iPad for Student Health
The more I use this iPad, the more I am convinced that it is the logical and necessary next step for students. It may not be the Apple brand iPad, but it’s becoming increasingly obvious that students will benefit on many levels from these ereaders.
We’re in the back-to-school mode, which means the inevitable articles about backpacks being too heavy. There’s this one about a kid who’s carrying a backpack that’s 27% of her body weight. Or this one that weighs out how much each item in a student’s backpack weighs.
Schools and textbooks are as necessary as they have always been, but the way we transport them is beginning to evolve. Even as I get my kids ready for school, I can see that they have too much to transport.
Here are a few things necessary to make ereaders viable for kids:
- Tough devices – Kids are not going to take good care of ereaders, particularly since they represent school and other “not fun” stuff. The device needs to be nearly indestructible. Even if it bulks up the device, a durable rubberized coating is probably necessary. Maybe the people who design the Panasonic ToughBook can help with a school-grade device.
- Controlled web access – As it is, parents have a tough enough time monitoring what their kids see on the Internet. A device like this would need to have parental and school control built right in, so that kids aren’t surfing inappropriate content when nobody is looking.
There are many, many reasons why we should be having serious discussions about ereaders for students. But it’s almost that time, and I have to get my kids off to school. And we’re renting a forklift to get their backpacks into the car.
Additional reading:
- Why You’ll Be Using an EReader in 5 Years
- Kindles + Kids = 37 Billion Reasons
- Another eReader Convert
iPad – Week 1
Apple iPad
It’s been a week, and I do believe I am in love. Well, at least serious infatuation.
One week with the Apple iPad, and I’m wondering two things:
- How did I live without the iPad before this?
- Why is free WiFi still so hard to find?
Here’s what I love about the new iPad:
- Snappy performance
- Gorgeous graphics
- Near-infinite amount of free and/or very inexpensive entertainment
- Amazing old and new apps that have already become part of my everyday life
What I don’t love:
- Screen that seems to pick up a little too many fingerprints
- Shiny display that is difficult to read outside on a nice day
- Bit too heavy and wide
- Apps that still haven’t been reprogrammed from the iPhone to the iPad
The Amazon Kindle still holds a place in my backpack, just based on super-light portability. But the iPad sure does offer a lot more function and fun.
And this is just the first week. Not bad, Apple. Very impressed.
For Sale: Print
Marvel Comics on iPad
I have seen the future…and I am selling all of my books.
Okay, not all of them, but an awful lot of them. Books, comic books, magazines, and just about everything print. Y’see, I’ve had an Amazon Kindle 2 for over a year now. And don’t get me wrong, it’s an amazing little machine.
But then I saw the iPad, and it changed the way I thought about books, particularly comic books.
Tablets have been around for quite a while. In fact, at work, we run tablet PCs with Microsoft Windows. It’s a nice technology, but for whatever reason, it just didn’t lend itself to reading full novels. Even comics were a little awkward, since you had to use a little stylus to turn the pages of a digital comic.
Apple’s iPad interface is amazing. It’s intuitive, pleasant, and fades quickly into the background. Admittedly, it’s not quite as good as the Kindle when it comes to reading plain text books. But it’s terrific for reading comics. And if they get that screen just a tiny bit larger on the next version — without increasing the total size of the device — it’ll be about a darn near perfect comic book reading experience.
Lots of comic book friends think this is just crazy, but I happen to think that it’s the way I’ll be consuming comics in the future. Sure, part of the comic book hobby is bagging, boarding, and saving your comics. But if you think about it, that’s just a tradition rooted in print and distribution.
Back in the early days, comic books were distributed on the news stand. If you wanted comics when you were a kid, you went to the nearest news stand, pharmacy, or convenience store and got your issues. The problem was that there were very few comic book stores, so it was difficult, and often very expensive, to find back issues of comic books. Scarcity increases price, so that’s the short version of why some old comics are expensive. More people want them than there are comics to buy, and suddenly, people are paying a million dollars for a single issue of Superman.
Because of this relative scarcity of back issues — and the fact that some comic book stories are one long serialized saga — people learned to buy and collect comics. A supporting industry sprung up that supplies bags, boards, boxes, and just about ever variation in between. Multiply that by a few decades of my personal collecting fervor, and I have a room that’s seemingly overrun with white boxes.
As I stare at the iPad, I wonder how many comics will fit on this device? Better yet, how many will fit on my Mac, which I can transfer over to an iPad or whatever device? How many boxes can I possibly clear out of my collection, and how much of my man cave will I be able to reclaim?
One by one, I have been getting rid of my regular books. I’ve donated them to book sales, shared them with friends, and have basically just purged many of my bookshelves. There are still keepers, but the vast majority have found a second life somewhere else.
High quality digital content is easier than ever to find. You can even do it legally through Amazon and Apple, which means that you’re not stealing from the pockets of your favorite writers or artists. The only thing that is changing is the distribution channel, and bookstores, comic stores, and newsstands are scrambling to adapt to this new profit model. Some will survive, but many will not.
In the meantime, I’m trying to figure out what to do with my comic book collection. It’ll be a few years before everything in my current collection is ready in the digital format. It’ll start with the mainstream publishers like Marvel and DC Comics, but it will move quickly to independent publishers. I’m a traditionalist, so if publishers offer comics on DVDs
The way content — including ebooks — is popping into the Apple iTunes store, I think the future is happening sooner rather than later. And that’s just fine by me.
In the meantime, does anyone want to buy some classic comics? Cheap.
Flash, HTML5, & Why We Need to Move On
You gotta wonder…how many people really understand the whole Steve Jobs vs. Adobe Flash debate? Sure, if you are reading this blog, you may already have a better-than-average understanding of technology. And you may even work and socialize with similarly tech-minded people.
But the rest of the consumer world? Maybe not so much.
For now, it’s not really that big of an issue. There aren’t that many iPads out there yet, so the device penetration is rather small. If they stay close to home (i.e., mostly use apps they buy in the Apple iTunes store), they’ll be mostly unaffected by the whole hullabaloo.
If the iPad takes off, and it probably will, it will mean that people will start to understand that the standards debate actually does matter to them. It’s the same way that people with old televisions started to understand that they just cannot watch HD television or use TV widgets (like the ones from Vizio).
As a content marketer, I’m rooting for a quick end to the debate. Right now, I know how to push out compelling messages in Flash. And in HTML and widgets and video, etc. If the developers tell me that we can do something with a particular technology, I try to understand what kind of message I can deliver…obviously paying keen attention to the limitations of the medium. It’s just the way it is. It’s not a big deal, we just learn to communicate brand value and message through whatever medium people happen to be using.
If I have to learn the nuances of communicating through HTML5, great, I’ll do that. If I can keep using Flash, terrific, let’s get moving.
In the meantime, I just hope that this debate doesn’t have some kind of chilling effect on people’s willingness to buy new devices, including the iPad. Sometimes people sit out new technology to see which will be the dominant format. Most of the world sat out the latest Blu Ray versus HD DVD. They didn’t care who won. They just wanted to buy stuff, so they waited it out. People who didn’t even remember the VHS versus Betamax debate could reference it as a prime example of the original video-format wars.
Let’s solve this HTML5 versus Flash versus open source versus Apple versus Adobe debate quickly. We need to get on with the business of selling devices, creating great content, and exploiting the best new technology channels.
Another eReader Convert
Another day, another ereader convert.
Yup, another co-worker came to the office today to show off his Kindle. He admitted that my relentless raving for the Kindle pushed him over the edge. That, and he ran the numbers, and realized that he’s actually going to spend less on his reading materials. He’s a heavy reader of new non-fiction books, so the cost of shipping alone from Amazon and BN.com was apparently adding up.
He loves the Kindle and was showing it around the room. His favorite feature? His back no longer aches from lugging around books. Nice.
The falling cost of ebook readers is increasing the amount of content that you can get electronically. The improved capabilities coming from the Nook, Kindle, and the Apple iPad are inspiring content creators and even marketers to look at new ways to distribute content electronically. It’s a beautiful circle of ever-increasing growth for electronic publishing. It’s a lot like the early incarnations of websites in the 1990s, except on an accelerated timeline.
Like the early Internet — heck, like anything early in the development stage — the ebook and ereader market is going to experience explosive growth in many different directions. Some of them will be logical, especially in hindsight. Some directions will be surprising, and perhaps even illogical. Other directions will fizzle and be left to Net history and Wikipedia entries.
People jump on new technology like it’s supposed to be fully de-bugged and realized in the first or even second release. It’s never been that way. Consider the first cars or telephones or televisions or even the first computers. These devices evolved naturally, as engineers and users determined was features were valuable and which were unnecessary. It’ll be the same way with ereaders and ebooks. You can wait it out or you can jump in and be part of the virtual team that de-bugs and priortizes our future technology.
Today, one of my co-workers joined the revolution. One day, we’ll laugh about how primitive the Kindle is compared to our more advanced devices.
Nook – Now for Games
Nook with Chess
With all the buzz on the Apple iPad (for good reason) and the inevitable comparisons to Amazon’s Kindle, it’s easy to overlook the poor Nook.
Barnes & Nobles released the Nook amongst much fanfare, but failed to deliver enough units for the holiday season. It was a shame, really, when you consider that the Nook would have made an awesome last-minute gift.
Amazon may have won the hearts and wallets of online shoppers, but there are still lots of folks who like the traditional shopping experience. That’s the advantage that Barnes & Nobles will need to exploit more aggressively to differentiate themselves from the Kindle.
Just today, BN.com announced that the Nook now allows you to play some basic games like chess and Sudoku. Not to pick on the poor Nook because it is a dandy device. But chess and Sudoku in glorious black and white? Seriously? Is that your response to the iPad? What’s next? Pong?
Barnes & Nobles seems strangely intent on battling Apple on their turf (cool games) and Amazon on their turf (download ebooks). I’m no expert on bookselling, but I would imagine that they should be pounding the competition in places where they dominate — brick and mortar stores.
Barnes & Nobles is winning the real estate war. They claim to have 775 retail locations in the US and 636 bookstore locations. Sure, Apple has a handful of stores, but you’ll find that there are far more B&N locations. Amazon is strictly online.
Since it’s one of my favorite stores, I hope that Barnes and Nobles gets serious about making the next version of the Nook a serious mobile ereader with all the appropriate and logical features. And to do that, they need to exploit their unique value and killer app…their stores.
iPad vs Kindle – First Look
Apple iPad
It’s nice. Really nice. The color pops, the screen is sharp, and you just don’t want to give it back.
Sure, I have a Kindle, and it’s a great ebook reader. And considering my initial assessment of the iPad, I think that the Kindle is still a better ereader.
But, wow. That iPad is just about better for everything else. Video, web browsing, games, apps. None of these are even available on my Kindle 2.0, which is looking a lot like old technology.
The iPad is really expensive. If you get the top-o-the line with 3G coverage, you’re dropping a ton of dough, even before you start paying for your phone service. Crazy as it seems, the Kindle suddenly downright inexpensive as compared to the iPad.
For everyday use, the Kindle is a great ereader. I didn’t realize how light and portable it was until I picked up the iPad. The iPad has clearly superior screen technology, but I guess that comes with dense, compact electronics that add an unusually uncomfortable weight. While reading a sample ebook (which looked much better than expected), my instinct was to rest it on a table, just to balance the weight. The Kindle, on the other hand, is pleasantly light. You hold it like a paperback novel. The iPad is like holding a textbook.
For me, of course, the iPad is a damn nice device for reading comics. The colors look amazing and digital comics are perfect for this platform.
It’s unlikely that my Kindle will be banished anytime soon, since I tend to read a lot. The e-ink technology means excellent sharpness and long battery life.
But for everyday, all-around fun, the super-cool, insanely useful iPad is the hands-down winner.
Twas the Night Before iPad
Apple iPad
On the eve of iPad, the buzz is everywhere. Once again, Apple has managed to make themselves the topic of discussion. Every newspaper, magazine, blog, and website seems to have some sort of opinion on the iPad.
This week’s episode of Modern Family (a very funny show) even featured a major story line that included the iPad. Not just a mention, but a major, intrinsic part of the story. The iPad got some of the best product placement ever known to television.
Sure, it’s a great display of awesome or “insanely great” technology, but it’s much more than that. It’s a demonstration of how well Apple can connect with their target audience. This is a brilliant marketing story unfolding in real time.
Apple is one of those rare companies that creates a culture that they feed with well-timed and well-conceived products. They know their audience, which happens to include the media. And they play to them.
Many books have been written about Steve Jobs, the marketing of the Macintosh, the iPhone, and soon the iPad. But these are real-time chronicles. What will be interesting is the hindsight perspective that we have 10, 15, 20 years from now. It’s a brilliant marketing case study that will help us understand why we were mesmerized and powerless to the siren call of Apple’s product line.
Sure, other companies are out there trying to steal the spotlight from Apple. But people aren’t that stupid. Apple has positioned itself as a trustworthy company that people just…well…like. It’s like a wedding, and the guests adore the beautiful bride. Even if she happens to be a tablet computer.
In the meantime, I look forward to reading the breathless first reviews from people who stand in line all night to get the first iPads. It’s all good cheery fun that dovetails with the improving economy and the coming of Spring.
And, at least for a little while, it’s nice to be part of the Apple geek club.
LINKS: Not necessarily endorsements:
- Product and marketing lessons from Apple
- What 1984 Macintosh marketing reveals about iPad
- Steve Jobs: Lessons from a Marketing Genius
Apple’s 10 Billion…eBooks?
Apple iTunes Store Sells 10 Billion Songs
Ten billion. That’s how many songs have been legally downloaded from Apple’s iTunes Store.
This is what that looks like: 10,000,000,000
If it look impressive, that’s because it is. And it is significant because it may represent a small victory in the war over digital piracy. Apple has made it easy and affordable to buy music (something the record industry didn’t do themselves). As a result, people have paid money for stuff that they can easily steal.
If you own an iPod, iPhone or some other Apple device, you know that the Apple iTunes Store is really, really easy to use. Plus, they sell more than just music. You can get movies and TV shows as well.
As the iPad comes out, Apple will begin to roll out ebooks, newspapers, magazines, and other new media content. It’s going to be a broad range of materials, many of which will be purchased by the download. (Currently there is no subscription model.)
From a content perspective, this is a huge opportunity. People have grown used to getting content for free on websites. Few websites have managed to get money out of their visitors. Marvel Digital and Disney Digital have online subscription models, but those are premiere brands with highly exclusive content resources and characters.
As the iPad hits the streets, Apple is going to be working hard to get you to pay for content. Amazon already gets people to pay for ebooks and blogs on the Kindle, so there is a segment of the population prepared to pay for content.
No, don’t get me wrong. I am not looking forward to paying for stuff that I am getting free today, but that’s how it goes. Only so many websites and publishers can survive on the freemium model. Eventually someone is going to have to pay.
Sure, there will always be people who figure out a way to get stuff for free. In fact, many pirates don’t rip DVDs and MP3s because they want the media. They do it because they enjoy the challenge of cracking the code or beating the system. (And DRM doesn’t seem to work.)
With ereaders like the Kindle, Nook, and iPad, publishers are going to have to figure out a way to get people to buy digital books and magazines. Free is not a sustainable business model for most publishers. As the music industry will attest, it’s not going to be easy, but it is possible to get people to pay for media.
Price them right, make them easy to get, and maybe in a few years I’ll be blogging about how there were 10 billion ebooks sold on the Apple store.
LINKS – NOT NECESSARILY ENDORSEMENTS:
- Apple iTunes Store Records 10 Billionth Download, Gives Away $10,000 Gift Card
- 10 Billion Songs Sold by Apple’s iTunes Store
- Simon & Schuster Issues Digital Piracy Policy
- Publishers Fear eBook Piracy, But Shouldn’t
- Piracy, Avid Readers and New Business Models
iPad – What It Is, What It Isn’t
The Apple iPad has polarized technogeeks, industry professionals, and average consumers. This new electronic device has sparked debates about what it is, what it isn’t and what it should be.
Once again, let’s just break it down and give it a quick analysis.
What iPad Is:
Apple iPad is a consumer entertainment device. It will have built-in multimedia capabilities that will allow you to use it to watch movies, check email, surf the Inter-web, and read short ebooks. It’ll be a pretty nifty device that will also allow you to play certain video games and apps that have already appeared in the iTunes App Store.
That, and maybe a few other things. For about $499 – $899, this limited-use device will give you some entertainment and maybe some other ephemeral enjoyment. Simply put, the iPad is a device marketed to play certain types of content.
But the techno-knows are experiencing some level of angst that the new iPad has not — and probably will not — solve world hunger, peace, or even cancer. (In the first few weeks, however, even the geekiest of guys may find that it attracts chicks. Temporarily.)
Tech experts have been going on and on and on about what the iPad doesn’t do. And for the most part, they’re right. The iPad isn’t a panacea to all problems. (Note: Look up the word “panacea.” It’s a rather cool and satisfying word.)
So I have compiled an additional list of things that the iPad “is not.”
What iPad Isn’t:
- Chick-fil-A sandwich
- Kindle 2
- Panacea to all problems (don’t you wish you looked up that word already?)
- Pair of tube socks
- Toaster oven
- An actual apple
- Device to bend the time-space continuum
- Whipped cream
- Monkey
- 1970 Mercury Cougar
You see? The iPad is something. And it’s also not a lot of other things. Feel better now?
Cheer up. Apple is brilliantly marketing iPad as something that they will manufacture and sell to people who want that something. This may irritate people who feel like the “something” that Apple makes should have been “something else” with some “other somethings” built into the “thing.”
Or “something” like that.
Flickr Feed
