My partial views on how some call the iPad revolutionary.
This is in response to http://www.macworld.com/article/146038/2010/01/ipad_future_shock.html
it’s basically just growing pains. evolutionary computational ergonomics demands that new user interfaces be designed that simplify, obfuscate, or remove the lines between using a general purpose computer, using an appliance that does 1 task very well, and simply interacting with objects we’re familiar with in our environment. it’s a big step. it’s basically the difference between a blinking cursor in Apple BASIC and an interactive AI voice interface as you see on the 24th century star trek shows.
the way apple is currently accomplishing this is to implement Jef Raskin’s idea (awesome guy to know about) of having completely minimalistic but ergonomic full-screen interfaces for each thing you want to do making said interface tailored for that task and no other, and having some ergonomic way to switch between tasks. that’s pretty much the basic idea behind the iphone os.
I still don’t understand why people are choosing NOW to talk about all this stuff instead of at the introduction of the iphone some 3 years ago. All the iPad is, is a really big, moderately more powerful ipod touch with better battery life. it’s not really a game-changer, it’s the same technology, just a bit bigger and slightly more evolved.
