
Nobody Knows What an iPad Is Good for Anymore - iamben
http://www.wired.com/2015/01/nobody-knows-ipad-good-anymore/
======
turnip1979
Bit of a stupid title. The iPad has changed my my mom's life and those of her
siblings (all retired). My father clings to his PC and constantly asks for
tech support. My mom went from having to be taught how to use a mouse (double
click was her nemesis) to be able to play games, browse the web, send email
and most recently - Facetime! It has significantly improved her quality of
life and I am really glad this tech exists.

I am in my 30s and the iPad is pretty useful for me as a device that just
works and provides access to books, the web and YouTube. Heck, we use it as an
awesome remote when we cast YouTube or Netflix to our apple tv, ps3,
chromecast, etc.

~~~
mikeash
I agree about the title. As best I can tell, when they say "nobody" they mean
"nobody in the marketing department." In short, there's no single overarching
theme that describes what iPads are good at, so it's hard to advertise.

Personally, I use my iPad pretty much the same as you do. When it comes to
casual web browsing, reading, or videos, the experience is a lot better than a
laptop.

~~~
tessierashpool

        I agree about the title. As best I can tell, when
        they say "nobody" they mean "nobody in the marketing
        department." In short, there's no single overarching
        theme that describes what iPads are good at, so it's
        hard to advertise.
    

Mainstream media continues to be surprised by the numerous use cases of a
Turing machine.

~~~
marcosdumay
And we continue to be surprised by them not undertanding it.

~~~
mikeash
I'm no longer surprised by any of the foolishness that journalists get up to,
but it's still fun to point it out.

------
tessierashpool
Well, number 1, an iPad is good for reducing the amount of free tech support
you do for your parents, at least in my case. Reducing doesn't mean
eliminating, unfortunately, but buying my parents iPads was still some of the
best money I ever spent.

I have three iPads myself. I use two of them every single day, for work, for
entertainment, for study, for the weather, etc.

btw, Apple just announced a record quarter with incredible iPad sales. For
whatever reason, Apple has a very odd history with the press. You basically
shouldn't bother with any story about Apple unless it comes from Daring
Fireball. He's kind of an Apple cheerleader, but he also seems to be the only
person in the world who will fact-check a story about Apple before publishing
it.

------
sholanozie
I really dislike the idea that people need to be told what they should use
their technology for. Tablets are just computers and they run software, like
every other computer. What you do with it is up to your imagination.

My girlfriend and I keep an iPad plugged into our stereo receiver via an
auxiliary cable and use it as a Spotify terminal. My dad's iPad is his primary
computing device. It seems like a lot of other people in this thread have
similar stories. So, clearly, saying "nobody" knows what an iPad is good for
is a little bit of a stretch.

~~~
signal11
Another example: Toddlers love iPads. I've talked to new parents who are
astonished how easily their 15-month-olds navigate the Youtube iPad app (most
of them set up playlists for their toddlers). There's also a huge collection
of toddler-friendly games and apps.

------
russnewcomer
I'm a developer, but my iPad is my primary computing device while at home. My
laptop died about a year ago, and I decided to save money and just use the
iPad that I got as a Christmas bonus. About the only thing I ever feel I lack
is legacy support for older Windows games. With the occasional keyboard
pairing for longer emails, I would say that the only thing it really lacks is
the ability to archive photos from my camera. Maybe I'm in the minority here
in that I specifically don't do any development or really intense computing
tasks at home, but I think that my use case mirrors much of the non-technical
world. I know of many people who use iPads as their primary computing devices.

I think it's more accurate to say that tech journalists don't know what an
iPad is good for anymore.

------
AndrewKemendo
_an interactive playbook for hockey coaches, a touchscreen map for storm
chasers, a training assistant for sumo wrestlers, a field guide for
identifying fish when you’re scuba diving, a cutting-edge tool for fixing wind
turbines._

The author answers his own question...enterprise. iPads are seeing massive
adoption in Architecture Construction and Engineering (Plangrid comes to
mind), not to mention medical and insurance practice. Go to any enterprise
rent a car and they are using tablets exclusively for contracts with clients.

The consumer/causal user use case may not be there but there is a real need to
be able to take a powerful computer with you that has network capabilities,
screen sharing/powerpoint display, cameras all without needing to lug around a
keyboard and mouse (yes I consider a laptop lugging around).

Especially when you consider power on/off time there is a big difference in
use case that makes it perfect for enterprise.

------
programminggeek
This is a dumb article. Sales growth has slowed because iPads are computers
and don't have a 2 year repurchase cycle. There are only so many people out
there who don't own a tablet of some kind and an iPad will last a lot longer
than an iPhone.

The iPad 2 is still a very good tablet for a lot of people. Not a huge reason
to upgrade until it breaks.

Also, nerds might not love it, but my wife adores her Kindle Fire HD and uses
it all the time. For recipes, surfing the web, and watching videos, that is
all she needs.

~~~
slantyyz
>> iPads are computers and don't have a 2 year repurchase cycle

If you regularly update to the latest OS release, you will barely get past the
second year. In my experience, "the final major version OS to run on any iOS
device" is generally annoyingly slow.

It might be better these days, but it wasn't the case with my original iPad,
iPhone 3G and 4. I'm glad I told my wife not to update her 4S to 8 (i.e., the
final major version that will be available for the 4S), because updating to 7
had already noticeably slowed down her phone.

~~~
programminggeek
There are literally millions of computers happily running Windows XP, Windows
Vista, Windows 7, old versions of OS X, Android 2.x, and 2+ year old releases
of Linux.

For what a lot of people do on computers, old software still works just fine.
Yes, you don't get all the latest updates, but millions of people don't care
at all. Certainly millions don't care enough to spend money to upgrade. More
than that, a lot of people don't really notice the difference.

------
gdulli
I don't agree with the analogy. There's a bigger qualitative difference
between PCs and mobile devices than between cars and trucks.

The need for a real PC has never gone away for me. A tablet or phone is
something I can waste a little bit of time on or use on an airplane. They're
great for that, but they're passive devices for consumption, not production.

Real work (anything that requires more than a small amount of input) and even
real entertainment (playing a full-sized game, reading/watching longer pieces)
is not comfortable for me on a mobile device. It would be a significant
compromise to go without a real PC. The efforts to make a tablet act like a
computer (like attaching a physical keyboard) don't go nearly far enough to
bridge the gap.

~~~
r00fus
Based on what you said, I think the analogy still holds. You talk about work -
that's the truck. Others talk about just browsing/Facebook/etc - that's the
car.

iPads (and iPhones) are awesome for some stuff - if I want to send a "fax" I
just take a photo and email/message it (say to my insurance company). Scanning
documents on my desktop is... not easy. Even doing the exact same operation
(take picture and send) is fraught with difficulty.

------
rebootthesystem
I can't use an iPad for much more than reading books, casual web browsing,
casual chess and a game or two.

For work I split 75%/25% between a PC and Mac, both with multiple large high-
resolution monitors, proper keyboards, trackballs and a Wacom tablet. I
couldn't imagine coding on an iPad or working on anything serious enough. The
closed nature of the platform, with lack of file system access, user accounts,
peripheral connectivity and lack of expansion (memory being a key issue) makes
the ipad inconvenient at best.

But wait! There's nothing whatsoever wrong with this scenario. I am perfectly
happy with what the iPad does for me. Sure, it can't match my 16 core PC with
24gigs of SDRAM, three monitors and five hard drives. It doesn't have to!

Different devices for different uses. And the ipad is great for what I do with
it. Ideal? No, of course. Editing text is a pain in the ass, the screen is too
small and some websites absolutely suck on it (Please STOP disabling zoom!).
The iPad is very useful. I am sure people outside engineering/design might
find a lot more use out of it.

~~~
BashiBazouk
Not to mention it's much easier to lie in bed or on the couch with an ipad
than with an awesome general computing setup...

------
boca
Barring the title, the article touches upon some right notes. Ipad quarterly
sales are down by about 21% YOY going by the latest quarterly earnings report
from Apple (1). With the Iphone 6 and Iphone 6 plus coming out, I guess
there's not much reason, except for certain use cases, for people to buy an
Ipad. Apple surely recognizes that and is probably looking to reverse the
trend with the rumored Ipad Pro (2).

(1) [http://venturebeat.com/2015/01/27/apple-breaks-its-sales-
rec...](http://venturebeat.com/2015/01/27/apple-breaks-its-sales-records-
with-74-5m-iphones-in-q1-2015-but-ipad-sales-decline-21-to-21-4m/)

(2) [http://www.macworld.co.uk/news/ipad/big-screen-ipad-pro-
plus...](http://www.macworld.co.uk/news/ipad/big-screen-ipad-pro-plus-release-
date-rumours-leaked-images-stylus-3492180/)

~~~
pivo
I used to work for Gazelle, a company that buys used iPhones, iPads, etc. from
consumers. We found that the iPads we bought were generally in much worse
shape than the iPhones. We believed this suggested that people were using
their iPads quite a bit. Anecdotally, among my friends and family iPads are in
almost constant use. So even if we don't know what iPads are good for we seem
to use them a lot.

I wonder how much of this is just that people are not upgrading their iPads as
often as they upgrade their phones. I'm still relatively happy with my iPad 2
and I've had three different iPhones during the time I've owned it. A lot of
my friends are in similar situations. I think we all kind of agree that iPads
are too expensive to justify frequent upgrades, especially when they're still
useable.

I bought an iPhone 6 Plus thinking it would replace the iPad but found that,
while I still really like the 6 Plus' size, it doesn't really work that well
for prolonged reading or the lazy internet surfing the author mentions in the
article.

~~~
digikata
I think your observations re: Gazelle point to the situation that telecom
companies drive shorter upgrade cycles for phones, often hiding their cost and
allowing three year upgrades. In contrast people generally pay full price for
tablets, and upgrade less frequently.

~~~
pivo
Yes, that's definitely true. Plus iPads are not essential in the way phones
are. They're luxury items.

------
hullo
Just since it hasn't been mentioned - I'd never buy my kids an iPhone 6+ to
share, but when our coming up on 4-years-old iPad2 finally becomes unfeasible
we'll absolutely get a new iPad. Not to mention the general and more formal
education market...

~~~
dharma1
I agree, our 4 year old loves our iPad. Sure he could use a phone but the much
bigger screen is great.

I also have some Windows 8 tablets, and sometimes he uses my MBP, but
generally those are far too complex for young children. The iPad is great, and
there is a wealth of great educational apps and games for kids.

------
Marcus316
My son's school (Junior Kindergarten to Gr 5) uses iPads as part of their
learning environment. We (the Parent Council) are helping fund the purchase of
AppleTV devices for the classrooms so students can share what they're doing on
the iPad with the whole class.

By all estimations from teachers and students alike, this has been a wonderful
tool for teaching and learning.

Now, I don't own any apple products at all, so (having never held an iPad
myself) I'm not really sure what they can actually do, so the question "what
is this device good for" is one I cannot really answer from personal
experience ... but I think in-school work is probably an excellent use-case.

~~~
ericcumbee
I had a discussion with a former co-worker that is the Lead for A/V and smart
class rooms at my former work. They looked at Apple TV to do just that and
decided that there were to many security/room for mischief issues for Apple
TV. I can't remember who, but they are evaluating a air-play device that
offers more granular control. might not be as big of a deal in k-5 as it is in
higher ed though.

------
teekert
I had the same experience, I bough one and a week later I sent it back. It was
annoying to hold on my lap because you can't put the screen at the angle you
want, my macbook has 5hr plus battery life, it is on when I open it, it never
has viruses, it just works... like an iPad.

My in laws however, who curse their windows machine when they have to
reinstall every year because of unbearable slowness and crap piling up, that
is a very different story.

~~~
aswanson
Yeah, I feel bad for normal users who buy pc laptops. The come loaded with
antivirus crapware that they threaten the user to buy after 30 days, and
usually become virus laden and slow after a few months of use because normal
users are so naive when downloading programs. For that reason alone, the Ipad
is a better device for most people.

------
eigenvalue
For me the killer app for an iPad is reading and highlighting/annotating
documents. The ability to download a bunch of PDFs (in my case, mostly
corporate filings) into a Dropbox folder, and immediately sync that folder to
the iPad so I can start reading and highlighting (with changes automatically
saved back to Dropbox) has completely changed my workflow, making me a lot
more efficient.

------
beachstartup
strangely, in my experience, people under 25 and over 45 love ipads, whereas
everyone between 25 and 45 really don't have a use for them (including
myself).

wonder if this is a wider trend or i just have a very self-selected peer group
(i'm early 30s). everyone in my social circle is 25-45 and either needs to
type very quickly or wants nothing to do with computers or gadgets beyond the
basics.

------
hengheng
This article certainly resonates with me. For a long time, tablets never made
sense to me.

I've had 13" laptops for a decade now (iBook G4 12", MacBook 1st Gen Intel,
Lenovo X220), and they were always highly portable and had decent battery
life. Along came smartphones with ever increasing screen sizes, leading up to
my trusty Note 2.

I've tried a number of tablets. 7" is too similar to my phone. 10" is too
close to the laptop. I need a separate bag for it anyway, and it feels about
as practical as the laptop at home. I never considered tablets being devices
to work on, and I'm that guy who will use his laptop on the couch just because
I'm still used to it.

Along came tablets with stylus. Being able to scribble and take notes on a
screen just made sense, even if there was no OCR and it's all just bitmaps. I
followed suit on the retina jump, switching from a 10" Android Thinkpad Tablet
to a Note 10 2014. I have to say, the tablet _with stylus_ is about the best
computer I've ever used. I use it to display scores when singing, to draw
bitmap sketches when designing, to read PDF _and scribble away in it_ , etc..
LectureNotes is the killer app that made me buy into the whole device class.

Granted I still play Hearthstone on it, I watch Youtube and Twitch, I browse
the web and do internet stuffs, but that would never be worth the maintenance
effort of owning a separate device between my phone and my laptop. At some
point I'd like to try a Windows Tablet, I heard they have better PDF viewers
and decent OCR. iOS devices on the other hand feel completely out of place to
me nowadays. Phones are nice if impractically small, but tablets are nothing
more than beautiful toys, and they're all overpriced by a factor of 4 relative
to the use I see in them. They'd be nice as a fourth device, but not as a
first or second one.

------
autoreleasepool
As a student, the iPad has changed my life. I no longer need to purchase giant
3 ½ pound tombs that cause back and shoulder pain. I just get them for my iPad
and they're all on one lightweight device.

It just renders text books so perfectly. I have a smart phone, but there's no
replacement for that big, 9.7 inch screen. It makes web pages and PDFs so
pleasurable to read.

I think the sales have slowed because the upgrade cycle for tablets is similar
to the upgrade cycle for computers. I've had my iPad with retina display for
over 2 years and, unless it breaks, I don't see a reason to get a new one.

One side effect of having an iPad is that it has allowed me to have a clunkier
PC life. I have a workstation set up with a 15inch MacBook, a second monitor,
mount, usb hub, keyboard, mouse and the works. I no longer have to worry about
its portability because I have my tablet.

------
bradleyjg
My computing devices are: an iphone (4s), an ipad (air 2), and a windows
computer with a 27" monitor. I also have a kindle, but that's not general
purpose.

I could probably replace the computer and ipad with a macbook, but 1) it would
cost more money and 2) wouldn't be as mobile and easy to use as the ipad (for
surfing in bed / on the couch, watching movies while eating, listening to
music) or as usable as the windows computer (for coding and playing games)
because of the smaller screen size and the relatively crappy keyboard / mouse.
I could remedy the latter limitations with a docking station, separate monitor
and keyboard, but now the solution is not just more expensive but much more
expensive and even more cumbersome as compared to the ipad.

------
rdez6173
The iPad is a tool for consumption rather than production. For those without
an iPhone, I think the iPad is a terrific device for consuming content.

I think that if the iPad could serve to bridge the gap between consumption and
production, then its place would be clear.

I own a Surface Pro 3 and I adore the ability to switch between consumption
and production. However, its presentation and implementation leave a lot to be
desired. It's often jarring switching between the clean Windows Store apps
that were designed for touch, and the "Desktop" apps that dump you into the
familiar, but frustrating, desktop where the mouse and keyboard dominate.

I feel that, if done well, a multipurpose device could supplant the
incumbents.

------
jpetersonmn
I use my ipad daily, for work and entertainment. When I'm working from home
it's nice to have on my coffee table so I can see when I get a new email, or
alert from the office. I leave my laptop in my office connected to a bigger
monitor and would just go downstairs if I needed to reply to an email, or
something. Then in the evening, I read hacker news, tv guide app, awesome
Netflix/hulu remote with the chromecast. When I go to holidays at my relatives
I always bring it to facetime my dad who lives in Hawaii. It's lite and easy
to pass around the room so he can have a little visit.

I'm not able to write code or really produce much, but it's a great tool IMO.

------
matthewmacleod
I don't really buy this. I see literally dozens of people a day using tablets
– mostly iPads. They're reading books, playing games, watching videos, using
Facebook. I think it's pretty clear what it's good for.

I suspect that iPad sales have declined not as a result of the iPhone 6(+),
but because the market is becoming saturated. There's little reason to upgrade
past a certain point – sure, iPad 1 -> 2, and iPad 2 -> Retina were
improvements. But aside from general performance improvements, there haven't
been many changes since. In this situation, it's hard to see why most users
would upgrade.

------
ortusdux
The latest episode of 99% Invisible does a great job of covering this topic. I
highly recommend it.

[http://99percentinvisible.org/episode/of-mice-and-
men/](http://99percentinvisible.org/episode/of-mice-and-men/)

A great analogy used in the piece (spoiler?) compared PCs to bicycles and
tablets and phones to tricycles. Anyone can just hop on a tricycle and go
around the block, but you need to learn and practice riding a bicycle. The
thing is, you cannot commute to work on a tricycle. The counter argument is
that modern smart phones and tablets are closer to 3-wheel recumbent bikes
than tricycles.

------
graublau
The biggest issue for me is: iCloud sync/Documents in the Cloud. When I used
the iPad I had to manage my global/individual app settings daily and still
found annoying holes where an both first and third-party apps wouldn't sync
across my iCloud data. What's worse is that Apple doesn't give the user enough
feedback when it's syncing data. (It's supposed to be magic, I suppose..)

I found that Third party sync services seemed worked much better than iCloud
for me.

It just got too annoying. I couldn't ditch my iPhone, so the iPad had to go.

------
perlpimp
I think it should replace all the textbooks in the university. It is
incredible the amount of dead trees that goes into making all those textbooks
that are in turn are very difficult to transport and use.

Perhaps textbook social learning app? Something, native, fast and reliable. So
you can do your homework in your study group and have the results to be shared
between all people in one place with a textbook.

I think iPad fell short with its textbook software - can someone make a
platform. There is the issue of expensive and profitable dead tree textbooks
though.

------
roozbeh18
My Mom practically pays all her bills, watches youtube, does whatever she
wants with her iPad. Same for other family members who aren't computer savvy
and just need to get by.

------
abandonliberty
It's fair to say that the initial enthusiasm and popularity of tablets is
crashing to reality.

When they first came out they sold like crazy even though we didn't know what
they were for.

Finally we are seeing where they can fit in, but it is less than we dreamed,
partially supplanted by smartphones and phablets; and came at a significant
cost after many failures.

As a result many people have tablets they don't and can't imagine using
(myself included), anecdotal evidence that leads to mistaken conclusions.

------
serve_yay
It's much better for reading, that alone is enough for me. I have a new big
iPhone but still use my iPad to read every day.

------
ZanyProgrammer
My iPad Air is much better than any phablet for reading books on Kindle-and
lets me honest, the way tablets and phones are designed these days, its not
like carrying an iPad Air _and_ my trusty 5s takes up a lot of weight or
space. There's practically no weight/space penalty these days for carrying a
dedicated phone and tablet.

------
z5h
It's an amazing platform for making music. The touch screen means every
instrument can have it's own custom controller interface (used to need tons of
hardware for hands-on tweaking).

Of course, it's also a great computer replacement for people who don't do much
beyond surf/email/casual-game.

------
lurkinggrue
Never found a use case with a tablet that worked for me. I have my main PC, a
laptop and a large phone.

Then again I was never one to sit on a couch and watch tv with a laptop so I
figured I was not in the right demographic for an ipad.

------
nicwolff
With Duet Display, it makes an excellent portable second monitor for a
MacBook...

------
ebiester
The iPad is good for letting me keep my work and play separate. I play on the
iPad -- I work on my (linux) laptop.

------
desireco42
Kids.

------
chrismcb
iPads are great consumption devices. But one place I've seen them that shocked
me was as point of sale devices. They seem to be taking over the cash register
market.

------
blueskin_
Did we ever know? I will concede that it was good for the random user doing
some casual internet use while watching TV before phones got big enough for
that, but I would contest if it ever had a single unique use other than that
even at launch. Any device with a single purpose seems likely to fail, I
think.

>Innovations like automatic transmission

I'd count that (or indeed, tablets) an 'innovation' in the same way as PRISM
or systemd. Sure, it is one in that it's new and a different approach and even
helps a very specific class of users, but not a net positive. I guess that's
just the state of the world though, that we will always be forced to accept
'innovation' that does nothing but make life hard for the power user, the
enthusiast, the person with an above-room-temperature IQ.

>had to be “far better” than a phone or a laptop

That's where it gets interesting, I think. As stated above, better than a
phone contemporary to its launch, yes, but it was never better than a laptop
bar "easier to pick up and carry around", which rarely applied to what are so
often sofa-bound devices, or shoved into a backpack on a long journey at most.

~~~
ceejayoz
> I guess that's just the state of the world though, that we will always be
> forced to accept 'innovation' that does nothing but make life hard for the
> power user, the enthusiast, the person with an above-room-temperature IQ.

I like how not wanting to use computing devices in the same way you like to is
a mental defect in your world. Wow.

~~~
toothbrush
The way the GP put it is a little harsh, yes, but i can see where they're
coming from. Personally, i think a device that "just works" is great. Really.
For certain people (i agree, not low-IQ people, just non computer
enthusiasts). And this is where the iPad shines. My gripe, though, would be
that it doesn't cater to the power user who wants to modify components and
software / create (whether that be a novel, a song, or a piece of software) in
the same way that a general-purpose (and i'd go as far as to say open-
source/libre software) computer does. I like hacking at my editor and being
able to plug in an Arduino, and an iPad wouldn't let me do that.

Having said all of that, my response is: if that is a deal-breaker for you
(like it is for me), don't buy an iPad. Simple. The iPad has it's target
market very well defined and served (even if i do lament the fact that it's
such a DRM / walled garden / evil spying companies experience, where the user
is the product).

~~~
mikeash
I can't really see where they're coming from. The existence of an easy tool
doesn't eliminate the more powerful tools, and even advanced users sometimes
want easy tools.

I'm a computer power user by any reasonable definition. I program for a
living, I customize a lot of stuff, and I get pretty upset whenever I try to
run an unsigned binary and my Mac decides this is too unsafe and makes me jump
through hoops to make it happen.

But I also use my iPad a lot. If I'm reading on the couch or watching a video,
it gets the job done much better.

It's fine to say that it's not for you, but it's ridiculous to say that
simpler tools must only be for people who are incapable of using advanced
tools.

~~~
autoreleasepool
> I get pretty upset whenever I try to run an unsigned binary and my Mac
> decides this is too unsafe and makes me jump through hoops to make it
> happen.

In my experience, a simple right click -> open (as opposed to double click)
gets the job done. Is this what you're refering to?

~~~
mikeash
Doesn't that only open it once, and if I want to keep using it I have to go
flip the setting in System Preferences? And in Apple's infinite wisdom, that
setting now resets if you haven't exercised it in a while, which is pretty
crazy.

~~~
autoreleasepool
No, once you open it that way (on an admin account) it's supposed to allow you
to open it normally from then on. I beleive you if you say it has bugged on
you though.

~~~
mikeash
Either way, I'll be sure to try it out next time I run into it and see what it
does.

