TightWind is written by Kyle Baxter. Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.

Apple’s iPad page is up.

Let’s just get this out of the way right now: it’s a terrible name. I don’t know what they’re thinking. Maybe they like dumb jokes.

So here it is: the hardware is what we expected, and the OS mostly is as well. The Mail application shows some unique uses of the screen real estate, however.

Apple has their own ebook-reading application plus book store, and it looks fantastic. Why didn’t they do the same thing for other publications, though?

Apple developed a new version of iWork just for it. Along with the keyboard dock, this could replace a notebook for most people. It browses the web, plays their music and movies, runs games, and they can create documents, presentations and spreadsheets on it. For most users, that’s all they need.

So we have a device that is more portable than any notebook, plays *video* for 10 hours, is a great ebook reader, and can be used for productivity.

That’s a big deal. For a lot of people, like students and normal computer users, this could be their only computing device. For others who do more involved tasks, an iPad combined with a capable MacBook Pro or iMac would be incredible. The iMac or MacBook Pro would be used almost exclusively at the desk for real computing tasks: editing video, photos, developing applications, designing web sites… And for everything else — browsing the web on the couch, reading a book in bed, the newspaper in the morning, and whatever else, they use the iPad.

Apple is going all out here. The device isn’t really a satellite device to the notebook. At some point, when it is more developed and has a bigger processor, this device will replace the notebook computer altogether.