ONE BY-PRODUCT OF APPLE'S new tablet may be the uptake in Online Meetings--if you can get Flash to work on the iPad. You can get reduced rates for Online Meeting Rooms through the end of January. The new tablet comes with two cameras and I'll show that with an authenticated photo before the 27 Jan 10 evening news in Ireland. One camera faces you and another faces outwards so using it inside an online meeting room is like a picture-in-picture experience. You'll be able to tell people using an Apple tablet because of their unique faceprint. [Updated: There is no camera on the iPad. Move along.] However, using the tablet for an online meeting means drawing down a lot of power for the wifi or 3G connection. That should force meeting lengths into an economy setting--no more than 90 minutes--because I haven't heard any of the Alpha testers holding more than a sustained 90 minute wifi connection with the device before they flip it over and recharge it from the solar collectors on the back (available only in the limited edition Calacanis model). When used to read news pages like the New York Times or Wall Street Journal, the tablet lasts for a hard work day. Its OLED screen gives it a longer time period between charges than the iPhone 3G S.
I trust Apple to offer something I can hold that makes reading my magazine and newspapers more fun. It should have a glossy screen like my iPhone (but larger than B5 size), high-quality content that knows my preferences like in the iTunes store, with content priced less than the pulp copies. If these things happen, I believe independent publishers will start flogging specialised books for less than €10 a copy.
Apple has developed an ecosystem to support all this. I can get magazines and specialised content from the iTunes music store. I have pulled PDFs onto my mobile media devices through premium (paid) iTunes subscriptions. Getting those documents in a larger format will escalate this market segment.
Expect the tablet to benefit from the millions of credit card customers already inside the iTunes store because a lot of those people don't realise they're spending money when they tap their screens to download tracks. Expect all sorts of publishers when the Apple tablet hits the streets--from specialised news agencies to indie film makers to television shorts. A smart-looking tablet connects all these pieces.
Expect the Apple tablet to hit Irish shores priced above €600.
Thoughts added after iPad Keynote:- No camera: There is no front-facing camera for video conferencing, and there is no back-facing camera for taking photos. This is surprising because most netbooks and all my smartphones have a camera or two.
- No multitasking: You cannot run multiple apps at the same time. I need to run things like a chat box or Last.fm while tweeting or I go nuts. The iPad cannot run multiple applications so it limits my productivity. The iPad feels like it was designed to avoid social software, not to leverage its usefulness.
- No HDMI Output: You can’t plug your iPad into your TV.
- No USB port: There is no place to plug in my favourite keyboard. I need to plug the iPad into my computer to update it. This reverts me to a way of working that was fine in 2008.
- No Over The Air Sync: With a Google Nexus One phone, I can enter my email address and all my apps magically appear on the phone. You cannot do that with the iPad. Wireless synchronicity accelerates productivity but it's not on the iPad.
Info from Jason Calacanis and another pre-release twit tester.
