The iPad Pocket Guide

Introduction

Given Apple’s advertising budget and ubiquitous ads, plus an enormous amount of media attention, it’s still difficult to determine just what an iPad is. Does it replace a laptop? Is it really just a “big iPod touch”? Is it a media player or a business machine? There are other tablet computers on the market, as well as “netbooks” that act like small laptops, and yet the iPad has captured people’s imaginations and pocketbooks like few other devices I’ve seen. It took only 28 days for Apple to sell 1 million iPads, and that was just in the United States alone; those couldn’t all be journalists and early adopters.

I’ve owned an iPad since the first day it was available, and I still have trouble explaining it to people. But I think I’ve ...