A name very similar to the one of its smaller brother, the iPod. Names that will surely make us pronounce and type the O in Pod and the A in Pad more carefully.
It’s not only the name that makes us refer to the smaller Apple brother. It’s also the shape and, of course, the functionalities.
And we wonder:
How will this brotherly relation influence the development of the new born iPad?
Room for yet another gadget in your purse? (Photo: Gizmondo.com)
Simplicity reflected by yet another jewel of advanced technology. Simplicity reflected by a perfectly directed speech. “Magical. Revolutionary. Unbelievable.” These are just three of Steve’s words that frame the Apple discourse on the new iPad.
But what are the words we are using to explain what the iPad is?
Here are some samples of home-made explanations:
“It is a like an iPod Touch, but with a bigger screen.”
“It replaces my ugly notebook.”
“It is the smartest e-book reader on the market.”
“It is a notebook…but one without a text processor, unfortunately.”
“It’s this amazing browsing experience…but it lacks Flash support.”
These explanations and rudimentary definitions reflect our primordial need of defining objects by their function. It’s this cognitive process we fall for: we desperately want to arrange the objects that surround us into classes or categories.
When it comes to the iPad, is it really a product without category?
Or is it the only product of its category (e-book readers?) worth using?
Is it itself launching a new category we do not know the name of yet?
How will we – the market – react?
Here is just one of the possible answers. An anthropologist answer, according to which the iPad’s lack of category will cause a stir.
Time will tell.
#1 by Carlos Escobar on February 4, 2010 - 10:29 am
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Maybe there is no defined category yet. It is probably just one big iPhone that can penetrate the market, whether for business or entertainment.
What might set up the iPad apart is that it has the potential to be successful. The iPod was not the first mp3 player, but it was the elegant and simple choice. The iPhone was far apart from the smart phones, yet, it captured the market extremely fast. This might be still another successful attempt by Steve Jobs to revolutionize ideas that have lagged behind. Even if they are not new, and most times, not close to radical, they tend to change people´s lives more so than other ones that might look like sharper turns.
#2 by Jaime on February 4, 2010 - 4:39 pm
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Another name given to this new gadget is “iPod Touch with steroids”. However, scalability will make this product as succesful as its predecessors.
#3 by Paulina Avila on February 23, 2010 - 4:35 pm
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Does the category define innovation? Steve Jobs is creating categories! An object like the iPad allow us to articulate needs we didn’t think of before. Products that lack a category when they appear on the market have the specific potential to articulate needs that are not obvious.