I’m curious about what will come out of the iPad 2 event from Apple that is supposed to happen today. With the market for tablets opening up, it’s just a matter of time until someone releases a more functional tablet than the iPad that Apple provides. I say this having read about the reason that the iPad is so successful - Apple’s ability to offer the device for a low price. But I think that the iPad is still just a bit deficient in a particular area.
Don’t get me wrong, I use the iPad very often. It’s not deficient to the point of being unusable. I’m using to write this post right now, in fact. With a bluetooth keyboard, the iPad is almost a computer. And that’s the problem - “almost”.
Sure, I guess that it’s not supposed to do everything a computer can, and I guess that’s ok, but later this summer, there will be many tablets on the market that can do just that. The Fujistu tablet I saw announced yesterday looks really nice (and I love their products otherwise), and even Palm come HP’s TouchPad with WebOS on it looks like something I wouldn’t mind having, because at least it’s a light installation of linux at its core and can be augmented.
With the iPad, none of this is so. The only way to create applications for it is to use a Mac to compile one and then launch it (for widespread use, anyway) via the app store. For as much as Apple touts their products as educational devices, you’d think you’d be able to at least write a program on it in Logo, or something. It seems like a device prime for on-device coding; something that will make it possible to run small applications.
I guess Apple’s getting miserly with their fortune. They must not be making enough money off of the sales of movies, music, and other apps to allow an app that builds apps to enter the marketplace. If they could make it possible for an app to build apps that could then be deployed via the app store, they’d just make more money. The only thing they’d lose is a few sales of Macs to people who really didn’t want to buy them just to make apps but did anyway. Maybe that number is huge, but it smacks of the gym membership tax - charging people for something they stop using afte the first week.
Anyway, I’m not really sure what the problem is, or why Apple won’t allow a high-level language app on their devices. It’ll be the first thing that really differentiates other tablets besides price. I’m looking forward to that.
