The Wrong Future ⇥ marco.org

Marco Arment:

What if the iPad isn’t the future of computing?

What if, like so much in technology, it’s mostly just additive, rather than largely replacing PCs and Macs, and furthermore had a cooling-fad effect as initial enthusiasm wore off and customers came to this conclusion?

On the flip side of that coin, what if Apple treated the iPad as the future of computing, instead of upscaling iPhone features to fit the iPad’s display, or hardly paying attention to it for an entire year? Would customers respond to an earnest attempt?

There are, undeniably, those who use the iPad to replace their desktops and notebooks. My parents almost exclusively use their iPads — I know this because every email I get from them includes the default signature. On the other end of that spectrum, Federico Viticci has set up his iPad Pro with a concoction of scripts and workflows that truly allows him to have virtually abandoned his Mac. And, yes, there are industries where the iPad excels.

Yet, all of that feels empty when the iPad isn’t given the kind of treatment and attention one might expect would be lavished upon the “future of computing”.