An interesting article on tablets

[xtabber]

This article from the Economist magazine illustrates why Apple may not be the future of tablet computing, and it's not just a matter of price. 

[Carol Haynes]

Somewhat schizophrenic article!

I want to buy an iPad mini but they're crap, so I bought a Nexus (which is fantastic) but I'll dump it when Apple bring out the next iPad mini if they make it more like the Nexus ?

Fair summary? WTF !!!

[Renegade]

The author seems to miss the point about what a tablet is for. Some decent criticisms for the iPad mini though.

[wraith808]

The author seems to miss the point about what a tablet is for. Some decent criticisms for the iPad mini though.

+1

[Target]

The author seems to miss the point about what a tablet is for. Some decent criticisms for the iPad mini though.

is that a fault on his part though, or a symptom of how they've been promoted?

probably came as a bit of a shock to him too as it seems he might have been an apple 'fan' up till that point

[xtabber]

The author seems to miss the point about what a tablet is for.

Huh? And what would that be?

IMHO, a tablet is for whatever you want to use it for, not for what someone has decreed it should be used for. 

And that is exactly what the article author discovered empirically, although his expressed desire to have Apple redesign the iPad Mini to be more useful to him indicates an inability to reject his own preconceived notions, even after he himself had seen that they were wrong.  That is not schizophrenia, but rather a well-known cognitive effect that has been the subject of much research lately in experimental psychology.

[TaoPhoenix]

IMHO, a tablet is for whatever you want to use it for, not for what someone has decreed it should be used for. 

In a way, yes - see the other thread about a Gaming Tablet.
Tablets are "what they are" (and how I despise that saying!) So if you get some funky app that makes you deadly a gaming because you are touch-sliding your guys by sliding your fingers all over it, have at it!

[Renegade]

The author seems to miss the point about what a tablet is for.

Huh? And what would that be?

IMHO, a tablet is for whatever you want to use it for, not for what someone has decreed it should be used for. 

I could have been more explicit...

The author seems to pigeon-hole tablets into a very limited set of roles.

As a simple example, while I mostly read on my tablet, I have only to dock it into my keyboard and I have a laptop for word processing or spread sheets, or whatever. They have a very broad range of possible uses, though some uses are currently excluded (some for practical reasons), e.g. mobile application development, CPU/RAM intensive applications, etc.

The average tablet has a huge amount of computing power compared to anything we had 10 years ago. They're pretty darn good little machines.

[TaoPhoenix]

Somewhere between your comment and mine Renny.

Absolutely everyone is mashing/smashing hardware and OS. There is absolutely no reason not to stick "Windows Blue" (Yes, early press has that just around the corner, amazing no press wants to speculate on Windows Semi-Vaporware like theyused to!) (I know, grammatically flawed line there. Go away.)

It's "not that hard". Just make the goddamn OS accept DUAL INPUT. Both modes - classic and touch. I'm just tired of things like not being able to get 1000 Librivox stories on my iPhone because that platform absolutely refuses to save files anywhere outside of an app. Skies help me if I decide to update a webpage with matching text and html file extensions. Oh wait, on phones and tablets you're just supposed to consume $hit. Right. Got it.

[barney]

Oh wait, on phones and tablets you're just supposed to consume $hit. Right. Got it.

Yep.  All ya need is a good case o' consumption  .

Recently had cause to use a tablet from a hospital bed, with my phone tethered for connectivity.  It worked OK, but OSK (on-screen keyboard) is not an efficient form of input.  (On the other hand, I couldn't have done what I did with a laptop - angle problem.)  That said, my tablets have more computing power than the high-end laptops I bought a decade+ ago.  Methinks the usage of tablets is going to rely more upon user perception than actual capabilities.  Well-l-l, that and the current promotion slant(s)  .  But a few of us will make them fit into our usage needs, so no real loss, just a matter of adjustment.

[TaoPhoenix]

Yep.  All ya need is a good case o' consumption  .

Read me right - I get a brilliant case of "Less Is More" to the tune of a Billion Bucks. Because that's what Apple did.

Now we're going all Pundit-Predicty and not one of the gang foresaw the iPhone. Or very obscure and buried.

We're in a weird time and sometimes the passage of time makes it all clear. Like we don't use MySpace anymore.

[barney]

Read me right

Apologies.