At this time, like millions of people who are awed by this device and the magnitude of what it can do, yours truly decided that a blog entry this time should be using this device.
Like many out there of my generation, I myself began my journey years ago riding the bandwagon on a Windows 3.1. How I loved that OS with it's simple layout that included windows laid out in a linearly fashion. Windows 95 was a stunner which was quickly followed by Windows 98, both impeccable pieces of software. Windows I remember in the wake of the Internet revolution was the tsar of creativity. Though the Windows me and 2000 models failed to excite, Windows xp till the coming of Windows 7 remained my favorite os ever.
It was during this time I came across Apple as a company, tired of Windows and it's clones topped with a never ending sense of corporate greed. I had seen the earlier iMacs and it's colorful design but I was least impressed with the software. With my first job however, I decided that I would buy anything other than a Windows laptop, after getting confused with Linux, settled on an Apple and it's Tiger OS.
In software, the biggest risk one can take is to try to be different. At that time when I brought my fiesta MacBook, though it looked like a toy, fancy in design and glossy in it's functioning, compatibility issues raged. Either the softwares were highly priced or it was incompatible. Got lost would be the apt word with it for sometime before resigning to the very fact that Windows is the undisputed ruler of the desktop and laptop market, mainly because of the Goliath productivity suite-MS Office which is best always on a PC.
Apple went a different path. It brought out iPods, iPhones, MacBooks etc. However, they all seem to be focussed on one particular area or the other. Then came the AppStore with the iTunes store and a new developer ecosystem was created.
The power of any device is fully exposed and tested when it's functionalities are fully stretched. All the devices in the market for playing music or calling were closed to outside developers. I am not sure whether Apple is the first one in this area, but to bring value to people for their creativity was first ensured by Apple.
For a long period in my life, I believed in free software, ultimately Linux. As one grows up we realize the potential for creativity to grow when value can be obtained from it. The power of inspiring someone when value can be created from it is amazing. The very reason why the free software evangelists never had their way was exactly because of that. In a commercial world and a global market, if money can be made from a product, why deny it?
iPad is the culmination of the journey for that ever promising ecosystem where money and content both can be made and distributed. Of Android, I would like to echo the words of Steve Balmer, it's a freaking cancer and it will meet it's death and I personally would love to see Google stick on to it's core area of search and other related applications. The failure of Nexus One, Google Wave is a testimony.
Concluding iPad is nothing short of a revolution; it is an amazing web browser, multimedia device, ebook reader and it's out there with real genuine interest to chosen our way of thinking with regards to mobile computing technology.
Sent from my iPad