Examine the Two Schools of Thought for Tablet Computing
The article above is from a Tech Republic Blog called Tablets in the Enterprise.
I'd like to see a real study, a good one, not one run by Apple, or Google or anyone else connected with the industry. I would like to see a study to determine how, or even if all those people really use their iPads. I have read reports that suggest that a lot of iPads sold in Britain are not even being used. I would like to know how many iPad users consider their iPad a waste of money.
I single out the iPad, because Android tablets don't have the same cool factor as the iPad. Apple produces good products, and I would not want to discount that as a factor in their success, but I think there is another factor in Apple's success that not many people think of.
Apple has developed cachet. iPhones and iPads are cool, and having one is seen as giving a certain amount of cool. This is why a lot of Apple advertising isn't about the product at all, but about how cool it would be to own one. If you couple that type of advertising with something that doesn't suck, you have a winner. Once again, I am not trying to say that Apple products aren't good, but people aren't buying them because they are good, they are buying them because they are cool, and after buying them, they find they don't suck, they aren't an annoyance. Maybe they aren't perfect, though some think they are, but they are good, and when you combine that with cool factor, you have a run away hit.
But, how many people really use them. I know some of the readers of Tech Republic will probably reply that they use theirs a lot, and several of the writers have already done that, but that is not a significant statistical cross section. Both readers and writers at Tech Republic are more likely, by their very nature, to be among those who embrace new technology.
How many of the grandmas we heard about early on still use their iPads? How many people actually replaced their laptop with an iPad and don't regret it at all? How many iPads sit in a corner gathering dust?
I have singled out the iPad because, IMO, persons who choose Android tablets are more likely to have really looked at what they would use a tablet for, before they bought one. Lots of iPad owners did too, and they are probably still using their iPads, but a lot of people bought iPads because they were the cool new gadget, and it is my guess, and only a guess, that a lot of those millions of purchasers found that an iPad doesn't really do what they want, or simply found that they don't need an iPad.
I would like the study done across the whole tablet market, but I would like it broken out into iOS, Android and Windows....and convertibles don't count as tablets....well, I might like to have them included, but with the first question for convertible owners being....
What percentage of the time do you use your convertible like a tablet (keyboard unavailable) and what percentage in standard laptop configuration?
So, where is the unbiased survey of tablet usage?
