20100128

iPad - a Kindle killer?


Pictures from apple.com and amazon.com

Apple introduced its long-anticipated touch screen device yesterday. It looks like a stretched iPod Touch and it is called iPad. Basically it is like iPod Touch with a huge 9.7" screen. I will not go to all the tech details, you can read about them here.

One thing that is very interesting is Apple's intentions with iPad. They have made a handy surf board for sure and easy to carry around video watching device for traveling. But is iPad also a way to catch the market from Amazon's Kindle? iPad has a big enough screen for digital book reading and with its desirable looks it makes Kindle looking like an old calculator. iPad comes also with a wide variety of functions while Kindle is more or less meant just for reading.

Amazon has been marketing its electronic book reading device for couple of years now, but it never has really gotten to the main stream and hit the big buck. Apple on the other hand, is known for its ability to make gold of almost everything it touches. Apple's strengths lie in design, usability and branding. Amazon is not first and foremost a device manufacturer, they sell books. I am just wondering will iPad catch the bubbling-under market from Kindle and make digital magazine and book reading a hit? We will see. Still, at this point I read my magazines and books as paper versions.

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