My first week with the iPad

I lasted 7 hours, from the time the iPad was available for purchase, until the time I bought one. I’m not entirely sure what possessed me, but I’m happy I did it. I’ve spent most of the last week kicking the tires on the thing and trying to figure out where it fits in my life.

I took it to the Sprout Social Media & Advertising Summit in New York and used it during the conference instead of a laptop. I checked and replied to emails, I looked at some of the Facebook apps that were being discussed and I got made fun of by Nick O’Neill from All Facebook.

I took it to my couch and watched The Big Lebowski, streaming from Netflix. I took it to work and drew a mockup of a webpage during a meeting. I played a Labyrinth 2 and checked in on Foursquare. I put the thing through it’s paces and I learned a few things.

I figured out that most emails that I write are about 3 sentences long and that’s very doable on the iPad. I find that the battery life is amazing. One huge discovery was the battery life. I used it heavily but only recharged it three times during the week. Thats huge because it changes the iPad from being a technology-thing that requires me to think about charging it all the time to something that I just pick up and use, like a cookbook or magazine. That said, it still cost $500 and I should have bought a case for it while I was in the store. I’m nervous about scratching the screen.

I think what Apple is saying with the iPad is that we’ve been hanging on to some old ideas in computing, and it’s time to let them go. The typewriter is 140 years old, and the mouse has been around since 1981. Thats forever in computer years, they’re still at the center of almost every computing experience. To me, there are real similarities between the introduction of the iMac, which didn’t have a floppy drive, to the iPad which is will bring gesture based computing to the forefront.

I for one, am enjoying my iPad and I don’t miss my floppy-drive at all.