad 2 with a smaller screen. iOS 8 needs to work well on an iPad 2 in a way that iOS 8 doesn't need to work well on an iPhone 4S.
  - programminggeek 12y ago
    There are literally millions of computers happily running Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7, old versions of OS X, Android 2.x, and 2+ year old releases of Linux. For what a lot of people do on computers, old software still works just fine. Yes, you don't get all the latest updates, but millions of people don't care at all. Certainly millions don't care enough to spend money to upgrade. More than that, a lot of people don't really notice the difference.
hullo 12y ago
Just since it hasn't been mentioned - I'd never buy my kids an iPhone 6+ to share, but when our coming up on 4-years-old iPad2 finally becomes unfeasible we'll absolutely get a new iPad. Not to mention the general and more formal education market...
- dharma1 12y ago
  I agree, our 4 year old loves our iPad. Sure he could use a phone but the much bigger screen is great. I also have some Windows 8 tablets, and sometimes he uses my MBP, but generally those are far too complex for young children. The iPad is great, and there is a wealth of great educational apps and games for kids.
nicwolff 12y ago
With Duet Display, it makes an excellent portable second monitor for a MacBook...
Marcus316 12y ago
My son's school (Junior Kindergarten to Gr 5) uses iPads as part of their learning environment. We (the Parent Council) are helping fund the purchase of AppleTV devices for the classrooms so students can share what they're doing on the iPad with the whole class. By all estimations from teachers and students alike, this has been a wonderful tool for teaching and learning. Now, I don't own any apple products at all, so (having never held an iPad myself) I'm not really sure what they can actually do, so the question "what is this device good for" is one I cannot really answer from personal experience ... but I think in-school work is probably an excellent use-case.
- ericcumbee 12y ago
  I had a discussion with a former co-worker that is the Lead for A/V and smart class rooms at my former work. They looked at Apple TV to do just that and decided that there were to many security/room for mischief issues for Apple TV. I can't remember who, but they are evaluating a air-play device that offers more granular control. might not be as big of a deal in k-5 as it is in higher ed though.
serve_yay 12y ago
It's much better for reading, that alone is enough for me. I have a new big iPhone but still use my iPad to read every day.
rebootthesystem 12y ago
I can't use an iPad for much more than reading books, casual web browsing, casual chess and a game or two. For work I split 75%/25% between a PC and Mac, both with multiple large high-resolution monitors, proper keyboards, trackballs and a Wacom tablet. I couldn't imagine coding on an iPad or working on anything serious enough. The closed nature of the platform, with lack of file system access, user accounts, peripheral connectivity and lack of expansion (memory being a key issue) makes the ipad inconvenient at best. But wait! There's nothing whatsoever wrong with this scenario. I am perfectly happy with what the iPad does for me. Sure, it can't match my 16 core PC with 24gigs of SDRAM, three monitors and five hard drives. It doesn't have to! Different devices for different uses. And the ipad is great for what I do with it. Ideal? No, of course. Editing text is a pain in the ass, the screen is too small and some websites absolutely suck on it (Please STOP disabling zoom!). The iPad is very useful. I am sure people outside engineering/design might find a lot more use out of it.
- BashiBazouk 12y ago
  Not to mention it's much easier to lie in bed or on the couch with an ipad than with an awesome general computing setup...
ortusdux 12y ago
The latest episode of 99% Invisible does a great job of covering this topic. I highly recommend it. http://99percentinvisible.org/episode/of-mice-and-men/ http://99percentinvisible.org/episode/of-mice-and-men/ A great analogy used in the piece (spoiler?) compared PCs to bicycles and tablets and phones to tricycles. Anyone can just hop on a tricycle and go around the block, but you need to learn and practice riding a bicycle. The thing is, you cannot commute to work on a tricycle. The counter argument is that modern smart phones and tablets are closer to 3-wheel recumbent bikes than tricycles.
beachstartup 12y ago
strangely, in my experience, people under 25 and over 45 love ipads, whereas everyone between 25 and 45 really don't have a use for them (including myself). wonder if this is a wider trend or i just have a very self-selected peer group (i'm early 30s). everyone in my social circle is 25-45 and either needs to type very quickly or wants nothing to do with computers or gadgets beyond the basics.
desireco42 12y ago
Kids.
sholanozie 12y ago
I really dislike the idea that people need to be told what they should use their technology for. Tablets are just computers and they run software, like every other computer. What you do with it is up to your imagination. My girlfriend and I keep an iPad plugged into our stereo receiver via an auxiliary cable and use it as a Spotify terminal. My dad's iPad is his primary computing device. It seems like a lot of other people in this thread have similar stories. So, clearly, saying "nobody" knows what an iPad is good for is a little bit of a stretch.
- signal11 12y ago
  Another example: Toddlers love iPads. I've talked to new parents who are astonished how easily their 15-month-olds navigate the Youtube iPad app (most of them set up playlists for their toddlers). There's also a huge collection of toddler-friendly games and apps.
eigenvalue 12y ago
For me the killer app for an iPad is reading and highlighting/annotating documents. The ability to download a bunch of PDFs (in my case, mostly corporate filings) into a Dropbox folder, and immediately sync that folder to the iPad so I can start reading and highlighting (with changes automatically saved back to Dropbox) has completely changed my workflow, making me a lot more efficient.
gdulli 12y ago
I don't agree with the analogy. There's a bigger qualitative difference between PCs and mobile devices than between cars and trucks. The need for a real PC has never gone away for me. A tablet or phone is something I can waste a little bit of time on or use on an airplane. They're great for that, but they're passive devices for consumption, not production. Real work (anything that requires more than a small amount of input) and even real entertainment (playing a full-sized game, reading/watching longer pieces) is not comfortable for me on a mobile device. It would be a significant compromise to go without a real PC. The efforts to make a tablet act like a computer (like attaching a physical keyboard) don't go nearly far enough to bridge the gap.
- r00fus 12y ago
  Based on what you said, I think the analogy still holds. You talk about work - that's the truck. Others talk about just browsing/Facebook/etc - that's the car. iPads (and iPhones) are awesome for some stuff - if I want to send a "fax" I just take a photo and email/message it (say to my insurance company). Scanning documents on my desktop is... not easy. Even doing the exact same operation (take picture and send) is fraught with difficulty.
- icebraining 12y ago
  they're passive devices for consumption, not production. http://www.kylelambert.co.uk/ipad-art/ http://www.kylelambert.co.uk/ipad-art/
hengheng 12y ago
This article certainly resonates with me. For a long time, tablets never made sense to me. I've had 13" laptops for a decade now (iBook G4 12", MacBook 1st Gen Intel, Lenovo X220), and they were always highly portable and had decent battery life. Along came smartphones with ever increasing screen sizes, leading up to my trusty Note 2. I've tried a number of tablets. 7" is too similar to my phone. 10" is too close to the laptop. I need a separate bag for it anyway, and it feels about as practical as the laptop at home. I never considered tablets being devices to work on, and I'm that guy who will use his laptop on the couch just because I'm still used to it. Along came tablets with stylus. Being able to scribble and take notes on a screen just made sense, even if there was no OCR and it's all just bitmaps. I followed suit on the retina jump, switching from a 10" Android Thinkpad Tablet to a Note 10 2014. I have to say, the tablet with stylus is about the best computer I've ever used. I use it to display scores when singing, to draw bitmap sketches when designing, to read PDF and scribble away in it, etc.. LectureNotes is the killer app that made me buy into the whole device class. Granted I still play Hearthstone on it, I watch Youtube and Twitch, I browse the web and do internet stuffs, but that would never be worth the maintenance effort of owning a separate device between my phone and my laptop. At some point I'd like to try a Windows Tablet, I heard they have better PDF viewers and decent OCR. iOS devices on the other hand feel completely out of place to me nowadays. Phones are nice if impractically small, but tablets are nothing more than beautiful toys, and they're all overpriced by a factor of 4 relative to the use I see in them. They'd be nice as a fourth device, but not as a first or second one.
z5h 12y ago
It's an amazing platform for making music. The touch screen means every instrument can have it's own custom controller interface (used to need tons of hardware for hands-on tweaking). Of course, it's also a great computer replacement for people who don't do much beyond surf/email/casual-game.
teekert 12y ago
I had the same experience, I bough one and a week later I sent it back. It was annoying to hold on my lap because you can't put the screen at the angle you want, my macbook has 5hr plus battery life, it is on when I open it, it never has viruses, it just works... like an iPad. My in laws however, who curse their windows machine when they have to reinstall every year because of unbearable slowness and crap piling up, that is a very different story.
- aswanson 12y ago
  Yeah, I feel bad for normal users who buy pc laptops. The come loaded with antivirus crapware that they threaten the user to buy after 30 days, and usually become virus laden and slow after a few months of use because normal users are so naive when downloading programs. For that reason alone, the Ipad is a better device for most people.
tessierashpool 12y ago
Well, number 1, an iPad is good for reducing the amount of free tech support you do for your parents, at least in my case. Reducing doesn't mean eliminating, unfortunately, but buying my parents iPads was still some of the best money I ever spent. I have three iPads myself. I use two of them every single day, for work, for entertainment, for study, for the weather, etc. btw, Apple just announced a record quarter with incredible iPad sales. For whatever reason, Apple has a very odd history with the press. You basically shouldn't bother with any story about Apple unless it comes from Daring Fireball. He's kind of an Apple cheerleader, but he also seems to be the only person in the world who will fact-check a story about Apple before publishing it.
graublau 12y ago
The biggest issue for me is: iCloud sync/Documents in the Cloud. When I used the iPad I had to manage my global/individual app settings daily and still found annoying holes where an both first and third-party apps wouldn't sync across my iCloud data. What's worse is that Apple doesn't give the user enough feedback when it's syncing data. (It's supposed to be magic, I suppose..) I found that Third party sync services seemed worked much better than iCloud for me. It just got too annoying. I couldn't ditch my iPhone, so the iPad had to go.
matthewmacleod 12y ago
I don't really buy this. I see literally dozens of people a day using tablets – mostly iPads. They're reading books, playing games, watching videos, using Facebook. I think it's pretty clear what it's good for. I suspect that iPad sales have declined not as a result of the iPhone 6(+), but because the market is becoming saturated. There's little reason to upgrade past a certain point – sure, iPad 1 -> 2, and iPad 2 -> Retina were improvements. But aside from general performance improvements, there haven't been many changes since. In this situation, it's hard to see why most users would upgrade.
jpetersonmn 12y ago
I use my ipad daily, for work and entertainment. When I'm working from home it's nice to have on my coffee table so I can see when I get a new email, or alert from the office. I leave my laptop in my office connected to a bigger monitor and would just go downstairs if I needed to reply to an email, or something. Then in the evening, I read hacker news, tv guide app, awesome Netflix/hulu remote with the chromecast. When I go to holidays at my relatives I always bring it to facetime my dad who lives in Hawaii. It's lite and easy to pass around the room so he can have a little visit. I'm not able to write code or really produce much, but it's a great tool IMO.
perlpimp 12y ago
I think it should replace all the textbooks in the university. It is incredible the amount of dead trees that goes into making all those textbooks that are in turn are very difficult to transport and use. Perhaps textbook social learning app? Something, native, fast and reliable. So you can do your homework in your study group and have the results to be shared between all people in one place with a textbook. I think iPad fell short with its textbook software - can someone make a platform. There is the issue of expensive and profitable dead tree textbooks though.
deleted 12y ago
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rdez6173 12y ago
The iPad is a tool for consumption rather than production. For those without an iPhone, I think the iPad is a terrific device for consuming content. I think that if the iPad could serve to bridge the gap between consumption and production, then its place would be clear. I own a Surface Pro 3 and I adore the ability to switch between consumption and production. However, its presentation and implementation leave a lot to be desired. It's often jarring switching between the clean Windows Store apps that were designed for touch, and the "Desktop" apps that dump you into the familiar, but frustrating, desktop where the mouse and keyboard dominate. I feel that, if done well, a multipurpose device could supplant the incumbents.
autoreleasepool 12y ago
As a student, the iPad has changed my life. I no longer need to purchase giant 3 ½ pound tombs that cause back and shoulder pain. I just get them for my iPad and they're all on one lightweight device. It just renders text books so perfectly. I have a smart phone, but there's no replacement for that big, 9.7 inch screen. It makes web pages and PDFs so pleasurable to read. I think the sales have slowed because the upgrade cycle for tablets is similar to the upgrade cycle for computers. I've had my iPad with retina display for over 2 years and, unless it breaks, I don't see a reason to get a new one. One side effect of having an iPad is that it has allowed me to have a clunkier PC life. I have a workstation set up with a 15inch MacBook, a second monitor, mount, usb hub, keyboard, mouse and the works. I no longer have to worry about its portability because I have my tablet.
AndrewKemendo 12y ago
an interactive playbook for hockey coaches, a touchscreen map for storm chasers, a training assistant for sumo wrestlers, a field guide for identifying fish when you’re scuba diving, a cutting-edge tool for fixing wind turbines. The author answers his own question...enterprise. iPads are seeing massive adoption in Architecture Construction and Engineering (Plangrid comes to mind), not to mention medical and insurance practice. Go to any enterprise rent a car and they are using tablets exclusively for contracts with clients. The consumer/causal user use case may not be there but there is a real need to be able to take a powerful computer with you that has network capabilities, screen sharing/powerpoint display, cameras all without needing to lug around a keyboard and mouse (yes I consider a laptop lugging around). Especially when you consider power on/off time there is a big difference in use case that makes it perfect for enterprise.
abandonliberty 12y ago
It's fair to say that the initial enthusiasm and popularity of tablets is crashing to reality. When they first came out they sold like crazy even though we didn't know what they were for. Finally we are seeing where they can fit in, but it is less than we dreamed, partially supplanted by smartphones and phablets; and came at a significant cost after many failures. As a result many people have tablets they don't and can't imagine using (myself included), anecdotal evidence that leads to mistaken conclusions.
lurkinggrue 12y ago
Never found a use case with a tablet that worked for me. I have my main PC, a laptop and a large phone. Then again I was never one to sit on a couch and watch tv with a laptop so I figured I was not in the right demographic for an ipad.
chrismcb 12y ago
iPads are great consumption devices. But one place I've seen them that shocked me was as point of sale devices. They seem to be taking over the cash register market.

47 points by iamben 12y ago

I'm a developer, but my iPad is my primary computing device while at home. My laptop died about a year ago, and I decided to save money and just use the iPad that I got as a Christmas bonus. About the only thing I ever feel I lack is legacy support for older Windows games. With the occasional keyboard pairing for longer emails, I would say that the only thing it really lacks is the ability to archive photos from my camera. Maybe I'm in the minority here in that I specifically don't do any development or really intense computing tasks at home, but I think that my use case mirrors much of the non-technical world. I know of many people who use iPads as their primary computing devices. I think it's more accurate to say that tech journalists don't know what an iPad is good for anymore.

blueskin_ 12y ago

Did we ever know? I will concede that it was good for the random user doing some casual internet use while watching TV before phones got big enough for that, but I would contest if it ever had a single unique use other than that even at launch. Any device with a single purpose seems likely to fail, I think. >Innovations like automatic transmission I'd count that (or indeed, tablets) an 'innovation' in the same way as PRISM or systemd. Sure, it is one in that it's new and a different approach and even helps a very specific class of users, but not a net positive. I guess that's just the state of the world though, that we will always be forced to accept 'innovation' that does nothing but make life hard for the power user, the enthusiast, the person with an above-room-temperature IQ. >had to be “far better” than a phone or a laptop That's where it gets interesting, I think. As stated above, better than a phone contemporary to its launch, yes, but it was never better than a laptop bar "easier to pick up and carry around", which rarely applied to what are so often sofa-bound devices, or shoved into a backpack on a long journey at most.

ceejayoz 12y ago
> I guess that's just the state of the world though, that we will always be forced to accept 'innovation' that does nothing but make life hard for the power user, the enthusiast, the person with an above-room-temperature IQ. I like how not wanting to use computing devices in the same way you like to is a mental defect in your world. Wow.
- toothbrush 12y ago
  The way the GP put it is a little harsh, yes, but i can see where they're coming from. Personally, i think a device that "just works" is great. Really. For certain people (i agree, not low-IQ people, just non computer enthusiasts). And this is where the iPad shines. My gripe, though, would be that it doesn't cater to the power user who wants to modify components and software / create (whether that be a novel, a song, or a piece of software) in the same way that a general-purpose (and i'd go as far as to say open-source/libre software) computer does. I like hacking at my editor and being able to plug in an Arduino, and an iPad wouldn't let me do that. Having said all of that, my response is: if that is a deal-breaker for you (like it is for me), don't buy an iPad. Simple. The iPad has it's target market very well defined and served (even if i do lament the fact that it's such a DRM / walled garden / evil spying companies experience, where the user is the product).
  - mikeash 12y ago
    I can't really see where they're coming from. The existence of an easy tool doesn't eliminate the more powerful tools, and even advanced users sometimes want easy tools. I'm a computer power user by any reasonable definition. I program for a living, I customize a lot of stuff, and I get pretty upset whenever I try to run an unsigned binary and my Mac decides this is too unsafe and makes me jump through hoops to make it happen. But I also use my iPad a lot. If I'm reading on the couch or watching a video, it gets the job done much better. It's fine to say that it's not for you, but it's ridiculous to say that simpler tools must only be for people who are incapable of using advanced tools.
    - autoreleasepool 12y ago

ZanyProgrammer 12y ago

My iPad Air is much better than any phablet for reading books on Kindle-and lets me honest, the way tablets and phones are designed these days, its not like carrying an iPad Air and my trusty 5s takes up a lot of weight or space. There's practically no weight/space penalty these days for carrying a dedicated phone and tablet.

ebiester 12y ago

The iPad is good for letting me keep my work and play separate. I play on the iPad -- I work on my (linux) laptop.

turnip1979 12y ago

Bit of a stupid title. The iPad has changed my my mom's life and those of her siblings (all retired). My father clings to his PC and constantly asks for tech support. My mom went from having to be taught how to use a mouse (double click was her nemesis) to be able to play games, browse the web, send email and most recently - Facetime! It has significantly improved her quality of life and I am really glad this tech exists. I am in my 30s and the iPad is pretty useful for me as a device that just works and provides access to books, the web and YouTube. Heck, we use it as an awesome remote when we cast YouTube or Netflix to our apple tv, ps3, chromecast, etc.

salimmadjd 12y ago
Same story here. My mom was also an IT support headache (for me) and now on her iPad she forwards me email, photos (a new headache) uses it for Skype and other connectivity tools. I told her to buy a new laptop, she said everything she needs to do iPad can do it. She likes it so much that she bought my grandmother an iPad...
mikeash 12y ago
I agree about the title. As best I can tell, when they say "nobody" they mean "nobody in the marketing department." In short, there's no single overarching theme that describes what iPads are good at, so it's hard to advertise. Personally, I use my iPad pretty much the same as you do. When it comes to casual web browsing, reading, or videos, the experience is a lot better than a laptop.
- tessierashpool 12y ago
  I agree about the title. As best I can tell, when they say "nobody" they mean "nobody in the marketing department." In short, there's no single overarching theme that describes what iPads are good at, so it's hard to advertise. Mainstream media continues to be surprised by the numerous use cases of a Turing machine.
  - marcosdumay 12y ago

boca 12y ago

Barring the title, the article touches upon some right notes. Ipad quarterly sales are down by about 21% YOY going by the latest quarterly earnings report from Apple (1). With the Iphone 6 and Iphone 6 plus coming out, I guess there's not much reason, except for certain use cases, for people to buy an Ipad. Apple surely recognizes that and is probably looking to reverse the trend with the rumored Ipad Pro (2). (1) http://venturebeat.com/2015/01/27/apple-breaks-its-sales-records-with-74-5m-iphones-in-q1-2015-but-ipad-sales-decline-21-to-21-4m/ http://venturebeat.com/2015/01/27/apple-breaks-its-sales-rec... (2) http://www.macworld.co.uk/news/ipad/big-screen-ipad-pro-plus-release-date-rumours-leaked-images-stylus-3492180/ http://www.macworld.co.uk/news/ipad/big-screen-ipad-pro-plus...

pivo 12y ago
I used to work for Gazelle, a company that buys used iPhones, iPads, etc. from consumers. We found that the iPads we bought were generally in much worse shape than the iPhones. We believed this suggested that people were using their iPads quite a bit. Anecdotally, among my friends and family iPads are in almost constant use. So even if we don't know what iPads are good for we seem to use them a lot. I wonder how much of this is just that people are not upgrading their iPads as often as they upgrade their phones. I'm still relatively happy with my iPad 2 and I've had three different iPhones during the time I've owned it. A lot of my friends are in similar situations. I think we all kind of agree that iPads are too expensive to justify frequent upgrades, especially when they're still useable. I bought an iPhone 6 Plus thinking it would replace the iPad but found that, while I still really like the 6 Plus' size, it doesn't really work that well for prolonged reading or the lazy internet surfing the author mentions in the article.
- JoeAltmaier 12y ago
  The market for pads has peaked, right? Means people are using other things, not upgrading/replacing pads. Maybe because phones are bigger?
- digikata 12y ago
  I think your observations re: Gazelle point to the situation that telecom companies drive shorter upgrade cycles for phones, often hiding their cost and allowing three year upgrades. In contrast people generally pay full price for tablets, and upgrade less frequently.

bradleyjg 12y ago

My computing devices are: an iphone (4s), an ipad (air 2), and a windows computer with a 27" monitor. I also have a kindle, but that's not general purpose. I could probably replace the computer and ipad with a macbook, but 1) it would cost more money and 2) wouldn't be as mobile and easy to use as the ipad (for surfing in bed / on the couch, watching movies while eating, listening to music) or as usable as the windows computer (for coding and playing games) because of the smaller screen size and the relatively crappy keyboard / mouse. I could remedy the latter limitations with a docking station, separate monitor and keyboard, but now the solution is not just more expensive but much more expensive and even more cumbersome as compared to the ipad.

roozbeh18 12y ago

My Mom practically pays all her bills, watches youtube, does whatever she wants with her iPad. Same for other family members who aren't computer savvy and just need to get by.

programminggeek 12y ago

This is a dumb article. Sales growth has slowed because iPads are computers and don't have a 2 year repurchase cycle. There are only so many people out there who don't own a tablet of some kind and an iPad will last a lot longer than an iPhone. The iPad 2 is still a very good tablet for a lot of people. Not a huge reason to upgrade until it breaks. Also, nerds might not love it, but my wife adores her Kindle Fire HD and uses it all the time. For recipes, surfing the web, and watching videos, that is all she needs.

AmVess 12y ago
I agree that the article is dumb. Apple sells two Ipads a second every second of every day of the year, which tells me a lot of people know exactly what an iPad is good for.
slantyyz 12y ago
>> iPads are computers and don't have a 2 year repurchase cycle If you regularly update to the latest OS release, you will barely get past the second year. In my experience, "the final major version OS to run on any iOS device" is generally annoyingly slow. It might be better these days, but it wasn't the case with my original iPad, iPhone 3G and 4. I'm glad I told my wife not to update her 4S to 8 (i.e., the final major version that will be available for the 4S), because updating to 7 had already noticeably slowed down her phone.
- mikeash 12y ago
  iPads are different, because Apple refuses to retire the iPad 2. Officially they don't sell it anymore, but they still sell the original iPad mini, which is just an iPad 2 with a smaller screen. iOS 8 needs to work well on an iPad 2 in a way that iOS 8 doesn't need to work well on an iPhone 4S.
- programminggeek 12y ago
  There are literally millions of computers happily running Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7, old versions of OS X, Android 2.x, and 2+ year old releases of Linux. For what a lot of people do on computers, old software still works just fine. Yes, you don't get all the latest updates, but millions of people don't care at all. Certainly millions don't care enough to spend money to upgrade. More than that, a lot of people don't really notice the difference.

hullo 12y ago

Just since it hasn't been mentioned - I'd never buy my kids an iPhone 6+ to share, but when our coming up on 4-years-old iPad2 finally becomes unfeasible we'll absolutely get a new iPad. Not to mention the general and more formal education market...

dharma1 12y ago
I agree, our 4 year old loves our iPad. Sure he could use a phone but the much bigger screen is great. I also have some Windows 8 tablets, and sometimes he uses my MBP, but generally those are far too complex for young children. The iPad is great, and there is a wealth of great educational apps and games for kids.

nicwolff 12y ago

With Duet Display, it makes an excellent portable second monitor for a MacBook...

Marcus316 12y ago

My son's school (Junior Kindergarten to Gr 5) uses iPads as part of their learning environment. We (the Parent Council) are helping fund the purchase of AppleTV devices for the classrooms so students can share what they're doing on the iPad with the whole class. By all estimations from teachers and students alike, this has been a wonderful tool for teaching and learning. Now, I don't own any apple products at all, so (having never held an iPad myself) I'm not really sure what they can actually do, so the question "what is this device good for" is one I cannot really answer from personal experience ... but I think in-school work is probably an excellent use-case.

ericcumbee 12y ago
I had a discussion with a former co-worker that is the Lead for A/V and smart class rooms at my former work. They looked at Apple TV to do just that and decided that there were to many security/room for mischief issues for Apple TV. I can't remember who, but they are evaluating a air-play device that offers more granular control. might not be as big of a deal in k-5 as it is in higher ed though.

serve_yay 12y ago

It's much better for reading, that alone is enough for me. I have a new big iPhone but still use my iPad to read every day.

rebootthesystem 12y ago

I can't use an iPad for much more than reading books, casual web browsing, casual chess and a game or two. For work I split 75%/25% between a PC and Mac, both with multiple large high-resolution monitors, proper keyboards, trackballs and a Wacom tablet. I couldn't imagine coding on an iPad or working on anything serious enough. The closed nature of the platform, with lack of file system access, user accounts, peripheral connectivity and lack of expansion (memory being a key issue) makes the ipad inconvenient at best. But wait! There's nothing whatsoever wrong with this scenario. I am perfectly happy with what the iPad does for me. Sure, it can't match my 16 core PC with 24gigs of SDRAM, three monitors and five hard drives. It doesn't have to! Different devices for different uses. And the ipad is great for what I do with it. Ideal? No, of course. Editing text is a pain in the ass, the screen is too small and some websites absolutely suck on it (Please STOP disabling zoom!). The iPad is very useful. I am sure people outside engineering/design might find a lot more use out of it.

BashiBazouk 12y ago
Not to mention it's much easier to lie in bed or on the couch with an ipad than with an awesome general computing setup...

ortusdux 12y ago

The latest episode of 99% Invisible does a great job of covering this topic. I highly recommend it. http://99percentinvisible.org/episode/of-mice-and-men/ http://99percentinvisible.org/episode/of-mice-and-men/ A great analogy used in the piece (spoiler?) compared PCs to bicycles and tablets and phones to tricycles. Anyone can just hop on a tricycle and go around the block, but you need to learn and practice riding a bicycle. The thing is, you cannot commute to work on a tricycle. The counter argument is that modern smart phones and tablets are closer to 3-wheel recumbent bikes than tricycles.

beachstartup 12y ago

strangely, in my experience, people under 25 and over 45 love ipads, whereas everyone between 25 and 45 really don't have a use for them (including myself). wonder if this is a wider trend or i just have a very self-selected peer group (i'm early 30s). everyone in my social circle is 25-45 and either needs to type very quickly or wants nothing to do with computers or gadgets beyond the basics.

desireco42 12y ago

Kids.

sholanozie 12y ago

I really dislike the idea that people need to be told what they should use their technology for. Tablets are just computers and they run software, like every other computer. What you do with it is up to your imagination. My girlfriend and I keep an iPad plugged into our stereo receiver via an auxiliary cable and use it as a Spotify terminal. My dad's iPad is his primary computing device. It seems like a lot of other people in this thread have similar stories. So, clearly, saying "nobody" knows what an iPad is good for is a little bit of a stretch.

signal11 12y ago
Another example: Toddlers love iPads. I've talked to new parents who are astonished how easily their 15-month-olds navigate the Youtube iPad app (most of them set up playlists for their toddlers). There's also a huge collection of toddler-friendly games and apps.

eigenvalue 12y ago

For me the killer app for an iPad is reading and highlighting/annotating documents. The ability to download a bunch of PDFs (in my case, mostly corporate filings) into a Dropbox folder, and immediately sync that folder to the iPad so I can start reading and highlighting (with changes automatically saved back to Dropbox) has completely changed my workflow, making me a lot more efficient.

gdulli 12y ago

I don't agree with the analogy. There's a bigger qualitative difference between PCs and mobile devices than between cars and trucks. The need for a real PC has never gone away for me. A tablet or phone is something I can waste a little bit of time on or use on an airplane. They're great for that, but they're passive devices for consumption, not production. Real work (anything that requires more than a small amount of input) and even real entertainment (playing a full-sized game, reading/watching longer pieces) is not comfortable for me on a mobile device. It would be a significant compromise to go without a real PC. The efforts to make a tablet act like a computer (like attaching a physical keyboard) don't go nearly far enough to bridge the gap.

r00fus 12y ago
Based on what you said, I think the analogy still holds. You talk about work - that's the truck. Others talk about just browsing/Facebook/etc - that's the car. iPads (and iPhones) are awesome for some stuff - if I want to send a "fax" I just take a photo and email/message it (say to my insurance company). Scanning documents on my desktop is... not easy. Even doing the exact same operation (take picture and send) is fraught with difficulty.
icebraining 12y ago
they're passive devices for consumption, not production. http://www.kylelambert.co.uk/ipad-art/ http://www.kylelambert.co.uk/ipad-art/

hengheng 12y ago

This article certainly resonates with me. For a long time, tablets never made sense to me. I've had 13" laptops for a decade now (iBook G4 12", MacBook 1st Gen Intel, Lenovo X220), and they were always highly portable and had decent battery life. Along came smartphones with ever increasing screen sizes, leading up to my trusty Note 2. I've tried a number of tablets. 7" is too similar to my phone. 10" is too close to the laptop. I need a separate bag for it anyway, and it feels about as practical as the laptop at home. I never considered tablets being devices to work on, and I'm that guy who will use his laptop on the couch just because I'm still used to it. Along came tablets with stylus. Being able to scribble and take notes on a screen just made sense, even if there was no OCR and it's all just bitmaps. I followed suit on the retina jump, switching from a 10" Android Thinkpad Tablet to a Note 10 2014. I have to say, the tablet with stylus is about the best computer I've ever used. I use it to display scores when singing, to draw bitmap sketches when designing, to read PDF and scribble away in it, etc.. LectureNotes is the killer app that made me buy into the whole device class. Granted I still play Hearthstone on it, I watch Youtube and Twitch, I browse the web and do internet stuffs, but that would never be worth the maintenance effort of owning a separate device between my phone and my laptop. At some point I'd like to try a Windows Tablet, I heard they have better PDF viewers and decent OCR. iOS devices on the other hand feel completely out of place to me nowadays. Phones are nice if impractically small, but tablets are nothing more than beautiful toys, and they're all overpriced by a factor of 4 relative to the use I see in them. They'd be nice as a fourth device, but not as a first or second one.

z5h 12y ago

It's an amazing platform for making music. The touch screen means every instrument can have it's own custom controller interface (used to need tons of hardware for hands-on tweaking). Of course, it's also a great computer replacement for people who don't do much beyond surf/email/casual-game.

teekert 12y ago

I had the same experience, I bough one and a week later I sent it back. It was annoying to hold on my lap because you can't put the screen at the angle you want, my macbook has 5hr plus battery life, it is on when I open it, it never has viruses, it just works... like an iPad. My in laws however, who curse their windows machine when they have to reinstall every year because of unbearable slowness and crap piling up, that is a very different story.

aswanson 12y ago
Yeah, I feel bad for normal users who buy pc laptops. The come loaded with antivirus crapware that they threaten the user to buy after 30 days, and usually become virus laden and slow after a few months of use because normal users are so naive when downloading programs. For that reason alone, the Ipad is a better device for most people.

tessierashpool 12y ago

Well, number 1, an iPad is good for reducing the amount of free tech support you do for your parents, at least in my case. Reducing doesn't mean eliminating, unfortunately, but buying my parents iPads was still some of the best money I ever spent. I have three iPads myself. I use two of them every single day, for work, for entertainment, for study, for the weather, etc. btw, Apple just announced a record quarter with incredible iPad sales. For whatever reason, Apple has a very odd history with the press. You basically shouldn't bother with any story about Apple unless it comes from Daring Fireball. He's kind of an Apple cheerleader, but he also seems to be the only person in the world who will fact-check a story about Apple before publishing it.

graublau 12y ago

The biggest issue for me is: iCloud sync/Documents in the Cloud. When I used the iPad I had to manage my global/individual app settings daily and still found annoying holes where an both first and third-party apps wouldn't sync across my iCloud data. What's worse is that Apple doesn't give the user enough feedback when it's syncing data. (It's supposed to be magic, I suppose..) I found that Third party sync services seemed worked much better than iCloud for me. It just got too annoying. I couldn't ditch my iPhone, so the iPad had to go.

matthewmacleod 12y ago

I don't really buy this. I see literally dozens of people a day using tablets – mostly iPads. They're reading books, playing games, watching videos, using Facebook. I think it's pretty clear what it's good for. I suspect that iPad sales have declined not as a result of the iPhone 6(+), but because the market is becoming saturated. There's little reason to upgrade past a certain point – sure, iPad 1 -> 2, and iPad 2 -> Retina were improvements. But aside from general performance improvements, there haven't been many changes since. In this situation, it's hard to see why most users would upgrade.

jpetersonmn 12y ago

I use my ipad daily, for work and entertainment. When I'm working from home it's nice to have on my coffee table so I can see when I get a new email, or alert from the office. I leave my laptop in my office connected to a bigger monitor and would just go downstairs if I needed to reply to an email, or something. Then in the evening, I read hacker news, tv guide app, awesome Netflix/hulu remote with the chromecast. When I go to holidays at my relatives I always bring it to facetime my dad who lives in Hawaii. It's lite and easy to pass around the room so he can have a little visit. I'm not able to write code or really produce much, but it's a great tool IMO.

perlpimp 12y ago

I think it should replace all the textbooks in the university. It is incredible the amount of dead trees that goes into making all those textbooks that are in turn are very difficult to transport and use. Perhaps textbook social learning app? Something, native, fast and reliable. So you can do your homework in your study group and have the results to be shared between all people in one place with a textbook. I think iPad fell short with its textbook software - can someone make a platform. There is the issue of expensive and profitable dead tree textbooks though.

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rdez6173 12y ago

The iPad is a tool for consumption rather than production. For those without an iPhone, I think the iPad is a terrific device for consuming content. I think that if the iPad could serve to bridge the gap between consumption and production, then its place would be clear. I own a Surface Pro 3 and I adore the ability to switch between consumption and production. However, its presentation and implementation leave a lot to be desired. It's often jarring switching between the clean Windows Store apps that were designed for touch, and the "Desktop" apps that dump you into the familiar, but frustrating, desktop where the mouse and keyboard dominate. I feel that, if done well, a multipurpose device could supplant the incumbents.

autoreleasepool 12y ago

As a student, the iPad has changed my life. I no longer need to purchase giant 3 ½ pound tombs that cause back and shoulder pain. I just get them for my iPad and they're all on one lightweight device. It just renders text books so perfectly. I have a smart phone, but there's no replacement for that big, 9.7 inch screen. It makes web pages and PDFs so pleasurable to read. I think the sales have slowed because the upgrade cycle for tablets is similar to the upgrade cycle for computers. I've had my iPad with retina display for over 2 years and, unless it breaks, I don't see a reason to get a new one. One side effect of having an iPad is that it has allowed me to have a clunkier PC life. I have a workstation set up with a 15inch MacBook, a second monitor, mount, usb hub, keyboard, mouse and the works. I no longer have to worry about its portability because I have my tablet.

AndrewKemendo 12y ago

an interactive playbook for hockey coaches, a touchscreen map for storm chasers, a training assistant for sumo wrestlers, a field guide for identifying fish when you’re scuba diving, a cutting-edge tool for fixing wind turbines. The author answers his own question...enterprise. iPads are seeing massive adoption in Architecture Construction and Engineering (Plangrid comes to mind), not to mention medical and insurance practice. Go to any enterprise rent a car and they are using tablets exclusively for contracts with clients. The consumer/causal user use case may not be there but there is a real need to be able to take a powerful computer with you that has network capabilities, screen sharing/powerpoint display, cameras all without needing to lug around a keyboard and mouse (yes I consider a laptop lugging around). Especially when you consider power on/off time there is a big difference in use case that makes it perfect for enterprise.

abandonliberty 12y ago

It's fair to say that the initial enthusiasm and popularity of tablets is crashing to reality. When they first came out they sold like crazy even though we didn't know what they were for. Finally we are seeing where they can fit in, but it is less than we dreamed, partially supplanted by smartphones and phablets; and came at a significant cost after many failures. As a result many people have tablets they don't and can't imagine using (myself included), anecdotal evidence that leads to mistaken conclusions.

lurkinggrue 12y ago

Never found a use case with a tablet that worked for me. I have my main PC, a laptop and a large phone. Then again I was never one to sit on a couch and watch tv with a laptop so I figured I was not in the right demographic for an ipad.

chrismcb 12y ago

iPads are great consumption devices. But one place I've seen them that shocked me was as point of sale devices. They seem to be taking over the cash register market.