iPad apps flood Apple's App Store
Après samedi le déluge
Updated The iPad apps have landed.
In preparation for the US release of its "magical and revolutionary" iPad this Saturday, Apple on Thursday began loading up the iTunes App store with scores of apps designed for Cupertino's long-awaited tablet/slate/e-reader/whatever.
As of 4:00pm Pacific Daylight Time (23:00GMT), about 2,600 apps had been added to the store, with more appearing on a regular basis.
In the iTunes App Store, you can now choose between iPhone and iPad "New and Noteworthy" apps
The apps span multiple categories, with productivity, games, travel, education, music, utilities, business, books, lifestyle, and other groups all well represented. Prices are all over the map, with many being free, most being $9.99 and under, and only a few being more expensive.
Included in the growing list are iPad-specific versions of such iPhone stalwarts as Shazam, Pandora Radio, MLB.com 2010, and Metal Gear Solid. There are also a number of notable newcomers, such as Netflix and, of course, Apple's trio of productivity apps, Keynote, Pages, and Numbers.
Some apps, such as Pandora Radio, have an iPhone version...
...and a new iPad version, in which the big display makes a big difference
Of course, with the iPad not yet available to the hoi polloi, Apple's gun-jumping can be seen as having perhaps three purposes: a) a shakedown cruise before the inevitable Saturday-morning onslaught, 2) the Apple marketing machine further stoking the ever-building buzz prior to the release, or iii) Steve Jobs thanking the few industry movers, shakers, and reviewers who got their iPads early and reponded with an avalanche of glowing reviews.
Also on Thursday, Apple poked another thumb in Adobe's eye by adding to its website a page entitled "iPad Ready" that lists a dozen websites that will be able to display at least some of their video content on the iPad at launch due to their support of "the latest web standards" - meaning, of course, HTML5 video and not Flash. Included in the list are The New York Times, Flickr, Sports Illustrated, Vimeo, and others.
Apple, ever vigilant in its defense of "the latest web standards"
The page also asks: "Is your site taking advantage of the latest web standards?" and provides a form where developers can submit info about their websites, presumably so those sites can be reviewed by some Cupertinian minion to determine whether they're worth of inclusion on what the form describes as a "growing list" of compatible sites.
The iPad apps have landed, and the iPad is set to take off. ®
Update
The first iPad fart app, Nasty Sounds, has been added to the App Store - and order has been restored to the universe.
COMMENTS
But you couldn't resist
Giving us your valued opinion. You even read a story about this 'pointless device' and made the effort to post.
So it's not exactly pointless is it? Deep down inside you are just burning up with jealousy/envy/greed/desire/hatred.
I bet you really want one but are too scared of looking like a fanboi after mouthing off to both of your friends about how pointless it is.
Doesn't quite do anything useful
The iPad fails for me as it's a cross between a laptop that won't let me code or develop stuff, and a phone that's way too big for my pocket.
However, since it's touchscreen I'd get one for my toddler in an instant... if it supported Flash, as that's what the CBeebies site uses. So, still useless. Oh, well.
still the most pointless title requirement
Yes, I agree. But now people can buy pointless apps for their pointless box.
I don't understand the fear
I have never owned a Apple product. But even I as a experienced IT engineer of over 15 years, can see that Apple is making products which are trying to be easier to use by the masses. Why can't all these critics see that too?
As a ex-Acorn user I appreciate the reasons why it is better to have a computer made by just one company (mainly quality and reliability control).
The iPad is a natural evolution of the iPhone. When I first saw the iPhone I thought how nice it was but it needed to be much bigger to web surf or to compose email. So I waited.
Other tablets have failed mainly because they failed to realise that the user interface of Windows is just too painful to use whilst standing or sitting on a sofa and it needed to be thinner and lighter than a small laptop.
We saw the first concept tablet devices on Star Trek television series and these designers knew that the fictional tablet devices shown in those programmes needed to be touch type, thin and light.
So we knew the concept we wanted but until recently with the development of capacitor sensitive screens to allow the human finger to be used and low powered but powerful chips, did we start to see Microsoft develop products like their touch tables which had no Windows interface.
But you just can't operate Windows with a finger!
So it took the mobile phone market to push the under lying technology to mature to the stage where we are today.
I've no doubt that the iPad will be successful as people do want a easy to use tablet. But it will probably do to the PC market what the iPhone did for the phone industry - give manufacturers a kick up the Ass to innovate.
The iPad will be a huge catalyst for the mobile computer industry and our children in the near future will be wondering why some people thought it was a bad or useless idea.
It's the future folks.
